A/N, this was supposed to be done tonight, but heheh, talk about irony but A Beautiful Mind was on TV. I really need to go up to him and thank him next time I see him, but usually when I'm in Princeton I'm shopping and not looking around at the Uni. And I also should thank garretelliot again for beta'ing it. :)
He was in what had once been a bedroom, a child's room. The only bed in it was small and the furniture was all brightly colored, and the peeling wallpaper was of sports and race cars. He sprawled as best he could on the small bed and thought. Two options, yes or no. A deceptively simple question. Either kill himself, or not.
But there were so many other variables. If he choose not to die, Jordan risked dying. Would Nigel choose to die? He didn't know, the man was a former member of the British Navy, he couldn't be afraid of dying, could he? But all the same, he had seen the man on both sides of the coin, he had seen Nigel ready to risk others, but the Brit also risked himself on many occasions. If Nigel chose to live, it would either be him or Jordan.
And if nothing else, he wanted to see Jordan live. It would be better if he was alive at the same time, but if it came down to him or her, it was most definitely her life he was going to protect. He didn't want to risk his life, who did? But he was ready to die, if he said he wanted to die, it would either be him, or the innocent man.
But hadn't he sworn to protect the innocent? It was why he became a cop, to stop innocent lives from being victims. He was supposed to be preventing that man from being a victim of a crazy psychopath. So he had to say no, or did he? He was supposed to risk his life for the innocent, but risking his life for the innocent also risked the innocent. It was almost a paradox.
In saying yes, that he wanted to die, he risked an innocent man's death, or his own death. In saying no, he risked Jordan's. He wanted desperately to know what Nigel was going to pick, which option he should. If Nigel chose life, he obviously, would pick to die, and if Nigel chose to die, it would be one of the hardest decisions of his life. An innocent man he had never met, or an innocent man he could count as a friend.
What was it the killer had said to find? The Nash Equilibrium, from A Beautiful Mind. He struggled to remember the movie, and the aforementioned theory. Blondes and Brunettes, that's what he remembered, and that people would pick brunettes. The catch was which one of his options now was the blonde, and which one was the brunette? Life or death?
Which death would have the least impact on everyone? His own? Nigel's? The innocent man's? Jordan's? He couldn't choose to die unless he knew Nigel would as well, he didn't want to give up his own life to see Nigel live. But he couldn't risk Jordan either. He needed to know what Nigel would do.
Nigel was the logical sort, what would Nigel think he would do? He laughed bitterly at the irony of it, this was exactly what the killer wanted, he wanted to see them think things through the way they were, to think of what his opponent was going to do and act accordingly. He didn't want to see Nigel die because of him, but Nigel was going to pick that, wasn't he?
Nigel would assume that he was going to choose to die, and thus choose to die as well, right? That was what he would do, if he was to choose based solely on emotion, he would choose to see Jordan live. How would Jordan handle losing Nigel? The Brit was her best friend short of Dr. Macy, could she handle his death? And could he handle knowing that he was the cause of an innocent man dying?
He had been left with no easy option, he had no choice that would be good, be easy. He wanted an easy choice, and easy way out. He wanted to walk out of there with everyone that was in there right now. He wanted to walk out of there with him, Nigel, Jordan and the innocent man all alive. But that wouldn't work.
Would it be his life or hers? Nigel's or the innocent man's? Nigel, the only if in all of this. The more he thought about it, the more confident he was that Nigel would choose to die, his only decision now was Nigel or the innocent man? He knew Nigel, Nigel was his friend. So would he want to see him dead over an innocent man?
He had never met the innocent man, and that was a blessing and a curse. The man in that corner could be a serial killer, another one, or it could be a saint. The man in that corner could be a pedophile, a rapist, a mugger, a bank robber, a cop killer, or he could be a loving father, a saint, a wonderful man, and no one knew. And it was that man's life or Nigel's.
And it would be the innocent man's life. It was cold, it was cruel, but it was what should be done. The one that benefitted him the most, the option that was the best for him. It would be collateral damage, he could say that it was one life for another, that he had no choice, that he had attempted to risk his life, the captain would understand, with two eyewitnesses there to say that he had chosen to risk his life. It was the best option for him, his choice to reach equilibrium, the brunette.