Author: Tige

Archive: Wherever, just let me know.

Spoilers: Take This Sabbath Day

Disclaimer: I don’t own anything to do with The West Wing. To all who do: don’t worry, I’m just borrowing your goods, and they’ll be returned in one piece.

Author’s Notes: This a short story elaborating on the tribulation that occurred in the President in ‘Take This Sabbath Day’. This is placed during the eve of Simon Cruz’s execution. POTUS POV.

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11:51 P.M.

There was a time, when all was simplistic. How it seems so far away, while I am in the present with such pandemonium whirling around me. My Presidency is forgotten, my Nobel Prize, everything. All I know is I am a man, and am in dire need of direction.

It’s always a blow to you conscience, when your ideals and principles are tested. I have been made aware of an execution that is to be made in the middle of the night. Simon Cruz is the name of the condemned.

He has murdered in cold blood. He is damned.

Am I to play God in these United States? Should I show mercy, and heed to the teachings on which my life is based? Should I save the life of a murderer?

What if I choose not save his life? What does that say about me as a President?

What does it say about me as a person?

Should I act like the President? Should I act like a Christian, or should I be human? I am known as a man of virtue, fairness, and morals. What would I be if I were to choose between the life. . .or death of a man?

This is like triage. How it is in hospitals, during a catastrophic number of human casualties, when you are to choose which lives receive immediate medical attention–who can be saved. If I were to pardon Simon Cruz’s death penalty, or even postpone it, who says he would ask for the forgiveness of his sins?

What do I know about him? Hardly anything. I have his wrap sheet, the vital statistics of his family tree. Simon Cruz is a man who has killed. Some neuron path in his brain signaled the limbs of his body to trigger an armed weapon, playing God, himself.

I’ve got to get myself together. I’m just stuck in this moment, and I can’t get out of it. It’s unavoidable. Many know I’m one to take on a challenge, with passion. But this is one of those rare instances where all I want to do is duck for cover, and shut myself off from the world.

What am I saying? I have a job to do. I am the President of the United States. I serve at the pleasure of the people. And to their credit, I must set aside any reservations, and be the best leader I know how to be.

I want to be forgiving to Simon Cruz. But I made a promise. By living in these United States, I agreed to a contract: The Constitution. And from this I must carry out all of my duties. Religious and a Politician. Christian and a Politician. So hard to be in these days. So difficult to be. . .ever.

I wish Abbey were here. But even she, who as always been my true voice of reason, would be as perplexed in this issue as I am.

All right, I can get through this. I must prioritize my trains of thoughts according to my position, as the President. What’s best for the country? What’s best for humanity? I should not mix my judgment with my religion onto this decision, because if that occurred, all denominations of every religion in this country that happened to differ from mine would jump all over it.

So, I’m to just sit back, and let this happen. And all the while, I can hardly bear it. I read up on the technicalities of death by lethal injection. The poisonous, vile substances coursing through your veins, making you who breathes life. . .no longer.

No longer.

What if it were me, strapped down to that table? Or what if I were to die in the next few minutes or hours? Could I look back on my life and say I lived a Christian life? I know I could remember my family with pride–Abbey, Elizabeth, Zoey, and my little granddaughter Annie.

I’m going to let a man die tonight. I tried my hardest not to. Father Cavanaugh should be along any moment now. I’ll need to take a confession.

Dear God in Heaven, please understand this situation.

Forgive me, Jesus.

Please take this sin away.

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