The Last Human

For a city capable of housing over two-hundred-thousand people, Aurora was quiet. At a glance, one could hardly tell why: the streets were still crowded with cars, lights still flickered in the windows, and trafficked doors still opened and closed.

But what remained of civilization was a shell – a ghost that had been left to rot. The cars were vacant, scattered and strewn over the lanes like discarded toys of some greater entity. The lights behind the window panes did not glow but burned as fires left to spread over the remnants of humanity’s possessions. The doors weren’t opened and closed by hands but instead by the wind, as if in some lonely and misbegotten attempt to overcome its loneliness.

But the wind was not the only one that was lonely. Rat also needed a friend – needed a reason to exist, in fact. He had been young when the attacks had started, had heard on the news as city after city fell; then, eventually, had watched the destructive power of the invaders – of the dragons – firsthand.

For around a decade he had survived among the wreckage of his kind – and, most of that time, he had spent alone. But where isolation had made the wind restless, it had honed Rat into the ideal survivor. His body had been molded by the struggle, allowing him to run further and faster; his naturally perceptive blue eyes had grown sharper, allowing him to take in and assess every detail of a situation; his constitution had advanced to almost inhuman levels, allowing him to go for days without food or water with little to no side effects.

And it was because of his awakened abilities that he had survived – that he had become the last human in Aurora, perhaps even on Earth. Others had attempted to fight; others still had attempted to live like rats, just as Rat did every day. But they had been attempting to outrun the bear, as the saying went; while the ultimate survivor had learned that it wasn’t so much outrunning the bear as much as outrunning everyone else.

And then the “bear” had left him alone. Sure, one or two dragons still prowled the streets of Aurora; but for the most part they had gone on to pick apart what remained of cities like New York and Los Angeles, where the hunting was rumored to be better. After years of lying low under the noses of dozens of predators, Rat’s new task was almost… simple.

Picking himself out of the gutter, Rat dusted the trailing bits of grim and garbage from his shirt and set his sights on the street ahead. It was an obstacle course of sorts: three overturned cars, a haphazardly placed dumpster, and a damaged shopping cart formed a tattered blockade between storefronts. They weren’t obstacles for him, however: they were cover, shields that kept him away from the weary eyes of anything that may be lurking overhead.

And if they weren’t obstacles, they were stepping stones – a path of sorts. And it led to something quite promising: most of the grocery stores in town had been picked clean early in the new era, and those that had survived the desperate hands of refugees had had most of their perishable products spoiled or rotten over years of neglect.

But Rat had found a supermarket – one of the last of its kind, just like himself. And it wasn’t one of the local farmers’ stands or a regional grocer: half of its shelves were full of foods with enough preservatives not only to transcend decades, but to transcend lifetimes.

Rat had two forms of cover that acted as a natural barrier between himself and the dragons. By moving out of the shadows and into the street, he relinquished one of them – but the other sagged and squished with each step, still very much intact. He was, in fact, wearing garbage: a rather oily cooking pot served as a hat, a pair of rags served as gloves, and an apron lathered in what might or might not be grease circled his waist. They weren’t a fashion statement of the post-dragon world or even designed to be clothes at all – they were designed to mask his smell, to make him as much a part of the street as any overturned car, misplaced dumpster, or straggling shopping cart.

And, as he darted between places of cover, he certainly felt like part of the street. The asphalt welcomed him in a way no other living creature had or would, providing for him like a parent and standing beside him like a friend.

Then, when it had done all it could, the road deposited him on the steps of the supermarket. And, there, his generous uncle – the husk of civilization – took over.

Rat was less noticeable than the wind, even going so far as to quietly close the loose doors behind him. Nature, however, had been far less careful with the place: inside the shelves and racks had been cast about and knocked over haphazardly; the contents of countless boxes and bags had long since drained across the tiled floor; and, at one point or another, a storm or other cataclysmic force had rent a gaping hole in the ceiling.

Then something else entered Rat’s field of view: a massive, descending set of claws.

All at once all his precaution, all his preparation, all his skills honed through years of preparation and dedication to stealth were thrown away. All at once he was on his back, winded and trapped. All at once, he was looking into the face of a dragon.

There was something humbling about the monster – but nothing comforting. The body itself – from the four clawed feet, to the vaguely feline shape, to the spiked tail, to the long neck and muzzled face – was bestial and animalistic. But the truly unsettling aspect of the creature was its eyes – eyes that were bright and blazing with the light of intelligence and sophistication.

It took Rat’s mastery of both mind and body to a whole new level – a level that, in one regard, had engineered a plan to overtake and eradicate an entire race; and one that, ultimately, left him trapped beneath the paw of a creature well over thirty feet long.

After years of practicing silence, Rat had nothing to say. But his captor did – and, in fact, seemed almost eager to do so.

“You must have been young when the invasion started.” She mused. “You probably can’t remember much? I’m the same way: I was a hatchling when we started to overtake Earth. I wasn’t allowed to participate on the front because of it; I came in later, when things had quieted down and the fighting had turned simply into hunting.”

Rat hadn’t been aware that dragons could speak – but, having avoided them himself and having been isolated from stories and rumors, that was no surprise. But, confronted with the fact, he wasn’t sure just what to make of it; if anything, though, he was angry – angry that a race that could find empathy with his own kind would drive humans to the brink of extinction.

“But I know a lot about your people.” She went on. She rustled with something in her other paw – something that sounded like papers, maybe even a book. “Maybe… even more than you? I’ve studied your history, you see – and considering what the rest of the dragons did to you… I don’t think you were given the chance to do the same.”

Again he didn’t answer. He understood the words; but he found himself incapable – or at least unwilling – to form them himself.

“I’m Kat, by the way.” She said, giving her captive a slight bow. “What can I call you?”

Rat’s vow of silence persisted; and impatiently – but gently – his captor gave him a prompting shake.

“I’m Rat!”

“Rat? I haven’t read about anyone named ‘Rat’ in your books…”

“That’s because I was never named. I had to find one for myself. And I picked a name that reflected my lifestyle.”

“Oh… I see.”

He didn’t speak further. Actually using language seemed out of place and corrupted after so many years; and it was also a waste, in the end, since it changed nothing.

“I’m a bit confused… what was this place? Some sort of feeding ground?”

He shifted – giving what may have been interpreted as a nod, but that was in actuality a dismissive shrug. While her grip did not tighten, a vein pulsed angrily along one of Kat’s temples.

“You’re a scavenger, then? Here looking for food?”

“And looking to not be caught.”

“And you’ve been doing this for years? You plan to do this for the rest of your life?”

“For all of the next five minutes of it yes, that’s the idea.”

A second angry vessel pulsed on the dragon’s forehead. Her opposite hand – the one presumably holding the book – scratched viciously against the tiled floor, taking out its malice in the form of four shallow gouges.

“What have I done to make you think I’ll hurt you?”

She had trapped him. She had ambushed him. She had played some part in the eradication of mankind.

Rat knew all these things; but he also reasoned he didn’t have to give an answer. Kat reasoned differently, however; and, for the first time, roughly grabbed a hold of her prisoner. Lifting him from the tiles she gave the human an equally rough shake, as if trying to rattle some notion of civility out of the confines of his mind.

“Say something back!”

Defiantly, he became as quiet as the animal after which he was named.

“You fear me – your whole race feared me!” she shouted, the echoes of her voice shaking the framework of the building. “But it isn’t just because of who or what I am: it is because you demand that dragons be something to fear. You build us up in your minds as creatures that seek only to cause harm and discomfort!”

Her tail lashed out, toppling over a pair of shelves. They crashed into one of their fellows, forming a domino effect that ultimately left what remained of stability inside the store in a crumpled mass of rubble.

“Did you know that I’ve been aware you were here for almost six months? Did you know that I watched and waited, never attacking or interfering with you? And did you know that I came here today just to talk, to maybe give both of us the friend we need?”

There was no response on Rat’s part – verbally or nonverbally.

“Well? Do you have anything to say about that?”

He didn’t – and he wouldn’t.

Fire danced behind Kat’s eyes. The faint lines she had clawed into the floor elongated into deep, ravenous gouges; and the wings that had remained tucked innocently against her back spread into a canvas massive enough to blot out the morning sun.

“Then perhaps you don’t need a friend?” she asked, her once upbeat voice quiet and guttural. “Perhaps you just need something else to fear?”

She lifted Rat above her head, jaws parting beneath him. Fangs and saliva stared up to meet the dragon’s prisoner – what had become the dragon’s meal.

Kat’s tongue snapped up to wind itself around the human’s legs, dragging him ever downwards. He expected to find the teeth pressed against his neck, to feel his life ebb with a cataclysmic bite; but instead he felt himself slide past the barrier of enamel and spittle, drawn deeper and deeper until the tips of his toes brushed against the entrance to the monster’s throat.

It was a horrifying sensation – not of being swallowed, but of being so profoundly aware of one’s own mortality and imminent death. Rat had been almost prophetic throughout his short life, able to predict the methodology behind his temporary survival – and, in that instance, he was no less aware of his ultimate fate.

And, by nightfall, that fate – the fate of the last human – came to an end.