The Principle of Survival

 

 

“We are the facilitators of our own creative evolution.”

" Bill Hicks

 

That day the sun was as bright and hot as ever, a lone, fluffy cloud floated along the horizon, as most other days " the city folk carried along with their days. The tall office buildings gave just enough shade to make the heat tolerable. On the sidewalk of one of the busiest streets in the city stood a young woman, in her hands she held a wad of newspapers, trying to sell them to passing pedestrians. The date on the day’s press read 2141 July 23, the headlines read ‘Doomsday Clock: how much time do we have left?’

            On the twenty-fifth floor of the office block the woman stood by sat a small group of men. The blinds on the windows were closed, the quiet hum of an air conditioner helped to maintain a dull atmosphere. The oldest of the group sat at the end of the table, his subordinates " on the sides. Having spent so many years in the office the CEO thought he would have gotten used to this by now, but his short beard seemed to get grayer by the day, a sign for retirement. This was not his idea of getting old, but his commitment to leaving a strong financial foundation to his offspring kept him going. The old man caught himself daydreaming again, when he came to " one of his colleagues was in the middle of giving a report.

            “… now if you turn to page six in your packages we will review the profit projections for the third quarter, which are showing great promise for sales to the new oil processing plant in Croatia…”

The head of the company leaned back in his chair with a bleak expression on his face, when a very curious smell entered his nose. He slowly sat up straight and looked over his coworkers.

             “Hold up, Terry. Does anyone else smell that?” The room fell silent as everyone looked at each other and murmured positively. The CEO stood up and looked over his employees. “Alright, how many times do I have to tell you, no weed during work hours!? Now let’s see, who’s the one who’ll be signing their resignation papers? He asked, as the group uncomfortably looked at each other.

            A loud cough emanated from behind the closed door of the office as if on cue, after which a voice, clearly struggling not to cough said, “Oh man, that guy wasn’t kidding! This is some tight s**t, damn!”

            The head of the company pulled back his chair and started heading towards the door with a furious frown - he hasn’t had his coffee yet, the man needed his coffee. “What the f**k do you think you are doing!?” He yelled. “When I’m done writing your report " you’ll be unemployed for the rest of your life! At this point he was nearly at the door. “Pack your s**t, genius, you’re fired, you hear me?! FIRED!”

            “A cute choice of words.” The man behind the door calmly spoke as a barrage of gunfire riddled the doors with holes, the old man dropped down as fast as he could, but before he could reach the ground " the shots had already stopped and all he could hear was the casings hitting the floor. In shock he quickly checked himself for any injuries and found none, but as he turned around to see his co-workers he realized that they weren’t nearly as lucky. Each of them had been shot right in the middle of their forehead, most of them collapsed on the table, with blank expressions and lifeless eyes.

            The lone survivor stared in shock and disbelief, he would’ve stayed frozen, if not the killer behind the remains of what used to be a door, who soon reminded of himself with a couple of knocks on the door.

“Room service?” the stranger mockingly asked. A thousand different questions rushed through the victim’s head, none of which he had an answer for. One thing was certain " the attacker was armed and dangerous, whereas he was not.

“Go f**k yourself, you lunatic!” the old man shouted as he rushed back to his seat, where he had hidden a gun of his own for situations like this.

“This is neither the time nor the place to discuss lunacies, I’ve come to have a serious conversation with you.” The shooter responded as the elderly man quietly pulled back the slide of his old M1911[1] and aimed towards the entrance. “Come on in, dipshit!” he shouted.

            The ruined door swung open violently as the dipshit pranced right in, shouting “You got me a present!?” As both men simultaneously opened fire. The scared old man didn’t stop firing until he was out of ammunition, at which point he had come to a dreading realization " not one shot had reached its target, instead all of the bullets laid right in front of him on the table, most flattened, some stuck together into a single piece of lead.

            As the smoke and smell of gunpowder faded the lone boss finally got a good look at the attacker. What he saw fell short of any expectations he might have had, before him stood an ordinary, middle aged man dressed in bland and unimpressive street clothes " not what you’d expect from a presumably hired gunman, the still smoking joint [2] between his lips didn’t help give the man credibility either.

            “So… Nice office you’ve got here.” The stranger calmly spoke, while he reloaded his firearm. “I hope I didn’t interrupt anything important.”

             The old man looked over his dead coworkers as he realized how slim his odds were. If he wasn’t going to fight his way out of this " he will sure as hell talk his way out, decades of experience in the market at least thought him that, if not anything else. He though to himself as the intruder slowly strolled towards the table.

            “Don’t play coy, and don’t presume I’ll cower in fear, self entitled little twats like yourself don’t scare me.” He said, with all the confidence that he could muster. The trespasser walked over to the chair nearest to his target and raised an eyebrow.

“I have to say, I’m impressed, most people lose all will to talk after I kill their crew.” He said as he tilted the chair, making the corpse fall on the floor.

            “I’ve lost more and better friends in the liberation war, this crap doesn’t work on me, boy.” The man responded with, doing his best to stay calm, though he knew full well how deep a s**t he was in.

            “Not at all, it’s quite refreshing to talk to someone who still has a sense of dignity when faced with uncertain fate.” The attacked complimented him as he took a seat in the chair. “As for who I am, well… If it’s the name you want " it’s Leo and let’s just say I act as a facilitator on behalf of humankind, all I want is the preservation and well being of humanity.” Leo stated and smiled from cheek to cheek.

           

 

“Funny, coming from a man who just killed fourteen innocent people.” The man pointed out, as he put his empty gun on the table.

            “Twenty one.” Leo corrected him as if to point out a simple mistake. “Do not put such a high price point on human life, a death of an innocent is just as meaningless as a death of a criminal.” He remarked.

            The businessman started losing patience as he leaned in on the table. “It’s obvious that you’re not here to kill me, so just spit out what you want!” The old man demanded.

            “Straight to business, huh? Not surprising given your reputation.” Leo spoke as he took out a folder of documents from his back pack. “Thomas James Wilson.” He said, reading the front of the folder. “The owner and CEO of ‘TrackOil’. I must admit, you’ve done very well for yourself, pumping oil seems to be a very profitable occupation indeed. Tell me, why did you choose this particular line of work?”

            “I inherited the business from my mother, what of it?” He answered, unsure of where the man was going with this.

            “Did you inherit her lack of responsibility too?” Leo smiled and pointed at the document.” Says here you directly bribed several scientists to publish misleading research on the particular subject of climate change. Tell me, did you do that out of sheer ignorance or are you simply that much of a dick?”

            The endless insults proved a powerful weapon against Wilsons self-respect, as his ever-reddening face made evident. “Who the hell do you think you are?! Some vigilante out to save the world?! He shouted. “For a cold-blooded murderer your concern for global warming unbecoming of you.”

            Leo backed up in his chair and looked at the frustrated old man. “Oh my, such enthusiasm, although you might want to be careful, your heart rate has reached 162 beats per minute. Dying from a heart attack now would be a b***h, wouldn’t it?” He stated as he stared dead into Wilsons eyes.

            “How the hell do you…” Wilson started to say as he heard police sirens through an open office window, which didn’t seem to bother Leo.

            “The point is, Mr. Wilson, we don’t like the direction your company is heading, so what we’ll do is we’ll make you have a change of heart, willingly or not. Everything you need to know is in these documents.” Leo said as he pushed the folder towards the confused businessman and got up from his chair. “I believe it’s time to make my leave.” He said and just a moment later loud footsteps could be heard from the corridor.

            Wilson picked up the folder, which seemed oddly heavy for its size, unwilling to believe he’d be forced to be played like a puppet. “Who are you, people?” He said “Why are you doing this?

            Leo took out a second pistol and checked the magazine. “Ugh, like I didn’t just go through explaining this to you. All the whys and hows are to be answered, I just hope you’re man enough to recognize how dire the situation is.”  He said and started heading towards the exit but stopped near the door. “Oh, just a side note " the folder is rigged to self destruct in 5 minutes, don’t worry, nothing too violent.” He chuckled and walked out the door, leaving Thomas alone with his deceased coworkers.

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[1] M1911 is a semi-automatic handgun, it was the most used pistol in the United States Military from 1911-1985

[2] A joint is a common word for a hand rolled marijuana ‘cigarette’

Author's Note

An introduction to the two main characters, no plot development yet.