Lights Out

Somewhere, there's a big building. It looks like a giant office building, which is for a reason. It's a building, built by God and his Angels, that takes the shape of a building of power in that era.

In ancient times, it was a temple. In medieval times, it was a castle, with a church. Now, it's a building resembling the headquarters of companies like Google.

The contents of this building are even more magical. There are over 7 billion candles inside, each one representing a person. Some candles burn bright, about half way through their lifetime. Others burn low, being lit for only a year, or with only a year to go. This way, God can check how it's going with his creations, but there are always unexpected events. Someone can get into a car crash, and have their candle burn low for a week, before going out, but heavenly events can have effects as well.

If a candle is snuffed out in the building, the person dies. A sudden heart-attack, or "unknown causes". The Angels have always been told not to interfere with the course of fate that the candles have plotted, even though that happens on earth itself already.

Recently, however, some Angels are starting to doubt that order. Isn't earth becoming a bit too crowded? Aren't humans just destroying the planet God lent to them, a place that was once the Angels'?

These Angels, calling themselves Apocalyptians, believe they should take fate in their own hands, and start putting some candles out. Having heard this, however, God cast them out from the Congress of Angels.

The other Angels shunned them, refused to have anything to do with them. It didn't matter to most. They were going to stand by their point. Candles needed to go out, and quite a lot of them.

The Apocalyptians came together, talking about plans of how to tackle their problem. After a short time, all of them agreed on a simple, yet hard solution. They would have to take the Hall of Candles by force.

Security in the Hall had always been tight, but since the Apocalyptians had made their ideas public it was more than ever before. They were going to have to plan it out carefully.

Luckily for them, no matter the shape of the building, the Angels loved their swords and blades. The Apocalyptians send some of their own to earth, to gather guns and explosives to attack the Hall. After training with the new weapons, and feeling their power, the Apocalyptians were convinced they would win.

They launched the assault at midday, just before the change of the guard, so their fight would be easiest. They threw explosives at the wall, easily blowing a hole in the wall. This breach alone took out hundreds of thousands of candles, killing everyone represented by tho candles.

Mass hysteria broke out. People driving their cars died suddenly, killing and injuring more. Cops who had just caught a mugger dropped dead, allowing the muggers to escape. Heads of state died mid-speech, plunging their countries into chaos.

The Apocalyptians stormed in, shooting the guards in the room, and those that came after. The guards, with their shields, didn't stand a chance against bullets and gunpowder. They set a perimeter, for if any guards tried to attack them in the back, and went onwards to the next room, taking out guards and candles as they went along.

More humans died, seemingly out of nowhere. Newscasters reported of the breaking news, before even some of them dropped dead. There was a world-wide panic as more and more people suddenly died, leaving whatever they were doing unattended.

Some guards did indeed try to attack the Apocalyptians in the back, without any success. They were quickly shot down. The attackers, however, had more luck. They took room after room, killing guards and candles as they marched through the Hall. Not all candles were snuffed out. The plan was never to kill all humans, just most. Population control to ensure that the earth would stay beautiful, and regain some of its former beauty.

Even more humans started to perish, and the cities were starting their decent into chaos. Buildings were burning from cars crashing, and gas being left on. Firefighters couldn't respond as well as usual, because some of them had died as well.

Only at that moment did God notice anything was happening. He went to the Hall, ready to talk the Apocalyptians out of their madness. It was too little, too late. They had captured the Hall and were preparing to extinguish even more candles when He arrived.

"ENOUGH!" God shouted with His booming voice, trembling the Hall, killing some flames himself.

"We are supposed to watch, not interfere! We should protect the natural order, not slaughter most of the population of earth!" Even more candles went out as He continued shouting.

On earth, even atheists started praying. Praying to make this madness stop. Praying to bring everyone back. Praying to please kill them as well.

In the Hall flames were dying out by themselves, as desperate people killed themselves. Even when God was shouting to the Apocalyptians, some were still extinguishing candles. In the end He had gathered them all in the central hall, but by then, it was too late. The last flame died, as the last person on earth killed herself.

It was only then, that the Apocalyptians realised that by being so fanatic about their goals, by being so obsessed with achieving it, they didn't take time to look at the consequences of what they did.

God, His Angels and the Apocalyptians looked at the earth, at what was left. All of them seemed to agree this had gone too far. Apocalypse had come. This had been the end for humanity.