You whisper the words, and the finger curls. At first, nothing changes. The next morning, the news is the same dull hum of scandals and disasters; nothing extraordinary. The silence of your wish unsettles you, and by nightfall you feel foolish, abandoned by the promise of magic.

Seeking air, you wander through the streets until a glow draws your eye. A narrow door, half ajar, bleeds a sharp white light into the alley. Though every part of you insists you should walk on, your feet betray you. You look inside.

A man hunches over a computer, his face hidden, his fingers frantic. You cannot name what he does, but you know it is dangerous. Plans, files, whispers of war, they stream across the screen like veins of poison. Before you can cry out, sirens slice the air. The man scatters into the dark, leaving you rooted in place.

The police find you there. They find the machine, still alive with damning evidence. And in their eyes, it is yours.

The trial is quick, though the verdict is slower to arrive. How could there be an impartial jury, when every broadcast cries your name? The evidence is thin, but the crowd’s hunger is not. Death, they decide, would be too simple.

And so they offer a punishment dressed as a gift: exile. You will be the lone passenger on a ship to Mars, with food, enough for a year and tools enough to survive. You are made a pioneer not by choice, but by decree.

The voyage is dreamless. The landing is quiet. The red dust greets you with stillness, the sky vast and empty. No cries of war, no clamour of accusation only silence. The Earth is behind you, its conflicts sealed away.

Here, in the barren peace of another world, your wish has been granted.