Following the extermination, Emry has the whole of Earth to himself. No one is left to fight, and nothing is left to fight for. The whole world is literally at his feet.
As is a paper plane...that he didn't throw.
Emry stared at the paper plane which had crashed against his boot, still wriggling in the breeze.
He crouched down, frowned, and poked the little plane.
It shouldn't be here. Not unless it had been floating around airborne for the last five years just to fall out of the sky right here, right now. Emry frowned at the sky.
It had been almost five years, hadn't it, since humanity died off? The memory remained hazy.
"Well, I was only twenty," he murmured and looked back down at the paper plane. Emry moved his foot and picked it up. He smoothed out the nose.
It didn't feel like five years. Felt more like yesterday, or...maybe the earth had always been this empty.
Maybe he'd only imagined a populated planet. A coping mechanism of sorts. Emry aimed the plane at the sky. His lips thinned.
No. Humanity had existed before, but Earth was empty now. Except for him.
He launched the plane back into the sky and watched it spiral before nosediving in the distance. He winced when it crashed. Emry squinted across the unfamiliar field.
If he hadn't been able to, there was no way that thing could've stayed afloat for five years.
"Hello!" Emry's voice echoed into the blue sky.
Something sharp bumped the back of his head, though. Emry jumped and turned. Another paper plane dropped into the grass.
Emry rubbed the back of his head and looked up.
"I thought I was the only one," a voice called out from the direction of the lone tree. Emry peered into it.
A young woman jumped from the branches and landed on her feet. Straightening up, she stretched her arms over her head. "I guess not."
Emry lifted finger to his lips, paused, and pointed slowly at her. "Did you throw those paper planes?"
She nodded and continued stretching as she walked to him. "Sure did." She stopped in front of him and offered her hand. "My name's Sallow."
"Emry." he took her hand and blinked. "I thought--"
"--I was the last person alive?" she finished. "Me too." She drew back and looked off at the horizon.
Emry followed her gaze. "How did you survive?"
"Probably the same as you," she said. "My parents hid where the extermination couldn't reach."
"Oh." Emry looked at his feet. "I...fought in the war."
"Really?" Her tone dropped. "And you survived?"
Emry nodded and bit his lip. The crash had left his memory of the war fuzzy, but he still remembered. Despite trying to forget.
"I thought everything on the ground got exterminated, though," she murmured. "How did you--"
Emry knelt down. He picked up her second paper plane and held it up, again straightening out the nose. He sighed. "I wasn't on the ground." He gave the paper plane a throw. "I survived because I watched it all from the sky..."
Quietly, he watched the tiny triangle spiral off into the wind.
"From my own little paper plane..."
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