It feels lonely without her. I went ahead in time. The timeline is all fuzzy. I met that Doctor years before all of us ended up here. I jumped place to place in this fragmented reality. Seeing young me and his comrades recovering from the first trial of experimentation. The first one died puking out deep, dark blood. Back then I couldn't make it out clearly, but with the clarity of memory I could hear the discussion the Technocrats had in their control room.
"You know neither the Commissariat or the Ethics committee would sanction any of that!" A young Technocrat shouted. "The details you provided obviously don't align with anything you described in your transcripts and outlines! Those kids are dying and when this Commissar Nevy comes in. He won't stop with just flashing his gun around like he usually does! He will put a bullet inside your head and find the highest lamp pole he can find and hang you from there for public display!"
I got closer to the wall, hearing the smug reply from Jasmine, "Relax, they won't dare to hurt the Technocrats' magnum opus. I'm the greatest thing they've ever achieved. Yes, I didn't go into detail about the cost of this endeavor, but it will be worth it. Can you imagine what I can achieve with the knowledge I can gather here? Under normal circumstances, it would not be possible for me to acquire any of the knowledge that we are not able to gather under any other circumstances."
"Under any other circumstances?" The young technocrat replied. "You're too full of yourself! If your ego were half as big as the knowledge you claim to have, you would know that our ancestors, on their quest for unlimited knowledge and true understanding of the universe, turned tail when they had all the knowledge of the universe at their fingertips! Unchained knowledge shall not be pursued and for good reason if you stop for nothing, nothing is all that will be left if you reach the end of that road. My team and I will withdraw immediately. You better find some half-witted excuse for the death of those kids before the Commissars or the ethics committee hang you on some lamp pole for the transgression you committed here. Taking advantage of loyal citizens is the greatest shame we technocrats have once committed, and you wish to repeat that?"
I looked at the face of my then 'friend'; I barely remembered it, or his name. We were all part of the same group, but I had never learned it.
"What made me never bother to learn your name?" I said out loud.
Do you say that as a sorrowful reflection, or is this a bitter acceptance of willful ignorance?
"Shut up, you're dead," I said to the voice. "You're different. You're not the Meldier."
I looked over my shoulder and saw a pair of eyes, one eye red, the other purple.
"Isn't what you said redundant? No matter what I respond with, both will answer the same feeling I had about my friend dying."
Then you know what I asked for. Tell me.
I looked down at my old friend once more. "It's hard for me to say. I don't think I ever mourned a death more than any other. No, I relish the thought of ending some people's life. Like my fathers."
I looked properly at the fallen boy's brown hair and blue eyes. He wasn't meant to die, not there not like that. A young impressionable youth was lured there with the promise he could serve as the Directorates finest.
"I think… I feel grief? I mourn the loss of what he could have become."
And you claim you do not want to become a Commissar? With that authority, you could have barged in here and demanded the safety of all of those who yet live.
"I don't think I would make a good Commissar. It's hard for me to even say what a Commissar is. Yes I do recognize when I see one. With their attire and how they carry themself. They have this righteous authority which they emit like a raging fire, but I wouldn't know how to emulate something like that. Or be someone like that."
Even if you can't tell what it is to be a Commissar you have seen plenty. Tell me, say it out loud. What is the difference between your foster father, Jay, Sabine, or any of those other Commissars you see at your annual pledges of allegiance?
"Well for one, he is my foster father who took me in and trained me so I wouldn't take the life of innocents."
Yes I know that, but what is his function? Why does the Directorate keep someone like him around?
The eyes dashed in front of me and hovered above the corpse of my friend leaning left and right like an excited animal. m"Because he is the one responsible for Police internal matters beyond the day to day crime and will maintain the infrastructure once they are no longer needed until their service is called upon again."
Yes, YES! Now you get it. Then tell me what does Sabine do, what is her function!?
"Sabine is the Supreme Head Commissar acting as Magistrate of our planet, protecting the interest of the Directorate and its Citizens."
Yes, exactly that. Now tell me what Jay does.
"Jay goes around enforcing equality and justice and making sure nobody violates the Unity Accord."
Yes, the Unity Accord so all of you are able to stand united despite your differences. And now tell me, what does a Commissar do during your annual pledges of unity?
"Well they're there to stand guard together with the Militia so nobody gets forced into signing it."
That may be on the surface but there is something deeper than to ensure that everyone is signing it willingly.
"They make sure everybody signs it, and no one leaves unaddressed if they're not willing to do so."
Close, so close but their function is that much deeper! And so much simpler!
I pondered, thought hard about what we in the militia were always doing during the annual pledges.
You've been there, haven't you? When somebody willingly and knowingly refused to pledge their unity.
My vision faded from the Technocratic testing chamber which was falling into the void to the People's Congress. There were so many ballots we approached a sole man who stood there in front of his monitor. A Commissar was already at his side, so was Sina…
You know what happened here, what you lost, and what changed forever.
"For the first time, I've seen somebody refuse to pledge their unity, and how Sina was lost to us."
Yes, and the Commissar?
I looked at her; she was a beautiful young woman in her late twenties, with beautiful depthless blue eyes. She reached her hands out to the sniffing man's and wrapped them around his.
"Look at me. You know what happens if you fail to pledge your unity."
The man slowly turned towards her, tears fell down from his eyes and snot came out of his nose.
"Im there for you, I can even hand you my number if you want to talk about what happened today or before. Know this, I am at your side and act on your behalf if you let me help. So please tell me what ails you?"
The men choked out his words like a hurt child.
"This is wrong. How can we keep doing this year after year? Not question a thing, keep doing what is obviously wrong? Why do we have to pledge all of this when we're safe. This is the Directorate not some sci-fi dictatorship from the series. This is plainly wrong and oppressive."
The young woman traced her thumbs over his to calm him down slightly.
"Your question is a valid one, and I'm really glad you voiced this! That we pledge our Unity annually is of utmost importance."
"But it's oppressive! It's wrong, you can't justify that! It can't be moral if generation for generation everybody has done it, and you're expected to follow along or be exiled and leave for ever!"
"I know." She looked at him with upturned eyes. "I know why you're hurt, and why you want to have it answered. I can offer you immediate access to therapy if you want the ethics question behind the Unity Accord, but please pledge it first or there is nothing I can do for you."
Sina stepped closer. She raised a hand to speak up, but it faltered like her courage. She stepped back and her hand reached out to the men, but then she decided against it. All of us were torn from the inside. Even though I experienced a pain which I still don't understand.
"I will not." Said the man resolutely; for the first time his voice was firm."
"You already said what is coming next, don't make me carry out my duty. I hate this as much as you."
"I do, Commissar." Hesitantly, she let go of his hands. She glanced at him one last time before she turned around.
"Do your duty, Corporal." All of those eyes fell upon me. Then and there I ,was pushing away a friend.
"Commissar, you can't! He's only sad and deluded. He can always pledge with everyone next year!" Sina cried out.
"He questioned the morality of the Unity Accord. It's beyond moral we figured it out, and even if it is not the way God intended for us humans to live. We guarantee the safety and passage of all of those who do not wish to experience it."
"He doesn't know what he's doing. He'll get turned over to some slavers guild or whatever corporate nonsense is out there in the galaxy! He might become a mercenary or whatever those regimes could do to him! Commissar, please, save this men!" The Commissar kept walking.
"I can't defile the dignity of this man or the Unity Accord. He chose his destiny without the Directorate, and the corporal will escort him to his first stepping stone."
"KYLE!" Sina cried out.
I was hesitant then; I knew the weight of my decision when she looked past those terrible goggles of mine, hiding how my blue eyes were slowly fading to grey.
"You heard the Commissar," everybody looked down suddenly as if struck by the same collective grief.
"You cannot do this! Please, Kyle."
"As he refused to pledge the Unity Accord, and relinquished his allegiance to the Directorate, we will guide him safely with his dignity intact to the starport where he will depart Directorate space for ever."
Sina shook her head as if I didn't mean what I had said. She dropped her rifle and scratched her head as she was stepping backwards.
"No, no, no, no! NO!"
She bumped against multiple desks where the Monitors were erected for everyone's pledge of Unity. She looked towards the leaving Commissar, and then looked at me. She tore off her jacket and ran. She ran far, far away.
The others ganged up on the man, pushing and shoving him, saying things like You did this to her, or why couldn't you sign, we all could be living in peace. and The Directorate isn't that bad, why don't you want to live with us? I had to step between them and get their hands off him.
"He made his choice, and we have to respect it."
Just like that, our procession to the star port began. Slowly, we embarked on a march that lasted several hours. He walked in front of us, all of us slightly behind him. There were many onlookers who stopped their daily duties to see the rare sight. We ignored him as best as we could. The man tried to drag his feet as if they had gotten a whole lot heavier. Careful we followed him, not daring to step into his shadow. His lift off the planet was already waiting there when we arrived at the landing pad. Sabine, Jay, my foster father all were standing there with several attendees. The man stopped at the sight of such an imposing array of characters. I laid my hand on his shoulder and urged him to go forward. He began to cry again. When he was on the ramp he looked at Sabine.
"Only death awaits me, doesn't it, Commissar? Can you not make me leave?"
"You made your choice, and it's my duty to respect that."
The man squealed as he turned around and tried to get past me. I tried to hold him in place and shove him off me, but Jay was the one to step in. He slung his arm around the man and dragged him inside. The man sobbed loudly, clutching his hands against his head when Jay sat down next to him. Time froze and I heard two steps creeping up behind me.
"So what is a Commissar's duty? If not to the Directorate's people? They might be political officers or officials. Magistrates, Policemen, and every other task within the Directorate, but first and foremost there they're servants. It would not be wrong to call the Commissars Stewards of the Directorate's people."