An Epic Battle of Miniscule Proportions

    It is long past my bedtime, I thought as I sat cross-legged on my bed, surveying my room and evaluating the quality of my day's work.  I had spent the day cleaning my room and rearranging furniture.  My leopard-print sheets had been meticulously folded and unfolded onto my bed until I could manage perfect hospital corners, and as I scanned the top quilt, looking for wrinkles in need of smoothing out, I noticed something I did not expect.  I noticed something much more unwanted.



    The color of my quilt was enough to obscure from my attention that which now suddenly dominated it.  Immediately, I hopped off of my bed and darted across the room to the door, never once looking away from the foul creature now scurrying about upon my bedspread.  Unable to retain composure whilst sharing a room with the loathsome wretch, I quickly exited, thinking to sleep on the couch in the living room.  However, as I lay on the couch, I feared that the thing might crawl under the door and into the living room after me; I concluded that I would not rest this night until I rid of it.



    Though I was by far the larger of the two of us, I must say I was more afraid of this disgusting insect than it was of me.  I could not squish if with a shoe because I couldn't bring myself to come that close to it, and even if I were to muster the courage, I did not want to clean up the mess.  Keeping this in mind, I had a plan that would leave no trace of this nuisance behind.  I would sic the lions on my dastardly foe!



    Matrix and Jam were, under normal circumstances, very playful; most hyper especially at night.  This night, however, was different.  Their laziness at such a time was almost ominous as I took them into the room to present them with their target.  Whilst I watched impatiently, flinching whenever my enemy moved, the cats simply knocked it onto the ground so that they could lie on the bed and watch it scurry about the floor from there.  Stupid cats, I thought, a dog would have rid me of this loathsome cur by now.



    Disheartened by my defeat, I plopped down on the couch, head in hands, thinking of whatever else I could do.  It was 11:30 pm now and I could feel the sleep paralysis force itself upon me every time I closed my eyes.  I had to fight it!  I could not let fatigue overtake me in the wake of such a battle!  My enemy would jump at the chance to conquer me, crawling on my face and into my nose and mouth and --- ah!  I could not allow it!  It was then that I saw what I must do: it stuck out to me so plainly that I did not know how I had not seen it before...the vacuum!  I could suck the little bugger up with the vacuum hose.  What could it do?  Crawl out?  As it turned out, yes, yes it could crawl out and it did.  The sneaky little wretch had legs strong enough to defy the forceful suction of my vacuum hose, but how?  Was it not enough that this creature could last longer underwater than I or that it could survive a nuclear bomb?  This just was not fair!  It wasn't right!  My terrible fear of this thing was, in fact, due to its virtual indestructibility, but never in a million years would I have thought that destroying a cockroach without making a mess would be so difficult.



    Twelve o' clock midnight; this battle had raged on for all of one hour and still my repugnant adversary lived.  How it had managed to thwart my attacks thus far was beyond me, but what I had up my sleeve next would be my winning strategy; I was determined now, I would win.  I would find a way to knock it on its back, therein, rendering it immobile so that I may sweep it into a dustpan and send it, by way of a whirlpool, to the sewer.



    This plan, of course, would require me to close a distance between myself and my nemesis that I was not comfortable with in the least.  But I must, I told myself, for the sake of my dignity!  I armed myself with a broom and, after several panicked swipes as the roach came too near me, I was able to slip it over and it landed on its back, squirming at first before finally accepting defeat.  The fear I faced whilst carrying the fiend in the dustpan with shaking hands was like none other in its irrationality, but what was more was the feeling of intense joy in my victory as I watched it attempt to swim against the current as the swirling water forced it down to its inevitable fate.



    Finally, I thought, as I lay down on my bed, now free of contaminants.  This was a night for celebration and if I hadn't been so tired, I may have heeded that.  But as it were, it was with a great sense of triumph that I was able to close my eyes, free of the fearsome company that had interfered with my peace that night.  I could finally let my exhaustion pull me under without my noisome worries.