The Button
I’m not a murderer…
…Right?
This dungeon of a room petrified the very last essence of my being, like the pressure deep in an oceans trench pushing upon my skin. Stone still with the thoughts God must have felt every second of his existence. I cannot go further before my mind decides the fate of a thousand souls. No inch towards or away from this switch of death- this press of history.
I have my own family; a wife and a single child. A young boy at the age of seven. My life is serene with little care. I love them to no end, and the thought of them being gone is enough to drown myself in death. I have nothing else. As do my subjects.
I rule over my kingdom now upon an overseeing tower. Though I see them not, their feelings waft to my eyes, ears, and nose. I taste their sadness, their memories, and their life. It is putrid. I weep.
My life has been normal. My pay is sufficient, and my activities are standard if not boorish. This job has presented little but long nights of coffee and music.
Or rather, it hadn’t done much to me. But now, the instant wave of sorrow has been cast, changing the feeling of my own age upwards fifty years. I am an old man now for this moment. Hollow and deprived of life. If this decision isn’t the right one, I shall forever remain decrepit. Forever disgraced. Forever dead.
My moment is crucial not to myself, but the ultimate decider of man. I am God right now, the owner of a thousand breathing toys of which my decision is law. I am the manifestation of the sun and the bringer of the maelstrom. But I cannot choose such a side or otherwise.
I am cold and barren. Sweat drips down my face as the evidence of the world’s tears. Mother Earth cries to me through my senses. She begs for mercy, for solace. A beautiful woman, praying to me, God, not to be so horrifically raped. I can only stare back, unsure of my own decision, for I hold both the sympathy of a man and the wrath of a nation. Which shall prevail?
I am also a letter, a reddened parcel of paper with the inscribed statements of doom. My reading foretells of a nature turning strong men to pitiful weeping. I can cripple a soldier with a stare and burn a tree with my voice.
I stand here without a movement beyond my hearts incessant pumping. My eyes are fixated on this button, and I cannot press it. I may not press it ever.
I consider the choices. What are the pros and cons? Even with such consideration, the mammoth con screams in my face; death of thousands. It floods my psyche; it drowns out all other thoughts. I am not a murderer, not yet, but I still feel its infection.
I want this moment to end. To reverse time and be in my bed again, sleeping sound without the weight of many souls upon me. I don’t want this anymore.
In my delirium, a simple fact of truth reached the molested expanse of my head.
“It’s either us or them.” It became clear for but a second. Either I lose my country, or they lose theirs. I have my family, and they have theirs. Surely I must take the side of my own interest!
Yet, it’s not as simple as that. Far from simplicity; it is a hindrance. It reminds me that they have their own loves in their life. They have their hopes, their dreams, and their reasons. Who am I to take that away? It seems so unbalanced, that such an unimportant man as me can deliver tempest through the mere press of a button. That I, an uneducated fool could take the aspirations of the fortunate and the intelligible.
This button is somniferous. It puts me to sleep, like an outside force working upon my immune system. It tells my body to shut down, to prevent this bomb of stress from exploding. The only thing keeping me awake is the drum of war inside my ears. This decision is not to be taken lightly. My life rests upon it.
The end of thousands or the end of millions?
My millions.
It is painfully obvious, but the will is still not there. I am without control, as I have separated from this temporal land. It is no longer a question pertaining to such worldly issues. I am in the spiritual realm for now. Dealing the cards and spinning the dice. I laugh in this turmoil, as I consider a game of “eenie-meenie” to be the decider.
As if a childish game could do so much harm.
A voice calls out in this fog; my partner. The second decider in the matter speaks to me with an impatient concern. He seems ready. He has decided to press.
“Well? Are you going to do this?”