"Today is the fifteenth of April, the year being twenty forty-two. The sun is shining and a nice breeze is blowing yet there are no children out playing," A mechanical voice chortled over the hidden speakers in the void sitting room.
"Today is the fifteenth of April, twenty forty-two," said a succeeding voice from the ceiling in the foyer. It reiterated the date exactly seven more stints for memory's sake. "What's the time, what's the time? I'm sure it's time to get up, rise and shine!"
"It's eight oh-nine, oh it's eight oh-nine! The humans should be up, it's breakfast time!"
The morning glimmers shone through the fissures of the splintered windows as no movement resonated throughout the house. The firm lay vacant and soundless while somewhere within the fortifications, timeworn cassette tapes reeled and electric wires sparked.
The electric cooktop sighed in the unoccupied kitchen, groaning blearily as it inevitably grilled two omelets and sizzled four precut strips of bacon. Squeaky clean dishes hovered around in midair, setting themselves on the ligneous tabletop for two, the freshly cooked foods ensuing after them before settling down with adequate crispy thunks.
At eight forty-five the omelets were desiccated and the bacon strips could easily be used as drum sticks. A sanitary cloth floated about airborne before seizing the dishware and scraping the food into the trash bin where metal wheels and teeth masticated the food fervently to tatters, swallowing them with a grunt before transporting them to tumble somewhere within the sewers.
"Nine-fifteen, it's nine-fifteen!" sang another voice. "Get up, up, up, it's time to clean!"
Robotic mice trooped out from the labyrinths in the putrefied partitions; the metal from the mice's feet spawning a ricochet of pitter patter throughout the deathly hushed house. They gnawed at dust piling at the feet of couches and sniffed at the seared spoor of ash cemented to the grim carpeting.
"Nine thirty-three, nine thirty-three! Come on now, you old joke, it's time for a smoke!"
On the flank table contrasting to the radiant fire place, a copiously rolled cigar bolstered itself up in midair; just above the coffee stained couch and alongside a timber chair. Tendrils of smolder glided off of the respectable inch of hazy embers from the cigar, soft and still, smoking and waiting.
"There are no humans, there is no life. Oh, what has gone wrong, leading to this strife?"
"The world terminated years ago, at the precise instant when people began caring about themselves than the lives of others. The human race transformed, fashioning a new species of blood-thirsty individuals, nourishing off of the ashes of the lost. The populaces who were meant to protect us began harming us, and the abused turned into the abusive."
"The religious ones interpreted new connotations from forms of the great divine, harming, slaying and murdering while the innocent hid themselves away, terrified of loss, change and pain. Everyday activities ceased and knowing that everyone was hidden away in the safety of their homes, the attackers attacked, bombing, shooting, killing."
The cigar which was once in midair startlingly fell away to the floor, the stillness of the house at that moment much like the tranquility of the heart when dying.
At nine forty-eight, the house began to die.
The wind raged, racketing loudly through the cracked windows and willed itself towards the burning cigar, rolling it, irritating it, striking it to the soft grimy carpet of the last house standing.
"Fire!" cried a voice. "Fire, fire, fire, fire!" The lights flickered and the walls concaved, and the house strained to save itself.
The fire hissed up the stairs hysterically, dashing through corridors and lodgings, scorching all in its pathway. The house erected its ground while fifty billion fuming sparks trekked forward with flaring ease, laying itself in beds and ornamented draperies.
Then unexpectedly, all was still and the remaining of the burning fire oscillated to an impenetrable smoke. The house shuddered, crumbling, toppling, crying to a fine dust before everything demolished to a hushed whisper. Clouds of smoke huffed and puffed through the debris and rubble, the tinkling of glass and the crackling of wood grazing the air softly as darkness fell over the earth.
Among the ruins, a voice coughed robotically, fire and steam blazing through the netted speakers.
"Today is the fifteenth of April, twenty forty-two. The sun is not shining and instead of air, there is smoke blowing. And much like the incredible stories the humans told when they were well and alive, the remnants of the sane universe have dissolved away, leaving nothing but a fine ash."
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Inspired greatly by Ray Bradbury's 'There Will Come Soft Rains'.
In solemn memory of the victims of the Boston bombing; 15 April, 2013.
