Click here to view all Last Man flash fiction.

Art by artroni.deviantart.com

The Last Man had forgotten what sleep was like without the nightmares. Sometimes he could only recall fragments. An endless abyss of undead. Fetid breath from mouths lined with jagged, black teeth. Glassy eyes that looked everywhere and nowhere at once. Maggots writhing in open chest cavities. Loops of entrails spilling out, hanging against their knees as they shambled ever forward.

In his nightmares he was running, but never fast enough.

He had a gun, but the wrong caliber of rounds.

He was safe in a bunker, but all his food had spoiled.

No matter the nightmare, in the end, the horde overtook him. Dragged him into the blackness. First he’d hear his clothes tear…then his flesh. Their lips smacking and jaws grinding as they chewed up his skin and muscle. A peculiar feeling of lightness as they tugged out his stomach, his lungs, his heart.

And just before he’d awaken, drenched in sweat, pulse caught in his throat, the dead were reaching for his eyes…