8 minutes. That’s how long it will take. 8 minutes and every living thing on this earth will be gone.

8 Minutes

I have lived a good long life with very few regrets. Like anyone else i do have some. Missing my daughters birthday is the biggest one i have. It stays with me to this day. We have a great relationship, my daughter and I. Even after I missed her birthday, thankfully she is understanding and forgiving. She has children of her own now in fact. I used to watch the sun, ironically that was what i was doing when i missed her day but i dont do that anymore. She is my sun now, as are her children. I’m with them all now. Together in these final minutes. All of us laughing and joking. Not a bad way to go.

7 Minutes

I can’t believe this is happening! I was on my way to him. The love of my life is waiting to spend our final piece of time together and I’m here broken down on the side of the road. I tried walking but i wouldnt make it in time, being eight months pregnant is hard. This is just my luck, everything was finally turning around and life was starting to work out. I married the love of my life, my soulmate, then we got pregnant. Finally the dream we had of starting a family was happening and the the fucking sun decided to explode. Some cruel twisted joke of life this is. I can’t do anything, he is too far away and I can’t make it before the end. At least I will have my daughter to keep me company. 

6 Minutes

I dance and move to the rhythm of the music. My body swirls and bends as if made from water, the music is all I hear, the bass and synth in perfect unison. I bump into a girl next to me and we splash together, two oceans combining together to create a flood. She smiles and I smile back. All my life I spent worried about what people would think of me. Not anymore. I grab her hand and she grips my back, two girls at the end of time. We dance and move as if made for this very thing, our bodies glide along the dance floor. I lean and kiss her and she returns the embrace. Our souls combine and the feeling of weightlessness floats over me. This is the first time in my life I am who I am meant to be. No more hiding. No more being scared of what others will think.

5 Minutes

I can hear them knocking, begging me to be let in. the same people that called me crazy and weird now knock and beg at my door, well fuck you! I made this bunker for me and my dog, my best and only friend. He sits at my side barking at the noise coming through the door, I pet him with a smile. I like to think he is also shouting “fuck you” at the soon to be dead people, charred and burnt to crisp. That’s what will happen to them now. I’ll sit in my weird little bunker and open a beer while the world ends around me, wouldn’t that be crazy.

4 Minutes

I walk through my house, the automated voice tells me that the front door is ajar. I remember when I had her installed, just after my first million. I sold my first company at twenty-five, made my millions easy. Company. That’s an interesting word. I sold and created companies most of my life, but when it matters I don’t have any. Company that is. I’m here alone, all the money i could ever want, in my luxury automated house made from the companies I bought and sold. I’m alone, no more company for me.

3 minutes

The riots have been raging for some time now. People using the last remaining minutes to hurt and steal and take. Take, take, take. I expected more at the end of the world, but apparently that’s who we are as a species. So here I sit, in my cell, watching the world destroy itself before the sun can. We could have been so much more than this. I could have been so much more than this. I made my choices like everyone else, we are where we deserve to be. 

2 minutes

It is so bright now. Sitting in this field with so many people around me. We all arranged to meet here to see the end of the world. It started as a joke online, one person turned into two and here we are, it just happened that way. Small groups formed bigger groups and now we are many, the digital generation. We were so proud of everything we did. We cancelled, we held people responsible and demanded more of the world and everyone in it. We lived in our screens, our perfect digital world, never fully appreciating the real one, we just thought we were making it better but never looking to see. I have so many regrets. I could have loved more, we all could have. It is a nice field though. I finally “touched grass” as they say. Fucking pathetic.

1 minute

The earth looks so beautiful from up here. NASA went dark about a week ago and we have been left on the ISS, probably forgotten. That’s okay though. We all know what’s happening. Solar flare they said before we lost radio contact. A big one too, big enough to end us, something to do with the sun expanding, getting ready for its very own heat death. Supernova they called it. It will grow and destroy, then shrink and consume. Nothingness will remain, a black hole of endless darkness. It will take everything we ever did, not even leaving a memory of us. We were not perfect. We destroyed and condemned, broken as a species at times. We killed and raped and murdered, irredeemable for most of our history. Those parts should be forgotten perhaps, but we also created. We gave birth to time, religion and art. We named colours and emotions. We laughed, cried, loved and hated, but most of all we tried. We tried to do good and be better. Each generation learnt from the last and built on it, time and time again. Maybe for the better and maybe for the worse, but, we did try.