The man's nature

Eventually I'm saved from that hell by mum coming in from the kitchen with a bunch of plates. That man gets up and places me in the seat he was sitting in before saying "I'll help your mother set up the table just wait here for food ok?" in a gentle tone before going up to mother and taking the plates off her hands before placing them in the places for each of us one by one.

First he placed mum's plate where she would be sitting right next to his seat at the head of the table. Now that I think about it he was probably sitting in this chair because he was planning on leaving me on this seat right from the beginning. Not sure if I should be proud of that thoughtfulness or annoyed by it.

The meal itself consists mainly of meat for myself and that man. Not surprising given our species but still certainly unusual for most families. In this case, the meat is smoked gammon. There's nothing on or with it except a few small baked potatoes. The gammon itself however is huge. A good few handfuls of the stuff.

That man's portion is obviously bigger than mine and he has more slices of it but my plate is nearly filled to the brim with gammon. There are no herbs or gravy or anything similar either. Being catkin, we just don't have the taste buds to enjoy that kind of thing. Too many flavours actually causes issues for us.

Mum's plate on the other hand is much more normal. The potatoes have pieces of mint on them and the gammon itself is fairly small. There's only a small handful or so each slice and there's only two such slices. The gammon itself is also covered in gravy or something similar at least. We don't actually know the proper name for it but most people just call it pseudo gravy.

For mum there's also a bowl of fruits right in front of her plate that man once again brought from the kitchen. The fruit is of various varieties but if you look closer you'll realise that a particular fruit is more abundant than the rest of them. A type of yellow or orange looking apple. Apparently referred to in some circles by the monicker grey star apple thanks to it's resemblance with the similarly named white star apple.

It grows quite a bit in the forests around the wastelands and while there aren't many such forests they are there and this fruit is so common there they've become somewhat of a staple in most houses diets. Since we're mainly carnivores though, with mum as the exception, we rarely if ever eat it.

Finally once everything had been placed down, that man sat at the head of the table and then mum sat next to him. I having already been sat down just mimicked an expression of an impatient child as I waited for the man to give me permission to eat.

Once he looked at both of us in turn and saw our stares, he gave us permission and we both immediately dug in to our meals. I did use a knife and fork even if I picked up the bad habit to use them the wrong way round thanks to that man. So with fork in my right and knife in my left I start cutting up the gammon and stuffing my mouth with it.

Mum looks at our cutlery with a little bit of a miffed expression but sees that both of us are doing it and apparently just decides to give up. So with a little sigh she appears to remove her concerns with our eating habits and once again starts digging in to her food.

We eat in silence for a few minutes but once we're getting to the end of our meals mum decides to speak up. "since we're here and you appear to be done dear, why don't we hear your stories about the time you were away while we eat." She says looking at the man in the head seat. Turning to look in the same direction I notice that his plate is empty already despite there being a fair amount of food left on both mum and I's plates.

I presume it's something they teach in the army, that you need to wolf down food because you won't always get some or something. I've heard that's a thing they teach you in some army academies. Regardless of the army's teachings however it's still impressive that he can eat that much food in such a short time.

Hearing the hint of excitement in mum's voice he takes on a proud expression and begins to spout nonsense about his military exploits. I never liked hearing these stories even when I was young albeit for different reasons for why I dislike them now. Before I was scared for his life. Now they just annoy me.

While the man regails us with his exploits in this particular revolt on a different planet and the sights he's seen, me and mum end up finishing our food but decide to stay to listen to his tales anyway. Well mum decided to stay and I had no choice but to play along. Because it would be weird if I wasn't excited about his exploits with the character I'm playing.

So I sit and listen to his military stories trying to maintain the enraptured expression I put on my face whenever he's speaking about this sort of thing. Of course, I also make sure there's a hint of worry in there every time his life is in danger despite the excitement I feel inside at the prospect of this being the end of his tale.

One such tale however is the start of my misery. The tale starts off fairly inoffensively. Just a story of being dropped off just before the front lines of the revolt and being told to inspect a city for any remaining insurgents or any of the populace that could eventually become insurgents.

The man emphasises the point that he only did this on orders from his superiors and he would never think of eliminating people who just 'might' be insurgents. Personally I think if they can nip problems in the bud they probably would and don't see anything really wrong with that. Sure they're innocent now but they did still stay with the people of the revolt. They've thrown their lot in and they deserve what they get.

I didn't actually say anything however because I know this is the subject that always causes me problems. My ethics or lack thereof is the reason for most of my suffering according to that man. Though from my perspective my lack of ethics isn't enough reason to put me through this.

Regardless I keep my silence on the matter as he continues the story and makes a few comments about infiltrating a few buildings that had civilians in them and essentially just evacuating them. Of course he plays up this part as much as he possibly can and on the outside I applaud him heartily for his 'heroic' achievement though on the inside I'm just screaming about what a waste of time it was to individually evacuate people who might be rebels.

The story continues however and the climax comes about when he finds a little girl not dissimilar in age relative to myself. I don't exactly enjoy this sort of topic because when I was a kid I would be worried for his safety at this point and keep insisting he leave the kids alone, as he always seems to get in danger and push himself too far for children of that age. That would earn me a session of hell to 'correct my morals' and I eventually figured out that I just shouldn't comment and he'll eventually just give up.

The girl is in a burning dilapidated house and it's about to collapse on her. This man's having none of that obviously and he seems incredibly proud as he recounts his telling of diving into the flames and heroically rescuing this girl from danger. I'd be pretty worried about him at this point before but now I'm just annoyed he didn't get crushed by the building.

After rescuing this girl from a building he asks her if she's ok but after a little discussion with the girl about what happened he turns around to talk about what to do about her with his comrades. Just as he does so however the girl takes out a knife and attempts to stab him in the back shouting about him being a dog for the government or something.

Essentially she was a rebel and he didn't notice when he saved her. My first thought when hearing this was along the lines of 'are you an idiot?' I'd bet there were signs she was a rebel that he just completely missed because she was my age.

Saving the girl wasn't the only stupid thing he did for her sake however as he continues to brag my expression becomes harder and harder to maintain. He explains that he grabs her knife and restrains her. At this point I was getting a little excited. My mind was already starting to whir with fantasies of how he would crush the girl's dreams and explain her hopeless situation before executing her for treason.

My fantasies however are quickly dashed when his story continues. Not only did this lumbering idiot let her out of the restraint he had her in and LET HER ATTACK HIM AGAIN! But he also just scolded her for choosing the wrong side. No punishment. Nothing. She practically got off scot free for taking a shot at his life.

I don't personally care that much about this man's life by this point and I would be more than happy for him to die in a ditch somewhere but the principle of this entire incident just makes me want to scream at him in rage. Not only did you not take control of her. You DISOBEYED ORDERS from your superiors to save a girl that attempted to kill you.

He goes on to explain that he believed the girl could be redeemed and that he would make her into a soldier fine enough to serve under him one day. If he was just doing that to get a new recruit I could understand. If he had perhaps seen a talent in the girl or maybe she had connections to some powerful people higher up that would make getting rid of her a problem then maybe I can understand the interruption.

But this is ridiculous. All she did was attempt to murder you and you think 'Oh yeah, why don't I have her serve under me' That's not how this is supposed to work you imbecile. I asked him hoping against hope that he would answer in the way I hope. "Did she have any special skills or did you see potential in her? Like maybe you're short of commanders and you need her to fill such a role?" I asked trying to keep my tone even and calm.

I didn't really notice as I said it but afterwards I did realise that I dropped my child speak for this question and that probably isn't a good idea. But at this point I'm too annoyed to care. You interrupted my fu- I mean you saved this captive girl at the cost of your own life. You'd better have a good reason for this.

In contrast to my silent fuming and slowly boiling rage, that man and the woman that adore him are as calm as ever and perhaps even a little excited about the prospect of saving this girl. Because of this state of mind, they reply to me as if it were obvious.

"I wouldn't know about that stuff. Whether she's talented or not though I needed a way to save her from execution and this was a convenient excuse. Plus it wouldn't be so bad to discipline a bratty kid. Give me some practice for those times you go off the rails." He says with a grin of satisfaction and my only thought was that I wanted to punch that grin off his face along with a few of his teeth.

Yes that's it. Just give me the opportunity. Just once. That's all I need. All I need is one chance. One chance where his life is in my hands. That's all I need. Then I can decide what I want to do with this man. I'm sure if I use that robot I could have them both at my mercy. What a wonderful scene that would be.

My fantasies continue to spiral and I start to go pink. My eyes become a little glazed and my breathing becomes subtly more ragged. I feel as though I have reached the heights of exhilaration. As though I've found the one thing I must accomplish in my lifetime. A bucket list item for certain at the very least.

I am interrupted for the second time in the last few minutes however by the man's concerned tone. "Are you ok Emily. You look a little worked up. Are you that impressed with your old man's heroism?!" The end of the sentence is said in a joking manner but it doesn't make me smile. That's the second time! The second time my thoughts have been brought down to reality.

For some reason I just snapped at those words. I don't really have a concrete reason why but I just have that annoying feeling that something important is being stopped. Like when someone interrupts you eating. It just gives me the same feeling. Like my very existence is screaming at me to get rid of the interruptions and I just couldn't hold it back any more.

So I drop my child like facade and say "No I'm not impressed by your heroism old man. I'm annoyed." I say in a flat emotionless tone that takes both the adults in the room by surprise.