NOT A FICTION
Exhausted, all muscles of his body achieving the fatigue they had been accumulating in one, unique scream were aching, exhausted, Liam Kincaid stepped into his appartment. The loft had sunk into darkness now that both neons and daylights were out. Here and there, shapes of minimal furniture could be made out of the uniform layer of greyish colors.
Reaching out to something nearby, the young man pulled the switch down and let light be. A small lamp lit up in one corner of the appartment, filling the main room with a redish toned light and extending shadows. A ray of light coming from behind a closed door indicated that a dim light also had been lit in the mini-kitchen, that the owner of the place rarely put at use anyway. And finally, the purpleish lava-lamp projected bizarroids forms on the celling, through the doorway of his bedroom. Liam's loft basically was one main room that was used most of the time as a meeting room. One wall was pierced with a huge window that during Fall would let the sun in. On the opposite wall was the hall, and before that, the door. And on the right side was nothing but a flat, undecorated wall but for a single – and authentic – Monet and a piece of art by Saulrey – representating, from the title 'An alien no man's land', two genderless drawn human beings united in a slow caress that looked very much like a lovemaking and still, could not be… Liam had always felt particularly attracted to that special portrait of the expression 'no man's land'.
His coat deposited on the hook that was fixed on the wall, Kincaid made his way toward the left side of the main room and went first to the kitchen, pouring himself a glass of vodka, drinking it down and pouring yet another one, intending to savor this second glass longer. Then, leaving the glass on the low table in the middle of the living-room along with the few pieces of paperwork he had brought back from the embassy – reports and security forms to fill out before handing them back to Sandoval – he made his way to the bathroom. Turning on the water, he waited for it to become cold to splash it on his face, relaxing in the shudder that came. Relaxing in the shock of reality.
He climbed up, spiralling along with the metallic stairs that led to the balcony that spread over half of the large room below and led to his bedroom, which was quite small in fact. Liam leaned down and picked up new, fresh clothes : a t-shirt that had in better times been green and an old pair of jeans that he would soon need to patch up.
Spiralling down again, his perfect recall memory instantly flashed a matching souvenir before his eyes : Hitchcock's Vertigo, he made it to the main room, sat down, and mechanically, began to fill out the forms. But, though his attention was focused on the paperwork before him, his mind was elsewhere. In fact, quite far away.
Today had been one of these days, one of these particular days that made him have thoughts he prefered not to have. Thoughts that, if they had come not to exist, would have made the world quite simpler.
Two weeks that they were searching for the guy. Technically, it was not their jobs, not the jobs of the services of the Companions to take care of what was, after all, none of the Companions' business. But the latest victim had been found in a Hospital for Children… by one of the taelon physician who had been worken with the young child that had been horribly murdered. Sa'rim was currently aboard the mothership, cleansing his mind from the sight, with the help of the healers. A very human phrase had escaped his lips, "Facing this, technology is useless : it left in me a wound that only time will heal." This particular Taelon was not purely sympathic to humanity. But he was a scientist, a biologist, and had been sent there to work along with human specialists in pediatry in order to develop a treatment to some specific mental diseases common to these children. And his work had awoken in him a passion. Each time he was asked why, he avoided or changed subject. Liam had with time just stopped asking. Da'an had told him on the later, that Sa'rim had lost two of his children in a similar manner : they had been murdered before his eyes by jaridian troops during the assault of the scientific station he had been established onto, many millenias before Earth actually had been in the range of possibilities.
Liam was shaken now. First, two days ago, there had been Sa'rim. It was Liam that had come to him first after he had called for help and had found him cradling the lifeless, blood-covered body of this little girl. She was named Sarah, and was an authistic child. She had been, rather. This sight, the words that Sa'rim had pronounced, shakily, as Liam had led him down the corridors of the mothership to the medical bay, and especially what Da'an had told Liam about Sa'rim's past and why were the healers so pessimistic about his recovery… All of this, combined, has been the first wave of the heartquake that now troubled his heart. And his mind. And his loyalties. And a little everything he was.
And now, today, they had found the guy. Not as emotionless as he should have been, Sandoval had lodged a bullet straight in the man's forehead, carefully using his gun instead of the skrill, making sure that he would not miss the shot. A young man, volunteer, an implant, one that had sold his soul to the Taelons, known to be Sandoval's loyal assistant, had come and had spat in the murderer's face, despising him even in death, his eyes filled with the emotion that Humans called hatred. His previous victims had all been children, but in a room they had found – he had found – a young woman, mutilated, from the blood and the sperm covering her tighs and lower belly certainly violated numerous times in the past hours. Both her feets and hands had been cut off with something that sure was not chirurgical. Her breasts had been… absent to the sight. In fact, all her chest was a mess of flesh, crushed blood and bleeding organs. She had not talked. But she had smiled, for her face had remained untouched. Liam had leaned down, pressed a kiss on her forehand and had then gently raised her head, applying the end of his pistol at the back of her neck, pressing the triger. Last words of thanking had come out of her lips.
Agent Sandoval had stepped in the room then, found him knelt by the dead body. Liam had just said that she was agonizing, that she would never have made it through any kind of surgery the Taelons could offer her. She had been wounded too deeply. She just wanted it to be stopped as soon as it could be. By every means possible. Sandoval had nodded, his face troubled, skin paler, hands shaking, eyes wavering on the ground, like a little everybody : he was shaken. He had just told, in a low voice to Captain Muller, that another corpse had been found, that he should get the younger volunteers away from the sight.
Liam had just walked toward the outside, stopping aside the building and vomitting all he had eaten so far in the day, allowing his body to be wracked with both sobs and quivers for a minute. Releasing the pressure. It always hit, it always was a hit, heading straight to his heart. When he knew that he was fighting, that he was defending humanity against aliens that accused them of barbarism, that he himself, through that, was not Human, then he wondered. Wondered if humanity really was worth saving. Or rather, if really the Taelons ought to be destroyed – because at this point and considering both Da'an and Zo'or's course of actions after T'than's death there was the only thing that was expected from them. It was hard to believe when he had seen that the responsible of such tragedy was a Human, and that a Taelon had been hugging the lifeless form of an innocent child to his chest, caring, desparing now. When he had seen Sandoval teareyed, or Zo'or, whose expression had been far from untouched and yet that was not totally readable though it was very clear that the Taelon was disgusted by the mere thought of profanating a child's body, as he had nodded, accepting as Sandoval had requested to take the rest of the day off…
After he had seen that, of course he was particularly worried that Taelons would associate this idea of barbarism to all Humans – though Zo'or looked sadly understanding when Sandoval had told him that there was something wrong in this guy's mind, that it was why he had done that, that it was not something common amongst Humans, and that yet he was affected, disgusted by what members of his own species could do.
Liam had not had the chance to personally speak to Da'an yet as he had been asked by the healers to remain at Sa'rim's side in the medical bay… for they had been close sometime ago – as Da'an had not explained further.
His hand sought for the door frame as the scene was replayed before his eyes with almost too exact clarity. That young boy, five years old, the unique boys amongst all the victims, the youngest also, as he was the son of one of the to-be victims (Liam had later assisted to the reunion) they had supposed that the murderer could not have avoided to take the son when he had taken the mother. It was Liam who had found both the little boy and his mother, in separate rooms. The older woman was in shock of course, but physically unharmed. When the boy had been tied against the wall so that his feet would hang over the ground of a couple of inches. As the rope had been tied tightly arouns his wrist, bounding him to the wall, lines of blood were drawn in the freah flesh.
Kincaid had felt that young being against him when the boy had come to him, put his arms around his neck and decidedly said "You're my hero !". He had not really understood what had happened to the others. He had just been told that they were gone, like would have been told any child of that age, and he had suffered slightly of the physical pain. But other than that, there was no much harm. This part would come later, when he would grow older and dream of screams that he heard in the night and of the sight of the few bleeding to-be cadaver he had caught a glimpse of.
Perhaps was Liam Kincaid a hero, perhaps was he, but he had killed someone. And he had seen such atrocities that were inhumane and yet… so human in kind.
Tonight, it felt different. It did not feel like the resistance and the Taelons, like the good ones and the vilains. Tonight it felt like nothing he had known before, like something that was scary and that, he knew, would hunt his dreams, turning them into nightmares for weeks, for months, or for the remaining of his days in a human skin.
Tonight, he did not feel like a hero, not after seeing this mutilated young woman, not after killing in pity for the first time. Tonight he did not feel like a hero. And it was tonight that for the first time he realized that his life was not a cartoon, that his life and his fight were not part of a fiction. That it was NO FICTION. That it was real, and happening, and that it was made by Humans.
As he shut his eyes closed a lonely flew down his left cheek. It was real, it had been real. Sa'rim being in the medical bay for heavy treatment with not recovery expected within some years was real. The sight of this young girl's body, violated in every ways possible, was real and printed on his retina. It was real. It was not a fiction anymore. He could not anymore think that it was fiction. And that things were simple.
"No, little boy, I'm not a hero and life isn't a fiction."
END
Exhausted, all muscles of his body achieving the fatigue they had been accumulating in one, unique scream were aching, exhausted, Liam Kincaid stepped into his appartment. The loft had sunk into darkness now that both neons and daylights were out. Here and there, shapes of minimal furniture could be made out of the uniform layer of greyish colors.
Reaching out to something nearby, the young man pulled the switch down and let light be. A small lamp lit up in one corner of the appartment, filling the main room with a redish toned light and extending shadows. A ray of light coming from behind a closed door indicated that a dim light also had been lit in the mini-kitchen, that the owner of the place rarely put at use anyway. And finally, the purpleish lava-lamp projected bizarroids forms on the celling, through the doorway of his bedroom. Liam's loft basically was one main room that was used most of the time as a meeting room. One wall was pierced with a huge window that during Fall would let the sun in. On the opposite wall was the hall, and before that, the door. And on the right side was nothing but a flat, undecorated wall but for a single – and authentic – Monet and a piece of art by Saulrey – representating, from the title 'An alien no man's land', two genderless drawn human beings united in a slow caress that looked very much like a lovemaking and still, could not be… Liam had always felt particularly attracted to that special portrait of the expression 'no man's land'.
His coat deposited on the hook that was fixed on the wall, Kincaid made his way toward the left side of the main room and went first to the kitchen, pouring himself a glass of vodka, drinking it down and pouring yet another one, intending to savor this second glass longer. Then, leaving the glass on the low table in the middle of the living-room along with the few pieces of paperwork he had brought back from the embassy – reports and security forms to fill out before handing them back to Sandoval – he made his way to the bathroom. Turning on the water, he waited for it to become cold to splash it on his face, relaxing in the shudder that came. Relaxing in the shock of reality.
He climbed up, spiralling along with the metallic stairs that led to the balcony that spread over half of the large room below and led to his bedroom, which was quite small in fact. Liam leaned down and picked up new, fresh clothes : a t-shirt that had in better times been green and an old pair of jeans that he would soon need to patch up.
Spiralling down again, his perfect recall memory instantly flashed a matching souvenir before his eyes : Hitchcock's Vertigo, he made it to the main room, sat down, and mechanically, began to fill out the forms. But, though his attention was focused on the paperwork before him, his mind was elsewhere. In fact, quite far away.
Today had been one of these days, one of these particular days that made him have thoughts he prefered not to have. Thoughts that, if they had come not to exist, would have made the world quite simpler.
Two weeks that they were searching for the guy. Technically, it was not their jobs, not the jobs of the services of the Companions to take care of what was, after all, none of the Companions' business. But the latest victim had been found in a Hospital for Children… by one of the taelon physician who had been worken with the young child that had been horribly murdered. Sa'rim was currently aboard the mothership, cleansing his mind from the sight, with the help of the healers. A very human phrase had escaped his lips, "Facing this, technology is useless : it left in me a wound that only time will heal." This particular Taelon was not purely sympathic to humanity. But he was a scientist, a biologist, and had been sent there to work along with human specialists in pediatry in order to develop a treatment to some specific mental diseases common to these children. And his work had awoken in him a passion. Each time he was asked why, he avoided or changed subject. Liam had with time just stopped asking. Da'an had told him on the later, that Sa'rim had lost two of his children in a similar manner : they had been murdered before his eyes by jaridian troops during the assault of the scientific station he had been established onto, many millenias before Earth actually had been in the range of possibilities.
Liam was shaken now. First, two days ago, there had been Sa'rim. It was Liam that had come to him first after he had called for help and had found him cradling the lifeless, blood-covered body of this little girl. She was named Sarah, and was an authistic child. She had been, rather. This sight, the words that Sa'rim had pronounced, shakily, as Liam had led him down the corridors of the mothership to the medical bay, and especially what Da'an had told Liam about Sa'rim's past and why were the healers so pessimistic about his recovery… All of this, combined, has been the first wave of the heartquake that now troubled his heart. And his mind. And his loyalties. And a little everything he was.
And now, today, they had found the guy. Not as emotionless as he should have been, Sandoval had lodged a bullet straight in the man's forehead, carefully using his gun instead of the skrill, making sure that he would not miss the shot. A young man, volunteer, an implant, one that had sold his soul to the Taelons, known to be Sandoval's loyal assistant, had come and had spat in the murderer's face, despising him even in death, his eyes filled with the emotion that Humans called hatred. His previous victims had all been children, but in a room they had found – he had found – a young woman, mutilated, from the blood and the sperm covering her tighs and lower belly certainly violated numerous times in the past hours. Both her feets and hands had been cut off with something that sure was not chirurgical. Her breasts had been… absent to the sight. In fact, all her chest was a mess of flesh, crushed blood and bleeding organs. She had not talked. But she had smiled, for her face had remained untouched. Liam had leaned down, pressed a kiss on her forehand and had then gently raised her head, applying the end of his pistol at the back of her neck, pressing the triger. Last words of thanking had come out of her lips.
Agent Sandoval had stepped in the room then, found him knelt by the dead body. Liam had just said that she was agonizing, that she would never have made it through any kind of surgery the Taelons could offer her. She had been wounded too deeply. She just wanted it to be stopped as soon as it could be. By every means possible. Sandoval had nodded, his face troubled, skin paler, hands shaking, eyes wavering on the ground, like a little everybody : he was shaken. He had just told, in a low voice to Captain Muller, that another corpse had been found, that he should get the younger volunteers away from the sight.
Liam had just walked toward the outside, stopping aside the building and vomitting all he had eaten so far in the day, allowing his body to be wracked with both sobs and quivers for a minute. Releasing the pressure. It always hit, it always was a hit, heading straight to his heart. When he knew that he was fighting, that he was defending humanity against aliens that accused them of barbarism, that he himself, through that, was not Human, then he wondered. Wondered if humanity really was worth saving. Or rather, if really the Taelons ought to be destroyed – because at this point and considering both Da'an and Zo'or's course of actions after T'than's death there was the only thing that was expected from them. It was hard to believe when he had seen that the responsible of such tragedy was a Human, and that a Taelon had been hugging the lifeless form of an innocent child to his chest, caring, desparing now. When he had seen Sandoval teareyed, or Zo'or, whose expression had been far from untouched and yet that was not totally readable though it was very clear that the Taelon was disgusted by the mere thought of profanating a child's body, as he had nodded, accepting as Sandoval had requested to take the rest of the day off…
After he had seen that, of course he was particularly worried that Taelons would associate this idea of barbarism to all Humans – though Zo'or looked sadly understanding when Sandoval had told him that there was something wrong in this guy's mind, that it was why he had done that, that it was not something common amongst Humans, and that yet he was affected, disgusted by what members of his own species could do.
Liam had not had the chance to personally speak to Da'an yet as he had been asked by the healers to remain at Sa'rim's side in the medical bay… for they had been close sometime ago – as Da'an had not explained further.
His hand sought for the door frame as the scene was replayed before his eyes with almost too exact clarity. That young boy, five years old, the unique boys amongst all the victims, the youngest also, as he was the son of one of the to-be victims (Liam had later assisted to the reunion) they had supposed that the murderer could not have avoided to take the son when he had taken the mother. It was Liam who had found both the little boy and his mother, in separate rooms. The older woman was in shock of course, but physically unharmed. When the boy had been tied against the wall so that his feet would hang over the ground of a couple of inches. As the rope had been tied tightly arouns his wrist, bounding him to the wall, lines of blood were drawn in the freah flesh.
Kincaid had felt that young being against him when the boy had come to him, put his arms around his neck and decidedly said "You're my hero !". He had not really understood what had happened to the others. He had just been told that they were gone, like would have been told any child of that age, and he had suffered slightly of the physical pain. But other than that, there was no much harm. This part would come later, when he would grow older and dream of screams that he heard in the night and of the sight of the few bleeding to-be cadaver he had caught a glimpse of.
Perhaps was Liam Kincaid a hero, perhaps was he, but he had killed someone. And he had seen such atrocities that were inhumane and yet… so human in kind.
Tonight, it felt different. It did not feel like the resistance and the Taelons, like the good ones and the vilains. Tonight it felt like nothing he had known before, like something that was scary and that, he knew, would hunt his dreams, turning them into nightmares for weeks, for months, or for the remaining of his days in a human skin.
Tonight, he did not feel like a hero, not after seeing this mutilated young woman, not after killing in pity for the first time. Tonight he did not feel like a hero. And it was tonight that for the first time he realized that his life was not a cartoon, that his life and his fight were not part of a fiction. That it was NO FICTION. That it was real, and happening, and that it was made by Humans.
As he shut his eyes closed a lonely flew down his left cheek. It was real, it had been real. Sa'rim being in the medical bay for heavy treatment with not recovery expected within some years was real. The sight of this young girl's body, violated in every ways possible, was real and printed on his retina. It was real. It was not a fiction anymore. He could not anymore think that it was fiction. And that things were simple.
"No, little boy, I'm not a hero and life isn't a fiction."
END