The application was 38 pages. Doyun had filled out 37 of them. Page 1: applicant's name, resident registration number, current biological age, Telomere Restoration Therapy history. Page 2: preferred date and time of termination (first, second, and third choice). Page 3: preferred place of termination. Page 4: method of termination (drug, gas, sensory deprivation, other). Pages 5 through 12: list of attendees and their contact information. Page 13: final meal menu. Page 14: background music. Page 15: whether to record a last will. Pages 16 through 30: plan for the disposal of assets. Pages 31 through 37: psychological counseling history, self-assessment checklist of motives for termination, attending physician's opinion. The checklist had 47 items. 'Have you had a pleasant experience within the last 6 months?' Doyun checked 'yes.' The day Sejin put too much chili in his gukbap and coughed had been pleasant. 'Have you considered alternatives other than death?' Doyun checked 'yes.' Resignation. Travel. A change of job. He had considered them. Considered them, and nothing more.
Page 38 was the 'reason' field. A single blank box. A box 15 centimeters wide and 20 centimeters tall. Doyun sat before that box, pen in hand.
In 2071, Telomere Restoration Therapy became universal. One injection every 6 months, and cellular aging stopped. Cancer vanished. Dementia vanished. Heart disease vanished. People stopped dying. Only accidental deaths and suicides remained. The population grew. The world population, 8.2 billion in 2071, reached 9.7 billion in 2073. People who would not die took the jobs, took the houses, filled the roads. Retirement vanished. Because there was no reason to retire. Because the body was in its 30s. But the mind was another matter. Even with a body in its 30s, a mind that had lived 70, 80, 90 years was weary. The number of people who did not want to live rose. The suicide rate climbed. The government responded. 2072. Enactment of the Dignified Termination Act. Establishment of the Ministry of Dignified Termination. People who did not want to live were allowed to die legally, safely, in the manner they wished. By way of administrative procedure.
Doyun was a civil servant in his 7th year at the Design Division of the Ministry of Dignified Termination. His rank was Grade 6. The Design Division was the department that listened to an applicant's wishes and designed a death. The place, the time, the method, the attendees, the music, the lighting, the temperature, the last meal, down to the design of the coffin. Even death required a project proposal. In 7 years, Doyun had designed 847 deaths. An average of 10 to 12 a month. 847 people had died exactly as Doyun's proposals prescribed.
Applicant No. 341 was a 63-year-old man. Biological age 28. He had received Telomere Restoration Therapy 6 times. His body was 28, but his memories held 63 years. The man said to Doyun.
"I want to die at the summit of Everest."
"The environment is oxygen-poor, so the timing of the drug injection changes. At an altitude of 8,849 meters, it takes 12 seconds longer to lose consciousness."
"That's fine. That means 12 more seconds to see it. The sky."
Doyun drew up the proposal. Summit of Everest. 5:40 in the morning. Just before sunrise. Drug: sodium pentobarbital, 15 grams, concentration adjusted for altitude. Attendees: none. Music: none. Only the sound of the wind. Last meal: 1 chocolate bar. The man read the proposal and nodded. He died 3 weeks later. In the report, Doyun wrote. 'Normal termination. Deviation from sunrise time: 2 minutes. Wind speed: 14 meters per second. Applicant lost consciousness at 5:41:23.' Doyun was drinking coffee as he wrote that report. An americano. While the man died on Everest, Doyun was drinking coffee in an office in Seoul.
Applicant No. 512 was a woman in her 40s. Biological age 25. She said she wanted to die in an elementary school classroom. The elementary school she had attended. The Grade 3, Class 2 classroom. The third seat by the window. Doyun asked.
"Why that seat?"
"If you sit there and look outside, you can see a ginkgo tree. Turning yellow in autumn. That was the best time."
The proposal. Grade 3, Class 2 classroom, Dohwa Elementary School, Mapo-gu, Seoul. The third Friday of October, 3 in the afternoon. The season when the ginkgo leaves are at their yellowest. Drug: propofol, 2 milligrams per kilogram, followed by potassium chloride. Attendees: none. Music: none. An empty classroom after school. Last meal: cafeteria curry rice. The woman smiled as she read the proposal. Cafeteria curry rice. The woman said.
"You'll do even this for me?"
"Exactly as you wrote it in your application."
The woman died in October. Doyun was there in the classroom with her that day. It was not mandatory for a designer to observe an execution. But Doyun observed the execution of No. 512. The ginkgo tree was visible. Beyond the head of the woman seated in the third seat by the window. The yellow leaves swayed in the wind. The woman closed her eyes. A single ginkgo leaf fell. Doyun did not write that scene in the report. In the report he wrote only numbers. The report. 'Normal termination. Proportion of fallen ginkgo leaves approximately 60 percent. Classroom temperature 22 degrees. No curry rice remaining.'
Doyun had written 847 reports. The format of the reports was always the same. Type of termination. Time. Condition of the site. Time the applicant lost consciousness. Notable observations. Repeated 847 times. Doyun's reports were precise. The margin of error was small. He was the designer with the lowest error rate in the Design Division. 0.7 percent. Since second place was 2.3 percent, it was an overwhelming lead.
This morning Doyun came in to work and submitted an application under his own name. Filed online. Queue number 41,307. Estimated wait: 14 months. Doyun looked at the queue number. 14 months. In 14 months his application would surface on someone's monitor. Another designer in the Design Division would design Doyun's death. Doyun found that strange. Someone else designing the death of a man who had designed 847 of them.
It was lunchtime. Doyun ate gukbap in the cafeteria. Sejin, a junior from the same division, sat down beside him. Sejin was in her third year. Caseload: 194.
"Doyun, don't you have a consultation this afternoon? Number 848?"
"I do."
"I've got one too. Number 197. Wants to die in space."
"Orbit?"
"No, the moon. The lunar surface."
"The moon takes 6 months to approve. You have to send a coordination request to the Space Agency."
"Right. Where's the request form?"
"It's in the shared folder. Use the 2071 revised edition."
Sejin nodded. Her gukbap was going cold. She ate it as she spoke.
"Where do you want to die, Doyun?"
Doyun was lifting a spoonful of gukbap. The spoon stopped.
"Why?"
"No reason. In 847 cases, you never once thought about it?"
Doyun thought. Everest. An elementary school classroom. A beach on Jeju. Under the aurora in Iceland. The middle of the Shibuya scramble crossing in Tokyo. He knew 847 places to die. The place Doyun wanted to go was written on page 3 of his application. It was written there, but Doyun did not tell Sejin.
"I don't know."
"Liar."
Sejin fished the scallions out of her gukbap as she spoke.
"For me, the sea. Not the deep sea—shallow water, where your feet still touch. Listening to the waves. Feeling the sand slip out between your toes."
"That's not death, that's a vacation."
"Can't death be a vacation?"
Doyun did not answer.
"Eat. It's getting cold."
2 p.m. Applicant number 848 came into the consultation room. A woman in her 70s. Biological age 30. Eight rounds of Telomere Restoration Therapy. The woman sat down in the chair. Doyun sat across from her. Her application lay on the desk. 38 pages. All filled in. Down to the reason field.
"I've reviewed your application. I'd like to ask you a few things."
"Go ahead."
"You wrote 'anywhere' for the termination site. Is there no place in particular you'd prefer?"
The woman smiled.
"I've lived 70 years. The place doesn't matter. What matters is that it's quick."
"There is a waiting period, so—"
"14 months, I hear."
"Yes."
"14 months is short. I've waited 70 years."
The woman looked out the window. Beyond the office window she could see buildings. She said,
"Some of those buildings I built. 40 years ago. I was an architect, you see. And now I've outlived my own buildings. Strange, isn't it?"
Doyun looked at the woman's reason field. 'Have lived enough.' Four words. Doyun read those four words. Have lived enough. Of all the applicants Doyun had met, she had written the shortest reason. Most of them crammed the field full. 15 centimeters across, 20 centimeters down, packed tight. Because they were lonely. Because they were bored. Because the same morning kept repeating. Because the one they loved had terminated first. Because the world would not change. Because they could not keep up with the changing world. The reasons varied. But what Doyun felt, reading 847 of them, was not their variety but their sameness. What all 847 reasons finally said was one thing. I don't want to live anymore. The reasons were decoration.
Doyun began drawing up the woman's plan. Site: unspecified, designer's discretion. Time: soonest available. Method: pharmaceutical. Attendees: none. Music: none. Final meal: none. Coffin design: standard. The plan was simple. The death of someone who wanted nothing left nothing to design. Doyun saved the plan.
Quitting time. 6 p.m. Doyun stayed behind in the office. The other staff had left. Sejin, shouldering her bag on her way out, said,
"Not going, Doyun?"
"In a bit."
Sejin left. Doyun alone remained in the office. 6 desks. 6 chairs. 6 monitors. The Design Division had 6 staff. Doyun was the most senior. The other 5 were all under 3 years. Few lasted 7 years in this line of work. Average tenure: 2.4 years. Doyun was 3 times the average. Doyun switched on his monitor. He opened his own application. 38 pages. Filled in through page 37. Page 38. The reason field. Blank.
Doyun read again from page 1. Applicant name: Kang Doyun. Biological age: 31. Actual age: 39. Two rounds of Telomere Restoration Therapy. Desired termination date: spring 2073. Desired termination site: this office. The Ministry of Dignified Termination, Design Division office. His own desk. Termination method: pharmaceutical. Attendees: none. Music: none. Final meal: cafeteria gukbap.
Doyun read the application he had written and laughed. The death of a man who had designed 847 of them was cafeteria gukbap. Not Everest, not an elementary school classroom, not the lunar surface. Eating gukbap at his office desk and dying. Doyun found that funny.
But the reason field was blank. Doyun picked up the pen. Set it down. Picked it up again. He knew 847 reasons. Lonely. Bored. Have lived enough. Doyun didn't know his own reason. He wasn't lonely. He had a friend. Sejin ate gukbap beside him every day. He wasn't bored, either. The 847 deaths had all been different. Nor had he lived enough. 39 years old. Thanks to Telomere Restoration, his body was 31. A woman who had lived 70 years called it enough, and 39 was not enough. Doyun looked back over his life. He had majored in public administration at university. He had taken the civil service exam. He had been posted to the Ministry of Dignified Termination. At first he thought he would do ordinary administrative work. Being assigned to the Design Division had been the HR team's decision. His aptitude test score for 'emotional detachment' had been high. Top 3 percent. The ability to empathize with another's feelings while keeping them separate from one's own. It was the ability a designer needed. It was thanks to that ability that Doyun had designed 847 cases. And perhaps it was because of that ability that he didn't know his own reason.
So why.
Doyun looked at the monitor. The blank of the reason field blinked along with the cursor. He rested his hands on the keyboard. These were the hands that had typed 847 reasons. Transcribing someone else's reason was easy. Writing his own was different.
Doyun recalled the 847 proposals. The wind on Everest. The ginkgo tree at an elementary school. The sound of the waves on the Jeju sea. The aurora over Iceland. What the 847 had wanted was a beautiful death. What Doyun had designed was a beautiful death. Doyun had made 847 beautiful deaths. He had recorded 847 beautiful deaths as reports. Termination completed. 847 times.
Not once had Doyun designed a beautiful life. Only death. Commute to the office, read the application, write the proposal, draw up the report, eat gukbap, go home, and repeat the same thing the next day. For 7 years. Doyun's day began with designing someone's death and ended with reporting someone's death. Every day. 2,555 days. Doyun's home was 40 minutes from the office by subway. A studio apartment. Bed, desk, refrigerator. In the refrigerator, water and triangle kimbap. Doyun did not cook at home. Lunch was the cafeteria. Dinner was the convenience store. There was no design in Doyun's life. He wrote proposals for other people's deaths, and for his own life there was no proposal. Doyun liked numbers. Numbers had no blanks.
Doyun began typing in the reason field. 'I have designed 847 deaths. ' He stopped. Deleted it. Started again. 'I no longer wish to design other people's deaths. ' He stopped. That was a reason for resignation, not for termination. He deleted it.
The phone rang. The office phone. Doyun answered.
"Design Division, Ministry of Dignified Termination."
"I'm the guardian for applicant number 848. You had the consultation with my mother today, didn't you?"
"Yes."
"My mother says she wants to cancel."
Doyun held the receiver.
"May I ask the reason for cancellation?"
"She says a grandchild was born. Today. My mother says she wants to see the grandchild's face. If she dies 14 months from now, the child will be walking by then. She says she wants to see it until then."
Doyun hung up. He opened the file for number 848. 'Application canceled. Reason: birth of grandchild. ' Doyun processed the cancellation. It wasn't that there had been no cancellations among the 847. The cancellation rate was 11 percent. Of the 847 designs, 93 had been canceled. The reasons for cancellation were varied, too. Fell in love. Found a new hobby. Just got scared. A grandchild was born. Every time Doyun read a reason for cancellation, a strange feeling came over him. The moment a person who had meant to die decides not to. What changed in that moment. In the case of number 848, a grandchild had been born. One new life had overturned the resolve of someone who had resolved that 70 years was enough.
Doyun looked at the monitor. The reason field of his own application. Blank. He thought about number 848's reason for cancellation. A grandchild. Doyun had no grandchild. No children, either. No spouse. Nothing had been newly born to Doyun.
9 p.m. The office fluorescent lights switched off automatically. The sensor had failed to detect Doyun's movement. Doyun waved his hand. The lights came back on. He found the gesture funny. Waving a hand in the dark to reclaim the light. A signal that he was alive. A signal to the sensor. Doyun made this gesture every time he worked late at the office. For 7 years. The sensor's detection range was narrow. If he sat still in his chair, it went off every 10 minutes. Doyun waved his hand every 10 minutes. He had once asked the facilities team to replace the sensor. 3 years ago. The request was denied. 'Current sensor operating normally. Insufficient grounds for replacement. ' Doyun did not protest. He grew used to waving his hand every 10 minutes. I'm here. Still.
Doyun leaned back in his chair. He looked at the ceiling. The fluorescent light was shining on his face. He had written that he would die in this office. In front of this desk. Under this fluorescent light. The place chosen by the man who had designed beautiful places for 847 people was an office. Doyun thought it was an honest choice. He had never been to Everest. The elementary school had vanished to redevelopment. The place Doyun had spent the longest was this office. For 7 years. 2,555 days. 8 hours every day. 20,440 hours. The place where he had spent the most time in his life.
Doyun opened page 13 of the application again. Final meal: canteen gukbap. Reading the line, he felt hungry. Enough time had passed for the gukbap he'd had at lunch to digest. Doyun stood. He left the office. He took the elevator down to the first floor. He stepped out of the building. Seoul at 9 p.m. The streetlamps were lit. People were walking. People who would not die. People with the faces of their 30s and 70 years of memory. People with the bodies of their 20s carrying 90 years of exhaustion. Every one of them brushing past him on the street could someday surface on Doyun's monitor. Along with a 38-page application.
Doyun went into a convenience store. He bought a triangle kimbap. Tuna mayo. It was the food he'd eaten most over 7 years. After the canteen gukbap. He sat on the bench in front of the store and ate the triangle kimbap. The night air was cold. It was March. Spring was coming. There was a reason Doyun had written '2073, spring' as his desired termination date. He wanted to die in spring. He didn't know why. He just liked spring. Of the 847 cases, spring was the most chosen. 31 percent. Summer 22 percent. Autumn 29 percent. Winter 18 percent. Even for dying, spring was the favorite.
He finished the triangle kimbap. Grains of rice clung to his hand. Doyun picked them off with his fingers and ate them. He stood. He could go back to the office. He could also go home.
Doyun went back to the office. He took the elevator up. He opened the office door. The fluorescent lights sensed his movement and switched on. The monitor was on standby. He moved the mouse. The application was open. Page 38. The reason field.
Doyun sat down in the chair. He set his hands on the keyboard. He typed. 'Reason: I don't know the reason. ' Doyun read the sentence. Reading it, he laughed. The reason submitted by a 7-year civil servant of the Design Division, Ministry of Dignified Termination, was 'I don't know the reason.' A man who had read 838 reasons had written that he didn't know his own.
Doyun did not delete the sentence. He pressed save. The application was filed. Queue number 41,307. In 14 months someone would read this reason. 'I don't know the reason. ' That designer would call Doyun and ask. What is your reason. And Doyun would answer. I don't know. That's why I wrote it.
The fluorescent lights went out again. Because Doyun hadn't moved. Doyun sat in the darkness. Only the glow of the monitor lit his face. Doyun raised a hand and waved it. The lights came on. Doing it, Doyun thought. 14 months. For 14 months, every time the lights went out he would wave his hand. I'm here. Still. Whether he'd still want to wave in 14 months, he didn't know. Just as the daughter of applicant number 848 had called, within 14 months a call could come for Doyun too. Or it might not come. Doyun stood up from the chair. He did not turn off the monitor. The application stayed on the screen. Page 38. Reason: I don't know the reason. Doyun closed the office door and stepped out into the corridor. He pressed the elevator button. First floor. Outside the building. The March night wind touched Doyun's cheek. It was cold. Spring was still far off. Doyun put his hand in his pocket. The triangle kimbap wrapper was still there. Crumpled plastic. Doyun looked for a trash can. There was one in front of the convenience store. He threw the wrapper away. His hand was empty. Doyun looked at his empty hand. 14 months. 14 months of nights lay before him. Every night the lights would go out, and Doyun would wave his hand. Whether he wanted that hand to still be waving in 14 months, Doyun didn't yet know. It was just as he'd written in the reason field. I don't know.
