Fresh Air 2.0

A re-write of a short story, sent in for competition.

The gum trees danced. Wind bounced their boughs angrily at the ground, up again, always moving. A dreaded sound, the rustle of eucalyptus. Beneath their limbs a solitary man stood and stared at a sign.

'Woolworths,' it read. 'The Fresh Food People.'

	This wanderer walked up to the automatic doors. He slid them apart with effort, rust having accumulated over the years. Stepping into the building, he surveyed the relic. Overgrowth had run rampant.
Every aisle was fruit and vegetables. Wild tomatoes, mushrooms, and strawberries covered the floor, ripe for the picking. He grabbed a black plastic basket and moved along the rows, taking what was needed.
He gingerly parted vines to get at the few tins and cans left. Dreamily he imagined the walls lined with products"man-made products"a variety of colours instead of endless botany. He turned towards the gardening section.
Whatever stock there had been was gone now, pilfered in the early days. Snatched up during Harmony. The man, and the people he had left at home, could really have used some weed killer.
Without what he came for, the man left the once-super market. Outside in the sun he could immediately breathe easier. Outside the plant-life didn't close in so much. He chose east at a whim, and continued.
He picked his way through constructed and natural rubbish, eyes keen for anything to put in his black plastic basket. His gait was awkward, encumbered by the suit he wore. The mechanism on his back weighed him down, slowed him and stopped him when he didn't pay attention. In and out, in and out went his breath, augmented by the machine, but drowned out by the roaring of reverberating flora.
The world was a hybrid: street lights wrapped in lantana, cars encased in ferns. At an intersection the man passed a gigantic Bird of Prey, its hydra-like form stabbing the air. He stopped in the middle of where roads met. They stretched in all directions, leading to places that were once somewhere. East again, always east.
The man meandered along pre-Harmony pavements, stopping at certain houses. Between his own rasps he could hear children playing, neighbours gossiping. Climbing in empty windows or breaking down rotten doors, he searched for chemicals and tools"anything that would hold Nature back. Cockroaches teemed in the woodwork of every building, and ant nests burst from between cracks in the bitumen. Smaller organisms had adapted to the changes, whereas humans could only use their intellect and tools for survival. It worked, but they did not thrive.
A sharp-edged shape stood out from the rest. Stumbling over the bones of animals and bicycles, the man made his way towards the large house. The purple of jacarandas crowded the sky, the Sun glittering through the gaps. Flowers littered the ground, rotting slowly. He could almost smell the stink through his suit. The man left his black plastic basket at the door, and stepped into a residential cavern.
Every hall he walked down was eerily devoid of plant-life. Finding nothing, the man returned to the foyer, and looked up a wide, luxuriant staircase. He could see few signs of leaves. It was unnatural. Something"something conscious"had been here.
Carefully, not wanting to disturb the scene, the man climbed the stairs. There were even fewer plants on the top level. His eyes scanned the walls, his muscles stiff and poised like a spring. The noise from the breathing apparatus increased. A door at the end of the hall was ajar, and a tinged daylight crept through the crack.
Kicking the door open he almost became tangled with a plastic sheet. He stopped himself, and through it he could see greenery. The man recoiled for a moment, but pushed aside the flaps and stepped into a contained jungle. Moving through palm fronds and drooping vines, jaw agape, marvelling in the cultivation, the man came face to face with a couple.
A man and woman sat cross-legged, holding hands with matching smiles. They wore no suit, nor used any breathing tools. They looked dishevelled, but had a healthy complexion, far healthier than anyone back at camp. Minutes passed while they stared at each other, until the wanderer turned on his microphone.
"What...who are you?" he asked, the robotic voice amplified by the close quarters.
"Survivors," the woman replied. “Just like you.”
"But how, without air?" he yelled, giving in. 
"Who says we don't have air," the male said, his skin a dark shade of brown. “The cleanest air you'll ever taste.”
The man lost his footing, swayed, looking all around. He spied a skylight, dappling his vision.
"Go on," continued the woman, "Take that helmet off. Conserve some air for your return trip."
"No...I don't know what, who you are. Tell me what this is?"
"Why, this is a greenhouse. What we're doing is growing plants, nurturing plants that remember how to give and to take. How to produce air as we once knew it."
"Impossible,” said the wanderer, but he did not believe his own words. He didn't want to.
How good it would be to breathe without machines. Without fear. To breathe fresh air. To exhale, not inhale, carbon dioxide.
In slow motion he unclasped his helmet; it came undone with a short hiss. He held his breath in anticipation. With a tug he left the oasis. 
A sensation of nothing hit his lungs, for there was nothing to breathe. What had been green was now brown. What oxygen and nitrogen composition had been in his suit vaporised. Bug-eyed, the man truly saw. The couple were there, but weathered skin was now withered corpses in suits much like the man's own, hands still grasped. He fumbled for the latches, but dropped the helmet. The bulk of the suit tipped him over. 
He gasped. 
Grasped.
Burned. 
Floundered and flopped, caught on a lure of the mind. He soon grew still.
Outside the gum trees nodded their approval.

Author's Note

I know it's badly formatted, but transferring text just doesn't work for me.