(NOTE:  It's been such a hectic week at work that I almost forgot to post this latest entry in the "Spohn Challenge" project. But here it is, for what it's worth...)


Empty. Barren. Devoid. A Grand Nothingness. A fitting eulogy to Man, as created by Man himself.

For centuries beyond reckoning, it had been a prosperous world. But now it was nothing more than a gigantic cosmic tombstone, the blues and greens replaced by black and gray. The price of too much prosperity. Armageddon. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust…

Of all the world's many varied peoples, there was but one who had somehow survived. One tortured soul, forced by a cruel fate to live out the remainder of his days alone. From his vantage point he could see what had been wrought upon his world – and he wondered at the futility of it all. The hopes and the dreams of an entire world, forever destroyed by a select few who never should have had any say in the matter. Where was the sense in it all? They had known for years that it might one day happen; why could they have not prevented it?

He hoped they were satisfied now, these destroyers of the Earth, burning now in their own little private corner of Hell.

The time passed more slowly than before. Minutes seemed like months, hours like decades, days like centuries. Or was that just the madness settling in at long last? 

Finally, in sheer desperation, he did the only thing he could think of to escape.

He found the old gun that had belonged to his grandfather and blew his brains out.

And in that split second before the darkness claimed him, he thought he had heard one last sound coming from outside. A sound he hadn't heard since before the war.

Was it a knock at the door…?