Page 71 - Demo

“Then what do you want? From me, that is. Not what you wish to do with me or against
‘them.’”
“Oh. I need your communications encryption-key.” What? All...all of this. I was
dumbfounded.
“And if I don’t give it to you?” I asked.
“Then...this was all for nothing, and I couldn’t show you the light.”
His face looked down. With his smooth complexion and general...loose-ness, he had the look of a man melting. His waxy features, all of them, frowned downward. He relocated his shoulder, again. Such genuine sadness limned his eyes, the beginnings of tears. But before they began to run, he straightened up.
“Which is why I am going to try as hard as I can to haul you into it.” he reassured himself.
“Okay. Show me your light, and let me share my own. If you persuade me, I will grant you my communications key.” I caved. My curiosity was too great now, his investment so clearly dear, that I could not deny him the possibility of success. It’s what my beloved would want. They were always weak for lost causes.
He stared at me, contemplatively for a moment, before beginning:
“Let me answer your first question. Why did I abandon my post? I had spent years crushing asteroids, taming the frontier, dealing with dissidents. What could shake the resolve of a man tempered in blood? As you say, I was doing “good”. I was among the best.” he paused, pulling what appeared to be an apple from his coat and taking a bite. “It was the holotapes. I’d seen the ones they recorded of us, blue fire from the heavens and a hail of tungsten. That didn’t bother me. I’d seen people die in the thousands, yet remained unshaken.” he stared daggers into me, taking another bite. “It was our tapes. The ones we recorded. The ones the children use for training, for education, for play. I realised then that I was not doing ‘good’. That I was only perpetuating violence forward. That nothing could be worth the life of another, especially when we condemn them to die repeatedly for the amusement of others.”