‘Walt’ is a short post-apocalyptic fiction work, written as original content for this site.

The same scrawny seabird had been staring at the deck of the boat for the past few hours. It had not blinked once in all that time. The creature sat, spindly claws scratching idly at the wood. There was a gentle swell to the waves that took them up and brought them back down again, the bird and boat moving as if one with the motion. Cocking a featherless head to one side, it observed the strange shape lying before it. A few days previously it might have passed for human. It was well beyond that now. The bird wondered where the lump might have come from, and how long it might take for it to get wherever it was going. They were far from land.

Overhead, a bright and unforgiving sun continued to burn as though nothing had changed. It had a job to do, regardless of whatever had gone on below it. The sky was blue and endless, stretching on forever. It was the rest of the world that had come to an end.

The bird looked up and gave a shrill cry, as if to confirm its presence to whatever was left of existence. There was no reply.

It shook itself, the few remaining feathers around its neck ruffling. It hopped down to the floor and skipped a few steps back and forth towards the man lying stretched out across the boards. Tentatively, it reached out and pecked at a boot. The boot moved slightly. It did not seem pleased at being disturbed. The bird flapped its wings and reclaimed its perch on the bow.

There was the sound of groaning. A tongue flickered across dry, cracked lips. They tasted of smoke and sea water. The owner of the tongue kept his eyes closed.

Opening them would not change anything. He would see nothing different to what he had seen when he had closed them several hours ago – blue above him, blue below and nothing else in between.

It would have been better to simply not have woken up at all. Instead, he came to the mournful realisation that they were still adrift. Jerome had not been sure at first, if it had all just been a terrible dream. As he felt the soft undulation of the sea beneath him, he realised that it was real. There was nobody else; Jerome was alone in the void.

It had taken some time to accept that he was, more than likely, the last man left on Earth. For the first few days at least, he had held out some hope that he had not been the only one to survive. With unyielding optimism he had searched for others. Miles and miles had passed beneath him, the water lapping at the sides of his vessel. He could not tell how many days had since passed. Every now and again, he would stop and look up at the sun or the moon. He wondered if they could see anything else left alive, still out there on the water. After a while, he assumed that they did not. There was nobody else left. The sea had claimed them all.

His stomach ached, pain gnawing away at what was left inside him, which wasn’t much. The last thing he had eaten had been raw mackerel and most of that had come back up the way it entered. At that point the will to survive had still burned. The light had long since flickered and died. It was as useful to him now as prayer.

Death was coming for him, as it had come for all people. For most of the world, it had come quickly and savagely – their homes and lives washed away by the tide. Where the sea had taken his family and loved ones, time would eventually take Jerome. All he could do was wait.

“Scrawk.”  The bird bent down and pecked at its own feet.

“Sod off.”

The words caught in his throat, dry and scratching. The bird took no heed. Instead it hopped back down into the boat beside him. With slow movements, Jerome pulled himself up slightly – just enough to be able to sit upright. They bobbed up and down on the swell of the waves considering their shared plight. The bird coughed up a little viscous bile.

There was enough fresh water left in the last flask to last until nightfall. Jerome had only intended to be out at sea for two or three days at most. The vessel was not designed for long voyages. It was something of a miracle that it had lasted this long. Perhaps miracle was not the best choice of words.

Jerome could feel his body withering away to nothing, his bones growing weaker. He wondered how long the human will to survive against all odds was predetermined to last. Later, if he could find the strength, he might finally build the courage to pull himself over the side and into the blue. A braver man would have done it already.

There was, however, a part of Jerome that was loathe to let the sea take him. It had already consumed every other living being on the planet. If he was, as he suspected, the last living man on Earth then Jerome would deny the waves their final victim. It would be one last middle finger from the human race to the great Mother Nature. She could take the world, but she would not take Jerome.

He tipped a little of the liquid from the flask against his mouth, enough to wet his lips but nothing more. The bird, seemingly encouraged by Jerome’s increased movement, jumped up so that it perched upon his leg.“I said sod off.”

“Scrawk.”

It suddenly occurred to Jerome that the strange creature sitting on his knee might well have been the only other living thing left above the surface of the water. Their exchange might be the last conversation that the world would ever hear. The bird blinked curiously. Jerome had never been a particularly profound man. “Just you and me then, eh?”

The bird did not respond.

“I’ll give you a name then shall I?”

The bird didn’t particularly want nor need a name. It had lived its entire life quite happily without one. Jerome, however, felt that if this were to be his companion through the final hours of his life, it was only right they should be on a first name basis. “I shall call you ‘Walt’.”

Walt appeared to have been a gull of some sort, although it was hard to be certain. From the top of its head down to its throat the creature was mostly pink, due to a distinct lack of plumage. The rest of it was scantily peppered with grey and blackened feathers. Jerome thought the bird might like to remember itself as it once was. “You’re a fine lookin’ bird.” Walt scratched at his leg, digging around in the material to see what was beneath. “Stop that.”

Somehow it seemed fitting that Walt had arrived now and not in the days previously. At that time, Jerome had still been hopeful that he would come across some patch of land, or better yet, another person. Had Walt arrived back then, it was highly likely that Jerome would have eaten him.

The thought of food moved his stomach, the empty chambers of his bowels cramping. Jerome had always assumed that when a man was left to contemplate his own death, his last thoughts would have been of things profound and meaningful – of journeys never taken or feuds not yet put to rest.

Now there were no more journeys to take and it would be impossible to lay any discord between him and others to rest. It was too late for that. So Jerome found himself instead mourning the fact that he would never again get to enjoy the crisp delights of a grilled cheese sandwich. He thought not of the afterlife, but simply the regret that he had not packed an extra slice of Monterey Jack into his lunchbox.

Reaching up he scratched at the top of his head with torn, jagged fingernails. Grease and oil had matted the hair together. It stuck up, unruly and dirty.

Turning, Jerome looked out over the rim of the boat. White foam spat and frothed in the distance. Dark clouds gathered to the east. The first storm since the wave was finally coming. It would seem that Mother Nature grew tired of waiting. The sea would soon come to claim what was hers and there was nothing Jerome could do.

“Go on then, hop it.” He shook his leg, attempting to disengage the bird’s claws from the coarse fabric of his trousers. The bird was reticent to give up his new perch. Jerome waggled his leg a little more fervently. If the storm was going to take them, he was going to get a better view of it. Walt looked disgruntled by the movement, but did as requested and jumped down onto the floor again.

As the waves began to roll, Jerome felt the cold wind against his cheeks. Walt began to sway gently, the bird far more adapt at keeping balance as the angle of the boat tipped first one way and then the other.

Jerome thought of home. He thought of the people he had left behind and the distinctly unremarkable life he had led – the fleeting friends that came and went, all the Christmas cards exchanged, long hours of work, and a marriage that had started out well and come to an end sixteen years later. Jerome wondered what Elaine had been doing when the wave came.

Walt fluttered up onto the bench, settling down and using Jerome’s arm as a windbreaker. The feathers on his chest ruffled against the wind. The waves rose higher.

Matthew would have liked to have met Walt. The boy had always been obsessed with animals, no matter how dirty or disgusting they may have been. Jerome still remembered the day that he had brought a rat into the kitchen. His mother had screamed bloody murder at the poor child. Matthew had fallen asleep on the porch swing, not daring to come back into the house lest he incur his mother’s wrath.

Jerome remembered the scent of his hair, the stickiness of his cheek pressed to his shoulder as he carried him up the stairs.

Walt let out a cry of alarm as the water began to cascade over the sides and onto the deck. Jerome wondered why he did not just fly away. Perhaps the little boat was the last place that the bird could find to roost. Great drops of rain began to fall. Jerome watched as they took the dust from Walt’s feathers, leaving behind streaks of black and grey.

The sky was closing. Jerome reached down and placed a hand on the bird. It did not flinch at his touch. The droplets got bigger, harder, crashing down and exploding across the deck. Walt let out another squawk, turning his head to look at Jerome with yellow, unblinking eyes.

Nothing had ever looked quite so real or quite so alive as Walt did in that moment. Never had Jerome felt so acutely aware of another presence. The touch of damp feathers beneath his hand brought a sense of relief that if nothing else, he was at least not alone. Neither of them would be.

Opening his jacket, Jerome picked Walt up and stuffed him inside the folds. The bird pressed against him, relishing the last few moments of warmth before they could be sucked from the world.

Jerome thought once more of Matthew, and all the things he now wished he had found the time to teach him.

His chest swelled, the beating of his heart echoing against the seabird’s shivering chest. They had not chosen each other, but they would face the storm together.

In truth, he needed that little bird as much as the bird needed him. Just as nobody wanted to be the first to die, Jerome did not want to be the last. Life would end, but it would not end alone.

Jerome and Walt sat together on the bench as the boat was tossed by the storm over and over. Together they rose up as if the sea were pushing them straight into whatever Heaven might be beyond the dark clouds. Jerome searched for a final glimpse of the sun. There was none to be seen, for it had turned away from them.

Taking his final breath, Jerome felt the push of the wave tip the boat forwards until they fell, tumbling and crashing together over the edge. Walt scratched at his chest as the waves pulled them into the blackness, choking, fighting until there was only stillness.

The remnants of the boat bobbed along the surface, battered and broken. A few scattered feathers danced on the waves. The clouds, content that their work had been done, parted to reveal a bright blue sky once more. The rays of light rippled across the water as the disenchanted sun shone down on the stillness and the silence that was left behind.