Sixty-Five Percent

It was a grey and rainy day as Andrea trudged down the sidewalk. She walked with her head thrust down, not bothering to look at her surroundings. Instinctively, she turned the corner onto Main St., coincidentally the busiest street in her small town. Once it had seemed to her a beautiful area of the town filled with shops and restaurants, but those had closed up long ago and fallen into disrepair. The end result was a long line of empty, ugly, brown buildings taking up space along the pot- holed road. Today, however, it looked vacant and lonely.

"Hey baby, what's up!" Andrea turned her gaze to a dark alley where she could see two boys slightly older than her. She turned back down the road and thrust her hands firmly into her pockets.

"Yo, come on, don't ignore us like that!" The boys followed her, coming up on each side of her. They jostled her between them, shoving her back and forth. She hurried her pace, but they kept up with her. She growled and tried to slap one of them, but he caught her arm, not letting her go.

"Oh, you like to play rough, eh? I can play rough, too!" He brought his fast back behind his head and clenched his knuckles tightly.

"Ray, stop, there's a cop!" Ray glanced over his shoulder a an ancient police car making it's way down Main St. He let go of Andrea's arm and winked at her.

"We'll meet again, babe." He and his friend strolled nonchalantly down the street pretending not to pay the car any attention. It slowed down as it passed them, the officer inside carefully scrutinizing them. They smiled and waved happily to the officer inside who frowned, reluctantly waved back, and continued to slowly drive.

Disgusted, Andrea resumed her walk. She again put on her icy exterior, but inside she cursed the two boys with every ounce of venom she could muster. She paid no attention to another car as it drove behind her. It suddenly swerved into a puddle near the curb, splashing Andrea in mud and filth. She felt her face turn hot as she glared at the car and it's laughing passengers speeding away. She turned, expecting to see the police car in hot pursuit. Instead, she saw the officer talking with the two boys she had met earlier.

Venomous and humiliated, she continued the walk to a bus stop. She stood damp and livid, the wind blowing against her, knowing the bus wouldn't arrive for another ten minutes.

When it finally did, she could feel the disdain as the driver looked her over. She avoided eye contact with him, only searching through her pockets for bus fare. All she felt was a hole in her pocket.

"Well? Are you paying or not?"

"I'm sorry, I've got a hole in my pocket, it must have fallen out earlier."

"Then get off my bus!"

"Please, this has been the worst day of my life. I can pay you later."

"I said get off! City transport is for paying customers only!"

"It's only fifty cents!"

"Then it looks like it's fifty cents you don't have. And if you go around looking like that all the time, it's fifty cents you're probably not going to have for a while! Now step aside and let other passengers get on!"

Andrea heard the laughs and angrily stormed off the bus. She walked into a dark alley and kicked a trash can. Not feeling relieved, she picked it up and hurled it against a wall. She continued her angry tirade in the confines of the cement and brick alley until she was spent. She leaned against a wall and cried into her sleeves.

"You have not had the best day, have you?" Andrea became aware of another presence behind her. She turned around expecting another unpleasant surprise. She was instead greeted by a character she could never imagine.

It was seven feet tall and dressed in a rigid blue and green robe. It's arms were crossed behind it's back and it looked down upon Andrea unmoving. It's face was a gnarled mass of green wrinkles, it's mouth drawn into a stoic frown. Heavy brows lined the eyes which seemed to look through Andrea. They were black with only a small white pupil in the center.

"What the hell are you?!"

"That is not for you to know."

"I said what are you!"

"And I said that it is not for you to know. What I am is unimportant, it is what I can do for you."

"I don't need anything, okay? So just go back to whatever Halloween store you came from, because I don't want anything from you!"

"That is because you have a closed mind. You think only of what humans can give you, and what you want cannot be humanly given."

"If you're not human, than what. Oh, forget it, you're not telling me that, are you? Can you at least tell me what I can call you?"

"You may address me simply as The Beyonder."

"Right, Mr. Beyonder, if you're so spooky and mysterious, then what do I want? Tell me, what's the one thing I want more than anything else in the world?"

"The partial extinction of humanity."

"How did you.?"

"I have told you already, I am not human, and I know things no human does. For instance, I know you care a great deal about life and you want to lead a happy existence. You hate the rest of your kind though, because you think yourself an outsider. With that generalization, you believe your viewpoint is correct, because you have not bothered to hear anyone else's."

"So? Anyone with a degree in psychology could know that!"

"You moved here when you were twelve, made no friends on your first day of school, and gave up trying. Instead, you spent your time alone, outside, with nature. You have grown close to the living things of this planet, and hate the way humanity has raped the world. Extinction of species, deforestation, waste of natural resources, you blame it all on humanity, and for the most part, you are correct. This, combined with your fear and hatred of humanity leads you to wish for one thing and one thing only, the instant death of approximately sixty-five percent of all human life. You believe this way, the world would be able to replenish itself, new governments could be put up to help the remaining people, population could be at a controllable level again, and there would still be plenty of room for the animals you love so much."

Andrea stood shocked before the being before her. "Lucky guess," she muttered.

"One thing that I do want to know, tell me why you want to do this."

"Why? You nailed it on the head just now!"

"I want to hear it in your words."

"Fine, you want to know why? All my life, no one's bothered to get to know me. But you know what? I know them. I've seen every type of person on earth, and they're all the same. Just another life who probably won't make a difference, just going about their lives indifferent to everything else. And if they do notice the negative effect they're having on this planet and the life on it, they just turn a blind eye to it. That all seems pretty useless to me. I just want a majority of people to disappear so the planet can sustain humans alongside animals."

"How would you want them disposed of?"

"Humans? I don't know, just by random, maybe."

"What if you were in the sixty-five percent?"

"Fine then, some sort of moral code, and the worst sixty-five percent of humanity according to that code is killed."

"Who's morals are we judging an entire population against?"

"Mine!"

"So you'd kill a certain amount of people you thought were doing more harm to the earth than good?"

"Yeah, that sounds good!"

"Didn't you just tell me that you've seen every type of person on the earth, and they're all the same? If they're so similar, how would you decide who dies?" "Stop turning my words against me!"

"They are your own words, they and they alone reflect who and what you are. If you cannot defend them, then why do you continue to believe that you are right?"

"I guess it did sound pretty stupid. But you, you sound like you've rehearsed this speech a million times! I'm just making this up as I go along! What do you even want from me?"

"I want to grant your wish."

"Excuse me?"

"I have the power to grant your wish. If you want the opportunity, tell me now."

"How would it happen?"

"We would make a deal. I transport you to a place where you can decide the fate of each member of humanity at this moment. You will have as much time as you would require. No one would know it was you, and the people you kill will die instantly and painlessly. Should you succeed and find sixty-five percent of the human population that you would eliminate, you will be returned to your plane of existence with all biological corrections made."

"And if I can't do it?"

"Then you die."

"Why?"

"I firmly believe that your wish was born out of anger and I am curious to see if you can actually follow through in the viewpoint that guides your life. You believe that the weak and feeble have no place in this world, and if you could not save your life by painlessly killing a majority of your kind, then you could not live up to your own expectations of yourself, and that is the ultimate weakness."

Andrea took a moment to think of her choice at hand. The Beyonder stood before her still unmoving. "One question, what did you mean by 'at this moment'? Do I only have to eliminate as many people as were born then, or would I keep having to make corrections as more babies are born into the world?"

"Andrea, I stopped time several minutes ago." The Beyonder motioned to the opening of the alley, Andrea watching as well. A man with a briefcase was stopped in mid-step, balancing perfectly and precariously on the toes of his right foot. In disbelief, Andrea picked up a garbage can near her, marveling at how light it was to her. She threw it with all her might, but it simply stopped in mid-air the minute it lost contact with her fingers She pulled it to her, turning it upside down, then yanking the can up. Its contents hovered in front of her. She turned in stupefied marvel to The Beyonder who still gave no signs of emotion.

"I don't know what you are, but if you did all this, then you must be for real. Count me in." The Beyonder stuck out its hand, Andrea grasping it with hers in a shake. No sooner had she released its hand than they had already disappeared from the earth.