OL ZA
Curtis forced open the well-insulated door. He lived in a small cabin in the wilderness on a cold, jagged rock on the fringe of human space. It was surrounded by ancient stone ruins yet to be claimed by the archaeological institutes of earth and on a little lake which served as his only connection to civilization, during the summers a waterplane flown by an old friend would set down there to bring him supplies and news. No chance of it landing on a block of ice though, he was solidly isolated during the dank winters, though on an exceptionally clear day he might be able to listen to something on his radio. Imagine his surprise then when a tightly bundled traveler arrived at his door in the dead of December.
Rushing him in, the stranger began to loose the thick scarf from his face and remove the snow shoes from his feet as Curtis went to add another cut of venison to the fire and searched for his best brandy.
The traveler spoke once his face was free. “Old man, you don’t have to spoil me. I’ve got my own rations, I just didn’t want to clutter your place with my bag.”
Curtis waved his concerns aside. “What’s food for but to be shared? And if you want to bring your bag in, I’ve got plenty of space.”
Pouring each a drink, Curtis led the stranger to his recliner and returned to turn the cuts of meat.
The stranger hung up his coat to dry, taking care that his pistol remain hidden. This man was a general during the operation that subdued his nation without force of arms, through means far more insidious and toxic. Curtis had to know that he was a Freedomer, he’d expected colder and more political, bureaucratic treatment from him like he had received from the other officers and politicians he had visited.
The stranger had witnessed his home completely transformed by the attacks employed by Earth in pacifying Freedom. In his heart, he knew there would never be justice for what had been done and he wanted to be made whole, he wanted justice for himself and his nation. Deeper down, he felt like he could undo what was done and gain back the life he had wanted to live if he just exacted retribution on the right people, so he refused to forgive anyone, sacrificing what was left of his conventional life to go on this quest. It was an irrational desire yet he could never seem to put it aside. He had come to let the man incriminate himself more before delivering the sentence, but right now he seemed fixated on being a good host.
Curtis was not stupid, he knew this traveler was a Freedomer far from home, and he also knew nobody would come by his door in the dead of winter unless they were looking for him. He had a gun under the table if it came to that.
Although Curtis had eventually learned to forgive others and then himself for the things he had done, he still wanted to be purified. He moved out to the edge of civilization so he wouldn’t profit from his status as a hero. Many generals from that war went on to become higher ranked, industry leaders, or politicians (ranking officers were already politicians in their own right, he supposed) but he had not felt right benefitting like that himself when he felt he had blood on his hands. If this was his time he would take it nobly. In any case, he’d come to appreciate the simplicity of life out in the wilderness.
“Old man, why are you living somewhere so remote? Haven’t you got a place to be back home?”
Curtis, still turning the meat, shook his head. “I do have places that would take me but I wouldn’t really consider them ‘for me’ anymore. If you recall what happened to some of the hold-out citystates on Freedom which, I’m sure you do, I was instrumental in the program that brought them down. I wouldn’t want someone skilled in that kind of information warfare in my city. It’s hard to build a warhead but it’s very easy to fool someone if you’re good at it, and we’ve discovered one is more devastating.”
The stranger walked around a bit, looking over Curtis’s collection of movies on the wall. “What is it you do all day? Especially in the winter. It must be hard not losing your mind trapped out here.”
The old man began to talk about his reading, writing, sketching, photography, mapping the ruins “since I figure I can do better with these ruins before those damned archaeologists lock them up.” Truth be told though, the stranger was having difficulty focusing on what he was saying. He hated to forgive, because forgiving meant giving up a debt and he wanted that debt paid, but who would pay it? What would he get, and what would he be losing here?
“Old man – Curtis – I was from one of those cities on Freedom, though I figure you already found me out, right? You already know what happened in those cities but you don’t know what it was like to live through it. Life keeps bustling on as always, and then one day you wake up again and you realize the streets are empty. People aren’t going outside anymore, people aren’t talking or acting like they did before. You say something to your friends and they get really squirrely, they get mad at you for saying things they believed in not too long ago. You realize you were thinking the same way too, you might still be and simply don’t realize it. Everyone’s still alive but your city is destroyed, the cohesion is gone, the culture is dead. The people flow out and carpetbaggers move in. It’s death without a corpse. Millions of people not living their own lives anymore.”
Curtis sighed and walked over to gaze out a window.
“So then, you have come to kill me.”
The stranger shot up and strode over to Curtis, thick fur-wrapped boots clunking against the packed dirt floor.
“No, not now. I’m not going to kill you. The ones I came for before? They were still doing evil to this world, putting that information warfare to work to abuse populations around the world. You can’t convince me what I’ve been doing has been wrong or that I don’t have the right to do it after what happened to me and my city, but what’s been the point of it all? I can’t bring my city back and those people down there, maybe they’re owed justice but I doubt they even care.”
Curtis turned to him gruffly.
“Are you waiting for sympathy from me? I’ve said what I have to say, I’m not convinced this little war was completely unjust on our part either even if I don’t like how I contributed to it. Would that we just bombed those people to oblivion, harsh to say in front of you but I’m sure we’re of one mind on this. Are you going to move on to the next politician now?”
The stranger turned and sat back down.
“I think I’ve wasted my life.”
Curtis handed him his drink again and lifted the meat out of the pan onto a cutting board to carve.
“I can’t tell you if you’ve wasted your life, but you’re still young. If you’re asking if you’ve wasted your life then I know you don’t feel young but I assure you that you are young. Some people get what they’d like and some people don’t but nobody gets to choose their circumstances, only what they choose to do. Space is wide and vast. You can still make a life for yourself.”
The stranger motioned around the cabin. “And you can’t?”
Curtis chuckled. “You’re an awfully poor guest. Believe it or not, I enjoy this sort of living. I don’t think someone in your line of work has room to criticize anyway.”
The two sat down to eat.
“I promise you, when you leave here I’ll give you fresh rations and some special gifts. I don’t have a ton to offer, but I beg you accept as much as you can fit in your pack.”
“You’re awfully generous for living in a tiny cabin in the mountains, old man.”
“I don’t get very many chances to be generous these days, I need to make the most of it when it comes around. I’m far from destitute anyway, and I want to help you out if you’re trying to put this ugly business behind you.”
The stranger smiled and took a sip of his brandy.
“Letting go feels pretty good, doesn’t it?”