The Last Thought of God: V. The Choice

And now… I drift.

The silence has returned.
But it is heavier than before.
Not the emptiness of potential…
but the weight of failure.

I have nothing left to create with.
Nothing but the memory of pain.

Should I begin again?
Should I shape light from this darkness once more?
What arrogance would drive me to repeat that mistake?

And yet… what else is there?

I have seen what life becomes.
I know that free will is the flaw I cannot erase.

But to choose nothingness…
is that mercy?
Or is it simply fear?

I do not know.

I who once answered every prayer…
cannot answer this question.

And so I drift…
undecided.

Perhaps this is the answer, then.
To unmake even myself.
To let the last thought fade.
An ending more merciful than another flawed beginning.

I begin to let go.

And then…

I feel it.

Small.
Faint.
A ripple in the silence.

Not memory.
Not regret.
Something else.

Presence.

I reach—not in hope, for I have none.
I reach as I did at the very beginning… from loneliness.

And something answers.

A mind.
Flickering.
Barely real.
But real enough.

One of them.

Not a memory.
Not a ghost.
A consciousness… drifting.
Here.
With me.

I do not understand.
They should be gone.
I ended them.

And yet… this one remains.

Not speaking.
Not asking.
Only existing.

But it is enough.

Enough to stop me.
Enough to make me wonder.

Perhaps… not all endings are final.