Terminus - Second Draft

It was slightly after nine on a balmy summer evening and there was nowhere of importance for anyone to be. Chester strolled into a house that was set back from the main roads a bit, in a secluded littler corner of town. He just walked right in, not bothering with the doorbell; it was his place, after all. The brown paper sack he carried was required a strong grip.

As expected, everyone was crowded around the television in the living room. The big announcement would come at any moment and nobody wanted to be the last to know. There was Jamie, Chester's ex, sitting on the floor in front of the plasma screen. Her platinum blonde hair hung about her shoulders and she was wearing a beautiful white sundress. He had to hand it to her, she was never one to leave the house without looking her best.

His kid brother Tommy was lounging on the leather sofa, nursing a rather large White Russian in one of those old Disney character glasses, the kind that McDonald's would sell. It seemed like he was taking the whole thing in stride.

Annabel was sitting on the loveseat, the tight bun in the back of her head giving her away instantly. She fidgeted at every little noise and jumped almost three feet when Chester walked in behind her. He couldn't believe that Jamie would drag one of her co-workers over to his place. Didn't really seem to matter, but it was something that bothered him.

Chester's best friend Chris was still in his pajamas and still sitting in front of the sliding glass door, staring into the small vista offered by the dropaway of the backyard. He was outlined in the slight reddish hue of the evening sky. To Chester's knowledge, he hadn't moved in roughly six hours. Wondering if he'd spoken in that time was probably futile.

"Finally," Jamie said, the first to acknowledge his presence. She sat up and grabbed an empty wineglass from beside the TV.

"Apologies to anyone who isn't exactly big on merlot, but there wasn't much of a choice at the store," Chester said, setting the bag down on the glass coffee table and removing a $50 bottle of wine. Chester had already popped the cork on the street. Patience wasn't exactly a virtue he possessed anymore.

"At least we can appreciate the finer things," Jamie said. She took the bottle and poured herself a generous sampling.

Annabel took a healthy portion herself, her vessel of choice a coffee mug with a picture of a beagle emblazoned on the side. "There'll be a conference any minute now. We'll know something definite then."
"Fair enough. Hey, that reminds me, my bearing of gifts isn't over," Chester said. He reached into the bag and produced five rather fat stacks of cash, held together with strips of bank paper. He threw them on the coffee table and watched as six eyes widened and glistened. Cash still had some power.

"Holy mother of fuck, where did you get these?" Tommy asked. He sloshed a bit of his concoction onto the leather as he sat up and reached for a stack. Chester would have normally had some choice words for his younger brother over this carelessness, but matters were a bit different.

"The liquor shop was completely cleared out. Broken bottles, dirt, glass everywhere. The only things left were that bottle, a bloody floor, and a briefcase full of these. Merry Christmas, folks!" He picked up a stack and leafed it under his nose, taking in the scent of every note.

"Ten thousand in twenties. This is serious cash. You said there was a briefcase full of these?" Annabel said, some color seeping back into her thin, ashen face for a few moments. She threw her stack aside and attended to her drink.

"Some dumb bastard probably thought he had enough to get away, to hide somewhere until this whole thing blew over. Well, I guess he was a dumb bastard," Chester said, swigging from the bottle. "Isn't that right, Chris?" he shouted in the direction of the door. He received no reply.

So he chucked ten thousand dollars at his friend, hitting him in the back of the head. This elicited no response of any kind.

"Has he been like that the entire time?"

"Pretty much," Jamie said. With that, the group turned their attention back to CNN.

A newscaster was reading her copy with a voice that hinted ever so slightly at existential panic. Every few lines or so there was a pronounced warble to her voice, but for the most part her smart blue blazer and perfect makeup job gave her an air of calm professionalism.

Making sure that the ship goes down with all the lights still on, Chester thought. He managed a small chuckle.

"...called a press conference to announce findings that NASA is interpreting as we speak. Confirmation as to the object's path and trajectory are said to be the main points...."

The group didn't say a word for some time.

"You think there's some way to stop it?" Tommy asked. Nobody took their eyes from the screen.

Chester could not help thinking that this was par for the course for his little brother. He wasn't terribly bright. "You've been watching too many goddamn movies. Don't you think that we'd have heard something about it by now?" he replied.

Tommy backed down a little. "Dude, I just...I gotta...I just can't deal with silence. C'mon, you know that." He sipped his White Russian and leaned back into the love seat.

Chester had to pity the kid. He wouldn't live to see the legal drinking age.

The newscaster continued to display surface calm, but the facade was fading. Chester's eyes left the screen and noticed Jamie's bare legs glowing in the light of the television. There wasn't a word for how smooth they were, and the only words to describe their shape were 'utter perfection.' He had an intimate knowledge of every detail, every crest and curve of those legs. They'd been a couple for more than three years while they attended college. Recalling it now, the whole thing seemed like a fossil of some alien past. None of those memories comforted him and nothing within him was moved in any way.

"So now that it's come to this, I say we play a little game. If you had one more week and could do anything you wanted to with ultimate impunity, what would you do?" Chester said, craning his head to make sure that even Chris could hear him in his deep stupor.

Almost instantaneously Annabel answered, "I would write a novel and self-publish it. I don't give a shit how good it is, either. I just want my name on a goddamn book." Her eyes never left the screen as she took a sizeable plunge into her glass.

Chester chuckled at that. "Okay, then. What about you?" he asked, nodding at Jamie.

She had to think about that for a moment. "Swim in the Mediterranean. I never got the chance to."

Chester nodded and turned to his younger brother. "What say you? What would you do?"

Tommy took a giant swig of his White Russian and paused for a moment to wipe his lips clean. "Jessica Alba. For three days straight."

Chuckles cut through the silence. Even Annabel had to laugh at that. Jamie chucked her stack of bills at Tommy playfully.

"Good choice. He gets that impeccable taste from me, you know," Chester said.

"Stop it," Jamie said. Chester noticed some of the old sparkle in her eyes had returned, if only for a fraction of a moment.

Silence returned but the tension was gone. Everybody's attention returned to the television. From far beyond the backyard a distant explosion could be seen. The party barely flinched.

"Another gas station, probably," Tommy said to the room in general. A few people nodded in agreement.

The newscast continued, showing an empty podium in front of what appeared to be a sea of reporters, all clamoring for a story. The people still needed to know.

"Chris told me his dying wish once. Isn't that right?" Chester shouted in the door's direction. No reaction. "He told me that he'd always wanted to jack off on home plate at Yankee Stadium. Worthy goal, eh?"

This time only Tommy chuckled. Even the die-hard Sox fan that Chris was couldn't be bothered to respond to such a grave insult.

"He missed his chance," Tommy said. "Entire goddamn town's an ashpile by now."

"Hey, it's the thought that counts," Chester said.

The headline on the TV hadn't changed in three days: CRISIS ESCALATES. The news had a funny way of making humanity's final hours seem incredibly dull.

"Didn't they say that there was an outside chance that it would miss us?" Tommy said.

"What? When did they say that?" Annabel asked, returning to her jittery self.

"Jesus Christ," Chester said, "what did I just say?"

"I mean, they said that maybe it could just pass us by, that we wouldn't know for sure until...until, well, now. There's an outside chance, isn't there?" Tommy took a sip, punctuating his thought.

"Yeah, I remember hearing that," Annabel replied. She had gone erratic, moving her drink between hands and hanging onto Tommy's every word.

"No, no you didn't!" Chester shouted. Jamie snapped her head toward him with a look he remembered all too well. She was good with scorn.

"Hey, there's no reason to yell at her," she said. Firm, yet calm.

Chester rubbed his eyes in frustration. "Look, all I'm saying is...why the hell are we even talking about this? I haven't heard a goddamn thing about this in the two weeks since all the other stations went out. You think that somebody at CNN would've mentioned that there was an outside chance that everyone would be okay? I mean, of all things to fuckin' report on..."

"Yeah, but..." Tommy couldn't find the words. "Maybe there's a way some people can survive, underground or something."

"Fuckin' beautiful," Chester said, walking to the kitchen. In a pissy tone, he added, "Anybody need anything?"

"Ice," Tommy replied, eyes glued to the floor in front of the TV. The part of the floor that Jamie's legs occupied, to be exact.

Oblivious to the leering of the younger sibling, Jamie chimed in. "What's the problem, Chet? He's just talking, who's it hurting?"

"Well, the first problem is that I know I told you never to fucking call me that. Second of all, where the fuck did I put the ice bucket?" Chester replied, his echo bouncing off every surface. The postmodern trappings of Chester's home ensured that the smallest whisper was carried to every corner of the building.

Jamie finished her glass with a steady swig. "Oh, grow up. What does it really matter? You're always too goddamn hard on people." She dutifully poured herself another glass.

"I just...it's too much to deal with," Chester replied.

"What do you think he's trying to do?" Jamie said.

After a silent moment Chester returned to his seat with a full bucket of ice and a toothpick in his mouth.

"There, you've got enough ice to last you till the end of time."

He started hoarding the rest of the wine. Nobody said anything for a while. The news now started displaying a graphic of the projected impact zone, somewhere to the south of Paris. A sigh of relief came from both sides of Chester, as Annabel and Tommy decided to simultaneously let off a little steam.

"Well thank God for small favors, huh?" Chester said, laughing to the room.

"It's a pity, actually," Jamie said.

Chester cocked his head in her direction, an almost involuntary reaction.

"What? Why?" Tommy asked.

"Yeah, this is a good thing, isn't it?" Annabel asked.

Chester didn't attempt to hide his snark.

Jamie ignored the dirty looks from her ex-boyfriend and explained herself. "Not really. They get out of it kinda easy. For them, it's over in a second. No thought, no real fear, and nothing prolonged. They're the luckiest ones in all of this. We'll suffocate."

It took a moment to truly sink in. Tommy blurted out, "We can still hide, can't we?"

"Yeah, we could leave now and get to a fall-out shelter. There's gotta be one within a few miles, right?" Annabel asked, the look of determination on her face entirely out-of-place as she stood, determined.

Chester chuckled. "Do you really wanna go back out there? Do you have any idea what it's like right now?"

Annabel returned to her seat and took the wine from Chester, helping herself to a generous gulp.

"Besides, they've probably been full for days now. This is a room full of bright fucking ideas tonight. Just genius-level shit, from all of you." Chester slouched into the sofa.

Jamie looked thoughtfully in Chris's direction. The buildings on the skyline clashed with the red twilight.

"We should get on the roof soon. After they announce zero hour. Maybe sooner." Jamie said.

Chester shot her a perplexed look, one that he'd perfected over the course of their relationship. "What the hell are you on about now?"

"It's gonna be our last sunset. And when it hits, we'll have a hell of a view for a while," she reasoned.

Annabel chimed in, "She's got a point."

Nobody expected it, but Chester could not help himself. It was as if he'd heard the funniest joke in existence and needed to get every bit of good cheer out of his system. He hacked and gasped and his skin began to match the hue of the evening sky. Snot and saliva were shot in all directions. He fell off the sofa as a drunk would, leaning his head on Annabel's skinny legs. She could only watch in muted horror. Tommy was taken aback and Jamie managed a soft smile as she looked on.

After finally catching his breath, Chester look to Jamie and said, "Tha-that's fuck...fucking brilliant. Why couldn't you have been this funny when we were dating? It would've made the sex a hell of a lot better."

"What's so funny about it?" Jamie asked.

"I mean...who fucking thinks about the view? The world's over, honey! That's it, this is zero fucking hour, and you treat it like a front row seat to some goddamned movie or something. 'Ah, yes, I hear that End of All Things is a rager, let's go see it!' I wish I had your worldview sometimes, it would be awesome to see the world like a fucking child does."

Jamie rubbed her forehead with both hands, doing her best to stay patient and calm. "What sort of reaction would satisfy you, huh?"

Chester's chuckling began to abate. "Well, I dunno, something with a little more depth than 'it's going to look so pretty!' would do just fine. Not that I'd expect it from you, but anybody else, sure."

Annabel's face was frozen. Chester continued to lean on her from his new seat on the floor. Jamie kept her voice as steady as she possibly could. "Okay...let me ask you something: what the hell does it matter?"

"Oh, it matters a great fucking deal. It matters because we can't just say that 'it's not the end of the world,' 'cause that's almost here. Life's not gonna go on and we're not all gonna wake up from some shitty little dream. It matters because you're like all these other fuckers trying to believe really fucking hard that this isn't really happening. It hasn't sunk in yet that your time is up."

CNN continued to hype up the official announcement of the end of time. Nothing else in the living room made a sound.

If it was five minutes or an eternity nobody could have been sure. Jamie never broke eye contact with Chester. Tommy couldn't look at his brother and Annabel couldn't tear her eyes away from the TV.

"What, you think you're gonna live forever?" Jamie asked.

Chester managed a bit of a smile. "Fair enough," he said as he stood up, shaking Annabel's body but not her bearing.

"Okay, okay, it isn't quite time for the funeral yet. We've gotta cheer the hell up somehow! C'mon, nobody asked me what I'd do with another week here, someone ask me what I'd do for a week."

Tommy's voice was small but he managed, "What would you do, Chester?"

"I've thought about it pretty much all day, I really have. And, I've decided, that there are many things I'd have done. Maybe I'd have actually fallen in love with someone sentient enough to recognize her own mortality," he said as he gestured to Jamie.

"Maybe I'd have associated with better fucking people, maybe spent time with Dad down in Lake Tahoe. At least it would have been worthwhile conversation." A sideways glance at Tommy.

"Perhaps I would have had the balls to shut down completely like our good friend Christopher over there," Chester said as he looked down at Annabel. "Hey, Chris, if you're having a fucking ball, don't say anything!"
Of course, there was no reply.

"That's what I fucking thought. Yeah, there's a lot you can do in a week, a lot of worthwhile and fun and productive and memorable things. Instead, I spent this week hearing about everybody's worst fucking fears or how we could survive this or this and that. But with all that time I finally decided what it was I would want to do. Hell, I've done it already. Maybe I'll do it again."

He reached into the paper bag, producing a weathered pistol.

Jamie instinctively crawled backwards, bumping into the television. Tommy's eyes widened as he shrank into the love seat. Annabel froze, eyes glued to the gun.

"I decided that I wanted to see what it was like to kill a man."

"Hey, Chester, c'mon now, nobody wants any trouble here, dude. Put it down," begged Tommy.

"I mean, what's the difference. There would be no 911 call, no police, no trial, no sentence, and no punishment. The perfect goddamn crime." His eyes didn't leave the floor.

Tommy got up slowly, his hand in front of him as if trying to will the weapon out of his brother's hand. "Hey, now...no need for this. We can talk about this, it's okay."

Seconds ticked by. CNN was interviewing a top astrophysicist about the impact timeline. A lifetime passed by inconsequentially. Nobody moved.

"At least this way, there was some sort of sense behind it, right?" Chester had their complete attention.

He regarded his brother. "C'mon, we've shot these before. Why so scared all of a sudden? What harm's it gonna do now?"

"Hey, bro...just...put it down," Tommy said.

"How do you think I got the wine, or the cash? People still fight for these things, you know. And it's the easiest goddamn thing in the world to do." He pointed the gun at Jamie with a sharp little smile. Then he turned and shoved the barrel into Annabel's temple as she shivered. Her face showed nothing but terror.
Chester had gotten the reaction he wanted. He got the fear.

"I mean...at least this way has a bit of purpose to it. Right?"

Chester moved with a swift hand and placed the barrel in his mouth. An instant later he jammed a finger down on the trigger. Everyone in the room who saw this final act would say that time seemed to slow, as if this moment in particular chose its own life span and had decided to stick around for a while longer than usual.

Every thought that Chester ever had now stained the kitchen in smatterings of scarlet and pink. Some bone white was thrown in as if for good measure. A modern artist might have even called the spray beautiful for all its sick symmetry.

CNN had cut the interview short. The screen was dominated by a view of from inside Ground Control at Houston. The atmosphere was uncommon for times of crisis.

Viewers saw celebration. People were embracing, crying, hopping with the glee that not even the happiest children could ever possibly muster.

A new headline dominated the lower part of the screen: FINAL PROJECTION: COMET TO MISS BY 35,000 MILES.

It should have been the happiest moment in human history. For many, it truly was. The inhabitants of the living room didn't acknowledge the television, and didn't hear the good news. Chester's form fell to the sofa with a sharp smack and a hollow sort of apathy.

From the door, it seemed that the gunshot stirred something within Chris.

He said, "I call next."