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### Scattered thoughts,
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Starvation was surely the worst way possible for a living being to go. 

He was unsure now, how long it had been since everyone he knew and loved disappeared. Abruptly awakening this day to find himself alone. Just a voice echoing off the walls of the locked building to which he had no key and was trapped inside of. 

It seemed that the doors were barricaded with rubble. His small knocks and cries lending him no answer. He was going to starve in here, as the world fell down around him. When would the final building fall? The explosions were steady and unyielding. The whole sky outside the windows flickering with detonation after detonation. He could hear the screams of strangers trapped in the streets. Angry shouts and pained mewls from the unwilling and engaged alike.

He should be grateful that although he was confined inside these walls, at least he was sheltered. For now. 

It had seemingly been days since he had been able to capture any significant source of nourishment. He had exhausted his food supply shortly before the start of the apocalypse. If only he had known. He would have been more sparing. 

He had found bugs, which, though small, seemed to give him a sustainable amount of nutrition. Just enough to stave off his inevitable death for perhaps another day. It also made him sharpen his mind and focus on the hunt of the small, quick tidbits instead of thinking about the time that has passed. It gave him a few moments to ignore the popping and crackling of the sky. 

He wrestled with his fear, considering looking out of the windows. To see what had befallen his world. But the thought occurred... what if *it* was sentient? What if it spotted his movement and removed him from existence, devouring him whole? Curiosity killed the cat, after-all. 

Instead, he kept low to the floor, creeping from room to room when he needed. At times when the explosions became too much, he hid himself away under the bed that he used to lay on languidly. Back when times were carefree and comfort was not a luxury. 

Laying under the metal frame, he realized that he was going to die here, wasting away in cowardice on the hardwood floor. His only companions being dusty cobwebs. He reached out and cleared one away solemnly, her face dancing in his mind's eye.

Her friendly smile. How her fingers felt in his hair. Her warm embrace that sometimes he would struggle from when he was irritated. How he regretted that now. What he wouldn't give for just one more. To press his forehead lovingly against hers to reassure her, that yes, he loved her. Even on the days he never showed it. His mind flashed to dinners that she had prepared for him. "Are you hungry, love?" 

His stomach growled and ached. 

Funny, that. Men and women cried outside of his involuntary fortress as they perished in ways unimaginable, and all he could focus on was the void in his belly. How selfish was that?

Faced with no other way to pass the time, he pulled a blanket down under the bed, resting his head on it, and settled into a fitful sleep. 

He awoke, blurry eyed and confused. The exhaustion and hunger fueling a solid and unshakeable sleep. For all he could tell he had slept for days. It felt like a week. He stretched slowly, forgetting for just the briefest moment what was happening outside the concrete structure around him. But how could he forget?

... The explosions... the screaming... they had stopped.

Silence fell around him, deafening in contrast to the constant barrage of sound that assaulted his senses. How long had the attack been over for? Was it really over? Are they hunting down the stragglers in sweeps, eliminating them now that the majority of the population was gone? 

He instinctively pressed himself flat to the floor, almost as if he was trying to disappear into it. His body tense and rippling with adrenaline and apprehension. He tried to hold his breath, listening for any sound that could hint at danger. Or give him some sort of clue as to what was to come next, if anything.

It was so silent all he could hear was his heartbeat, hammering away in his ears, fluttering in fear. That was when he heard something else, something abrasive and harsh. A scraping, scratching sound on metal near the main door to the building. Was it the shattered remains of society shifting and settling outside? Perhaps something sifting through the rubble to come for him, to tear him to pieces.

There was a familiar sound, the turning of the knob. Hot panic rose up in him, catching in his throat. Whatever it was, was coming in, and it was going to find him in this small space. He couldn't hide forever. He slid out from under the bed, rising from his belly to his feet. He looked around the room and wondered what he was going to do. 

What was going to be his last act on Earth?

He rounded his shoulders and crouched low, finding his center of gravity. He had decided. He was going out with a fight, even if he was feable and weak with hunger. Anything was better than withering away into nothing. One flash of searing pain and it would all be over. Or he would prevail to see the outside world one more time. 

He launched himself from the room, running feverishly through the hall towards the door. He reached down deep within himself and summoned from his chest his most desperate and ferocious war-cry. Screaming into the silence, vocally beating his sword on his shield, and becoming the warrior he had forgotten in his weakness and terror. As he rapidly approached the main entrance, his feet falling in rhythmic determination, ready for the fight of his life, he heard a voice. 

**HER VOICE.** 

She floated through the door, halting him dead in his tracks. He skid to a stop and marveled at the sight of her. He began to cry, in relief, and in love. Finding the rest of his voice as he called to her wordlessly, begging for her to look at him. He ran to her.

He threw himself to the ground in front of her, worshiping at her feet, holding tight to her legs. She was alive. She was alive and she had come back to save him from this hellish fate.  

She smiled down at him, her angelic face lighting up and showering him in warmth and love. She was so serene and untouched by the horrors she must of endured to return to him.

"Well, hello, Mister Nubbers! Are you hungry, love?", her familiar coo floated down to him.

"*Oh god, yes! I have starved for days, weeks!*" he mewed, rubbing his face against the soft fabric of her pants, feeling her closeness with his whiskers. 

"The Robinson's brought out the good fireworks this year! I bet you could hear them from here!" She said, reaching down to pet from his head to tail. 

He bristled, no longer afraid, no longer lost, no longer on the edge of death. He wove himself between her legs as she wandered to the kitchen and opened a small tin of food to place in front of him. 

He looked up at her, crying out and saying his thanks over and over with reckless abandon like a prayer.

"*Thank you for coming home, thank you for not leaving me to rot, thank you for the food, thank you, thank you, thank you.*"

She sat down his bowl gently in front of him, and he gorged himself to bursting. The salmon pâté tasting of pure ambrosia after so long without a meal, after only feeding on fear and neglect. After tasting only the apocalypse.

"Nubbers, slow down! You'd think I haven't fed you in days with how you're acting. You had a can 12 hours ago! Fatty...", she said.

Her laughter filled his ears as she filled his kibble bowl in the corner. She had braved the end of the world. 

# Just for him. 

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Me and my ghost writing companion had a great time creating this piece for you!

I hope you have a fantastic day and look forward to your feedback regarding the story we lovingly crafted from the oddest of places, a creative writing prompt from reddit. I hope you find it worthy and again look forward to your comments in the section below.

Much love, @SammoSK and Company. <3

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