• 2012. The end of the world.
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    Rubble coated the once green grass. Heck, there wasn't even grass there anymore. A dry patch of sand was all that remained. Was it even sand? He didn't care anymore. Life was over. Not a living being existed except for the 40 survivors left to suffer. The giant explosion that came from the ground had shook the earth, and meteors came soaring out of the sky. It would have been the most historical disaster ever, except no one could record this down. There was no way they could live. Dry ash and ruin extended far past the horizon, and even blocked the sun. He couldn't even remember the way the grass looked, or the sky. It was all rust orange and storm-cloud gray. There were a few rocks scattered here in there, but that was it. Just a mountain of ruined cars and houses, sand, dust, ash, and them. What was there to live for?

    Ki had had a wife. Beautiful as an Iris, as was her name, and same as her personality. Her personality was that of a Lotus. She refreshed and purified even the most ugly mud puddles. But, like almost everyone else, she had perished in the huge earthquake. His family, as well, had been forced to leave the face of the earth. The whole population had passed into the void. "Ki, come here. We found a dead lizard." A whole lizard was amazing. Except that they had to share it with 39 other people, and we all know how tiny lizards are.

    "Share it with the others. I'm not eating. Going off on a walk." The man who had called him shrugged nonchalantly and called back, "Your loss, our gain." As he walked back and sat down with the others, Ki walked slowly past the towers of rubble, dirt, dust, and ash.

    Dead bodies were piled on top of one another, faces down in the dirt or their legs caught under the tire of a truck. A small girl was still in the midst of crying when she had disappeared from the face of the earth, and her face had become grimy. He felt sorrowful looking the youngster before him.

    And next to her... Was his daughter. Anice Glory, she had been named as. Her eyes were unfocused and clearly not working. Anice Glory. Kius and Iris Glory had decided on that name after playing Tales of the Abyss together many times. "I really like the name Anice, and it's rather coincidental your last name is Glory. Shall we name her Anice Glory, the perfect cosplay of the character?" They had agreed, and the next day little Anice was born. Now, as her corpse lay in the dirt, soiled and dirty, Kius began to sob. Why had no one paid any attention to the Mayans? He gently caressed her face, and smiled. He would again return to her, when he had died from hunger and thirst finally. No one would stop him, and he would again be reunited with his family, so he could support them in life and health again. Kius walked away, tear streaks coating his dirty face.

    Anice Glory lay there, dead, with a faint dazed look on her face. No, she actually wasn't dead. Just blind. As she heard a man sob, she couldn't comfort him. She seemed paralyzed, then realized that someone was on top of her. No. That wasn't it. She was stuck to the ground. The man walked away, muttering faintly to himself. Oh, how she missed her beloved father. In the earthquake, her whole family had passed away. The lay in the soil somewhere, dirty and full of dust. The world had become an unwelcome desert. As she couldn't move, she lay there for a while, and began to fall asleep. The girl, unaware, was unable to experience life again. As she closed her eyes, she fell into a coma there was no way out of. She stopped breathing, and as she breathed for the last time, she muttered, "Daddy, mommy." Thus was the end of Anice Glory, who never got to see her father for the last time, though he was standing right in front of her.

    Continued later, on a happier and sunnier day when I feel like it.