My eyes open and I take in my surroundings. I am in a dark room in a small circle of light. The only furniture I can see is the chair that I am tied to. I have a pounding headache and I can feel a warm trickle of blood moving down my face.

“Good, you are awake” says a man standing on the outer edge of the light, his face cloaked in shadow. “I suppose you have some right to know why you are in this condition. Though I don’t see why. Either way you are dead and dead men tell no tales.”

“What are you talking about? Where am I? Who are you?” I ask, as I twist in my bonds trying to undo the knot holding my hands.

“I am talking about your ‘heroic’ actions, the entire reason we are in this situation. As to where you are, what I believe you mean to ask is when. You are still back in the year 2021 and I am here to stop your so called heroism. Finally, your last question, you do not need to know who I am. All you need to know is that I have been given a task I am not allowed to fail.”

“So you were sent by the mafia from my time period? And your task is to kill me? Am I right?” I ask as I finally get a good grip on the knot and begin to work at it.

“You are half right. My job is to kill you, but we were sent by the same company” states the man. My hands freeze and I look up at the man, trying to make out his face. The company that had sent me was only trying to prevent an epidemic that would be happening in a few weeks. I was sent with the antidote that I would inject into the first person to contract the disease before it could be passed on, thereby killing it.

“You are wrong. The company that sent me is trying to help the world. I was sent back to become a hero by saving millions.”

“Oh, no. If you had succeeded in this mission you would not have been welcomed back as a hero. You would be hated by everybody on the overpopulated Earth. It would be your fault that there was not enough food to feed everybody and you would be in hiding from everyone and everything. You would never know when the day would come that you would be caught and killed. You would only know that even if you survived attack after attack the people would eventually win.”

“How can you know all of this? The company said I would be welcomed as a hero. They promised.” I murmur. My hands begin to work again and I unravel the knot. I hold the rope in my hands, waiting for my moment to strike.

“I know all of this because I am you” states the man. As he says this I jump out of the chair. I can’t believe him. None of it can be true. I wrap the rope that he used to tie my hands together around the man’s neck and bring him to the ground. As he hits the ground his face comes into the light. Staring up at me is my face, but with a horrible scar going from his eyebrow to his chin. He is jerking as I choke him, his hand going to his belt. Then, suddenly, I feel a pain in my chest. I look down to see his hand holding a gun with a silencer on it. I stand up, pressing my hand to my chest where the bullet had gone in. I watch my blood seep through my fingers, slowly at first but then faster as if my body just realized it should be bleeding.
I stand up and look at myself. “I had the best intentions when I came to stop this epidemic. I could never have known what would happen when I did. Now just know that it is in my best intentions to die here and now.” As I finish talking I raise the gun and watch as I shoot myself in the head. A fast death — I give myself the most I could have wanted.