Page 6 - Ferry Tales

Donnerwetter

That one had a lot of respect for vicious dogs! Probably owned a
few of them himself. I just had to hang around to watch you usher
him into his new barracks. No, you mangy Hound of Hell, I never
thought he’d be able to get back here and beg me for a return trip. I
go back empty. Do I mind? Not at all: I can’t be harassing the
damned nonstop; it would lose its thrill and I would lose my
nastiness. That reminds me of the lame excuses that guy came up
with while I was poling him over here.
“I am a soldier,” he yells at me—or so he thinks; windpipe and
larynx are rotting or burning somewhere else, but his type never
wonder about that. “Yes, I have killed. I have tortured. I have
destroyed innocent lives, put towns and villages to the torch and laid
waste to great tracts of arable land and ancient forests.”
“You don’t have to convince me, Donnerwetter,” I say, continuing
to pole the ferry across the river. “I’m sure your life is an open book
to those who need to examine it.”
“But I did it all as a faithful follower. It was for the greater good.
You can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs. It is the natural
order: animals do not sin, but they are red in tooth and claw. Is there
another boat for livestock down here?”
“So you want to chop logic before it’s your liver on the block?
Faithful, were you? Have you forgotten your commandments?
About face!

Before good Christian
Soldiers go abroad,
They first must check their
Cheeks in with their god.

Whose orders were you following? Your leader? Your leader’s leader?
His most supreme exalted leader? Well, whomever it was had to be
obeying my leader, Rex Mundi.”
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