Arthur Kirkland

Montreal, Quebec

October 23, 2163

I couldn't keep my eyes open at the meeting. I was so tired... I just wanted to sleep. I put my head on the table in front of me and closed my eyes, hoping to get a few minutes of rest. Just a few.

I must've dozed off because the next thing I remembered was that I woke up in my Hotel room. For a long time, I just lay still in the bed, feeling too weak to move and too tired to try. I was still wearing the khaki suit that I had worn to the meeting, but my tie was missing, as were my shoes.

I held my hand up in front of my face and stared at it; it was slim with long fingers, delicate fingers, smooth milk pale skin. It was too thin; I was too thin. Part of me, the part that worked to save others and keep people alive even when they've almost killed themselves, told me that I was starving to death. It was a small part but it still caught my attention.

Silly Arthur, I thought, smiling slightly, you can't die of neglect or that time at sea would've had you dead long before Alfred came around...

I realized that I had been talking to myself, and I made another startling discovery; I actually wanted to die.

I wanted to die... I knew that there was no way in hell that I could die that way, but I wanted to die... to starve. If only to hurt them... Alfred, Matthew, François, all of them... everyone that I had ever loved with the exception of Joan and Lizzie... who had both died long before, anyway, and wouldn't be hurt if I died.

I wanted to hurt those people that I'd once loved... they had known exactly what he was going to do; I warned them that he would. They knew that once he lost his temper I wouldn't be able to keep him calm. They may have sent him to jail for 200 years but they had no idea how trusting humans could be; he would be out within a week. He even called me before the humans gave him parole (I'll bet that they thought he was talking to a little girlfriend when he called, he was calling me butain, which means whore by the way, and from what I recall there were only germans who didn't understand the world or Americans who didn't care to).

There would be no punishment; no justice. there was no reasoning with these people after they got the idea that he was totally innocent. If it had gone my way, Alfred would be the one guarding him and ludwig would help. Even Alfred wasn't dumb enough to just let him go.