text: Graham woke up as the sun rose through the crack in the blinds in the window next to his bed. He had cracked the blinds himself the night before. He wanted to make sure that he woke up for the sunrise this morning. After all, it was the last one he would see on the planet. Because today was Humanity’s last day on Earth. The year 2099 had brought widespread fear throughout the population. The year had finally arrived. The year that would bring about the destruction of the planet. Over the past century despite repeated warnings of the havoc they were bringing to their home, somehow Humanity continued on its path like an old steam engine, unaware that every belch of smoke and step forward hastened their imminent demise. Tearing up the ground for all the natural resources, poisoning the water supply of the planet, letting species after species fall one by one through greed, ineptitude, and sheer ignorance. Despite this abject cruelty to their own world, the human race had formulated a contingency plan. Since 2050 when the final end date for the planet had been announced, for the first time in human history all governments and people banded together. Not in a last-ditch attempt to save this planet no. But to begin the terraforming and colonization of the moon and mars. Both locations had enough room to house the entire earth's population. Surprisingly enough, no one would be left behind. Rich or poor saint or sinner, all would be leaving on ships to these new worlds. For the next step in human history. Tonight as the sunset and the last ships would leave, the sun was expected to unleash a solar flare. Normal enough it had happened before. It had happened in 2037 and turned Hawaii into a burnt-out rock of an island. It had happened in 2076 when it boiled the English Channel like a steaming kettle. And it had happened just five years ago in 2094 when the entirety of Australia was transformed from a sea of dry orange sunbaked desert into a barren wasteland of ash. But today was different. The combined effect of the legions of ships leaving the planet and the impending solar flare, the planet would be eradicated. But not entirely destroyed. The rock would remain. But its oceans would boil and steam, its vegetation would twist and burn and its ice caps would melt. It would become a dead rock floating in space, a distant and deathly reminder of all the mistakes humanity had made. A reminder not to squander the gift of their new homes. Graham pondered all this as he got up from the bed and began his daily ritual. He made a pot of coffee and while it boiled hopped in the shower. Due to the worldwide lack of water due to the vast amounts of untainted water being taken to Mars, he was only allowed the state-mandated daily allowance for single occupancy households. Frankly a dismal amount of water. Roughly 60 seconds of cleaning. No matter. Graham didn't mind. Stepping out of the shower he went back into his bedroom and laid out his clothes for the day. His wardrobe was empty bar the suit he was due to wear. The rest had already been packed away by his daughter the previous day as she rushed him to get ready for today's impending escape. The suit was 30 years old to the day. He had worn it to his wedding to Catherine, his long-deceased wife. They had been married for 20 years before the plague of 2089 had taken her along with most of her family. He admired the picture on the bedside table of them shoving wedding cake into each other's faces as he got dressed. Despite the illness, she had died peacefully. She didn't even know she had it. One night she had kissed him goodnight. The next morning she was cold beside him. Just gone. If Graham had ever been thankful for anything in his life, he was thankful for that. As he fastened his tie, he looked at himself in the mirror. He had gotten so old in the past ten years since Catherine's death. What was once a tight square jaw, had given way to a set of jowls that hung from his chin like an umbrella bucking under the weight of rainwater. His hairline had begun creeping up his head like a retreating armed force, fleeing the encroaching wrinkles on his forehead. His blue eyes, once crisp with the vibrancy of an electric life and personality now murky with the passage of time and the expelling of too many tears. He was only 65, and by all accounts still had at least 20 good years left based on the estimates of this new forefront of medicine being promised on Mars. He sighed and grabbed the picture frame he slipped out the photo and tucked it in his breast pocket before heading into the kitchen. The coffee pot bubbled and spluttered, sending out the sweet roasted smell of the coffee. He poured himself a cup and took a swig. It tasted good, but nowhere near as good as the real stuff. Coffee had been one of the first crops to disappear. Now it was synthetically made in some lab in Japan. Funny how all these wonder synth products all came to exist mere weeks after their forebears had died out. Graham had often wondered if they knew they could do it for so long, why not release it sooner. Then maybe there would still be some reality left in the beans. Who knows, Graham wasn't a scientist. Taking his coffee Graham headed out to his front porch and took a seat on the swinging bench Catherine had made him install a few months before her death. She had always dreamed of lazy summer evenings spent on the porch together. Watching the sunset and sharing a glass of wine. By then, however, the evenings were as hot as midday and she never did. Graham sat and he looked around the neighborhood. The houses lay empty. Driveways free of the usual mandatory TESLA premium model vehicles. Everyone else had left yesterday. No one wanted to miss their spot on the ships despite everyone being guaranteed one. Graham looked at the houses of his now-absent neighbors. There was the Roberts house, usually so loud even in the mornings with the sounds of little Carol and Bob chasing each other around the garden. There was the Bimmers across the street, usually lit up with disco lights and thumping with Bass music. There were the finkles, usually radiating with the famed smell of Miss Finkle's synth beef pie. But not today. Today a lone bike laid broken on the Roberts lawn. The Bimmers windows did not shake with modulated beats and the only smell from the finkles was the hot aroma of burnt tarmac from their driveway already in the clutches of the sun. Graham's phone beeped in his pocket. Pulling it out he inspected the screen. His daughter's stressed face appeared. Cassie, named after her mother. Graham smiled as he answered. “Morning Cassie. You alright?” Graham asked. “Yes yes fine dad. Just trying to get the kids in the car now... David can you just grab Sam please. No tell him he's packed all the toys he taking. If he wants Caltheman then he has to put one back”. Graham giggled. That grandson of his. Never did know what he wanted. Would change his mind on a dime. “Are you getting ready to leave? The transport for your area passes by your street in 15 minutes don't miss it please!”. Graham nodded. “Of course not darling. I’ve got everything packed and ready to go. Can I see Sam and Becky?” Cassie shook her head. “Sorry Dad they are driving me up the wall today. You’ll see them in a couple of hours at the departure depot okay?”. Graham paused but relented. “Alright love. You tell em Grandad loves them anyway okay?”. Cassie too stressed to notice the emotion crackling in her father's throat nods as her husband David appears behind her. A former military man he always greeted Graham with rigid respect only found in those that had, had it institutionally enforced in them. “Sir. How are you today. Ready to go?” Graham nodded and gave David a flimsy salute which David responded to firmly and with sincerity. “All good to go David. Now listen. You take care of my daughter and my grandkids alright”. David nods. “I sure will Sir. Right up until we see you later. And after that also.” Graham looked away for a second, composing himself. He turned back to the phone as David passed it back to Cassie. “Okay Dad we’ve got to go now. But ill see you in a few hours okay. Don't miss the transport!”. Graham nods and smiles. “I love you Cassie. Very much.” Cassie paused and looked at the image of her father on the screen. “I love you too. See you soon”. Cassie ended the call and Graham put the phone down on the floor next to him. Stifling some tears he slams his foot down on the phone smashing it. Graham wouldn't be seeing his daughter, her husband, and his Grandchildren later. Or ever again for that matter. Because Graham wasn't going to catch the transport. Graham wouldn't arrive at the depot. Graham wouldn't board the ship with the hundreds of thousands of people who make up his sector. He wouldn't look out the window and wave goodbye to this world as he made his way to the next. Because Graham was staying here. Graham was staying to the very end. Graham sat on his porch and he waited, gently swinging on the bench. After a while, he saw the transport vehicle arrive at the end of the street. He watched a few late families scurry towards it, overloaded with bags and suitcases. He heard it honk three times signaling its departure. And then he watched it leave. That was it done then. He had made his decision, there was no going back. Graham spent the rest of the day walking the streets of his neighborhood and the surrounding areas. He visited Stark's Pond where he had taken Catherine for many walks in their courtship and taught Cassie to swim. Now it was just a cavernous space in the ground. An absence in the world filled only with his memories. He climbed Moss Hill behind his house and looked at the short ledge where Sam broke his arm playing Wootball with a friend Graham couldn't remember the name of. He strolled through the dead forest of Gimblewood, inspecting the remaining blackened and twisted trunks of a once lush wood. He had played here as a boy. He even saw a deer once, long after they were supposed to have died out. No one believed him, not then or in later retellings of the story around the dinner table and at company picnics. He knew what he saw though. He didn't think they were extinct. They were just hiding from them. Maybe searching for their own way off this derelict and decimated world. As the day drew later and the time drew nearer Graham returned to his house and grabbed the 60-year aged bottle of scotch Catherine had bought him for his 50th birthday. They were going to share it together on their 30th anniversary. But she had never made it to that date. So he would have it now. He sat back down on the swinging bench and poured two glasses. One he placed on the bench next to him and going into his breast pocket retrieved the wedding picture. Folding it in half so as to only see Catherine’s cake covered and smiling face he placed it next to the glass and clinked his to hers and said “Cheers love. It’s been a hell of a run”. Graham checked his watch. 745pm. The ships were due to leave at 8 pm at sunset. Cassie, David, and the kids would already be on board. She was probably panicking as they began to close the doors begging them to wait for him. It broke his heart to think of her distressed, desperately calling his phone to no answer. David attempting to calm her and hide her hysteria from the questioning children. But in truth, it was a necessary evil. She would suffer now but once her ship slipped the bonds of earth and the solar flare burnt it to a crisp she would have her answer and begin the process of starting a new life. One unencumbered with the painful memories of a world that was no longer there. Graham had to remain here. Graham felt that someone had to be here. Someone had to stay to the very end. Not for some grand and meaningful reason. Not a reason that would be written about and stored in the annals of history as the definition of nobility and sacrifice. But for a million small reasons. Graham had worked as an engineer of a drilling company for 40 years. He constructed the small belts that connected the drill bits to the inner housing. Drills that were used to harvest the world's resources. He had contributed to its destruction. Not directly. He was never stood astride those behemoth machines, manically excavating the ground like a technologically advanced rabbit. It’s not like if he had quit they wouldn't have found someone else. He had a family and a set of skills suited to that job. So he worked it and made peace with the decisions he had made. Over the years when he had read stories and news articles about the effects the work he did was having on the planet, he was concerned sure. But he did not blame himself personally. The entire race was to blame. The companies that drilled, the companies that sold the resources, the companies that used them, the general population that refused to protest until it was too late. But when the date had finally arrived and it was announced that all humanity would be saved, sent off to new worlds on the moon and mars it didn't sit right with Graham. Instead of a feeling of elation, and happiness at being able to do the impossible and leave, instead, he found himself sleepless and stressed. After everything that happened, after everything the human race had done to this planet. They shouldn't be rewarded for that with TWO new places to haphazardly do with what they will. If a child breaks their toy on purpose and with ignorant malice, their parent does not placate them with two more. So Graham, in his own head, opted to stay. Someone had to go down with this planet. Someone had to take penance for it. If the entire race were to flee and let it be engulfed in flames whilst they wiped their brows in relief it would forever taint them as a species. He didn't know if there was some greater power or beings out there that could see them and what they had done and what they were doing. He didn't know if there was anyone who could or would judge them in such a way. But he knew. He would always know. So Graham would stay. Graham stayed. 759 the soft computerized voice of Graham's watch said. He poured the last of the scotch into his glass and clinked Catherines once more. He looked at the happy cake covered face of his wife from all those years ago and it stilled his beating heart and drove the fear from his mind. He would be with her soon. Besides what does the new world really have to offer him? Sure another 20 years. But It would take them 500-100 to really work out what the hell they are doing up there. Just look at how long it took them to finally get themselves right down here. No Graham was fine to go down with the ship. His watch beeped. 8 pm. A deafening sonic boom echoed around the world vibrating the air. Graham stood up and walked to the edge of his porch, every step convulsing with the vibrations of the earth. The sky lit up with the lights of the armada of ships. A myriad of spots fleeing across the deep dark red of the sunset like grain on old film stock that was processed for too long. Graham wondered which held his family. It didn't matter. They were safe at least. Graham held onto the beam of the porch to steady himself as the ground shook and the air wailed with wind and energy. The temperature rose and sweat broke across Graham's head as the solar flare whipped out from the sun. Graham was not scared. He closed his eyes and waited. Suddenly he felt a presence next to him. Looking down Graham opened his eyes to see a cowering deer, fur old and patchy, eyes milky and wide. It pushed itself against him for comfort. Graham smiled and sat down, placing a comforting hand on its head. The sky filled with light as the ships finally escaped the atmosphere. The sun’s flare lashed out at the earth and the world engulfed in flames. Graham smiled as he disappeared from this world. He knew he had made the right decision. There Has To Be One he thought. There has to be one....