Conversation · The Deserter

Nothing comes up. The old man watches you stimulate thoughts by hitting yourself.

Fucking communard! Fucking asshole! Look at him, just staring -- hit him where it hurts!

Politics. Hit him with POLITICS and he may start giving his motive...

Oh yes!

There were May bells in the grass when you got here! They're revolutionary symbols, from the war!

Nowhere else -- nowhere in all of Martinaise have you seen them this spring.

Wait, here it comes -- the god damn May bells, the dried may bells on Klaasje's roof!

Oh yes!

There were May bells in the grass when you got here! And may bells on Klaasje's balcony!

And nowhere else -- nowhere in all of Martinaise have you seen them!

My head hurts now.

Who cares -- there were May bells in the grass when you got here, and on Klaasje's balcony! Is this a coincidence?

"I don't need your cooperation. I've got this." (Show him the Triangong 4-46.)

"Heh..."

"Not a lot of guns around that use military-grade ammunition, are there?"

"It's a real gun," he points to the lieutenant's holster, "not like your little musketeer pistols. I've seen you prance around with those, jumping hoops for the liberals..."

"You look like imbeciles. Why don't you ask them to give you real weapons, huh?" He chortles. "Going against automatic rifles with a flame bomb... of course you got all those boys killed!"

Damn, he saw you. He's watched it happen.

He would have a good view of the tribunal from here. It's not just empty boasting.

So he saw you... okay. So what. Don't let it divert you.

"Okay then." (Concede.)

"Imbecile..." He shakes his head.

"We saved a lot of them -- their leader Titus... We handled that situation."

"You didn't handle anything. I watched it happen -- you let those fucks rip right into them. Got that girl killed too."

"None of those people mean anything to you. The vultures feed on this city and you prepare the meal for them."

You're getting diverted. Push the gun. Only the gun matters.

"So you watched the fight?" The lieutenant points inland. "Did you like what you saw? The mayhem? It was all your doing. Your plan. You got them killed."

"You don't know anything..." A twitch runs across the right side of his face as he stares the lieutenant down.

"You didn't handle anything. I watched it happen -- you let those murderers rip right into them. Got most of them killed, even the fat one."

"Stop squirming. I have the murder weapon."

"You let them all die. Pranced around, let your little friend be shot too... I didn't get a good look at that, tell me, did he bleed out?"

"Shut up. I'm calling it: I have the murder weapon."

"Who are you trying to prove this to, huh? Your friend? He's not here." He cracks his knuckles: "He's dead, isn't he?"

"He's not dead, he's in the hospital."

"The world will rejoice when he dies. One fascha less..." He hisses, then glances into the reeds and twitches suddenly...

Like a marionette, on some invisible string...

He suddenly jerks to life: "You know who he was -- a Coalition trained murderer, armoured and armed. He wasn't human, the blunt end of a hammer, dripping with blood..."

"He was a rapist. I'm not saying he didn't deserve it."

"...beating us to the ground. Moaning with joy..." He breathes in with strange animation: "You hounds get so thorough when a company-trained killer dies. I haven't seen you on this coast for forty years. You know... maybe I should have killed one sooner?"

"Got your attention..." He looks you dead in the eye, pupils shaking. "Now you stop beating druggies and prostitutes in your basement. Now you come to investigate. Not when they die by the hundreds..." He breathes through flared nostrils...

This is it. Shot him, shot him, say shot him not killed him...

"So you killed him?"

"Oh the inhumanity..." He closes his black eyes. "One paramilitary less in Revachol." You can almost see him squeeze a tear out of his eye. His fists begin to tremble from the anger.

The lieutenant raises his right arm to hush you...

Hush, he does not need to be pushed any more. The ball is rolling...

...while the lieutenant listens, holding his breath.

Hold your breath.

"I had them in my sights, both of them -- him and the whore. I was breathing with them, in phase, and I pulled the trigger and flew on the air until I landed in his mouth..." He begins to smile.

"I didn't think I had a shot like that in me anymore. I did. I saw him kneel there with his mouth full of death and that stupid look on his face." The smile quivers. "And his dick still in her..."

There. A hot flash of rage almost carries the smile away. Some dark piece...

"Then what?"

"Nothing. I went to sleep. Next morning there were May bells everywhere. The world was white -- or what's left of it anyway. My last spring here... I knew the fascists would come to avenge their own..."

"And so they did."

"Mr. Dros -- are you aware you're confessing to murder?" the lieutenant asks after a second of silence.

"Yes." A single word is all he gives.

"And you were looking at them -- the victim and a young woman -- having sex? Through the scope of your rifle that night? Before you shot him?" The lieutenant takes out his notebook slowly, very slowly.

The old man nods.

"Why?"

"Because that's what they were doing..." He shrugs, then smacks his lips.

The motive! This is where the motive is going to come from...