Survival of a Rat

Image Credit: https://vihola.deviantart.com/

Scratch, scratch, scratch. 

Nails digging through. No not digging. Scratching. Scratch, scratch, scratch. 

Food. 

There is a blaring need for food. For how long has the creature not eaten food? It can’t tell, all the creature feels is the emptiness in the pit of its stomach. Past a certain period of hunger caused by a lack of food, there is just … there is no hunger, only tiredness, fatigue and then death. That is what the creature feels. 

No. Death was still not upon it. The creature’s scratching slows. Tiredness, fatigue and then a final burst of energy. 

Scratch, scratch, scratch, scuttle. 

The creature - a rat - finally climbs up the debris it’s been buried under. 

Air, fresh air, nothing is more pleasant for the creature when it has been down a hole… yes even for a rat. Does it surprise you? Doesn’t matter - you are already dead. The human race is dead. 

The air.. it does not smell right. The rat raises itself on its hind legs and sniffs the air. At first, the air smells as clear as air can be, and then it’s second nose smelled, its odor-detecting organ, what the humans called (when they were alive) - the vomeronasal organ. This is how the rat truly senses the world. And, the rat smelled death. There was also dust, carbon particles, and smoke. 

As far as the rat could see, there was smoke rising up from the ground and up into the air. Buildings had crumbled, roads had turned into crater disasters, the humans were dead, the rat was hungry. 

“Chirp.”

“Chirp.”

A bird… no  - a cockroach. Even a cockroach would be a feast. Summoning up what energy it could, the rat charged towards the target. It leaped across the debris and crashed on the ground. The rat recovered and charged on. The cockroach was scuttling away. The rat scrambled up the rock, under the pipe, and across a thick layer of dust. The rat was right behind it, its weak bones and weak muscles running on pure will and the will to consume something, anything. 

The rat skipped over a human bone and climbed over human skull. The cockroach had snuck inside the skull socket. And then the rat came upon the cockroach. It’s claw struck through and through the insect. It felt the insect’s life drain and the body slowly come to a stop. 

Then the rat took a wholesome bite and chewed the first nutrition it had in days. The future was bleak.