I wake up in an unfamiliar room. I am tied to the wall and handcuffed. I have no memory of how I arrived here. I study my surroundings. The room is cold and unforgiving. Tile floors; white, bare walls. Not a speck of dust anywhere. There are 9 others in the room, tied up like I am. In front of me on a small console are two buttons. One is labeled ‘live’, the other ‘die’. Before I can examine this further, I hear a voice, coming from an unseen loudspeaker. “If all choose life, no one lives. If all choose death, no one dies. You have fifteen minutes.” I look around and notice that everyone else is doing the same. No one breaks the silence for a few moments until I speak up. “We need to approach …show more content…
this as logically as possible. First, let’s see if there is any way for us to remove our restraints." I'm not optimistic.
The handcuffs are designed to prevent tampering. Even if someone had something they could pick the lock with, they wouldn't be able to reach it. Only our buttons are close enough to our hands. They want each of us to make a decision for ourselves. These people, or whatever brought us here, are serious. This isn’t just some game, for us anyway. There is no way to survive but to beat this puzzle. Sure enough, no one can find a way. After about a minute, we give up. The others look uncertain. Someone needs to take the lead, but no one seems willing. It will have to be me. "The best way to make sure that we all get out of here is to cooperate. If we all choose death, everyone survives." This might not have to be a difficult situation if I can just logically convince everyone that this is the best …show more content…
way. "One person could mess this whole thing up for all of us." a man says. "How do we know we can trust each other?" Great. If this person stirs up fear, it will be a million times more difficult to convince people to think. I consider this for a moment. "You don't. That's the key to this whole puzzle. If you don't trust anyone, you choose life to save yourself. But if everyone did that, we would all die." “How can I trust you all with my life? I’ve never met you before. I don’t know anything about you." The others are starting to agree with him.
He’s taking advantage of their fear. “We're entrusting our lives to each other no matter what we do. My life and the lives of everyone else here are in your hands, in all of our hands." I am becoming more desperate. I need to retake control of the situation. “For all any of us know, you could be part of this test. Maybe you’re trying to kill us. We don’t know anything about this situation, and we can’t make such a risky decision in these circumstances.” "Look, I don't know how we got here. I don't know what they are going to do with us after this. What I do know is that you need to cooperate, or the rest of us die. Are you willing to let that happen?" He shrugs defensively. “I don't know. I’d rather survive than some other recreant.” "Some other recreant? You're a coward if you aren't willing to take the risk and vote as a group." I feel myself begin to get angry. I need to cool down; I can't let emotions cloud my brain. I take a deep breath and think for a minute. The logical thing to do would be to choose the first option. How likely is it that everyone will work together? I have a much greater chance of survival if I don't think about the
others. On the other hand, choosing to live means sentencing the people who have trusted me, the people that are willing to risk their lives to save others, to death. Two buttons. Two paths, both possibly leading to terrible consequences. What do you do when logic goes against every moral system imaginable? Suddenly, I hear metal screeching, and see walls closing around my console and me. Panic overtakes me for a second. What are the others going to do? I was hardly listening for the last few moments! Discussion is over. You have ten seconds to press a button. “10… 9… 8… 7… 6…” the countdown continues. Hyperventilating, I take a deep breath to calm down and make my choice. “5… 4…” I steel myself to press the button. “3… 2…” I close my eyes. I reach out. I press it. “1.”
paradox, leaving no way of escaping from a dilemma. No matter what we do or say we
“They set a bomb off in the base,” she explained looking terrified. “Then they raided it and made sure that not a single one of us had escaped. I was lucky not to be there when it happened. I am even more lucky that they didn’t hunt me down.” She tipped the motorcycle over and hid it with some brush. “Follow me,” she demanded.
"Hold your hand Soldier. He's the bravest lad I've ever seen and I'll not have him whipped." He paused for a moment. " At least not until I've spoken with him and see what this is all about."
“Can I kill him? Can this be the end? No, it’s not going to work.”
“Your money or your life, why should I be in haste to give it my money? ”
I am laying on a bed in a cell of some sort, smaller and darker than what you see in movies. As time passes, I hear sounds of footsteps getting closer, guards come running past my cell. They are all armed. They stop a few cells over, then someone shouts. “no... you can’t!” and silence. I shiver in fear thinking “that could be me next.” The guards walk back carrying a motionless detainee, not a normal man, more of a lizard with scales and a tale but with the features of a human. Hours passed before I heard the stamping of the boots again, he was still unconscious when they put him back. As I struggle to find something to do, I noticed a crack in the wall. I look at it to inspect it, but it's just a crack. Then, as a guard opens my cell, another guard rush in and corners me. He steps up with a needle and jabs me in the neck, slowly everything gets blurry but I try to hold on. Nothing I do will help. I try to get out, but I'm too far gone to do so, then I
Could I really do this? I stood up on my chair. People die all the time, but people still moved on, right? So why can’t I move on too? I pulled the noose around my head, my hands trembling as I do so. If . . . if only I could start over. If only today hadn’t happened. I could change everything. No one would have to die.
In a deep gravely voice “Fine, your job is to stay behind and guard the base with your life, do I make my self clear!?”
“I-I don’t know,” he replies timidly. “Do we even know what we’re fighting for anymore?”
I notice something out of place at the end of the hallway. The light bulb was on. I can’t imagine why. The room has been empty for the entirety of my career. My curiosity burns bright as I peer closer at the door. I can’t help but feel drawn to it. I notice a sign underneath the light. ‘Patient 71. High Concern’. Surely I would’ve been notified of this patient. The lights flicker as I am eclipsed in maddening silence. I peer through the slit in the door, to be greeted by a young man sitting stiffly on the edge of his mattress, staring directly at me. I jump back in horror. How could he know I was there? I breathe heavily, feeling my heart beat through my ears.
Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share.” Steve Jobs made a good point. No one has ever escaped death and we all want to. That’s why you have to do what you love and not let the thought of death stop you.
"He's an easy target. Now move," he says, attempting to push everyone out of the way. The twins, however, stand there, stiff as a board and
Suddenly I awake at the noise of sirens and people yelling my name. Where am I? Those words radiate out my thoughts but never touching my lips. Panic engulfs me, but I am restricted to the stretcher. “Are you ok?” said the paramedic. I am dazed, confused, and barely aware of my surroundings. Again “Yes, I am fine” races from my thoughts down to my mouth, but nothing was heard. Then, there was darkness.
“Good job Matt, you did perfectly until the part where you got shot. Oh well, I guess not everyone is perfect so I let you have the job as undercover agent,” chuckles a man with a brown coat covering his big build body, “Dr., please give him the antidote for the memory loss, I want him to be back up and ready to go for work tomorrow.”
I woke up suddenly one day, I had been disturbed by the sound of the television someone had switched on. I heard a soft sweet voice coming out of the TV later. It was a little girl's voice but wasn't a distinct one. I could only hear a word, which was the last word of her mesmerising speech. And that was "Live!" Live. Just as simple as that, "Live". Live, it kept ringing in my head for the next few hours. I never expected I would get addicted to thinking this word over and over. I forced my dry mouth to open. It was like trying to pull open a lift stuck on the highest floor, and it ached too. I desperately told myself to refrain from the pain and just rip the door of the lift apart. Aaargh! It was futile. Totally, extremely hopeless. Again, my heart sank.