The Chosen One


by Dan Mumm 2/26/09


Once upon a time a baby was born. It was known far and wide that this baby was The Chosen One. Foretold by prophecies and legends of old, The Chosen One was pre-ordained by fate to lead his country out of oppression, unite the clans, bring peace to the world and other colorful chosen one type things. The parents of The Chosen One were initially enthralled about their luck of having been chosen to parent the great Chosen One. At first they catered to the child's every need with love and care. They gave him the most expensive crib, they gave him only the finest baby formula in the land. Unfortunately, these good people were not among the wealthy and soon began to grow poorer and poorer with each lavish gift they gave to said Chosen One. Thus, their love, over time, turned to a mild neglect. They allowed the Chosen One to stay up late, watch TV and play video games as he wished. They allowed him to skip his vegetables and go straight to dessert. They pretty much let him do whatever he pleased. After awhile, our good old Chosen One stopped going to school and chose to sit around watching TV for the greater part of each day. And so, The Chosen One, a product of fate, as a product of circumstance, became lazy.
As the years progressed, many people of the village began to lose faith in The Chosen One. Although, many shop owners would still allow The Chosen One to take what he liked free of charge. After all, some people still believed that, one day, he would lead them out of crisis and into a new dawn of prosperity. Periodically, they would see him walk out of his home, in his slovenly way, to pick up more junk food from the local grocer. On his way, he would encounter a variety of townspeople. On one such day, The Chosen One woke up around 3 PM and decided to make his way out of his house. By about 5 PM, he was ready to leave the house. At this point in time, The Chosen One had given up on some of the little daily pleasantries such as shaving or bathing. His appearance was disheveled to say the least. On his way to the grocery store he encountered a little boy who was obviously stricken with poverty. He was emaciated from lack of food and wore only rags and cardboard boxes as shoes. The little boy asked The Chosen One when he would set out on his legendary adventure to save him and the world. The Chosen One was rather irritated by this disruption in his routine. After all, he had mustered all of his strength to even leave his house that afternoon, or evening I suppose at this point. However, The Chosen One knew of his duty to the world and at least wanted to show that he would, at some point, fulfill the prophecy foretold so many years ago. The Chosen One looked at the boy and replied "I am a very important person, as you know, and you have interrupted me whilst doing very important things. But I see that you may be losing faith in your great Chosen One, so to quell your fears, let it be known that I will begin my great task tomorrow". The boy grinned, apologized for interrupting and scurried off with a skip in his step. The Chosen One meant what he said. Every last word. However, he didn't know how or what he would do on the following day to live up to his promise. He decided it would be better if he didn't worry about it for the time being and he continued on his original quest. The Chosen One made it to the grocer, filled a few bags with goodies and made his way home to play some more video games. By about 3 AM he had completely forgotten about his promise to the boy and thus stayed up all night playing games and watching television. He didn't leave his house for another couple weeks after that and the townspeople continued to lose faith.
All the while, there were very devout supporters of our great Chosen One. Every day, bright and early, at a time of day that The Chosen One himself had completely forgotten about, a group of supporters would come to his home to pay homage. They would sometimes leave gifts of bread and meat, wine and beer, and even flowers. Many supporters would leave letters of praise and appreciation for what The Chosen One would someday do. Every few nights or so, The Chosen One would step out on his porch to pick up the gifts and letters. The gifts made it easy for The Chosen One, although sometimes his supporters would have the audacity to forget to leave his favorite type of bread or his favorite brand of beer. This of course would force him, at some point, to have to venture out of his home to go to the store. He would sometimes read the letters of appreciation to be. He would bask in their praise and sit back feeling generally good about himself. He would say to himself "I truly am a great man! I am, as a matter of fact, The Chosen One! They are right to praise me!". He would usually then, grab the remote control and turn on his television. After years of lazily sitting around watching TV, he stopped caring about what he was actually watching and was just happy to zone out staring at anything that was on his glowing box of joy. He didn't really know what to do with himself, and at this point he had lost motivation to do anything but sit around lazily and indulge in his every whim. This was, of course, the circumstance of his existance and probably not really what fate had initially planned. However, he knew that one day he would fulfill the prophecy. After all, it was a prophecy and it was his destiny. There's not a whole lot one can do about their own destiny. With these thoughts in mind, his anxieties would be calmed and he would be quite content wasting another afternoon on his now very worn out couch.
More years went by, and The Chosen One had done nothing to change his habits. He was comfortable in his belief that, one day, something would happen that would change it all and turn him into the person he was supposed to be. One morning he was awoken by a loud banging on his door. He turned over on the couch and pulled a pillow over his ears. The banging continued. He ignored it for as long as he could, but it only got louder and more torturous. After about 2 hours of enduring the loud banging, The Chosen One finally and very grumpily made his way to the door. After the pain of his sleep being interrupted at such an ungodly hour, he was beginning to fume. He stomped his feet on the ground as he walked closer to the door, and when he turned the latch on his door, he turned it as hard as he could. He pulled the door open and to his surprise there stood a very old man. It was the village sage. At first The Chosen One calmed, knowing that he should show respect to this man. But almost immediately, he became indignant. After all, he was The Chose One! Even if the man standing before him was a king, he still did not have the right to interfere in the sleeping habits of the great Chosen One!
"What do you want!?" The Chosen One snapped.
"I have come to check on your progress. How are things coming? What is it that you plan to do?" The Sage very calmly replied.
The Chosen One was calmed again and said
"What do you mean?"
The Sage began to get visibly irritated and responded
"So far, you have done nothing to fulfill the prophecy. You have a duty and a responsibility to all the people of the village and to the world! How is it that you can so easily ignore your duties!?"
"What would you have me do?"
"I don't know man, raise an army! Help the poor! Give an inspirational talk at the local bookstore! Do something!"
At this point The Chosen One lost it. Who was this man to talk to him in such a way?! He was The Chosen One!
"Sage, you have come to my home at this early hour and insulted me. You have not shown me respect and you have interrupted me as I sleep. Furthermore, years have gone by and my tastes have progressed, but the townspeople still leave the same old gifts at my doorstep. Because of this grave insult, I am now no longer going to save the world. In fact, I'm not even going to save you or this village! Now goodbye!"
With that The Chosen One slammed the door on the sage and returned to bed. The Chosen One was true to his word and as a result of the sage's insult, he never lifted a finger to help so much as one single person for the rest of his life.
The End