Who cares. This world -- this planet, and everything on it can rot.
After all, isn't that what all things are destined to do? Die and rot, forever.
And so..
..I don't care.
The End
by C4TCHFire
The Name
"He is a menace."
A man with an impressive width to him, his forehead and cheeks smothered with angry sweat and his eyes nearly bulging, spoke with a voice that neither whispered nor shouted, but steadily roared.
"He is a menace," he repeated, glaring at the camera in front of him, his words being broadcasted to every available television set in the world, "and he must be stopped at all costs."
A moment of silence passed, the man appearing to be both in considerable distress and in a fit of rage, his large chest heaving with unsteady breathing.
"Thank you, Mr. President."
The video of the President of the United States was boxed and shifted to a corner in the top right of the screen, while a newswoman wearing a grey suit shifted a pile of papers and cleared her throat, "That was President _______ with his.. opinion on our nation's latest, shocking story: A 17-year old boy from the state of ________, now on the run, has--"
"'--Discovered a particle that can create a weapon with such power that the damage, if used, would be on a colossal, almost nation-wide scale."
The white-haired youth yawned, leaning back into the worn-out sofa he was sitting on, and shut the TV off.
He was able to finish the newscaster's sentence before she could finish simply because he'd heard it enough times to subconsciously memorize it. However, it wasn't the "latest" story as the lady had told it to be - the government had been keeping him a secret for nearly a month, hoping to track him down and lock him away forever, pretending that the catastrophe was not as imminent as they believed it to be.
"'.. 'almost nation-wide scale,' huh..?"
The ghost of a smirk tugged at his lips. They had it all wrong. The government was, despite the information leak, still able to keep one vital fact from the public, and that fact was that the damage caused by the weapon wouldn't destroy a nation, or even "almost" destroy it.
The damage would vandalize the entirety of planet Earth, leaving nothing but ashes in it's wake.
Callen shut his television off with a casual flick and rose from the battered sofa. The face of the President, ugly with rage, burned into his eyes from the already black TV display. He chuckled at the thought of him; the stupid, hyped-up old grandpa who couldn't do anything but pace around in his office and rage, anxious for news of Callen's capture so he could relax once more.
He was thin for a boy his age, and odd-looking. Callen's white hair grew out in silky, long strands, and had grown to the point where a short ponytail was needed. His clothes were dull, albeit well-fitted to him, washed over with darker and lighter shades of black; and a large pair of earphones were clipped to the sides of his head. Standard procedure, that was, as the environment he was in required some measure of noise-cancelling.
The white-haired youth walked over to the other end of the room and pulled a door open. Inside was a room barren save for a peculiar-looking set of machines. Multiple desks with old-fashioned monitors and devices were stacked on top of each other, each display showing multiple confusing-looking charts and graphs, filled with algorithms and numbers that only the boy could fully understand. The room was littered with trash, crumpled papers, files, cabinets, and other miscellaneous objects that showed a history of tireless work - but Callen immediately was attracted to the machine to the far side of the room. It was comprised of a series of metal parts and gears, with a glass encasement connected to one side. Inside the encasement was a single, blue, dot-like particle the size of a dime, occasionally scraping the glass walls of it's confinement with strands of electricity. Callen walked up to it and felt the warm glass, his sharp eyes illuminated by the light within.
The Anton Particle. That's what it had been dubbed by leading scientists around the globe. A particle comprised of about a dozen different components, a whole bunch of them chemical elements that could be traced back to the periodic table of elements - the other half a completely unknown, but very lethal and highly dangerous material that bragged extreme amounts of unadulterated, pure energy. The amount of energy the Anton Particle was able to produce, and the compounds it was comprised of, was enough to create a weapon powerful enough to devour all life within a 570 million kilometer (squared) radius - a little over the surface area of Earth's land and water combined. Callen was humored by the amount of time the government had given him, their frantic but ultimately useless attempts to track him down giving him about a month of time to complete a rather simple research. There were about a million ways he could have gone about destroying the world - guns, large missiles, a great big cannon, anything. Joshua had decided to go with something simple, and sort of classic. A bomb.
Today.
Callen simply knew it somehow. All the research, all the preparation and work done far beforehand - today, his plans would be set into motion. There was no hesitation, no drawbacks, nothing to hinder him any longer. If there was regret in him, it didn't show at all, Callen's features were collected, calm, and cold-blooded as his eyes darted around at the multiple screens in the room, occasionally tapping at a keyboard or turning a knob slightly left or right. Last minute check-up's - little nitpicks to be dealt with before it would happen.
The white-haired youth wanted to be, despite the situation, theatrical about it. He felt no remorse for what he planned to do, and against all the odds, even wanted to give it.. a name. The name of the moment where everything would end, where all life on Earth would diminish in a matter of minutes or hours or whatever amount of time. A title. Naming something gave you power over it, a measure of control, a way to harness the significance behind the concept. The potency and sheer indefiniteness of the Anton Particle's bomb had power, and Callen, being the catalyst, wanted the pleasure of having control over that power in the form of a name. But it would have to wait until just a little later - perhaps a spark of creativity would hit him, and he'd have the perfect name for it. The event that would go down in history forever, except this time, nobody would be around to take notes, to jot down the finer points and put it in a textbook. This was the final, the last piece of history that would ever exist in the duration of human beings.
The clicking of keyboard keys came to a steady halt, Callen standing upright and closing his eyes for a moment.
Today.
And, suddenly, a bang. A noise, voices, from very far away.
What else was happening today?
Oh, yes. Today was, according to Callen's calculations, the day that the President's lackeys would find him. It had to happen sooner or later, didn't it? He glanced down at his wristwatch.
About an hour late. The Special Weapons And Tactics team sure are losing their grip, huh?
But no matter.
"Search the perimeter, look for signs of life, and shoot target on sight. He's here somewhere."
The voices, the banging, and the hustle of busy feet and hands grew closer and closer. Callen could actually feel the rumble in his feet, though, he wasn't sure if it was from the vibrations of the floor or his own trembling legs.
He would do it.
The white-haired youth massaged his forehead and lifted the glass case off of an object that looked strangely like the escape key on a standard keyboard.Callen had always wanted it to be simple, a big button to push to end it all. He still didn't know, though, why he chose the escape key, above all else. It wasn't like he had time to change it then, though. After what seemed like an eternity of constant noise, the banging finally rocked against the door to the room Callen was in.
"In here!"
It all passed by in a blur.
The door came down. People, various men with large suits of armor on, equipped with heavy firearms, rolled in and took aim.
And in spite of himself, Callen smiled, his finger already on the escape key. He had his name, the name of the moment where, upon pressing down on the key, everything would come to a close.
The End.
A blinding, white flash of light, a shockwave of immensely excruciating strength, the crushing weight of what seemed like the sky itself collapsing onto the Earth. All the pain and pleasure, freedom and death and life and happiness and sadness all drew to a close in a single moment --
and everything was still.
Absolutely still.
