Final Transaction:

The fluorescent lights flickered, casting a dull glow over the empty aisles. The store was silent except for the hum of the coolers and the occasional crackle of the overhead speaker, playing a loop of pre-recorded announcements. The words felt hollow now. Welcome to Horizon Market, where savings never end!

But the savings had ended. Everything had.

Daniel ran his fingers along the conveyor belt at the lone open register, smearing a streak of dust across the once-pristine black rubber. He stood behind the counter, staring at the automatic doors that no longer slid open. The generators were still holding, but for how much longer? He wasn’t sure.

It had been weeks—months, maybe—since he’d seen another person. The news stations had gone dark, and the radio broadcasts were reduced to static. The sky had taken on an unfamiliar shade, a duller blue that seemed drained of life. He had tried to keep track of time, carving tally marks onto the wall of the breakroom, but eventually, he lost count. Did it even matter anymore?

The world had ended, and somehow, he was still here.

And so was the store.

Horizon Market had been his first job. Stocking shelves, running register, taking inventory. He had moved on to other things—college, a corporate job, an apartment downtown—but somehow, when everything else fell apart, his feet had brought him back here. Maybe it was familiarity. Maybe it was fate. Either way, he had become its last employee.

And its last customer.

At first, he had wandered the aisles aimlessly, grabbing cans and boxes with no real plan. But old habits died hard. Within a week, he was running the place like it still mattered—scanning items at the register, bagging his own groceries, even pausing to restock shelves. There was something comforting about the routine. It kept the emptiness at bay.

Then, the receipts started printing on their own.

The first time, he had thought it was a malfunction—a glitch in the system. But as he pulled the slip of paper from the register, his breath caught in his throat.

FINAL TRANSACTION: 1 ITEM

TOTAL: UNKNOWN

THANK YOU FOR SHOPPING WITH US.

A single can of soup sat on the conveyor belt. He didn’t remember putting it there. But he took it anyway.

The receipts kept coming. Some were blank. Others had bizarre items listed:

One Echo

Three Forgotten Names

A Half-Remembered Sunset

He kept them all, stuffing them into his pockets, taping them to the walls, trying to make sense of them. He never saw the items appear, but somehow, he knew they were his. Things he had lost. Things the world had taken from him.

And the more he took, the more the store changed.

The first real sign was the mannequins. They weren’t there before. Horizon Market didn’t even sell clothes, but one morning, they were standing in Aisle 5, where the cereal used to be. Their plastic faces were blank, featureless, but Daniel swore he could feel them watching him.

Then came the voices. Soft at first, whispers over the intercom that weren’t part of the usual store announcements. Clean-up on Aisle Seven. Customer assistance is needed in Frozen Foods. But there was no one to assist. And when he went to check, he always found something out of place. A single, steaming cup of coffee in the breakroom. A radio playing a song he hadn’t heard in years. A shopping cart, full of items, is abandoned near the self-checkout lanes.

As if someone had just been there.

Daniel tried to ignore it, but the store wouldn’t let him. The receipts became more insistent.

FINAL TRANSACTION: 1 MEMORY

TOTAL: A PRICE YOU CAN NOT KNOW

He almost didn’t take it. But curiosity, loneliness—something deeper—made him reach out. The moment his fingers brushed the paper, he was somewhere else.

A backyard. A summer afternoon. The smell of freshly cut grass. A girl’s laughter rang through the air.

He gasped, stumbling back against the counter. The memory faded as quickly as it had come, slipping through his fingers like sand. He tried to hold onto it, but it was already gone, leaving only the ache of something precious he hadn’t realized he’d forgotten.

He looked down at the register. The receipt was gone.

Daniel spent the next few days—or weeks, or months—trying to resist. He stopped scanning the receipts and stopped shopping for things he didn’t need. But the store refused to be ignored.

The mannequins moved now, closer each time he looked away. The music playing overhead was distorted, warped like an old cassette tape left in the sun. The automatic doors rattled as if something was trying to get in—or out.

And the receipts kept printing.

FINAL TRANSACTION: THE PRICE OF BEING LAST

Daniel stared at the words, his pulse pounding in his ears. He turned to the conveyor belt, where an item sat, waiting for him.

A mirror.

His reflection stared back, but it wasn’t quite right. His face was paler, thinner. His eyes were sunken, hollow. He reached out, and his reflection did the same—but the glass was warm beneath his fingertips.

The lights flickered. The store groaned. The mannequins lined the aisles like silent sentinels, watching, waiting.

Daniel took a deep breath and did what he had always done. He scanned the item.

The register beeped. The receipt was printed. The total flashed across the screen.

PAID IN FULL.

The store sighed. The lights dimmed. The automatic doors slid open.

And for the first time in a long, long while, Daniel stepped outside.

The parking lot was empty, but the horizon wasn’t. The sky was no longer dull, no longer drained. The sun rose over the remains of the world, golden and warm as if waking from a long sleep.

Daniel turned back to the store one last time. The neon sign above flickered, then went dark.

Horizon Market was closed.

He took a deep breath, feeling the weight of everything he had lost—and everything he had gained.

And then, with nothing left to carry, he walked forward, toward whatever was next.