The Internal Conflict of I


Though I know that I will loose in time
That the Beast that is my own heart
Will kill Kindness, overcome Civilization
And even Honor most Sacred
I fight on
Though
Defeat
Is
Assured
I fight on
With the keen Sword of Will
The bright Shield of Dignity
The Breastplate of Strength
And the Power of Spirit
I fight on.






The word came in from Command.    I heard that they were going to send someone immediately through the mag drive to take care of it.  Whoever this is, it must be one of the last ancestors.  Too bad they don't realize that they have a revolutionary in their midst.  I grin as I enter my quarters, dull gray on gray with a tele-monitor and a separate workout area.  The tele-monitor was blinking with a dull yellow glow.  There was a message for me.  I walked in front of the tele-monitor and spoke aloud "Voice Identify-Daniel Thomasson".  The screen blinked and on came the face of a fat man, in his late forties.  Almost bald and old long before his time, I knew immediately that it was Wilkenson, that fat bastard.  He grinned that grin that only meant one thing, he was going to dish out some torture to some poor shmuck.  Since I was the only one seeing it, I guessed my number was up.  I was right.

"Thomasson, it is with great pleasure that I inform you that you have been given a great opporotunity to serve your country.  You have been selected to go on a mission to the year 2000 to sanction a dangerous criminal, one that threatens the very heart of our world.  Please report immediately to the briefing room, there you will be given the particulars."  I grumbled and shook my head.  I thought that they had given up their quest.  We had killed all of the ancestors of the leaders of the Soverignty Wars long ago,or at least the ones that were on the records and could be tracked down.  Maybe they found the pivial figure, one of the parents of Daniel Wilson, the leader of the Mars colony that incited the first War of Soverignty and persuaded Caliope, the President of Diana Enterprises to side with him against the earth.  I walked to the bathroom and stared for a moment at the old man staring back at me.  Could I really be 25?  Grey peppered my dark scalp more like a man twice my age.  A hard stubble covered a face that was beginning to seriously show the wear of the years.  If it wasn't for some of the pictures I've seen from the past, I would think that this is how people actually looked.  At least, it's how people actually look in 2170.  I splashed my face with water, dried off and took off for the debriefing room.  When I entered, it was empty.  Ever since the Sucession Wars, there aren't that many people left on any of the planets involved.  Earth, once home to over 40 billion people, now only has one billion,and half of them are scattered across the solar system.  Mars, which at one time boasted 1 billion now only has 50 million people.  The moon, well, what's left of it now only has a skeleton crew of 5000.   I snapped to, suddenly aware as the monitor glowed alive. On the screen was a woman, around 25, it was one of the military AIs used to dispense classified information.  This way the only person who has to know about the mission and who does it is the highest ranking commander on the base.  She smiled and focused on me and began to speak.  "Good evening, Mr. Thomasson, you have been selected to go to Earth in the year 2000, your arrival date will be Febuary 23, 2000.  Here is the dossier on your target.", the disc drive on the wall hummed as a small disc slid smoothy out which I took and slid into my pocket.  Once I had the disc, she continued,"Your target is to be found in a modern music show on Febuary 25th, 2000.  You are to make it look like a mugging and will be equipped accordingly.  Please report to the quartermaster for your equipment."