Ronin stood before me. In his true form, he was half a man with all the power that I possessed in my whole body.

A dead snake hung from a tree just over his shoulder.

Snake-skins surrounded us. I could feel rock and  water beneath my feet. To my left, a glass wall separated me from all that was worth fighting for in this world. The last innocent boy on earth.

Is this what my mother felt? Is this what she could never get me to understand?

"What do you wish for Eve?"

The first time he asked me this, I wished for nothing. But now, I wish for something more, something human.

"The boy."

He laughs and I laugh too.

His is rich, confident, full.

Mine is depleted, hoarse, dead.

The drip of water in the far corner of my cage takes over the sound in my ears. He steps closer but I don't move even as what's left of his face frightens me.

"Oh Eve, you can't have him to yourself. That's not how the story goes."

"Then how does the story go."

"It's an old. A tale as old as time, even older than rhyme." He smiled, as best he could but I wasn't impressed. I wasn't as enamoured as I once was. Appearances really did matter. He didn't have the looks anymore to appear like anything, not even human.

"There was a garden. The Garden." He continued, gesturing towards the tree behind him. "Much prettier than this one, if you can imagine such a thing. The sun was shining, greens sprawled around and there was a girl named Eve. She was hungry."

"For what?"

"You don't know?"

"No. Should I?"

"Why, yes. The girl is you."

"Me."

"You."

"I don't understand."

"Don't worry, you will."

He turned towards the tree and yanked the snake by the head and wrapped it round his arm, the arm with flesh still remaining. "You see, Eve, you were looking for knowledge. The scandalous sort. And it hung from a tree, in the shape of an apple. But you didn't have the courage to get it. You needed some advice from a friend. A very wise friend."

He moved towards me, his posture bent to keep his one good eye at my level.

I stepped back, pressing hard against the glass frame.

"This friend," he said nodding towards the snake in his hands and cupping its loose jaw, "wanted you to take a bite of the apple."

"Why?' I asked.

"Because it was sweet and you were blind and it was meant to open your eyes. And the eyes of a certain boy you loved. Can you guess his name?" He asked back.

"No and I don't want to. Your story is stupid. I'm not blind. I know what you are and you're not my friend."

He paused, raising himself to his full height.

"Adam was his name and on the contrary, Eve," he hissed, "You are quite blind, quite enamored by innocence. You've been fed very poor fruit."

"I am tired of your riddles."

"But you love them."

"No."

"You and I can start a new beginning, Eve, just like before. I'm the friend you need. It's in the Good Book."

"No." I moaned confused.

"Bite the apple, Eve...just one more time...it'll be sweet. I promise." he whispered in my ear.

"Speak, English." I spat shocked from his closeness, my skin crawling from the heat of his breath.

"You saw what happened out there in the world."

Out there where the sun rages, where the air is poison, where the dead walk upright in the light and the living scurry to find shade in the dark. Where my mother's dust blows in the wind. Where Adam's father and all our friends lay, rotting because I was so blind.

"Humanity has run the physical limits of this earth to the ground. Nothing will come of you keeping this layer of skin..." he stroked my cheek slowly with his dead hand, so obsessed with my human flesh that he wanted to tear it right off, "...intact. The pride you have for this flesh is a pity. You need something a little bit worn, durable, rotten to some extent. Give me half and I shall make you whole again. You and Adam.

It's time for a new garden, Eve, and your flesh is the price you'll pay to enter."

Word Count : 738

PART I : I LOSE AN EYE AND SOME FRIENDS TOO.

Eve's health status : Functioning on borrowed time. A little more dehydrated. Blind in one eye.

Problem : Oxygen is running low for her and her companions.

Solution : Find water but get past a zombie horde first.

PART II : I'M THE ANIMAL IN THE ZOO

Eve's health status : Fully functional. Well-fed and clothed. Eye has been replaced with a mechanical one.

Problem :  Something is wrong with Adam.

Solution : Fix what's wrong with Adam or turn a blind eye to it.

PART III : MY KEEPER WANTS TO EAT MY FLESH

Eve's health status : Fully functional. Emotionally unstable.

Problem : Ronin is a fraud.

Solution : Run away from Ronin.

PART IV : IN THE END, I NEVER HAD A CHOICE

Eve's health status : In the process of rot.

Problem : Eve reeks of humanity.

Solution : Ronin must wipe her clean of it.