Maybe the End of a Story, Maybe the Beginning

She stood naked looking out the window, limbed by the lights of the city. “You people,” she said.

From the deep hotel bed I said, “what people?”

She shook her head and after a moment looked back over her shoulder at me. It seemed, in that light, that maybe her light brown eyes were lit from within, but it was just the way her they caught the glow of the the television, I told myself.

“You people,” she said again. “You need something to fear. It’s wired in your brains.”

“Uh huh,” I said. The night was getting a little weird. I was for sure going to end up paying for the room, I could tell, no matter what she had said.

She snorted. “If you don’t have something concrete to fear, you will invent something.” Her eyes were definitely glowing now.

I pushed myself up against the headboard, pulling the sheets up with me to cover my frailty. My gut told me that there was no need to invent something to be afraid of at that moment. She watched me.

“You’re cute when you’re terrified,” she said, and turned to look back out the window. “It’s an honest fear.” She took a deep breath. “Delicious. Left to yourselves, that fearful instinct, combined with the power you suddenly wield, will certainly destroy you. There’s no doubt. That’s why I’m here.”

“To… help?” I was starting to feel the heat radiating from her body. She didn’t seem like the helpful type.

“Maybe,” she said. “Or maybe just to speed things up. I’ve been sent to simplify things.”

She waited for my obligatory leading question but my throat was dry.

She laughed. “I’m giving you something real to fear. It’s as simple as this: you people learn to work together and kill me, or I will cleanse this planet of life.”

“Simple enough,” I croaked, as I kissed my planet goodbye.

3

The Chosen One

The archives of the True Disciples of the World-Changer were burned to the ground, and it turned out the data backup service they used was owned by their enemies. It is only by the most outside of chances that the content of the email the Disciples sent me was saved by their email provider for marketing purposes.

I did not read the email at the time, and even if I had, it would not have changed anything. When you read the excerpt below, you can see that it comes off a bit… Nigerian.

It began thus:

Blessings upon you, chosen one! You have been “randomly” selected to usher humanity into a new era! What will this new era be like? We all wait with great anticipation to learn the answer to that question from you! As the chosen one, you will leave a permanent imprint on the course of humanity forevermore.

How you exercise this great responsibility is of course entirely up to you, but we True Disciples of the World-Changer are eager to help you come to terms with your responsibility.

Alas, please note that the True Disciples of the World-Changer only invoke the “random-chance” protocol when humanity is under dire threat, and this time is no exception. Should those forces that wish to end humanity learn that you are the chosen one, they will stop at nothing to end you. For that reason, please do not share this email with anyone, no matter how trusted.

In retrospect, that explains a lot of what’s happening now. Especially when you consider that email is not remotely secure, and the Band of Destruction had long since put their tentacles in every email provider. There was more in the email, about contacting them, and giving them info, and thwarting an existential threat, but how many of those do you get every day?

Live and learn, I guess. Sorry, human race. My bad.

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