You stand in the overgrown ruins of your once-great city, staring at a large hunk of rusted metal. You snap your fingers over and over while trying to recall what this thing was.
“Eighteen wheeler! That’s it!” you shout to no one, because there is no one else. You are all that is left.
Flecks of white show through the ferrous coat covering the dead truck- the last bits of its old self clinging to life. You sigh and shrug, then hobble slowly away from the sleeping hulk.
Slowly is the only speed you can walk these days. You’re pushing 90, you think. It’s tough to remember any more. You know you were born in 1985, but you’re not sure how long ago that was. You know that you were born in this city, and that’s why you’ve come back. You want to die here, too, and you know this will happen soon.
You shuffle down the clear, dirty game trails that were once streets. You are surprised at how easy it is to navigate, even with all the old landmarks being reclaimed by vines and brush. It’s easy to navigate to your old house.
Clearing the vines covering the door proves somewhat difficult, because you are an old person and you were never very good with a machete anyway. Were machete skills prized in the world that was? You can’t remember. It probably wasn’t important.
After you finally clear the door, you are panting heavily- you know it’s close. You come as near as you can to a scramble to get inside. Your heart is pounding and your vision is going dark.
The inside of your house is surprisingly not covered in vegetation, but sports a considerable layer of dust over every object. You remember reading somewhere, decades ago, that dust is mostly human skin. Guess you’ll be adding a lot more dust pretty soon.
You walk into the living room and collapse onto the couch. You’ve made it, and not a moment to soon. Your breathing slows, and your eyelids slowly close. As you slip into darkness, the television falls off the stand and crashes through the rotten wood floor.
Never was anything good on, anyway.