she walks down the ruined road, passing the cracks where the lightning has struck so many times before.

behind her, telephone poles reach up into the sky like knitting needles with thin wires between them. birds sit upon those wires. they watch her from their perch.

we watch her.

we could kill her now. we could have killed her many times over. it is not her time yet. not when she still walks. not when she still moves forward.

sometimes she stops and looks up into the sky. she remembers in the old days, in the time before, when her parents would insist on them going stargazing. she would look up into the night sky and try to count the stars.

she no longer counts the stars. when she looks up into the sky, she does not see possibilities. she sees only her own loneliness reflected back on her.

we have ruined the sky for her.

she does not stop for long, though. she continues her walk, with her rifle slung across her back.

she walks with a weariness in her bones. she walks without pausing, without stopping. she walks.

her legs have grown strong.

her feet are covered in callouses.

still she walks.

one day, she reached the edge. the edge of the coast, where the sand met the ocean. the shore.

there was a storm building in the sky. she could see the flashes of lightning and hear the rolling of thunder. she knew she should leave, but she was fascinated.

she took a step and it was one step too far. the world seemed to shift. the sky turned from blue to dark purple. the storm spread out in tendrils.

the sand had turned black.

she saw this and turned to run. she almost missed her window. she could feel the shore reaching out to her, trying to bring her back, but she ran and pushed herself harder than she ever had and she found herself back where the world made at least a small amount of sense.

she stays away from the shore now. she moves inland.

she still remembers how the black sand glittered under the stormy sky though.

she cried later on. she cried for her family, for the old man, for the time before.

every time she cries, she resolves that it is the last time she shall cry.

she knows this is a lie.

it was soon after her family died that she was given the rifle.

she had walked back from the wreckage of the camper until she reached a small town. most of the town had left and she walked down the middle of the main street, counting broken windows and empty shutters.

and then a voice called out to her: 'girl! girl, get in here!'

she turned and there was an old man. he was standing in the doorway of a shop and waving his hands at her, urging her to come inside.

she did. 'what're you doing, girl?' the old man said, his accent thick as molasses.

she was silent. what could she say?

'where's yer family?' he asked.

her face collapsed like a burning building. she wanted to cry, but her eyes couldn't, wouldn't. she never forgave herself for not crying at that moment.

'shhh,' the old man said, 'it's okay. it's gonna be okay.'

she looked at him as if to say 'how?'

the old man smiled at her and walked into the back room. he emerged with a rifle. she recoiled, but he said, 'don't worry, i'm not gonna shoot you. it's for you. it's so you can protect yerself.' he handed it to her. 'i'll show you how to use it and everything.'

over the next few weeks, he taught her how to shoot and how to hunt. they hid from the flocks and hoarded food.

and then, one day, he said, 'you can't stay here, girl. i've been seeing more and more of those huge storms. them birds are making them, i know. this place won't be here much longer. you have to go and find someplace else.'

she motioned to him as if to say, 'what about you?'

'me?' he said. 'nah, i'm too old for that. that's why i didn't leave here. but don't you worry about me. look in the back room there.' she did and then turned back to him. he smiled a reassuring smile. 'i got 'em from the old quarry. they were just lying around. when them birds come for me, i'll light the fuse and then...well, at least i'll take some of 'em with me when i go.'

she grasped his shoulders and tried to make him go. 'it's no use, girl. i told you, i'm too old. but you got many years left in you. you can survive, i know it. please go.'

so she did. she slung the rifle across his back and gave one last look at the old man.

then she started her walk.

sometimes she cries.

she was young when the first of the flocks came. when the storms hit. she was only a teenager.

her family tried to flee. they piled themselves into a camper and they drove off, hoping to find a place where the flocks could not find them. where birds could not go.

they didn't know yet how strong a flock could be. a big flock, one composed of thousands of birds, it could tip over a large camper. it could take them no matter where they went.

she had been near the door. when her mother had twisted the wheel, had tried, uselessly, to swerve away from the inevitable, she had been flung against the door and the door had burst open.

she fell outside, hitting the hard pavement and rolling. she was lucky she hadn't broken any bones.

she was also lucky that the flock ignored her in favor of the rest of her family.

sometimes, when she's walking along a long road, she will think of that day. she will consider different scenarios in her mind, different ways she could have saved them. none of them would have worked, but still she considers them.