The Interview

"Did you do it?"

"Of course"

"Of course what? Of course you did it or of course you didn't do it?"

"Why do you ask?"

"There are people that think you shouldn't be killed."

"All of a sudden, I have so many people making decisions about my death. I didn't know there were so many gods on earth."

"But you committed a crime."

"Yes. I spied for another country. I committed treason. But I didn't kill anyone."

"Your actions might have caused deaths."

"Might, you say. I was of the assumption that all claims must come with proof. Have you provided one corpse that was a result of my crime?"

"No, but it was highly likely that what you did would result in the deaths of your own countrymen."

"And now you send me to the guillotine, on account of an assumption that is highly likely. They decide how my life should be from birth. What I should do and what I should wear. They decide how good my life should be by how much money I can make and with that, they decide whether I should eat a hot meaty meal or cold stale soup. They decide where I should work and if i should even work. When I get sick, they decide if I'm worthy of treatment, and if I'm not, they suffocate me with debt. Now, it's time for me to die, and these earthly gods wouldn't even let me decide what way I should be killed. The power they have held over my life does not satisfy the gods. They must wield power over my death as well."

"So you would like a choice?"

"Between a guillotine, a bullet to my head and a blunt machete? Yes I would like a choice. What difference does it make, you ask? Well I love life. With a guillotine, my head comes clean off in a moment. With a gun to my head, my brain is blown to bits in a second. But with a blunt machete, I get to savor a few more moments of this life that I love so much. The pain from each repeated strike of the machete reminding me that I'm still alive, like a pinch that brings me back from a daydream."

"But you will still die at the end"

"But I will still live, don't you get it? I will still live a few miserable moments longer."

"For someone who wants to cling to life so much, someone who is so afraid of dying, you seem so calm."

"Why my good friend, you also seem calm."

"I'm not the one on death row. You are."

"But you also are my friend, your execution could even happen before mine. The catch is, I know the precise moment of my death. I know the means of that death, that is why I'm so relaxed. You on the other hand, have no idea what it's going to be. You do not know whether it'll creep up on you in your sleep, or if it will catch up with you while you're relishing moments with your loved ones, hoping that moment lasts forever. You do not know whether it'll be a blunt machete or a noose breaking your spine. You do not know if you will burn to a crisp in a house fire or drown far out at sea. It could be any of these ways, maybe even worse. How do you remain so calm, not knowing when and how your life ends?"

"Because I trust God."

"And you think I don't?"

"If you did, you wouldn't put his people in danger by spying for their enemy."

"His people? Who do you think His people are? The same ones who claim to abhor death but wouldn't hesitate to kill a man for selling a secret? The ones who's childish curiosity piques at the spectacle of death, that they have made it an exhibition to be enjoyed by the masses? This godless crowd are whom I've been forced to submit the most precious things to. My life and my death."

"What makes you better than them? You sold your soul for a few pieces of silver and what can that silver even get you? A house? A new wife? As much as you love life, that silver wouldn't elongate your life a second longer than it is meant to last. Yet you put the lives of your kinsmen in peril with your avarice, and now you claim they are godless. I shudder to think what earth would be if you were the godly one. One with no care for any other soul in the world apart from his own. Who loves life so much, that he is willing to let his tribe die as long as he can live. And now I ask you, who is worse? The one who wants to play god and judge over the life and death of hos fellow man or the one who sells his fellow man's life for a reward that will not even put off his death?"