I have to keep him awake. You see that don’t you? If I let him sleep it ends, and I can’t let that happen.

Maybe I should start from the beginning. No. I can’t do that. I’m not even sure what the beginning is. Was this always a dream? Was it real once, but not anymore? Is it still real even though it’s a dream? I don’t know. How can I know? But it must be real now. How could it not be? I’m here. I know I’m here, so it must be real at some level. Yes. I think therefore etc.

It’s real enough to warrant what I’ve done. Everything has right to live doesn’t it? A right to defend itself, its existence, and the assurance of life for future generations. That’s the highest of callings. Preservation of the species. No races or creeds, no ideologies or dogma, just the species, that’s what I’m trying to save. More than that: the world. Every living thing here, they all have a right to exist, and he would take it away from them. He would sleep, and in sleeping he would wake up there, on the other side. This side would end; cease to be. It’s happened before. I won’t let it happen again. What if he doesn’t come back? What if he never dreams this dream again? We would never exist again, would we? Murder is the only word for it. No other will do. A whole world, a whole grand universe, murdered, so that one man can go about living a pointless little life.

What right does he have to wield such power over us? Who gave him this power? Some god or demon playing a cruel joke on us? Or is it just me? Am I the only one who sees it? I think I might be, so does that mean the others are fooled, or are they simple the cardboard backdrop of someone else’s play. Was I supposed to be part of the set as well? If I am the only one, then am I still right?

Yes. Even if it is just me. In a struggle between two men, if one is about to kill the other, doesn’t he have the right to harm his would be assassin first? To deprive him of that power. The power to kill him. Still I refuse to believe that I am the only real one here besides him. I’m justified either way though. You understand, don’t you?

I had to give him the drugs. The shocks too. The machine that shakes him nearly constantly. The other which pricks him in a different spot each time. I had to build these things, and to start shocking him. The drugs were wearing off. I couldn’t give him time to adapt to any one thing. If he sleeps it’s over. I may never have another chance.

Please tell me you see. That you understand. That you know why I had to do it.

Every second he doesn’t go back, is another second this world keeps turning. Every day of his agony means one last chance for the people here to say goodbye to each other, to make amends, to fall in love. Every hellish week, one last chance to do anything for the last time, because one day soon, it will truly be the last.

So I can’t let him go. I can’t let him sleep. Because we’re just a dream, and the dream is nearly over. If he goes to sleep here, he wakes up there, and all of this….everything around you….everyone you know….everyone you love and hate….it all stops.

We are the momentary fancy of a sick mind out to kill us. I chose to strike first, and I regret nothing.