The End

It didn't happen like she had thought it would.
There were no explosions, no raging fires, no ruptures in the ground... and nothing but silence.
She didn't stop to wonder why she never heard any screams, because she already understood. As life had slowly moved from this realm of existence, all that remained were mute shadows - mere footprints of what used to exist. All colour had drained away and those once distinct lines had blurred, leaving nothing but an empty, monotone shell of a world long gone.
So why was she still here? What had she held onto that everybody else hadn't managed to grasp? And was the End finally coming to a close?
Glancing to the wall beside her, she watched as a faint glimmer of ever fading sunlight filtered through the cracks in the blackened window pane. The sky had grown darker than she'd ever seen it before, and she doubted that the lonely sphere on which she stood would last for much longer. In a way she hoped it wouldn't, because she had seen too much to continue her existence in this tiny room without wishing that she had gone wherever the rest had, and wondering why they'd never come back to save her.

The floor beneath her felt as though it was loosening, as though it was seconds from becoming an impossible fluid that would carry her away, and she dug her nails deeper into the sodden boards. She closed her eyes and waited.
She didn't know what to expect. Would it happen quickly, or would she fade as slowly as the gradually cooling Sun?
With the next breath she took, she felt the walls around her slip. The stale air rushed away from her and she found herself falling... falling away from the world that had for so long been her cage.
And for a fleeting moment, she thought she could hear again, as a momentary burst of song from a swallow that had once perched upon her garden fence brushed lightly against her ears...
And that was the last thing she ever remembered.