Average
It’s a cold night as Robert Reginald stares out of the only window of his tenement flat. He sits on the sill, in complete darkness, and looks up at the bright twinkling stars. He is counting them - a habit he has gotten into of late – in an attempt to grow tired, and eventually fall asleep. He would count sheep if there were any, but unfortunately the only thing he can see when he looks out of his window is a concrete jungle that covers every square foot for miles.
He sighs as he grows tired of trying to make himself tired.
His worry keeps him awake. He used to blame his insomnia on the fact that his neighbours threw parties on different nights of the week – he thought it was a conspiracy. If it wasn’t the neighbours above him it was the neighbours below, and if it wasn’t either of those two culprits then the ones directly across from him used to pick up the baton and throw the loudest, wildest parties that even Gatsby himself wouldn’t be able to match. But now, he finds himself sitting in complete darkness – in absolute silence – and is still unable to sleep.
The parties had stopped a few weeks before tonight, and Robert – being Robert – was not bothered to take a step out of his flat to find out what could possibly stop the noise that had become a standard feature in his day-to-day life.
He works remotely, from the comfort of his own home, and hasn’t been out of the house in years. The 21st century technological boom has provided hermits, like himself, the perfect environment to feed his insatiable need for solitude. He orders groceries online - and pays the delivery person extra to leave the groceries in their crates outside his door. He never has to worry about buying new clothes because nobody ever sees them but him. Most importantly, he never has to interact with anyone – and that is the best thing in the world, in his opinion.
But now his groceries are late; his boss is not answering him; his neighbours have gone silent, and every building is dark. It has only been a couple of days since the electricity went out, but Robert is starting to seriously worry that this outage is not the temporary kind. He doesn’t know how much longer he can deal with the smell of rotten food all around him, but he’s not yet reached the point where he feels that he has to go outside and investigate what has happened.
He starts his count again and is on 77 when the knock on the door makes him jump. He quickly covers his mouth with his hand, and tries to calm his breathing as his worst nightmare takes hold. It had been years since someone had knocked on his door; it had been years since he had seen another person’s face at all.
He tries to calm himself. He forces himself to think, “they’ve knocked on the wrong door, and have realized their mistake, and are walking away.”
He has almost managed to get his heart rate down when there is a second knock.
‘Bob Reginald, open up – I am Colonel Randall and I do not want to have to kick down this door,’ a man’s voice sounds loudly from the corridor.
Robert closes his eyes and distracts himself by thinking about how much his mother used to hate when anyone called him Bob.
“Your name is Robert Reginald, and I won’t let anyone take away the majestical nature of such a fine name by calling you something as common as Bob!”
Robert finds that quite amusing now as he is, in all considerable aspects, common. He is as average as they come, in his own humble opinion, and he doesn’t want to be anything more than that. He is content with average; he likes average. That is why it makes no sense that anyone from the military – let alone a colonel, would be looking for average Bob Reginald.
‘I’m giving you 5 seconds before I bust this door down; I am coming in, one way or another, son,’ the Colonel says to break Robert from his comforting thought process.
‘What do you want?’ Robert squeaks, as he fails to keep the panic out of his voice.
‘The planet needs you, son,’ the Colonel calmly replies.
‘The planet?’
‘Yes, the planet. You know, Earth? The plague isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.’
‘The plague?’ Robert raises his voice as he asks.
‘You have got to be kidding me,’ he hears the Colonel whisper, ‘look, son, I don’t have time to catch you up on what’s happening in the world right now, just open the door, I need to get you back to our HQ – and then I’ll tell you everything that you need to know. It’s not safe here, Bob – we need to go.’
’With all due respect Colonel, I don’t want to go anywhere – if there is a plague, I think I’m just going to wait it out. You guys will come up with something, you always do.”
’With all due respect, Bob, you don’t have much of a choice of whether or not you want to wait it out. You’re coming with me, whether you like it or not.’
‘What about my rights!’ Robert shouts as he starts to panic again.
‘Your rights went out the window as soon as the plague came through the door, son. Now, I’m not asking again, open the door.’
Robert feels like his chest is about to explode as he tries to find a way to avoid his worst nightmare. He considers jumping out the window but finds that he is too scared to die. He considers grabbing a knife from the kitchen but finds that he is too scared to kill. He is unable to think of anything else when there is a loud bang as he sees his door come clean off its hinges, and a man in a biohazard suit walks into the flat.
Robert can’t see any part of the man but can see what a big man the Colonel is. The biohazard suit is tight, and Robert thinks that if the Colonel moved too suddenly the suit might tear.
Colonel Randall unzips a protective pouch on his suit, pulls out another suit and throws it at Robert.
‘Put that on before we leave, this place is probably the only place on the planet that hasn’t been affected by the plague, but once you’re out there it’s like a disease, son.’
Robert doesn’t need a second invitation; he picks up the suit and puts it on. It hangs loosely on him, compared to the tight fit on the Colonel.
‘Come on, we need to go,’ the Colonel says as he turns and heads for the door.
Robert doesn’t follow him, and when the Colonel realises that there is only one sound of footsteps he turns around, and sprints to Robert.
Robert is frozen as he watches the hulk of a man sprint straight at him and stop centimeters away from his face.
‘I don’t know what kind of weird shit you’ve gotten up to in this room for the past 6 years, but you listen to me, and closely boy! There are billions of lives at stake and, whether you like it or not, you’re quite possibly our only hope of saving any of them! So, when I order you to do something I expect it to be done before the words are even out my mouth! I will not tolerate any form of incompetence! Do you understand me!?’
Robert can hear the Colonel’s breathing get heavy as he finishes speaking. The Colonel turns away from him and puts his hands on his knees before he lets out guttural coughs for 2 minutes straight. The only thing Robert can do is watch as the Colonel instinctively tries to wipe his face before he realises that his biohazard suit is in the way.
The Colonel begins walking to the door again, a lot slower than he did before, and this time Robert follows him.
Robert follows the Colonel up multiple flights of stairs before they enter a door that takes them onto the rooftop of the tenement. There is nothing outside, and Robert starts to panic as his brain naturally envisions the Colonel picking him up and throwing him off the rooftop – for no real reason at all.
But then a sleek jet appears from thin air. It’s titanium shell opens with a hissing sound; its sharp nose is tilted at an upward trajectory, which allows the Colonel to reach the cockpit without any ladder, or other equipment.
The Colonel just looks in Robert’s direction and Robert races to join him in the cockpit of the jet.
The titanium shell closes, and the world suddenly goes dead silent.
‘These suits are among the most advanced that we have, they will allow us to reach where we’re going without an issue – just thought I’d tell you that before you start to freak out, cause I don’t particularly like the thought of a fight when I’m trying to pilot an aircraft,’ the Colonel calmly says as he presses a few buttons and pushes a joystick forward – sending Robert’s head cannoning backwards into the headrest.
Robert can’t think, he can’t really move as the aircraft’s inertia keeps him pinned to his seat. The world blurs past as they ascend, the sky changes rapidly as they make their way further into the deep darkness of space.
A trip that only takes a few minutes feels like a lifetime to Robert as his anxiety flares, and the reality of the situation hits him square in the chest. He finds himself thinking that if he could go back to his flat, to just before the Colonel kicked his door down, he wouldn’t hesitate to jump out the window.
It is all too much for him as he barely has time to come to grips with the fact that he has just travelled further away from his comfort zone than he ever has in a matter or mere minutes, and he isn't even sure of the reason why.
A massive white vessel grows larger and larger as Robert and the Colonel draw nearer and nearer. The Colonel slows down, before coming to a halt, right beside the vessel that can now clearly be identified as a space station.
‘Welcome to your new home, Bob,’ the Colonel says as he looks at the space station.
In this moment, Robert Reginald feels a lot less average.
