Bug Apocalypse

The crunch of a dried, surfboard-sized cicada shell under your foot is the loudest sound for miles. It’s been like this for a while now. Bugs the size of humans—some also looking a bit humanized—walk the streets instead of people. Finding another person is incredibly rare, but you’ve gotten used to the quiet. Whatever. It’s a normal day again—well, as normal as it can be. You wake up on a dusty mattress in the abandoned apartment where you stayed the night. Sunlight filters through cracked windows, illuminating dust motes and the thick, sticky webbing stretching across the ceiling corners. Outside, the distant, rhythmic clicking of giant mandibles echoes down the street, a reminder of who owns the world now. You sit up, shake the dust off your gear, and prepare to face the day.