“Want to go outside and have a smoke?” says Isaac.
“I don’t smoke.” He knows that, must be acting smart again.
“Still?”
“Yes still. I don’t smoke; it’s not good for you.” Seriously.
“Do you realize where you are Peter?”
“Yeah, the wreck room.”
“There you are, being cute again. I take back saying you were thick. Really though, we are about to be shipped out to our death. Whatever is in these ancients,” he waves the tin box around in front of my face, “will have no time to take effect on your body. You’ll be six feet under first.”
“What if we live?” It sounded hollow even as I said it. But I mean, one never really knows. We could win this. We could come back alive. I have to believe in something.
“Then I’ll pay for your chemo myself.”
With that he leaves to the patio. I join him for company. He has his helmet with him and a yellow marker. “What do you really think about the stims?” he says, “I’ve known you for almost a year. You raised your hand saying you’re a pacifist too. Surely you’re not okay with them like you let up.”
“The real answer man, is that I don’t know. They really did fuck with us, huh?”
“Yeah. I feel guilty, that I could betray myself so easily. They have it down to a science, controlling us and all.”
“I wouldn’t call it that. This is just in the military…”
“Oh yeah, I forgot you’re infatuated with the Party. Want to be their newest bitch.”
“Shut up.” I am not that simple. “I just don’t think our government really has it out for us like you think they do. I mean if they really wanted us gone, they’d just let the Herculeans come here and wipe us out.”
“Or they could just send us over there and let them do the same.”
We sit quietly, letting the cold air ease our hot and sore bodies. Isaac writes something on his helmet, then lights one of his ancients.
“Where did you find those out here, anyway?” I say.
“The military, at least, has good taste when it comes to certain pastimes.”
“Okay, real talk now. If we weren’t about to die, why don’t you just vap? It’s healthier.”
He blows a ring. “We’ve been over this. The taste is way better when it’s burned in its natural form,” he blows another ring, and shoots a smoke stream through it, “and because I couldn’t do that with vapsticks. I gotta have fun with my activities.”
I watch him blow more smoke rings, and then watch as he tries to blow a straight line through multiple rings at once. He grins at me when he gets up to shooting a line through four.
I ask him another question, “What do you think of our unit?”
“We got a big unit, which ones?”
“I don’t know, all of them, start from the top.”
“I’ll start with who I like. Vance is cool, he’s just a geeky nerd our age. Which makes him likable.” I nod in agreement. “Julian is also alright. He’s old, but he’s nice too. He really doesn’t feel like he fits here though, more than all of us.”
“I wonder how he ended up here. He’s older than twenty five, what the draft only goes up to, but not an officer obviously, since he is fresh like us. The only people his age are the ones who made the military a career.”
“A shitty career,” Isaac blows another O, “Ray’s cool too, he’s always on edge though.”
“He keeps talking about his girl back home, sounds like stuff isn’t working out between them.”
“Tough. Next, we got Alex, I like him, he’s quiet, kinda just there. And does he have a jerky addiction? He’s always chewing on it. Then there’s Jonathon, who also never says shit, but a weird kinda quiet, not like Alex.” He moves on to his second ancient. “Now there’s Tommy,” Isaac snorts instantly from laughing, “that fucker spent the whole first day looking for grid squares. But to his credit, he’s a proud son of a bitch who thinks the marines is all that. But at least he’s polite and actually believes it, unlike Vick, god fuck that guy. A-plus douche bag. Acts all tough, like he’s the shit. Next is Kaiden, right? Our Corporal. He’s an ass kisser. Cut out POG material. We’ll probably die out there all young and shit, and he’ll just come back to be a Lifer.”
“We still got Rommel.”
“Oh god, that kid is crazy. Barely over eighteen, and all he can talk about is war and shooting stuff. He’s mom clearly didn’t let him play those shooter games, or maybe she let him play too much. He’ll either save us or get us all killed.”
“Why do you think that?
“Because he is the only one that actually likes Buzz. It gives him some sorta rage boner. He’ll either be a war hero, or end up dragging us to our death. Probably the latter.” He returns to smoking, and I sink into my lawn chair looking at the stars.
So the conversation ends back at Buzz. It’s still eating away at my mind. At first I felt betrayed, like Isaac does. But looking longer at it, if I were in the Party making these tough decisions, I suppose I would have come to similar conclusions. They need us ready. Ready to stop them from advancing to their next planet of conquest.
But my pacifism, my life philosophy of violence not being the solution was ripped right out of me, and it doesn’t matter how hard I stick to my ideals, they will just change it when the time comes. I don’t know, maybe I am looking at it wrong. I mean, in retrospect, my pacifism was always to humans. I ate meat. I was only peaceful in social convention. These Herculeans are not human, so they also don’t deserve my pacifism anyway, right? And further, they were the ones who showed they don’t want to negotiate, they attacked us first. They killed us first. They are the real monsters. The ones that need to be stopped. Violence be it if it’s the only way.
But god, I still feel off about changing my morals so easily, even if I am doing so because I came upon a new truth that is correcting my old convictions. But the Party obviously knows more than me. They know what humanity needs, what needs to be done. They have always taken care of me, practically raised me. Just because I don’t fully agree with them on one aspect, doesn’t mean I get to be rebellious everywhere else. And as they always say, we must look at the bigger picture. If I don’t fight today, how many peace loving people, how many want-to-be pacifists will I doom, force to fight for me tomorrow then? All because I shied away from my obligations.
What is really right or wrong? Surely it is all just perspective. And I mustn’t be narrow minded to think one philosophy is always correct, the Party knows that, they know that the ends justify the means—fight now so they won’t be a threat to human peace later—I need too as well.
Isaac breaks me from my thoughts. “Here, add this to your helmet.” He throws me the yellow marker.
“What?”
He shows me his helmet. It says Fool’s Gold on the side.
“Are we allowed to do that?”
“Just do it. Gonna make it a little squad thing.”
I add the saying. I even add sparkles on some of the letters. He looks over and smiles. “I have come upon a new parable to tell.”
“Another Isaac parable?” I groan, throwing him back the marker.
He pockets the marker, and then rotates his lighter around in his hands. As he rotates it faster the red and white stripes become a tie-dye blur. “Yes my pupil. Now shut the fuck up while I lay down some wisdom.”