‘Fighting fear itself’ is big talk, but it is of course far easier said than done. After all, it’s not like ‘fear’ is something you can grab and deck in the face, like Martha did with me. No, fear is intangible, yet its grip is more powerful than any stranglehold could ever be. In order to fight it, you need to fight the reasons, and, as it turned out, Martha had a pretty good idea about the problems our little get-together had. As expected of the woman who ran one of the largest independent associations of the compound we were cooped up in.
“So you say, you want to ‘defeat fear’. But I’m just about
sure that you have no idea on where or how to even start, am I
right?” she asked me after the resident healer left ‘us two
lovebirds’ alone (her words, not mine). While I took the
insinuation with a wry smile, Martha looked like she was ready to
storm out and do some ass-kicking to prevent any rumors from
spreading, but managed to refrain from doing so. Which was good,
cause if you try to silence a rumor with violence, you only help it
spreading. No, the only way to make a rumor die is to not make a big
fuss about it and pretend it doesn’t even exist. People will then
get bored and that’s that. Sure, there will still be people who
will be ‘absolutely sure’ that whatever the rumor says is true,
but the best course of action is to ignore these people instead of
trying to prove them wrong.
But I digress.
Martha explained to me, that my people from the league were pretty
much spot on, when they said, that ‘fear’ was making people
behave strangely during the inspector’s visit. Just like all
people, they were afraid of change. Because change meant uncertainty.
In this compound, they knew the rules. The who’s who and the what’s
what. They knew their place and they arranged themselves in the
pecking order of occasional outbursts of violence. If, however, they
ever got out, they’d be back to square one. Thrown into a world
that does not want them. Most were afraid of being sent to die in a
war they did not believe in. When asked about the prospect of
deserting, they often stated, that they’d never feel safe anywhere,
being traitors to the crown and all that.
The more Martha told
me about the state of affairs in the town, the lower my heart sank.
How do you give people, who had never been accepted by their peers, a
prospect for a future? In here, we were all misfits. And we made it
work, mooching of the kingdom’s generosity. But out there? Out
there were the ‘normal’ people. Out there you had to work for
your meals. Out there was a war nobody really knew anything about.
Mind you, I say ‘nobody knew anything’, but there were plenty of
rumors floating around. And none of them were very promising.
“So, you see, Mr. Townsend, there’s very little you can do. Sure,
you could lie to the people, promise them that it would all be okay,
that all they’d need to do is follow you and you’d lead them into
a brighter future, but I you’d need to be the Messiah himself to
pull that off.”
“Or a damn good crook,” I comment.
“Same
thing in this day and age, really.”
“So...you are saying
it’s hopeless then?”
“Pretty much, yes…” Martha stated
and her look trailed off into the distance.
“What are you
thinking about, Martha?”
She got startled, flushed red for
just a second, but had herself back under control in a matter of
seconds and swiftly replied, “I’m sorry, I allowed myself to get
lost in memories.”
“Memories? What kind of memories?”
Martha
gave me a stern look, seemingly appraising me and finally said, “I’ll
tell you, but under one condition. You must tell nobody. If I even
just catch as much as a whisper of anyone else knowing, I’ll come
for you. And then ‘broken bones’ will be the least of your
concerns, you hear me? I’m talking about ‘Ripping off your balls
and feeding them to the pigs’ kind of pain here. So...you still
wanna know?!”
I cracked a weak smile, “If you still want to
tell me, then yeah. Sure. Knowing me, I’ll have forgotten about it
in a week anyway.”
“...you’ve got dementia or something,
old man?”
“Nah, actually my memory is pretty good. But it’s
highly associative. Meaning that, in order to remember something, I
usually need a trigger of some sort. A word, a song, a smell,
anything, really. And social affairs are rarely the kind of stuff I
form strong associations with. So, who was he?”
“What makes
you think this is about a guy?”
“Eh, just going with the
trope here. You know, you threatening me with violence if I tell
anyone about it, yet apparently adamant about sharing your story with
someone.”
“It’s not about ‘a guy’, though. At least
not in the ‘past lover’ sense.”
“Fair enough.”
“You’re
not going to probe?”
“You’re going to tell me what you
want, when you want to. Or much rather, when you’re ready. Though,
to be honest, are you sure that I’m the right kind of person for
this talk? Shouldn’t you have a best friend in your association to
discuss such things with?”
Martha fell silent for a long time
before responding, “Sometimes it is better to confide into a
stranger than a ‘best friend’. The chances of them using the
knowledge against you are lower.”
“That would be a pretty
bad friend, who would go and use any knowledge you’ve shared with
them against you.”
“...yup, you’re definitely new here.
Kinda surprising that you didn’t wake up with a knife in your back
yet with your attitude.”
“I haven’t had much time to make
that kind of friends yet. I was too busy getting beaten up.”
That
made Martha snort into a little laughter. Something I had not seen
for far too long, as I realized in that very moment. And at the same
moment, I wanted more of it. Happiness in my life, I mean.
That
was, what I’ve always wanted, actually. I wanted the people around
me to be happy, so I could join into their happiness myself. I really
am a wuss.
After the moment passed, Martha switched back into her ‘serious’
mode and said, “Fine, Mr. Townsend. I’ll tell you a little story
and I sincerely hope that you’ll remember your promise to not tell
anyone. Though I guess I shouldn’t stress that point as much,
huh?”
“No, that’s not a good idea, if you want something
to stay secret.”
Martha took a deep breath, sat down on the
side of my bed and said, “I’ve been here for 5 years now. Give or
take a few months, the people here aren’t all that good with
timekeeping. When I first came here, I was lost and confused, just
like you. I also thought, that all of this could just be a dream.
After all, ‘waking up in another world with all your weaknesses
magically being removed’ doesn’t happen in reality. Sounds
familiar, am I right?”
“Yes it does. I assume that your body
also looked a tad different than what you were used to?”
“Damn
straight it did. And you? You weren’t exactly Mr. Universe before
coming here either, were you?”
I merely shook my head and
nodded for her to continue.
“Well, at first everything went
fine. People were a bit weird when they realized that I was a
‘champion’, but I quickly learned how to hide that fact and from
there it went uphill. Looking the way I do certainly helped.
Eventually however, ‘the fate of champions’ caught up to
me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Yeah well, I got involved
into a bar fight. The guards came to break it up and, during
questioning, they found this blasted magic stone, which translates
this world’s gibberish into something I can actually work
with.”
“Let me guess the rest: They ‘escorted’ you to
this compound, where you were supposed to train for being deployed on
the front line against the demon king?”
“Spot on. That you
managed to stay out of trouble long enough to actually make it to the
front gates of Eregrund is a pretty amazing feat. Us ‘otherworld
champions’ like to stand out like a sore thumb.”
“I...wouldn’t
say that I managed to stay out of trouble until then, actually. But
you didn’t want to tell me my own story, did you?”
“No, of
course not. You see, when I got thrown in here, I met a man. Another
otherworld champion, who had been here for 10 years or even more. A
shining beacon of hope, who ran the whole joint. He took me in and
taught me everything I needed to know in order to survive. After a
while, I was sure that he would be the one to lead us to victory and
freedom. He was an idealist, who truly believed that we, as
champions, could make a difference. And you remind me of him.”
I
processed the information, especially her deliberate use of the past
tense and, of course, the fact that I had not heard about anyone like
that.
“I am not going to like what happened to him, am I?” I
asked, painfully aware that I wouldn’t even like the answer to this
question.
“No, I don’t think you will. Because he and you
are from the same breed. You are fools. And he was too weak. And that
combination is always the first to die in this world.”
Yeah
well, that was obvious. Still, that didn’t explain, why she seems
to try keeping it under wraps. So I kept probing a little further and
eventually she revealed how his demise came to be.
“He died
trying to protect me and a girl I tried to rescue, Thomas. Threw
himself into the way of an incoming crossbow bolt. The darn bastard
bolted when he realized what he had done, but there was no saving the
only real friend I’ve ever had in this god-forsaken town. I called
for help, of course, but nobody came. I tried to drag him out of that
street, but he was too heavy. In the end, he died in my arms...wanna
know what his final words were?”
“Something pretty damn
awesome, I reckon.”
“If you’re hoping for some ‘Ben
Parker’ level of bullshit, I’m sorry, but I must disappoint you.
‘Do not hate them’. That’s what he said before life left him.
After that, I cried. I cried for one whole week. And after my tears
stopped running, I had resolved myself to continue his work. To lead
the people into the brighter future my mentor had envisioned. But I
failed. 4 years have passed since and all I managed in the meantime
is, that the few girls in here have a somewhat safe haven to come to
once darkness falls. That the men no longer consider us mere ‘prey’.
But I am far from the shining beacon he was. Try as I might, I am
still too weak.”
Martha looked away, apparently fighting hard against the tears she had held back all those years ever since. Maybe he wasn’t her lover, but clearly he was very important to her. An anchor to hold on to. A man who could make a difference with his words and deeds. A hero. Because that’s what heroes do. They put themselves in danger to protect the people. And they die in the service of these people.
I wanted to hug Martha at that point, give her some solace even at
the risk of getting beat up again, but the instance I rose my arm,
she snapped, “Touch me and you’re a dead man!”
I did not
hug her after all. And eventually the moment passed, Martha got up
and left the infirmary without saying another word. I stayed in there
for the night and when I went back ‘home’ the next morning, I
wondered, why she would tell me that story in the first place.
To
warn me? To encourage me? Or just to get it off her chest?
I’ll
likely never know and it doesn’t really matter either way. The
important part however is, that she confided in me. She opened her
hardened shell and allowed me to peer past the walls she had
surrounded herself with for protection. And she showed me that it is
possible for one man to make a difference. Okay, he paid for this
‘difference’ with his life, but I must not let that stop
me.
After all, I wanted to go home. And for that, I needed to
get out of here. I needed to make a difference. I may have been a
fool to think so, but after that night, I was convinced, that there
was some way for me to succeed. There just had to be.
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