He
was tired. The next morning, he was to die. The man paced around his room with
his hand under his chin. With the time limit on his life, many thoughts were
suddenly rushing into his already troubled mind. All of a sudden, the idea of
death became apparent to him. For his whole life, he had been running away,
constantly pushing away the fact that he was going to die when he was old and
frail. Now that the moment had come at such a young age, all the pressure came
crashing down on his mind. What would he do before he died? He looked around
the room. He could not see much, as there was barely any light. The only light
source was from a grimy window, so greased up that it the light barely
penetrated the glass. This dark, gloomy setting put down his mood to the point
where he had almost lost hope. He looked around the room once more, in a
desperate attempt to accept his situation. Beneath the window, there was a
small round wooden table with a bucket full of water in it. He saw that the
water was coming from the ceiling, where there was a leak in the centuries-old
cobblestone and mortal. He also noticed that every time he put his foot down on
the floor, the table wobbled. Beside it, there was a small blue cushion,
probably to substitute for a chair. He glared intensely at the table, and an
idea popped into his mind.
Quickly but rather
quietly to not alert the guards, he leaped towards the chair, and looked at its
legs. He saw that one of them was loose. He carefully grabbed the loose leg,
and twisted it slowly until it broke off from the rest of the table. The end of
the leg was curved, shaped peculiarly like a spoon. He made up his mind on that
spot: This is what he would do before he died. He would escape. For he decided
that his death was up to whichever path he was put on, and should not be
decided by other humans. Very carefully, he set the table down, and saw that it
still stood on three legs, though somewhat unstable. Silently he grabbed the
cushion, and stood on the table. He reached up to the crack where the water was
dripping down from, and wrapped the table leg with the cushion, to muffle as
much noise as he could. He scraped away for a good two hours, and the little
light that was coming from outside the window began to fade out into pitch
darkness. He had almost taken out the looser stone and was about to pull it out
when suddenly, he placed his foot back, but could not see where he set his
foot. Losing his balance, the table toppled over, and he hit his head on the
hard stone floor. Everything was bright, and then faded back into dark.
He woke up to the sound
of scratching. He moved his head, immediately regretting that decision. Pain
seared through his temple like a bullet. Now only daring to slightly move his
head, he looked down at where the scratching noise was coming from. He saw that
it was a rat, scuttling about and chewing on what looked like bits of bone. Crying
out, disgusted, He scrambled onto his feet, ignoring the unbearable pain in his
head, and quickly backed up into a wall. Gasping, he dropped back down and
looked around again: This room looked different. The dripping was gone, and
there was no window, but this time, there was a single candle on the wall,
alight with a small flame. This gave him a comforting feeling, an almost
homeliness mixed with melancholy. He wished he could go back home.
When his head and heart ceased pounding, he
looked back at the rat. Slowly creeping closer, he stared at it. Knowing that
it was being watched, the rat fidgeted around, occasionally glancing up at him.
"Hello, little rat", he said. The rat stayed in the same spot, still
looking at the human whilst gnawing on that piece of bone. "It's
unfortunate that you have such a ugly name for you", he said again after a
few seconds of silence. "People see you and think you're always up to no
good, but you just look harmless and innocent!" he remarked. Seeing that
it stayed still, the man stopped talking for a few minutes in deep thought. "We
are not so different, little rat." he said after. "Society both hates
us for things that out species scarcely do... If the people gave us a chance,
we could possibly merge back into being accepted!" The man smirked to
himself. "Look at me! Stuck in this measly dungeon, my execution tomorrow
morning imminent." he exclaimed, exasperated. "Humans shouldn't kill,
what gives them the right to choose the fate of others?" He shouted this
time, causing the guards outside his door to yell at him to shut up. "It's
too harsh", the man muttered to himself. His head began to hurt again from
the shouting, and he closed his eyes. Before he knew it, he was drifting off to
sleep.
He woke up to the sound
of rattling at the door. "Wake up! Wake up, you rat! This is your last
meal!" A guard shouted from the door. A bowl of gruel and a stale loaf of
bread was slid through a wide slit on the door. Rousing himself quickly, the
man scrambled forward and snatched the plate. He began to ravenously inhale the
small amounts of gruel-porridge there was, using his hands as a spoon of sorts.
After wiping the bowl clean, he turned to look at the loaf of bread, but was
shocked and disgusted to see that rat with its body practically inside the
loaf, tunneling through with the same raging hunger that the man had. Complete
anger took over the man's head. He felt his heartbeat in his forehead as he
smashed his foot down onto the rat, stomping it as many times as he could until
he was sure it was dead. "Damn rat!" He screamed. "You dirty
animal, you good-for-nothing scoundrel!". When the squealing had stopped,
the man lifted his foot. He saw the gnarled mess of what was originally the
rat. As quickly as it had come, the anger faded away. Like the ocean tides,
another wave of emotion came upon the man: But this time, a wave of sadness;
regret. "What have I done?" He thought to himself.
At that moment, the door
swung open. "What a mess you have made," the guard said. "Come
on, it's your time to go now." The guard gestured towards the door. The
man contemplated running out the door and
then out of the dungeon as far as he could. Then, looking back at the
rat, he sighed, and followed the guard out of the door.
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