part 2
A bit later he passed a remotely controlled bomb along with its remote controller. It too had a sign. The sign went like this:
WE DON'T KNOW WHY WE PROVIDE THIS, NOR DO WE KNOW WHY WE REFER TO OURSELVES AS 'WE'. THIS IS A REMOTELY CONTROLLED BOMB AND ITS COMPANION, THE REMOTE CONTROLLER. IN CASE OF THE FIRST DOOR YOU PASSED BEING OPENED, IT WOULD NOT BE WISE TO USE THIS UNLESS YOU ARE INSIDE THE SECOND DOOR. OR YOU COULD JUST FORGET ABOUT THE OTHER TWO DOORS AND USE THE BOMB TO SURPRISE YOUR CAT WHILE HE'S EATING... MUA HA HA HA!! AHEM... WELL, YOU'RE ON YOUR OWN FROM NOW UNTIL THE END OF THE WORLD. WE'RE--I'M-- THE MANAGEMENT IS GOING NOW TO TAKE A VERY LONG NAP. GOOD LUCK AND GOOD BYE.
-THE MANAGEMENT
Same routine, Timothy turned around, stared at the door, and the rest. But he didn't understand this last sign, especially the parts about the Management's use of pronouns. He did understand the part about the nap. He liked naps. So he took a nap himself.
In his dream it all became clear, the pieces came together. The oxygen, the safe place, the bomb... He felt pretty smart. So he set a date and time to open the door and press the little button and thus annihilate the human race. That time was in twenty minutes.
Was in twenty minutes. Now it's down to eight minutes.
Timothy, not being extremely bright, had already opened the oxygen door but hadn't quite made it to the safe place yet. You see, skin cancer frightened him more than any other thing, so he was stocking up on SPF 80 sunblock when it happened.
We should take some time to back up.
Simon is twelve years old. His special talent is making SPF 80 sunblock, but it's not a very profitable business. He's always been rather short, but recently he's grown quite a bit. More's the pity, because what used to be clumsiness became an inevitable cause of disaster. Today he was doing rather well. He was delivering a new shipment of his special sunblock and didn't even screw up the order. He had only tripped twice and hadn't crashed into anyone, unless you count that little toddler that ran into him. And then it happened.
Timothy was racing toward the cashier and Simon was doing his best to recover from the toddler's impact. Simon fell over. Timothy chuckled to himself, thinking, "It serves him right." He giggled, and the giggles erupted into full-blown belly laughter. He was bent double, tears streaming from his eyes, unable to contain his mirth. He had to hold on to the counter to keep from falling over. And then he remembered-- he had an appointment to kill everyone in less than three minutes. Suddenly he stopped laughing and skedaddled out of the store without even paying. He made it to the safe cave in time, got inside and leaned against the door, heaving for breath. Once he had regained his composure, he checked his watch. Twenty-eight seconds left. He felt his pockets for the remote control.
Simon was more than a bit dazed. Some crazy man had just laughed at him and then stolen a bunch of sunblock. It was adding injury to insult.
Simon noticed a little black box on the floor next to him. The box had a button on it. Simon pressed the button.