[ IP ] The Last Human

The doors swung smoothly open, gliding on their silent hinges. Light from the stairwell seeped into the room, doing little to penetrate the darkness as I steped tentatively forward. 
 
 The click of my eyelight sounded deadened in the musty room, unfrequented by the Others working above me. Trays and trays lay opened from metal drawers, row upon row of empty cubbyholes stretched out into the darkness. 
 
 I swept my eyelight to the left and right, looking for the specific column that Dacx spoke of, all the while being very aware of the nonchalant clinks and scrapes descending the stairwell from the lightened floors above. I finally spotted column'Q', and headed towards it, keeping the taps of my feet quiet. The unnatural silence in the room demanded it. 
 
 As I reached column'Q', I went cautiously from tray to tray, drawer to drawer, eyeing each opening in the seemingly endless metal containers hopefully. 
 
 My foot scraped along the iron floor accidentally, making a seemingly deafening sound in the unnerving silence. Another sound shattered the stillness surrounding me. Ahead of where I stood, from three drawers away, a muffled cry came out from the darkness. 
 
 I instantly went to the tray, ignoring the scrape and clang of my feet, and opened it to reveal him. My eyelights dimmed quickly, so as not to startle him. He opened his mouth to cry out, and may have given me away. A small needle ejected itself from my arm, and I quickly but gently gave it to him. 
 
 When we was asleep again, I took him with me, back towards the direction of the stairwell and the light, away from the Infant Graveyard. upon the way, I brusquely searched through drawers for something to hold him in. There were the dirty remains of a blanket, lying dejected on the floor near another open drawer. 
 
 Swaddling him in the cloth, I got to the stairwell. Facing the light, I found myself with a surprising feeling. I did not remeber being coded with this feeling. I asked myself, `` is he going to be able to make it? what if he wakes up? If they find us, will I be ready to do what must be done for him?'' 
 
 These questions threatened to overrun me, flooding my files with concern and sadness. I searched desperately for a fix. The index came up with an answer, a collection of words I had gleamed from a half-brunt scrap among the piles of garbage. It read, `` Courage is grace under pressure.'' 
 
 I steeled myself, and sprinted up the stairs and towards the light. 
 
 Flying past Others, collecting records and priming others for power transfers, past the Lab of Humanology, not daring to think that he may end up there if I failed. 
 
 Sprinting through the doors and out into the dusky twilight of mounds of ash and garbage, I ran. I ran with him in my arms. Soon after leaving, I heard alarms rise behind me in the distance. I kept on. 
 
 Though Striders almost caught me in their net of light, and Gliders almost spotted me in their vision of night, I ran and ran and ran till there was nowhere else to run. 
 
 I was home. 
 
 Sitting down next to the husk of Dacx, my only friend, I laid him down in a small manger that used to be located in the burnt remains of the barn nearby. 
 
 And then I realized that I had no idea what to do next.
