Earth

“We’re out of time”, he said while speeding down the hallway in his car.

He was a rich man. His rooms were renowned for being too spacious. His kitchen had a garden to its left where the shelves for the spices ended. His library was a town. Many people had shifted their home in there. They liked calling themselves the bibliophilic sect.

“Bloody hypocrites”, he called them “All they require is a free space for their mind and soul.”

It was his dining table, however, where a jamboree of sects and tribes had made their home. It went on for miles. At its centre he had set up a bazaar with all kinds of exquisites from all the different places that these people came from. So that they may each get a taste of the others’ creations. It was a nice place for the gatherers.

His bedroom housed the sea. This year was the beginning of disasters. It was the killer monsoons that created the flood. It overflowed down his bedroom to his entire house. And everything was about to drown.

“We’re out of time”, he said to the lady “We’ve gotta get out of here fast.”

“But what about all of them?” she asked.

“I can’t save them from the flood. I’m just a rich man.”

“But what about this place that you’ve built? You’ve spent a fortune and almost a lifetime building this.”

“I know. It almost feels too bad. I was so attached to this place.” He turns and looks at his drowning house for one last time, nostalgically. “But one day, I know, the floods will be over. The water shall be gone. And I’ll still be ever more rich. I’ll get this place rebuilt, brick by brick, all over again.”

“And what about all the different sects that had gathered in your home?”

“I’ve taken care of that too.” he chuckles “There’s this old man I came across. Quite talented. He’ll be building a grand boat. I’ve asked him to call two specimens from each sect…”

“You’re calling them specimens?”

“Oh! Come on. They’re just poor people. We can’t save them all.”

“So, you’d just let them die?”

“Look, honey. I can understand how you’re feeling. But you’ve got to understand – It’s the place that’s more important than the people. We’ll get more people, but we’ve got to take care of the place. And in any case, they were too flawed a bunch.”

“What makes you believe that the next bunch won’t be just as flawed?”

“I’m sure they’ll be”, he chuckles once again “But they’ll survive only until the next of the floods.”

“Then why choose this old man for the existence of your dreams?”

He smiles back at her.

“Sometimes, you have the money. And sometimes, you have the vision. But someone else has the capability. I’ve got knowledge and power, but he’s got the skills. I liked talking to him. A really strange old man. But I liked his confidence. When I shouldered him the responsibility, he seemed almost too confident that he’ll succeed. I liked him.”

“You almost seem to forget that they called you God.”

“Oh yes, that too. I almost seemed to like it when he called me by that name. I think I’ll use that name in the future. But do you think that name has any meaning at all?”

“Well, I feel it’s an intent rather than a meaning.”

“Maybe. But the intent exists only as long as I’m rich. You see, they’re no different from us. Just as I love the house more than its residents, they love my riches more than me. I’m nothing but my riches. And must forever stay so, so that both me and them can exist mutually. We all mean business.”

“This business you speak of seems like a game of endless annihilation to me where no one ever wins.”

“Annihilation? You must be joking. How can there be annihilation? If annihilation exists, its creator must’ve been a failure. And therefore, he couldn’t have created it. Annihilation, my dear lady, is impossible. For from the very moment that annihilation starts existing, it ceases to be.”

He drives his car in maximum speed to escape the flood. He drives his car, in the hallway and down the stairs, where he loses his balance and the car tumbles down the staircase and is shattered into pieces.

None ever comes to know about the accident.