Be all my sins remember'd

She realized that the figure sitting alone in the bar, looking at the glass he held into his hands, apparently lost in his thoughts, was a human. Being relatively newcomers in the galactic scene, she wasn't expecting to see one, she had never seen anyone of them venturing this far.

She felt her blood boiling and her claws extended. She barely managed to compose herself.

Thirty years ago Dacklans invaded the space of a species seen as a defenseless prey.

Humans…

By gods, they fought like demons and newcomers or not, their technology was far ahead. They pled Dacklans to surrender, offering generous terms, terms that no other was going to offer to an enemy beaten down this hard. But they were the Dacklans, never surrender, win or die trying.

Αnd die they did. She lost her mate, she lost her elder children, she lost her parents… She lost everything and everyone but her youngest daughter.

Humans had a rule never to attack civilians, but there were no such things as Dacklan civilian, they all were first and foremost warriors. First, they started dying in the millions and then in the billions. The path to the holy grounds of Dack'lah'Mator was paved with blood, Dacklan and Human alike.

In the end, Humans won. And yet, this defeat brought a new era for the feline species. Now Humans and Dacklans are close allies, their bitter war been long forgotten.

But Zamalan could not forget, and so she fled, she fled like all the daemons from hell were chasing her. And here, in the ass-end of nowhere, there was a human drinking, alone, lost in his thoughts.

She approached the human, her heart filled with rage.

“You want to kill me, dacklan?” he asked, not looking at her. “I suppose I deserve it… fuck.”

Then he started talking more to himself than to her

“Do you know why I chose to be a bombardier? Because I fucking loved the bomber's shape. They were such beauties. At first. Then in the crew, I found the brothers and sisters I never had. Do you know 'Puller'? Of course, you do, after all, your unconditional surrender was signed on that very battle-carrier. We never had battle-carriers till we met you. Plato said that necessity is the mother of invention. Yeah, he is long dead, who gives a fuck what he said? But you know something? Every war is a fucking cave allegory. You fight the shadows, you learn to hate the shadows, but in the end, you are nothing more than another shadow. You have to break free, you have to go outside the cave to grasp the true horror of the war.”

“Our squadron was staged in 'Puller'. We called her 'Chesty'. Did you know that at that time was the biggest vessel we have ever produced? Nearly one km long, over one fucking million tones of ceramo-steel, hosting ten wings of attack spacecraft, five wings of bombers, and a whole fucking marine battalion with their dropships and their tanks. We were young and proud of being the tip of the biggest stick our species ever produced.”

He sighed

“And we were just at the steps of Dack'lah'Mator. Your last stand in the space and the lands of Sandacore. We've just beaten what was left of your navy and having the space superiority we demanded again you to surrender. You fucking didn't, by fucking gods, why? Why? You were on your death throes, you fucking stubborn pieces of alien shit…”

“We were young, we were prideful and stupid. We got into our bomber, 'Stormbringer' was such a beauty… such a fucking beauty. And then we were dropping at the skies of Sandacore like Thor's fucking hammer. We made our first run, then the second, then the third. 'Όποιος σπέρνει ανέμους θερίζει θύελλες'. We sowed winds and we reaped storms. We got hit… skipper? Skipper? We are going down. Maaack? Steve? We are going down… we are going down… brace for impact… brace for impact!!!!”

“I don't know how I got out unscratched from the wreckage. We have crashed in farmland to the ass-end of nowhere. Far in the horizon, the battle was still raging on, but here… it was so peaceful. The pilots were goners. Mack and Steve, the two of the five gunners, were mangled corpses. Joe was in his death throes. Jude… her beauty transcending her death, like Hades himself wanted to preserve her beauty to light his kingdom of shadows… It was so peaceful out there. How come death and destruction became so peaceful? It was… it was only me and George that got out alive. He had a broken ankle, but he was alive. I radioed in. The battle raged, there was no one to spare to come getting us. We had to lay down and wait for the rescue. George was in pain, the shot I gave him doing little. And then I heard the sound of bullets raining down to us. There was a dark hole in his head… I was alone… I… then my panic suddenly subsided. I… I just stood there, rained down by bullets, having no care in the world… Then the rage… I don't know where it came from. I took my weapon and I became… I became a berserker, the Ripper himself. I… I don't remember… my mind shot down to preserve my sanity…”

He stared at the infinity, his voice broken. “And… and then… the veils were lifted and I saw… I saw what we have done… what *I* have done. She lay dead… her body… her body covering her two cubs. And the cubs… and the cubs were dead… God, the cubs were dead and I… and I was the one who murdered them. I… I was… I…”

He didn't finish, he just burst into tears. He put his face in his hands and he started crying. She didn't know what to do, she has never seen humans acting this way. Humans used to be bitter enemies… and yet… and yet she felt her hatred dissolving into the air.

Still not looking at her, continued talking, again, rather to himself than her. “My father's warning still echoed in my mind; 'Trust me, son, until you have drawn your first blood, killing is just an abstraction. For some, not to be consumed by the fact they killed may prove to be harder than the killing itself'”. He sighed. “We were soldiers, we had a greater duty. From the dawn of history, soldiers sold their souls to the devil in order to spare their countrymen of the same fate. But… but this? It was… it was too much… too fucking much. I ran, and I ran, and I kept running, but no matter how far away I went, I could never escape. I will never… I… I…” He started sobbing again.

In front of her wasn't the frightful warrior that she learned to fear and hate, in front of her was a broken man, a victim of the very same war his species won. She didn't know what to do except what her maternal instincts screamed at her. She hesitantly hugged him and then the same hug got tighter and tighter, and she started rocking him gently. And then, just like that, two former enemies in a war long forgotten by everyone, but those who survived its true horror, found themselves hugging tight, sobbing, in a vain effort to comfort themselves and, more importantly, each other.

 

Φρικιαστικά υπέροχη, καμία σχέση με αυτά που μας έχεις συνηθίσει.

 

Ίσως αυτό που ξεχωρίζει τον καλλιτέχνη από τον βιρτουόζο είναι ότι ο δεύτερος δεν επαφίεται στην μανιέρα  

 

Φοβερό!

 

νουάρ sci fi