This started as response to a prompt, but I dropped it and never got back around to it...
White ash was everywhere around me. I huddled under the only tree I could find. The whole city had burned, all I could see in every direction was dust and ash. How my little tree had survived, I didn't know. I just wonder if anyone else had survived.
Then it hit me! I could be the only one left! My city, The City, had been destroyed by something as simple as fire! No one had thought that was possible, but apparently it was. What was I supposed to eat, sleep on, do until someone came to rescue me, if there was anyone to rescue me. I told myself not to think like that. Even though the cities had cut off communication with each other, surely they would see the smoke and send help.
Then I realized, someone else might be in there, in the smoke, someone who needed help! I pulled my shirt over my face, tried to remember where my tree was, and headed into the ash.
As I plunged into the choking grey mist, I tried not to think about the carnage all around me. I thought mostly, about how all this had started.
Our city had been designed to be perfect, unfortunately a lot of people wanted to live in a perfect place. The city became cramped as the population increased. People rarely thought of leaving. No one lasted long outside the cities and since the political war had started, few were allowed back into the old cities. This, new city, had been one of their last projects. Professionals had warned us that we were packed to close together, that devastation was eminent, but no one payed much attention to them.
I had been playing with Thomas when I smelled something odd, like a hot stove. We were on the swings. We had been talking, and laughing more than is becoming to teenagers, but we were doing it anyway. Then Thomas took one giant swing, and just as he neared the top of the set, he yelled "FIRE!"
"Where?" I asked. He pointed, his face pale. I sniffed. the smell was getting stronger, and I was paying more attention to it. Thomas's eyes suddenly lit up. Let's go look!
So we did, we left the park and circled one of the skyscrapers. Then we saw it. We turned and ran.
I had stopped when I was out of breath. We'd run back to the park, but it was already surrounded by fire. All I remembered after that was my tree, and a woman running past me, through the flames with a crying baby.
I jumped back to reality. I mustn’t think about that. But, I could still hear a baby. Then I realized, there was really a baby crying. I looked around frantically. There! Inside a trash can! The garbage cans in our city were intended to be used as ash trays for smokers, so they were naturally fire resistant, in and out. There was just enough space in the oval can for a one-year-old.
The thing I pulled out of the garbage was smelly and covered in soot, but it's bright blue eyes looked at me in, what seemed like, relief. It stopped crying as I cradled it, and I began to take it back to my tree. It was the one place of green goodness in all this destruction.
All of the sudden a thousand things came into my head. This baby was gonna need food, or did it still drink milk. Where was I gonna get that? It would need a bath, and fresh clothes, and about a hundred other things. It was as if, as soon as I knew I wasn't the only one left, I could start moving forward.
By, now, I had been struggling for nearly an hour with the smoke, I didn't know the child in my arms could handle it. Suddenly, I heard thunder in the distance. Oh, great. A storm was brewing, it was about to get worse.
I hurried back to my tree. I decided the first thing to do, was keep the rain of. I thought of going to a building, but I didn't see a structure I trusted anywhere. I saw several low branches, close to the ground on my tree. I took the band from my hair, and tied several together. It was just wide and thick enough to keep rain off one very sleepy baby.
I finished just in time for the rain to start. It made it easier to breathe, washing the soot out of the air, and off of me. I curled up, using my back as a wall around the babies shelter.
It was a cold night, and I trembled all night, whether from the chill, lack of food, or both, I wasn't sure. The baby woke once, but I caught enough rain in my hands for it to drink, and it quitted. I decided it needed a name. I was tired of calling it "the baby" and names kept my mind off the cold.
In the end, I called him Colin. It was a simple, handsome name. It would be the only name he knew for a long time. apparently no one had seen the smoke of our city. None of the other cities came that night, or ever.
After the rain stopped, Dawn came quickly. Something was bothering me. My ears itched, like a fly that was making too much noise.
Than I realize, there was no sound! No hover cars, no generators, no shouting people, nothing. There wasn't even enough wind to rustle the tree leaves.
Then, Colin started crying, returning me to sanity.
I looked around at the silent city. In that moment, I knew it was time to go. There was nothing here. No food, water, life, nothing.
Colin stank. I cleaned him up as well as I could with tree leaves, then took care of my own business. Fertilizer, my parting gift with the tree.
I had never really realized how large our city was, till I tried to get out of it without a hover car. I walked for hours, carrying the baby. The sun baked my back as the sun got higher. Eventually I tried taking my shirt off, but that only made it worse. I walked so that my shadow fell on Colin, shading him from the most intense heat.
When the sun reached its peak, I stopped for a rest inside some kind of office complex. I saw a phone, and for a moment I had the urge to call my mom. Tears came to my eyes when I realized I couldn't. The baby was crying again, and for a moment, all I wanted was to hear the familiar noise around me. I wasn't ready for this. In the space of twenty four hours I was turning my back on the city, and my family, not even knowing how they are, to try to mother a baby in the wilderness. And more than anything, I wanted noise? I wondered if I was losing it. No choice but to try and do what I could. I picked Colin up, and continued through the grey rubble.
It was hard going through all the rubble. Toward evening I was fortunate to come across the ruins, of what had once been a restaurant of some kind. One of the storage rooms was only partially damaged, and I managed to scrape up enough cheese and half-burned meat to stop my hunger, and I gave a couple bites to Colin before he threw it up. I'd have to find something else to feed him. I'd gotten used to his crying by now. I just wondered how long he'd last.
The worst part was the bodies. I tried not to look at them, but they were everywhere.
As night fell and my knees gave out on me, I got to the end of the city, and was in for another shock. I had thought that once I had gotten away from this smoldering garbage heap, that I'd find some place clean, with plenty of water. What I found now was a burned forest. Black stumps stretched before me, a wilderness I now had to face.
I cried myself to sleep that night, sure I was going to die.
But, a much weirder fate was in store for me. I woke up, and realized the baby wasn't crying. I opened my eyes and screamed to see a half-naked boy with long-brown hair and black eyes staring at me. I screamed louder when I realized he was up-side down.
"Hush" he told me in a sharp whisper. "You wake up chunga."
I didn't stop to ask what a chunga was. "What are you doing here? Where did you come from? Who are you? Where's your shirt?"
He smiled at me eerily. "Me Walik. Come from green place. Watching strange girl and chunga. What shirt?"
"Shiiirt" I said slowly, pointing at mine. "What Chunga?"
"Chuuuuunga" he said, pointing behind me. I realized he meant Colin.
This was bizarre. I thought there were no people outside the cities, but even a street brat knew what a baby was! But, I needed food and water, and he seemed well fed. "Take me to green place." I said clearly, then, just in case someone had taught him manners I added “Please.”
He grinned again, his white teeth startling against his tan body. "Girl follow Walik. Bring chunga. Go fast, Morin waiting." And he took off. I scooped up the still-sleeping Colin and did my best to follow. My life just kept getting weirder, but there was no time to look back.
