Is Darkness a friend or an enemy? Do I even have enemies? I think there is one, and I'd say the fiercest and most hateful enemy, the one who hurts me the most, is myself. Sometimes philosophers and creators declare in their speeches that a person is born without enemies and should live their life as it meets them. Perhaps there is some truth in that.
I have fought and killed a lot. You have no idea, reader, how much I hate those two words — so simple and pathetic, almost like all the others, yet they contain something you won't find elsewhere.
I despise everything I've done. It doesn't matter whether I was forced or it was my own choice. Perhaps I am repenting. Repenting for the fact that I could have prevented so much, but didn't. I could start making excuses to myself — that there was no other way, or that I couldn't.
And my prison became Darkness. Not now, later. Maybe God is taking revenge on me for everyone I lost and failed to save. Perhaps I am my own God and Judge.
Sometimes I remember those days when we were all studying at the academy. I remember almost all their faces, I remember their voices and laughter, their anger and childish joy at successes. Time flies fast.
Too fast.
Now I am alone. And if earlier I was afraid of all this, now I understand there was nothing to fear. When a person is alone with themselves — truly alone, no one else around, nothing else near — they begin to realize who they are. They understand what they like, what they truly want. And when that realization comes, a person becomes completely different. They begin to hate their old self.
Forever trying to change, forever thinking it's not enough. Distrusting themselves, they stumble and fall into that pit they were trying so hard to climb out of. And the worst part of it all is that for many of the strongest and most brilliant people, that pit became a grave.
I am one of those.
Perhaps my words will resonate in someone's heart, and for me that will be the highest reward as an author, the highest price of all my work. It will be worth more than anything I have achieved — or at least am trying to achieve.
My monologue could have stretched for a few more lines, but my eyes began to slowly open, and my head was humming with noise. Bright light blinded me every time I tried to open my eyes.
"Easy…" I heard a quiet voice coming from somewhere to the side. "Easy…"
The voice was so soft and gentle that it seemed as if some divine being had descended to me to guide me on my final journey, to its gates. I tried to sit up, but someone's warm and light hand held me down, stopping my attempt. By then, my vision was slowly beginning to return.
"What happened? Where am I?" I began asking, turning my head in different directions, still seeing poorly.
"Everything's fine. Don't make any sudden moves. You have a concussion," said the same gentle, calm voice — warm as warm milk flowing from the chest of ancient Gods. It washed over their souls and made its way to Earth, straight to people.
A moment later, I realized. It was a girl — the same one I had met at the formation in front of the barracks.
My vision and hearing had almost fully returned, allowing me to see her and the place we were in. It was cold, and that surprised me.
She was wearing a white coat with an emblem related to where we were. Her black hair swayed gently in the wind created by a small fan behind her. Her lips were a little dry. And her eyes…
I swear that when I am on the verge of death, dear reader, it will be them I see in my final seconds. Her. Her eyes were bright blue with shades of whiteness in different places. A mutation. But so beautiful — as if she were art, a forbidden fruit for which travelers and dreamers tore each other's throats in search of it. And now this fruit, this art — all of it — looked at me with a thin, tiny, barely visible smile.
"Where am I?" I asked her, looking around.
This place resembled a hospital or some kind of medical facility, but something was wrong. The walls were bright white everywhere, and there were no doors to be seen anywhere, no windows, nothing. And the light that illuminated everything seemed to come from nowhere, as if it had been locked in here with me from the start. The only things in the room were the cot I was lying on, a stand with medicine and tubes connected to me, and a small table with a fan behind it.
Fear gripped me. Although I'm not afraid of tight, small spaces like this room, I was afraid that I couldn't see a way out of here. None at all.
"You're in an isolation unit. It's alright," she said calmly, placing her hand next to mine.
"Why are you here? What happened?" I asked sharply, still looking around.
"Several units revolted and seized a weapons depot, which started a massacre," she explained, looking away. "Fifty-eight dead and over a hundred wounded," she said with bitterness and pain. She was still more human than all the others.
"What's your name?" I asked, trying to change the subject.
"Eli," she answered quietly, turning to me. "And you, as I understand…" she began, looking at the tablet she'd been holding the whole time. "Kyle Gratz, former Legion intelligence agent, convicted of attempting to assassinate the Emperor," she read aloud.
"Not much of a career, I admit," I said and smiled.
"I've seen more interesting," she said and smiled back.
Our conversation lasted a few more minutes, most of which we just sat in silence. Then she had to leave, and I was left alone — fortunately, not for long. Soon after she left, two soldiers arrived to take me back to the barracks so I could continue my work. Although I wasn't particularly bothered by their attitude toward me, their actions and mockery, something was still troubling me.
Where was Ray.
They led me through rocks and sand. I didn't recognize this place until we walked a bit further and I saw everything from above. The isolation units were on top of a mountain. White cubes stood in the middle of a sandy field — like some unfinished statues left by their owner in the hope that someday he would return and grant them life.
Before us appeared an elevator, rising from below on a cable while we stood and surveyed the entire prison. It was larger than I'd thought, but most of it was hidden beneath the massive ship that was still burning. Smoke rose from it and spread for hundreds of kilometers to the north.
Also near the ship and the airfield where it had landed was a sphere floating in the sky — large, white like the isolation units. But it certainly wasn't one of them.
When the elevator reached us, we stepped inside and began to descend. As we descended, I looked around and saw something that horrified me. All over the mountain were similar elevators, rising and descending, and in each of them were prisoners along with guards. Why hadn't I noticed them before? Probably because of the drugs they'd pumped into me to cure the concussion.
The wind shook us considerably, slamming its incomparable force against the cliff again and again, shattering into millions of pieces ready to go on their way. Perhaps we are alike in some way. I had to hold onto the railings to keep from falling. The wind made me colder with every minute of the descent, and the descent, to be honest, was not fast. Standing in hospital linen and a torn robe, I was ready to jump off just to feel the heat of the scorching sun.
After a few more minutes, we descended. Guards and military personnel were already waiting for us, holding prison uniforms in their hands. Stepping off the elevator, I approached one of them and was about to head to the barracks when they stopped me.
"What's the problem?" I asked, surprised.
"Change," one of the guards said through a mask that hid his face.
"What? Right here?" I asked, thinking it was some kind of joke — but I understood perfectly well when I heard shouts from the side.
Turning, I saw soldiers beating naked prisoners. And the most horrifying part of all was that soon after the beatings, one of the guards would bring an iron rod with a red-hot brand at the end, which they pressed to different parts of the prisoners' bodies. Looking closer, I saw only one word:
Cattle.
The same awaited me, dear reader. I know what it's like to feel pain. I remember all the pain I endured — that's just my nature. I remember how they tore off my robe and how I resisted. I remember how I sobbed — not from the pain, but from helplessness. Even now I see all those people standing ten meters away, watching as I was beaten and mutilated, as I was being killed. But I don't blame them for it. They were afraid — just like me.
I remember how a soldier broke my rib, and I fell to the ground, curling into a ball, suffocating. All the while in tears and filth, begging for mercy. If God exists, if some higher power exists — why didn't it help me? Why was I rejected by my creator? Why?
I haven't found an answer to that question even now, in exile. I don't know what to answer or write. So, reader, I hope you'll understand why I resist writing about this pain in more detail.
They tried to break me, tried to make me into something inhuman. But I was born the way I am. I cannot be changed, cannot be rebuilt, much less broken. But it brought me no pleasure or relief when all those who tortured me burned in hellfire. I felt sorry for them. In a human way.
After the torture, we were all taken to the common barracks, where we were allowed to dress and rest — if it could be called rest. Later I found out that out of forty prisoners who were beaten and tortured, five died. And the warden watched over all this brutality. It was a birthday present for him.
The old, wretched geezer enjoyed the pain and torture, enjoyed death and destruction. And his decrepit brain had long since rotted under the weight of power. He reminds me of someone.
In the barracks, I changed and lay down in a corner on the floor. I slept for a couple of hours before someone woke me. I probably had dreams, though I don't even remember the last time I had any. They're like wanderers — sometimes they come with great and precious goods called Happiness, sometimes they come with nothing. Some buy, some sell.
Someone started shaking my shoulders.
"Kyle! Kyle!" a man's voice shouted at me.
Opening my eyes wider and seeing who had disturbed me, I was relieved.
Raymond.
"Is that you? Ray?" I asked him with pain. It hurt to breathe. My lungs seemed ready to exhale themselves. I was bleeding out.
"What did they do to you? Why?" Ray shouted, grabbing his head with his hands and starting to tear at his hair.
He was afraid. There were tears in his eyes.
"Why?" he repeated over and over as he tried to help me stand.
His hands were cold and dry, and all his clothes were dirty and torn. With his help, I managed to sit on a chair against the wall of the barracks. The other prisoners who had been beaten were lying in their bunks — they got luckier than me. One had his jaw broken, leaving the poor guy unable to speak.
"I'm fine," I said quietly.
More accurately, I hissed — the sound coming out of me was like gas escaping from a pipe or a vent.
I was surprised he was so worried about me. Even though we'd known each other for nearly a month, I probably would have done the same in his place. But he wasn't here just to check on me. He had business with me. Or rather — an offer.
"Kyle, listen. I know it's hard for you to process right now, but tonight the ship's doors will be open," he began quickly and quietly, afraid someone might hear us.
"What? What are you talking about?" I began asking.
"We can escape," he said and fell silent.
I looked at him silently. I was in terrible pain, and even the thought of fighting made me want to try. But still, I managed.
"But I'm…" I said, pointing my right hand at myself. "I can't."
He looked at me sadly, but it wasn't despair that I expected. It was something else.
"I have UI-06. Two of them," he said with a weak smile, holding out his hands with two gray syringe-capsules with red necks at the needles.
"Where the hell did you get them?" I asked in confusion.
"Your friend gave them to me."
"What? What are you…" and then it hit me.
It was Eli. Had she really decided to risk her reputation for me? But why?
The UI-06 syringe-capsule was an elongated syringe containing substances that promoted bodily regeneration. Such syringes were so expensive that only high-ranking command personnel were allowed to carry them.
And two of them were right in our hands.
Ray injected one into my neck. The medicine would take three hours to work. So for all three hours, I lay there, waiting for Raymond, who had gone back to work with his group.
Three hours felt like an eternity. Many of those who had fallen asleep with me in that room woke up. Some limped, some couldn't stand without help, and some never woke up.
All this time, I sat in the corner and watched the others. Three left, two died in their sleep, and the rest stayed in the room with me. We all remained silent. Speaking was painful, and there was nothing to say. We were all scapegoats — things, cattle.
I thought a lot, but, as often happens with people, little of it stayed with me. Some things remained in my head, though. Thoughts of family, thoughts of Reni and Durs, of our work, of Maron. Sometimes I remember our days at the academy — how we had fun and fooled around as children. Even though it was a terrible time for children, we never complained. I must admit — I miss them. All of them.
You know, the thing I hate most is goodbyes. Even more than introductions.
By nightfall, Ray returned — all sweaty and exhausted. He was holding a pack of rations.
"Here," he said, handing me the ration.
I refused, saying that I was getting better.
"Then listen. In an hour, the guard will change, but only today they'll be delayed by twenty minutes. That's our chance," he began.
We also discussed the escape route and decided to leave the ship on a shuttle, then cross the desert to the nearest settlement.
An hour passed, and we set off toward the ship. Past the guards, past the checkpoints. Ray had gone far ahead, but I tried to keep up with him. The air was fresh and not as hot as during the day, and my scars had almost healed, so I felt fine.
Passing another checkpoint, I noticed something illuminated by yellow lamps. Coming closer, I heard the roar of an engine and saw.
A large rusty bulldozer was pushing a pile of dead bodies into a pit. With its powerful blade, it flipped them over. Women, men, old people, and even children.
I froze in that moment. I couldn't move, and my mind shut down. All I could do was stand and watch from deep in the shadows nearby, where no one could see me. Among them were people I knew. Among them was the boy I'd tried to save.
I remember the first bodies falling into the pit, and the others covering them.
My face went cold, and my hands went numb. I was paralyzed, and I started to sob. I couldn't breathe. Every second became harder and harder. Tears fell from my cheeks onto the cooling sand — still hot as life itself. They soaked into it.
I fell to my knees and shoved my hands into the sand where my tears had just fallen. I didn't know what to do. I was starting to lose my mind.
Is the world really this cruel?