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The Last Prayer
An unreleased short story from the book:
Disconnected: Hyperinflation: Dark Tales of a Broken Economy
David knelt in the corner of the crumbling apartment, his hands clasped tightly, fingers digging into his palms as if the pressure could draw a response from the heavens. The room was cold—colder than it had ever been, as if the world outside had sucked out every last ounce of warmth, leaving only a husk. The distant sounds of sirens wailing through the streets of the city barely registered in his ears anymore. The world, once full of promise, had become nothing more than a haunting void.
He had spent years of his life living for something greater than himself—his faith, his family, his hope in the belief that salvation was always within reach. But now, kneeling there in the dark, he wondered how long the human spirit could endure such suffering before it crumbled. Every belief he had held dear was eroding, pulled away by the bitter winds of despair that had come with the collapse of society.
The government had fallen. The food had run out. The power grid had failed, and with it, so had any remaining semblance of order. Violence had swept the streets like wildfire, families torn apart as they fought for what little remained. Every man, woman, and child had been left to fend for themselves. And as the world crumbled around him, David found himself standing on the edge of the abyss, desperately clinging to a faith that no longer seemed to answer.
His wife, Rachel, sat across from him, her face gaunt with hunger, her eyes vacant from the constant strain of their survival. Their two children, once bright and full of life, now sat silent in the corner, their stomachs hollow and aching. There was no food left to give them. No water. No hope. Rachel had stopped crying days ago, but David could hear the tears in her silence. It was the silence that gnawed at him more than anything. The silence of a woman who had given up everything, who had nothing left to give.
And so, David prayed.
“Please, Lord,” he whispered through clenched teeth, his voice trembling, cracking under the weight of the words. “Please, save us. We are lost. Save my family. Save my children. Hear my prayer, God.”
The prayer had once come easily to him. In the days before the collapse, when life still had some measure of meaning, it had been a comfort, a solace. He had felt the presence of something greater than himself. But now, as he begged, his words felt hollow, as if they fell into a void, absorbed by the empty air. Nothing. No answer. Nothing but the cold, the silence, and the suffocating pressure of a world spiraling into oblivion.
Rachel stood up from the corner, her thin frame shaking with each step. She had tried to be strong for the children, tried to hold them together, but now, as she watched David kneel in front of her, she knew it was over. There was nothing left. No prayers, no promises, no salvation.
“David,” she said softly, her voice ragged. “We can’t keep doing this. There’s nothing left. There’s no food, no water. No future. You can’t keep praying for a miracle. It’s gone. All of it. Everything is gone.”
David didn’t answer her. His hands trembled as he pressed his palms together, his knuckles white with the force of his grip. He had always believed that faith could move mountains. But now, that belief seemed more like a cruel joke. The world had turned its back on them, and all he had left was his prayers. His hope. His last desperate cry to a God who seemed to have abandoned them.
He closed his eyes, squeezing the words out as if they were being torn from his chest.
“Please,” he whispered again, his voice barely audible. “I will do anything. I will give anything. Just save my children. Please.”
But still, nothing came. No divine voice. No sign. No answer.
Rachel sank to the floor beside him, her eyes empty, her hands resting on her lap. “We have to face the truth,” she said, her voice breaking. “There is no one left. No one is coming. And we’re dying, David. We’re dying.”
David’s chest tightened. He could feel the pressure building, the weight of the world pressing down on him. His throat burned with the realization that he had lost his grip on everything. He was alone. His family was alone. They were abandoned.
But as he stared into the darkness, a part of him realized that it wasn’t just God he was praying to. He was praying to the world, to the universe, to anything that could give him an answer, anything that could bring his family back from the edge.
But the world remained silent.
Days blurred into each other. The hours stretched on endlessly, and each breath felt like a futile attempt to keep going. David’s body grew weaker, the hunger gnawing at his insides. His family had stopped talking, stopped looking at each other. The children no longer asked for food or water—they had stopped asking altogether. They were too young to understand the full extent of what had happened, but David knew that they had lost the will to live, just as he had.
Rachel, too, had grown quiet. She no longer cried. She no longer tried to comfort him. She simply sat beside him, staring blankly into space. Their love, once a beacon in the darkness, had withered away. There was no room for love in this new world. Only survival. Only desperation.
And then, in the final hours, as the light outside grew dim, David heard the last of his prayers answered—not by a voice from heaven, but by the deafening silence that filled the room. He turned to Rachel, his eyes hollow, knowing what he had to do. The price of survival was steep, and they had already paid with everything they had.
In his final, desperate act, David made a choice that would haunt him forever. His children’s faces flashed before him—faces that would never grow old, faces that would never smile again. He pressed his lips together, tears streaming down his face, as he turned to Rachel.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, the last shred of his humanity slipping away.
And in that final moment, David realized that the prayer had never been the answer. The world, the divine, salvation—it was all an illusion. In the end, there was only survival, and the cost of it was more than anyone could bear.
As the world outside descended into total chaos, David and his family drifted into an abyss of darkness, their fates sealed by a world that had no place for them. The last prayer he had ever spoken hung in the air, unanswered, a hollow echo in a place that had forgotten what it meant to believe.
If you enjoyed this short story you will probably like our latest release available now:
Hyperinflation: Dark Tales of a Broken Economy
$3.99
In Hyperinflation: Dark Tales of a Broken Economy, the collapse of the financial system takes center stage, and the disturbing consequences of a world plunged into chaos unfold in brutal, unrelenting detail.
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