One Chance

If you have not, you must play it.
It isn't long, but you should set aside as much time as you need to complete it.
It is free, it is contemplative, it is shocking, it is sad, it will haunt you.
It is worth your time.

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/555181
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As I started to play it, I suspected it was what it appeared to be, but I was not at all sure. After all, it would be incredibly unusual for me to come across such a thing. As I always do, I tried to see every corner and every object, person, and scrap of information, but this time it was in conflict with the growing certainty that what I did could be a one way trip. So I didn’t take up a women’s offer to enjoy ourselves.

I dreaded what I felt sure would happen. Our discovery would go wrong. I saw the planes fly overheard with a fear just beneath the surface of existence. Shortly after, it was confirmed. So then there was the choice left – the world was ending. Should I try to save it? Should I enjoy what time I had left? Should I care for the people I could? Or should I care for the world? Those questions were asked and cast aside because there was really only one questioned that mattered. What was right, what mattered?

So I went to work.

Each day, I tried to find out if there was something else, something I was missing. And each day things were frighteningly the same. While everything fell apart around me, I did the only thing I could do: go on. My wife became hysterical and lost her mind. She was a wreck, merely pieces of someone who had once been. My child was worried, neglected, and constantly on the precipice of finding out exactly what was happening. My colleagues were dropping like flies, losing hope and losing themselves to the apocalypse. And what of me? I might very well spend my last days on earth in a pursuit that would go nowhere.

My wife killed herself and my only thought was, “I hope my child didn’t see any of it.” That night we slept in a cursed house. Me fearing that something horrendous would happen. The scientists coming in a mob, an insane intruder, and monsters of every kind haunted me.

As each day passed, I knew what I was doing was the only real option, but on the last day I faltered. Shouldn’t I spend this last moment with my child? Silence. Then, hesitantly, but firmly the answer returned. No. What was right now was right all along. What mattered was the effort, the striving, the attempt. What mattered, even if it was hopeless, and I was the only one left to try, was that I do everything I could. Even if I knew 100% it would end in failure, it mattered above all else, literally above all else, that I do everything I possibly could to fight and to recover what was left. So I turned my back on my child.

She ended up coming with me. She waited by the door, slowly turning an ashen grey as I lost myself in formulas. In an impossible turn of events I succeeded. I had a cure. With nothing left, but my small triumph and a little time, I took my child to the park and we spent our last moments there. Alone in a dead world. Maybe it was kinder that she wouldn’t survive to see the aftermath. It was certainly a mountain of unknown, fear, and desperation that faced me now. I was probably one of a handful in the entire world left. Maybe the only one left. Still. Those last moments were beautiful, and I was so grateful to have a chance to enjoy them. And … what can the living do, but go on living? [ErgoProxy]