June 2023
The Last Day of Earth
Prompts: Survival, Extinction
1 The snow stopped after 297 days of darkness, and the sun shines through the clouds as we huddle in our shelters to keep warm for survival. Now the snowmelt is flooding the world and if we can't plant the seeds we've saved, we're headed for extinction.
2 I sat with thousands of others waiting to hear if I was one of the lucky few selected for survival via transport to a colony planet on this last day before the great spaceships departed and total extinction of Earth continued. I was less than ordinary, a homemaker, married, mother of one, a cashier at a warehouse store, when my name and number was called, offering the option to marry a settler on Ramudar; my husband pushed me to my feet and I kissed him and our daughter goodbye and left alone for the departure dock.
3 The plague-stricken howled and died below the ramparts of Brighton for hours and hours as we few, we healthy, we hopeful escapees watched the nuclear flash birth a mushroom cloud over London that spread across the heavens until this last dreadful day ended. The new dawn would lead to one of two ends: extinction, or survival.
