Some Time Alone

2032

I lay my body flat against the wall of a decrepit building. My breathing is long and deep. I peer around the corner. The streets are a mess but there is no sign of them. I look across the street and find a gas station. It is beaten and crumbly but, with my luck, could have supplies or food. I give one last look at the street before holding my breath and running to the store.

I release my breath slowly as I pry open the sliding doors. Something large came tumbling out of the door. I quickly jump out of the way as more things came down, creating significant clunking and grinding as it hit the ground. I quickly look back around the lot for any sign of them. Nothing moves. I sigh and look at what fell. Shelves and large objects are in the ground along with two corpses that I can't recognize. They look older, about fifty. The bookshelves they are leaning against had scratches and blood soaked into them. From the bloody fingers on the corpses, the people had obviously barricaded themselves in, then had been found and tried to escape. Poor bastards.

I step over the bodies and walk into the store. It reeks of rotting food and flesh. The smell doesn't affect me too much. I wake up to that smell every morning. I walk to the shelves that still stood. The food had been picked through and some of them had been chewed through by some animal but, to my surprise, a small batch of food is still packaged and edible.

I quickly reach for it. A pain shoots through my shoulder. I bite my lip and clutch my right shoulder till the pain stopped. I look down at my arm. The artificial limb belonged to one of them. I didn't want to take it but I was given no choice. It was either my morals or my survival and, with the world now, it wasn't a difficult choice to make. The arm bonded to me almost as soon as I put it on. It hurt like hell but it was better than dying... Sometimes I wish I would've bled to death... It would have been a hell of a lot easier than trying to survive off of rotten food and polluted water. The arm has helped my survival the most. Once it was added to my body, it connected to my brain. It thrives off of the energy I get from food and... sometimes... it speaks to me....

"That food must be rancid by now." It whispers to me.

"I need food." I respond reaching, slower this time, for a chewy granola bar.

"I doubt this will keep you alive. It would kill you faster."

"It's about time. I've been waiting twenty-six years for my inevitable doom." I grab a snickers and rip off the wrapper. The candy bar looked pristine. I haven't seen that shine since I was a child. I feel my mouth watering as I raise the candy bar to my mouth and bit into it. I nearly gagged. The chocolate is rotten and the nougat tasted moldy. The caramel is hard but the nuts aren't as bad. I looked down at the cross section of the candy bar and moaned. The nougat had turned green and the nuts had little furry pellets on them. I slowly continue chewing on the rotten bar as I pull off a raggedy bag from my back.

"You're going to keep eating it?" My arm judges me as I load up the bag with the other candies and food from the shelf.

"I could stop eating altogether and shut you up." I mumble as I swallow the candy hardily. I pull the bag over my shoulder and bite into the bar again as I move to look around the rest of the store.

"You're not alone." My arm whispers. I stop in my tracks and hold my breath. "It's in the freezer." I turn my head slowly to the freezer in front of me. Food boxes are scattered and dented in the freezer but nothing else is there.

"Are you sure?" I whispered pocketing my candy bar and reaching slowly for the gun on my belt, "Nothing-" Something in the fridge moves quickly, knocking over boxes and clattering shelves. I whip out my gun and get on one knee. I point the gun steadily at the fridge. I take deep breaths as I wait for its next move. Nothing happens. I inch slowly towards the freezer with my gun still held up. I grab the fridge door with my free hand and slowly open it. Something flies out and barely misses my face. I jump to my feet and point my gun at the android... except there isn't one to shoot.