I dine with our prisoner, the cold and beautiful Lena.
I notice some interesting things. She’s fussy with her food. She talks to herself, without realising what she is doing, though that may simply be her way of communicating with her remote computer. She drinks large schooners of sherry, and even larger glasses of red wine. She picks at her food. She farts openly, without any attempt at concealment. She is taciturn, never asks questions. But when she does speak, she’s appallingly garrulous. She regaled me for several hours with stories of her time as a crime fighter in ancient Earth. A man called Tom featured frequently. The stories were rambling, but fascinating. But my, she did go on.
She is very opinionated, about everything. Society has decayed. Courtesy is a forgotten art. Television has gone downhill. Young men lack sexual charisma, they are just “boys” now, in her eyes. When she pours herself a glass of wine, it doesn’t occur to her to pour me a glass. At one point, she falls asleep when I am talking. I am halfway through a sentence, and she damn well cat-naps off. Then she wakes, farts briefly, and continues with one of her stories from half an hour previously.
She is, in short, old. Everything about her, apart from her sleek and sexual body and her shimmeringly wonderful face, exudes withered and arid age. She’s selfish, self-contained, cautious, cowardly, bigoted, small-minded, self-pitying, spoiled, self-indulgent, arrogant, uninterested in the feelings of others.
Was she always like this? I can’t tell. But I do know that she has wrapped herself in so many comfort blankets that she can no longer feel the air around her. She is cocooned.
I try to explain the reasons behind my course of action in kidnapping her. My ideals, my political imperative. She mocks me mercilessly at this point.
“You’re just a pirate,” she tells me. “A savage!”
“I’m a soldier of fortune,” I reply mildly.
“You’re a butcher. You let that beast maul and bite me, for the sake of a grisly display to intimidate my son. And I saw what you did earlier, on the merchant ship.” Her bitter words hang in the air. “I saw you behead two men!”
“Hey! I’m a pirate.”
“You’re a terrorist.”
“Whatever.”
“You have no remorse.”
“Neither do you.”
“I don’t kill people.”
“No, but your people kill people. They slaughter entire races. They incinerate planets. They enslave large sections of humanity.”
“Oh, this is just socialist rant.”
“Your son presides over the most evil dictatorship in human history.”
“That’s an appalling exaggeration.”
“He’s a monster.”
She pauses, momentarily flustered. Then she says: “I’m his mother, not his keeper.” It sounds lame, and she can’t help wincing at her own words.
“Do you deny the internment without trial?” I say angrily. “The torture and humiliation of innocent people singled out because of their race and creed? Do you deny the Cheo’s government is corrupt, exploitative and ruthless?”
“I deny none of this! But it’s not for me to defend my son.”
“But he’s your son. You could at least…”
“What? Tell him off?”
I am seized with an appalling homicidal rage, and I rein myself in. Not now, not here, not like this… I force a smile. Then, in icily measured tones I tell her: “My people have suffered for centuries. But we will endure and we will survive and we will find our Promised Land.”
She blinks for a few moments.
“You’re a Christian?” she asks me.
“I’m a Humanist Atheist,” I reply. “But I still believe in the possibility of a better future.”
“You’re full of lies,” she snarls. “You’re just a very successful thief. I don’t buy this freedom-fighter bullshit.”
“I can be both! A thief and a champion of justice!”
“A butcher, and a beheader of innocents!”
“In war such things must happen!”
“In peace, such things must happen too. That is why my son is so severe!”
“The Cheo is an animal.”
“He is a leader. He leads. The universe of humanity follows. His way is brutal, yes. But given the restrictions imposed by the vast distances of space, and the fragmented and self-destructive nature of humankind, and, and, and… the xenobiological threats which jeopardise our very survival – how could it be otherwise…?”
Our angry words hang in the air, like mist on a summer’s morning.
“I’ve enjoyed this quarrel.”
“So have I.”
“Even though you’re wrong.”
“Oh fuck off!”
“Fuck off yourself, bitch!!!!”
“You blame me for everything.” Suddenly, the ice maiden Lena is in tears. “Why is that? Why am I always blamed for everything?”
“You gave birth to a monster. For that, you stand condemned.”