City of Redemption

-Chapter 10-

Beginning Part 2

He woke in a smoky pile of dust and stone rubble, the ground still warm to the touch in some places. He made to stand, careful where he put his hands and knees, and as he did so he realized he was naked and alone.

Jonathan glanced out into the vast expanse of charred ruin. Everywhere around him appeared the same. Remnants of destruction. His heart hammered inside his chest. Where was everyone? What in the Angel's Name happened while he had been sleeping? Had the apocalypse came and went without his knowing?

He cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted. He received no response, save for his echo in the wind. After several useless calls, he stopped. He knew he could not stay here long if he wanted to survive so he decided to head west, judging by the position of the sun in the sky, in search for a body of water and/or other survivors. Something.

He wandered for quite some time on an aimless trek. No building had been left standing, no road unbroken, nor organic matter unscathed. No bones, either, which was strangely even more disconcerting. Every now and then he would bend over to pick through the trash and heaps of rubble along his way, scavenging for food and water, tools, weapons, shelter, people, any other resource that could prove useful to him. It seemed he did not need to protect himself from any predator, demon or earthly beast. There had been no sign of life within his cognizant radius for the entire time he'd been walking. Judging by the sun, he'd spent several hours wandering on his own. He was beginning to think he was the last living organism on earth that did not seem to get the memo that he could not stay here on this inhospitable planet.

As time went on he slowly began to panic. It became harder and harder to convince himself not to. As the sun made its descent on the horizon, Jonathan looked out into the dull, orange-purple mixed skyline and fought the urge to sob.

"Halooo!" He tried again. He could not remember how long he'd been wandering. Man was not meant to be alone. Without even so much as an animal for a companion he felt supreme loneliness out here. He was abandoned, all over again. Only this time, instead of his mother, the entire world had walked away. Shunned him. Left him for dead, like discarded waste, along with all the rest of the world's trash he'd been picking through for the past half hour. He did not like this feeling of isolation. Of being cut off from the world. Worse than that. Utterly forgotten. What did it mean to be a man if there was no one to love him, or even remember he once existed? His throat constricted as he began to weep. "Is anybody out there?!? HELLO!!"

Jonathan...

He paused at the soft whirring in the wind. He turned in all directions, searching for the source of the sound. "Who speaks my name?"

He heard flapping in the wind and a shadow appeared on the ground, soaring eastward. Toward him. He looked into the rapidly darkening moon-lit sky, squinting his eyes to catch the contours of this small figure. As it passed overhead and continued on its wayward path he realized it was an owl.

His heart leaped. He did not care what kind of creature it was, only that it was the only other living thing besides him out in this lone wasteland. He followed in the direction it was going, sprinting to keep up.

Jonathan... Jonathan...

The voice seemed to hasten the more he ran. He saw what looked like mountain peaks off in the horizon when—