08-04-2015, 01:57 AM
“You mentioned being a freedom fighter,” she said, changing the subject rather abruptly. “So what made you want to get into that?”
Ron grinned. “Are you ready for this?”
“Shoot.”
“Well, it all started when I was taken hostage.”
“Ha! You’re good at that.” She said with a wry grin. He rolled his eyes. Lady, you don’t know the half of it. “But go on,” she goaded. So he did:
“I was just a boy, really. Fresh out of school. I worked as a trauma surgeon for the Interplanetary Alliance’s secret moonbase. It was a fairly boring job, honestly—nobody attacks secret bases, because, well, they’re secret. I worked there for four years. I knew about the wars, and the Russian nuclear holocaust back home, and the NEO TECHNO LIBERATION FRONT and all that jazz, but it just seemed so far away. Besides, the pay was great!”
“So I’m guessing eventually the secret got out, right? You were attacked?”
“Right,” Ron affirmed, continuing his story. “One of our own researchers told a splinter faction of the Red Planet Army about the kinds of experiments we were performing—and I had no idea it was so bleak. Implants designed to control people, to erase their wills entirely and supplant it with something new. Mind control executed on the cellular level. When I found out, I could hardly blame our attackers. I knew then that the narrative I’d been fed my whole life—about NEO TECHNO NEW JERUSALEM being the one and only villain in all the solar system—I knew then that it was all even more bullshit than I thought. There were no benevolent rulers, no compassionate kings in our solar system. Just a bunch of desperate, horrified people trying to keep their hands as tightly on the reins as they could, and for as long as possible.”
“Your captors told you this?”
“I saw the implants work with my own eyes. My captors put them into the very scientist that had ratted us out, and used them to force him to shoot all of his companions. It was… difficult to watch, to say the least. It was there, watching them die, along with all my notions of security and freedom under the IPA’s rule of law, that I made my choice.”
He decided to leave the bits about Grey saving him from the captors out.
“I can only imagine what that was like…” She said, looking genuinely unnerved. He didn’t want her asking how he’d escaped, so he decided to ask her a little about herself, in order to change the subject. Although he’d have been lying to himself if he said that was his only reason for doing so. “What about you? I’ve heard stories about what you’ve done, but how did you end up here?” he asked.
“Who, me?” she cocked her head to the side. “Well, if you must know, I was actually born in the Town, but I was taken captive by a roving band of slavers back when I was, I dunno, around 16 or so maybe. That was around eight years ago now. Wow, time flies… Anyway, I don’t come from weak stock, so after they’d all gone to sleep one night, I snuck up on their leader, cut him open with his own machete, then choked his second-in-command to death with the leader’s innards. After that it was pretty easy to convince the remaining ones to accept my leadership or die horribly as well, and from there I’ve built a nice little niche for myself out here. Sold the others from the original band into slavery over falsified transgressions a couple years back.”
She noticed Ron giving her an alarmed look, and quickly added “… if you knew what they did to me, you’d know why I did them like that. So don’t give me that shit look.”
He only nodded. She glanced around, looking strangely ashamed of what she’d just so candidly admitted to him and the way that things had gone since then. “God, I… Nevermind.” She said, taking her cloak and pulling it back up to obscure her face. “Listen, just forget I said anything, okay? I made that up. I’m going to go back to my tent now.”
Ron opened his mouth to object, but she was already gone.
There, alone in the silence, with only the falling of the rain on sheet metal echoing through the camp, Big Ron’s initial thoughts of escape plans and philosophy were now replaced by just one burning question: what happened to Nat?
Ron grinned. “Are you ready for this?”
“Shoot.”
“Well, it all started when I was taken hostage.”
“Ha! You’re good at that.” She said with a wry grin. He rolled his eyes. Lady, you don’t know the half of it. “But go on,” she goaded. So he did:
“I was just a boy, really. Fresh out of school. I worked as a trauma surgeon for the Interplanetary Alliance’s secret moonbase. It was a fairly boring job, honestly—nobody attacks secret bases, because, well, they’re secret. I worked there for four years. I knew about the wars, and the Russian nuclear holocaust back home, and the NEO TECHNO LIBERATION FRONT and all that jazz, but it just seemed so far away. Besides, the pay was great!”
“So I’m guessing eventually the secret got out, right? You were attacked?”
“Right,” Ron affirmed, continuing his story. “One of our own researchers told a splinter faction of the Red Planet Army about the kinds of experiments we were performing—and I had no idea it was so bleak. Implants designed to control people, to erase their wills entirely and supplant it with something new. Mind control executed on the cellular level. When I found out, I could hardly blame our attackers. I knew then that the narrative I’d been fed my whole life—about NEO TECHNO NEW JERUSALEM being the one and only villain in all the solar system—I knew then that it was all even more bullshit than I thought. There were no benevolent rulers, no compassionate kings in our solar system. Just a bunch of desperate, horrified people trying to keep their hands as tightly on the reins as they could, and for as long as possible.”
“Your captors told you this?”
“I saw the implants work with my own eyes. My captors put them into the very scientist that had ratted us out, and used them to force him to shoot all of his companions. It was… difficult to watch, to say the least. It was there, watching them die, along with all my notions of security and freedom under the IPA’s rule of law, that I made my choice.”
He decided to leave the bits about Grey saving him from the captors out.
“I can only imagine what that was like…” She said, looking genuinely unnerved. He didn’t want her asking how he’d escaped, so he decided to ask her a little about herself, in order to change the subject. Although he’d have been lying to himself if he said that was his only reason for doing so. “What about you? I’ve heard stories about what you’ve done, but how did you end up here?” he asked.
“Who, me?” she cocked her head to the side. “Well, if you must know, I was actually born in the Town, but I was taken captive by a roving band of slavers back when I was, I dunno, around 16 or so maybe. That was around eight years ago now. Wow, time flies… Anyway, I don’t come from weak stock, so after they’d all gone to sleep one night, I snuck up on their leader, cut him open with his own machete, then choked his second-in-command to death with the leader’s innards. After that it was pretty easy to convince the remaining ones to accept my leadership or die horribly as well, and from there I’ve built a nice little niche for myself out here. Sold the others from the original band into slavery over falsified transgressions a couple years back.”
She noticed Ron giving her an alarmed look, and quickly added “… if you knew what they did to me, you’d know why I did them like that. So don’t give me that shit look.”
He only nodded. She glanced around, looking strangely ashamed of what she’d just so candidly admitted to him and the way that things had gone since then. “God, I… Nevermind.” She said, taking her cloak and pulling it back up to obscure her face. “Listen, just forget I said anything, okay? I made that up. I’m going to go back to my tent now.”
Ron opened his mouth to object, but she was already gone.
There, alone in the silence, with only the falling of the rain on sheet metal echoing through the camp, Big Ron’s initial thoughts of escape plans and philosophy were now replaced by just one burning question: what happened to Nat?