Star Trek: Outwardly Mobile
Episode 60d The Price
by
Jay P. Hailey

 

I looked at evil, sitting across the force field from me.

I wasn't used to seeing people as all the way good or evil. We worked hard to look at the facts first.

I looked at the facts. The man in the brig was evil.

“Why?” I asked.

“Why what?” he responded.

He was a young man. He had clean sharp features, black hair and an athletic figure. Something about his body language disturbed me.

I wasn't going to give him a break anyway. “Why did you murder those people?”

He shrugged. “That's what my orders said to do.”

“That is a poor defense.”

“I am not defending anything. You asked me why, I told you why.” He said.

“And it didn't occur to you to question your orders?” I snarled.

“Captain.” he sighed. “Everyone has his price.”

“Oh?” I couldn't believe it.

He looked me straight in the eye. “You have no idea.”

“Enlighten me.”

He leaned back. “There comes a time when you surrender to it. A man can only fight so long before he gives up. Before he lets go.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

He looked at something far, far away. “I was a real soldier once. Long ago. I fought to defend my home and my people.”

“Those people were of no threat to you.”

“Not them. It was 60 years ago now,” he said “Back when I was a real soldier.”

I felt disbelief settle on my face.

“Seriously. Because I had been a real soldier they made me the offer first.”

“This price?”

“Yes.” He nodded. “Yeessss.”

He looked at me sharply. Where had I seen that look before? “I turned them down, of course. I was a moral man. I turned them down once and then again and again.”

“Is there a point coming along any time, here?”

“My wife gave in first. She wasn't a soldier the way I had been. She stayed home the first time. She worked in the factories producing the weapons we soldiers used.” he said. “But the pain was too much. And the bills. It was the bills you know. They weigh on you night and day.”

“What?”

“She saw a way out of the trap. To this day I maintain it was a deliberate trap. But she came back after basic training. Looked like my granddaughter. She was aroused. For the first time in 30 years.”

That was too much information, and not the right type. “I am waiting for my answer.”

“She left me not too long after wards.”

“I'd express some sympathy except I'd be lying.”

He grinned. He grinned wider. “A moral man. I like that. Hold on to that for as long as you can.”

“So when was the price they offered enough?” I asked.

“I was flat on my back in a nursing home, Captain. Waiting to die. And then my granddaughter stopped showing up to visit me. The intervals between visits just became longer and longer. I couldn't even get out of bed on my own. I was alone, and broke and I was waiting to die.”

“So why didn't you die? It seemed like you'd already crossed most of the way.” I felt sort of dumb for buying the guy's premise.

“The doctor told me I could last another ten years.” He said it simply, directly. I could see a wall of pain there.

I winced.

“So they offered me this.” he waved his hand down his torso. “A fresh young body to drive around. It doesn't hurt. Everything is so easy.”

“Did you get your wife back?”

“Who needed her? All the young honeys. All I had to do was romance 'em a bit and it took a court order t' get 'em off me. The boys of the modern age, they're a bunch of chuckle heads. Never had to work to get laid.”

I stared at him. That where I'd seen the look. The El-Aurians. Old eyes in a new face. I felt my face screw up “And all you had to do....”

He looked at me flatly and I could see something awful inside him. “All I had to do was go where they sent me and kill who they sent me to kill.”

I had never met a truly evil person before.

“Got any polana leaf sticks? I sure could go for a smoke about now.” He asked.

I stood up and walked out of the detention center.

He spoke to my back, clearly but not raising his voice. “Hold out for as long as you can. But everyone has his price, Captain.”

I kept walking, telling myself that he was incorrect. That he was painting his weakness on to everyone else.

I didn't sleep that night. I looked out the window and held an anonymous farm boy's energy rifle. I wondered what my price was.