Seventeen (Nuclear Winter Contest)

Winter 2065.

It was my birthday. I turned 17.

We turned on the television and saw the news. It was the sixth bombing of the week. They were targeting the main cities and popular events. Weeks go by, then they sent the airstrikes. Cities are being gassed, water poisoned. The bigger the place, the more damage. Then they sent the soldiers. They went through even the smallest places, they shot to kill. Millions dead every day. Countries turning against contries, nuclear warfare, a World War 3. They didn't know who was doing it at first, but then it came clear it was our own country, doing it to ourselves. But some saw it was coming. We had to make sure our kind survived the leaders tried to launch space programs to take children to small habitable planets. Some launches worked, some launches failed. I was on the fifth rocket. 12 kids, a couple I knew. They started the countdown, I knew something wasn’t right.

We barely went up 100 feet. The rocket was torn to shreds. Explosions, fire everywhere. I was falling straight out of the sky. A metal rod from the rocket all the way through my chest. My arm cut clean off. Snow impacted my fall. I was dead. Deserted. Only me.

The radiation spread killed most lifeforms. Those who were left were mostly uncultivated and from poor areas, leaving our race to redo everything all over again. Soon the past would be forgotten.

The skin represents the 17 year old boy if he survived the explosion. Scavenging earth looking for life.
Be aware that this takes place 50 years from now, advances in space travel were made.