The Reluctant Messiah

The prophecy covers every wall like a disease. Sharpie. Lipstick. Something that might be blood, might be shit. Doesn't matter. Same message, different hands:

HE WHO IS CHOSEN SHALL RESTORE THE KINGDOM.

You count seventeen iterations while wringing gray water from the mop. Seventeen prophets or seventeen schizophrenics. After six years, the difference blurs.

The fluorescent tube above flickers like a dying moth. This particular gas station bathroom, mile marker 47 off I-95, has become your office. Third Thursday of every month. Clean enough to think, dirty enough that nobody asks questions.

The man behind you materialized sometime between mopping the third stall and discovering someone had carved DESTINY IS A PYRAMID SCHEME into the baby changing station. He wears a suit that screams middle management at a company that went under during the first Obama administration. His cologne fights a losing battle against the smell of burnt coffee and whatever died in the walls last winter.

"Vincent Kaspar," he says, like the name should mean something. Maybe it does. You've met so many recruiters they blend together: same hunger, different business cards. "The Council sent me."

The Council. The Brotherhood. The Eternal Order of Whatever. They rebrand every few years, but the pitch remains constant: embracing your destiny comes with dental.

"Thursday's my cleaning day." You squeeze the mop, watch the water turn from gray to black. "Come back never."

"Twenty thousand are dead in Mumbai. The Thames caught fire. Again." He produces a tablet from his jacket, swipes through catastrophe porn: buildings folding like origami, skies the color of infected wounds. "The world needs its savior."

You've seen this presentation before. Different tablets, same apocalypse. The numbers change. Twenty thousand, fifty thousand, a million. After a while, they're just statistics. Background noise to your real problem: the thing living under your skin, the power that makes streetlights explode when you're angry, that turns wine to blood when you're not paying attention.

"The world needs a lot of things. Healthcare reform. Better public transit. A savior's pretty far down the list."

Kaspar steps closer. His breath smells like printer toner and desperation. "You can't run forever."

That's when you notice his hands. Soft. Manicured. A gold class ring from some state school, the kind of jewelry that screams 'I peaked in my thirties.' This isn't a true believer. This is middle management looking for a promotion.

Perfect.

"You're right." You set the mop against the wall, careful not to disturb the geometry of this moment. "I can't run. But here's what they didn't tell you in orientation."

The parchment materializes the way migraine auras form: first a shimmer, then substance. The paper feels older than the building, older than the interstate, older than the country itself. It smells like every church you've ever been in and every courthouse basement where deals get made.

I, [name], do hereby accept the role of Prophesied Hero, with all rights, responsibilities, and glory therein...

His eyes track the words. You watch his pupils dilate, that beautiful moment when ambition overrides intelligence.

"The prophecy," you continue, voice dropping to the register of late night radio hosts and telephone psychics, "doesn't care about bloodlines. It's not genetic. It's contractual."

A lie. Maybe. You discovered the loophole three years ago in a Phoenix drunk tank, but you're still not sure if it's real or if reality just bent to accommodate your exhaustion. Does it matter? Reality is negotiable when you're desperate enough.

"Anyone can be the Chosen One." You extend the pen. Montblanc, because details matter when you're selling salvation. "All they need is the will to accept it."

He reaches, hesitates. Smart enough to smell the trap, not smart enough to identify it. "What's the catch?"

You could tell him about the loneliness that feels like drowning in empty space. The way your reflection stops looking familiar after year two. How everyone you love becomes either a vulnerability or a stranger. The dreams where you save the world but can't remember why it mattered.

Instead: "No catch. Just consequence."

The truth, technically.

He signs. Vincent Kaspar, in the practiced loops of someone who autographs things professionally. Middle management to the end.

The transfer hits like a defibrillator. Your bones sing relief. His bones. Well.

Light erupts behind his eyes: holy, terrible, irreversible. His spine straightens. His cheap suit suddenly looks like armor. For thirty seconds, Vincent Kaspar is magnificent.

"I feel it," he whispers. Tears stream down his face, but he's smiling. "I understand everything."

"Good luck with that."

You're already at the door when he calls out: "Wait. What about the manual? The training? The Eight Pillars?"

"YouTube," you say. "Pretty sure there's a WikiHow."

Outside, the rain comes down cold and chemical, carrying the interstate's exhaust. Your Honda starts on the third try, which feels like a miracle without the cosmic assistance. In the rearview mirror, Kaspar emerges from the station glowing like a lighthouse. He looks both ways, steps into the crosswalk.

The semi doesn't even have time to brake.

The sound: metal meeting meat meeting destiny. The holy light flickers like a bad connection, then dies. Through the rain, you can just make out the contract reforming, floating down like the world's most dangerous snowflake.

Someone will pick it up. Someone always does. The janitor rushing out with a first aid kit. The trucker stumbling from his cab. The hitchhiker who was just trying to use the bathroom.

You merge onto the interstate. The radio plays something with steel guitar and regret. In your jacket pocket, three more blank contracts wait. Not copies. Echoes. The universe, it turns out, loves paperwork.

Your phone buzzes. Unknown number, familiar area code.

"This is regarding Vincent Kaspar," the voice says. Female. Professional. Exhausted. "The Council wants to discuss his... transition."

"Never heard of him."

"We have surveillance footage."

"Deepfakes are getting scary good these days."

Silence. Then: "The position has been refilled seventeen times this month."

Seventeen. Same as the bathroom walls. You do the math: that's one every thirty-six hours. Better than last month's average.

"Sounds like a retention problem. Maybe try offering better benefits."

"We know what you're doing."

"Cleaning bathrooms?"

"You're weaponizing hope."

The phrase hangs there, too accurate to deny, too elegant to correct. Through the windshield, the city emerges from the rain like a mouth full of broken teeth. Somewhere in there, another recruiter is already getting the call. Another true believer or desperate middle manager ready to be special.

"I'm providing opportunities," you say. "Very different thing."

The line goes dead.

You drive. The contracts in your pocket whisper against each other like conspirators. Three years ago, you would have felt guilty. Two years ago, you would have felt something. Now you just feel the beautiful absence of destiny, the weightlessness of being nobody going nowhere with nothing to save.

The radio shifts to news. Mumbai. The Thames. Statistics climbing like a fever chart. The world ending in increments, demanding its hero.

You change the station. Classic rock. Better.

Let someone else be the Chosen One. You've got bathrooms to clean.