Free Ruin (The Ruin Saga Book 1) by Harry Manners Page B

it would be for the last time. Before nostalgia or hesitation could set in, he turned and descended the stairs. Returning to the living room, he then packed his still-wrapped gifts.
    The dog emerged from under the stairs, sensing that something was about to happen, whining at the sight of his bag. He stroked her head, but still she yipped, her shoulders hunched, sensing something at odds with the world as surely as he.
    Outside, the sky was beginning to darken as the day came to a close, and he became aware that he was set to sleep in the empty house for the night if he lingered any longer. There was no way he would be able to stand that.
    “Come on,” he said. “We’re leaving.”
    The two of them left the house within the minute and marched away down the street. Alex was determined not to look back, but couldn’t resist a final glance as they rounded the corner. The dog howled as it passed from sight. He, in turn, gritted his teeth against a fresh slab of heartache.
    Then it was gone, and he was heading into the vastness of an empty world.
    *
    They walked for an hour before Alex decided to stop and check the nearest house. At first he only found cold coffee collecting dust, bread growing hard in the toaster, and a prepacked briefcase in the hallway. But when he looked closer, he found the owner’s remains: a single bathrobe, still damp, spread in the approximate posture of a lounging person at the breakfast table. A pair of spectacles lay shattered near one of the chair legs.
    He returned to the street with gooseflesh blossoming on his arms and neck. Hurrying away, he could no longer ignore the endless piles of clothing. He was walking over fresh, invisible graves.
    From then on, as the hours passed, he checked larger and larger establishments, eventually making his way to police stations, schools and office buildings. He found nothing but more clothing, half-eaten food, and myriad half-completed tasks. Gas hobs blazed, air conditioners whistled, and cooling car engines ticked. But there was no hint of an evacuation, or abduction. Every shred of evidence indicated that people had simply disappeared, mid-action.
    On several occasions he considered searching for the man he’d seen while Paul Towers had died at his feet. Where had he come from? Where had he gone? Had he even been there at all?
    Each time he found himself shuddering with disquiet—the manner in which that lupine smile had fixed upon him had been almost predatory, as though Alex had been but a scurrying ant beneath a magnifying glass.
    He never searched for the man. After a while, Alex even found himself pushing any thought of him from his mind.
    He slept that night in the living room of a tiny bungalow, which had belonged to a couple of pensioners, judging by its many framed photographs, stagnant atmosphere, and the flock wallpaper hanging from the walls.
    After that, he lost track of everything. Time became a dimensionless entity, settling somewhere between a trickle and a relentless cascade. Villages, roads, and towns passed by, one by one, but none yielded a single clue, just more of the same wreckage.
    On the second day, the swarms flew overhead: enormous flocks of squawking birds that wheeled and swirled as one, stretching from horizon to horizon and blacking out the sky. He spent the majority of the daylight hours looking skyward. Millions passed overhead, hour after hour; every species Alex could name, and more. They cast shadows abound onto the ruined world of man, occasionally straying too close to the ground and committing suicide in their thousands, colliding with brick walls and plummeting through panes of glass without any attempt at evasion, as though blinded.
    They plagued the heavens until dusk had fallen. When the sun rose the next day, they too had disappeared. Alex hoped that they had merely moved on instead of vanishing themselves.
    He pushed on, still accompanied by the dog, which insisted on tossing around the bloody remains of