On A Lonely World Isolated By Indifference by Loulou Harris

Preliminary note by the transcriber

I believe that the time has come to deliver the memoirs of Kerr Avon to the printer. To have brought them here before would have been worse than careless; it would have resulted, most certainly, in the loss of my life. Still, time passes and matters which once seemed possessed of the most dreadful import come to appear as little more than trifles; the whimsical accounts, memories, of individuals long since dead and forgotten.

All those whose names appear in the following account have, therefore, been allowed to come to the natural end of their lives before I undertook to make public the manuscript which, twenty-seven years ago, I took from the hands of Kerr Avon as he languished on death row. In those final days, I am convinced, Avon came to understand something of the essential compassion and humanity which had, all the previous years apparently eluded his comprehension; he learnt and experienced this compassion at the hands of the person from whom he might have least expected it; his jailer.

In the years during which this manuscript has lain in my possession, I have read and re-read it countless times; I have learnt more from the life of Kerr Avon than I have from my own and I freely confess to having taken inspiration from him - inspiration, that is, in reverse. It is indeed a rare insight into the mind of a man to whom true friendship, virtue, humility or any of the more delicate qualities of a being were for much of his life no more than abtsract concepts of which he was aware but quite incapable, emotionally, to grasp. For me, this narrative has served as a model before which I can only say;

"He is the chief architect of his own misfortune"

But this is only my evaluation of the text. When the man himself has a chance to speak, it is entirely possible that he will gain an audience at once sympathetic and enlightened by his life.

You know who you are. If I am right, then you will never lay eyes upon these pages and yet sometimes even those closest to one can surprise a man by their actions; for this reason alone I continue to write, in the possibly vain hope that this will one day reach you. Then you will finally understand the ramifications of a life that began all those years ago on a lonely world isolated by indifference.

It seems I am to die, not with the uncertain eventuality to which all lives are subject but at a date, place and hour to be proscribed with the utmost and chilling precision.

Since I received the news I have found it impossible not to reflect on the incidents which have led me to this. This, I find to be a particularly bitter aspect of human existence; the tendency to look at a life with hindsight, imagining oneself making different choices which would lead to happier outcomes, as though our choices were, in fact, free and not dictated by the immutable, grim facts of our inheritance. Most galling is the fact that even I, as familiar as I am with the futility of such ideas, cannot avoid my thoughts meandering through this unavailing territory. We should be born with our fates inscribed clearly upon our foreheads; then we should all have time to adjust to the measure of the approaching task.

Time passes very slowly for me here. I have been imprisoned before, interrogated, tortured even, but no previous experience of my life has prepared me to sit day after day, almost motionless in this cell with no other contact except the occasional word from the jailer. And yet even this, one can learn to tolerate. I never thought that I should learn such a skill but now I have been given to muse, on occasion, that had I been given, from birth, just this small cell to inhabit I might have got used to it by degrees. The intelligent man can always adapt.

I would not have guessed that the end would come like this; no rapid execution but rather, one appeal followed by another, my fate in the hands of two warring factions within the Federation; one which wishes to see me swiftly despatched, another to whom my complete psychological rehabilitation is most desirable. The executioners seem to have the upper hand but still the rehabilitators battle; it seems there is political mileage in this dissident yet.

Time passes slowly; I therefore thought to begin a letter of sorts, a recapitulation on a life lived, I seem to see clearly now, entirely without my ever having exersised a whole hearted commitment to any choice whatsoever. What I have sought, with the curiosity of one almost entirely convinced by a thesis and yet willing, albeit reluctantly to put it to the final test, is to discover whether or not there was indeed any other route.

It is customary, I believe, to begin these accounts with the recounting of an early incident which had a great impact on the development of the character. Such analyses, however, have remained mysterious to me throughout my life; it seems perfectly clear that, as we arrive in the world, so are we formed; the genetic consequences of our parental couplings are as unavoidable as the fact that night follows day. I was fortunate enough in that my own genetic stock provided me with the intelligence and bearing to conduct myself in my chosen area of expertise. Neither were the social positions of my parents any impediment to success; however, since the only filial role I served was as a weapon employed by one parent against the other, their positions were soon to be of little relevance to me. My central yet ineffectual role in the political machinations of mother against father was from an early age quite intolerable; as soon as I was able, I went to live with my elder brother and left them to it; it was their funeral.

Krommer lived on the other side of the planet and travel between the two domes was impossible on anything but an occasional basis. In this way, I believe, I saved myself the inconvenience of a life lived at the will of two jealous and manipulative individuals and them the inevitable day when the scorn of their younger son would be heaped generously at their door.

In my life, I have had cause to feel gratitude to only two people; one of them was Krommer. Not because he took me in when my home ceased to be a home but for a valuable lesson he taught me - taught me by example. Life with Krommer provided daily instruction in weakness, listlessness and gullibility. Within days of my arrival I came to realise that his loneliness was so great that my presence would rapidly become his raison d'etre. With Krommer I quickly found that no sooner had I to state a wish than he would busily put himself to work to find some way to grant it. The problem was that I was not the only person with whom he displayed this behaviour. His associates, too, understood how to tap the Krommer fountain of virtue but instead of the gratitude which I accorded my brother, they only became greedy for more until one day he risked too much, far too much and was dragged away by the troopers. He was tried for smuggling, dealing on the black market, extortion; all offences easily dealt with by professional operators with the necessary contacts. Krommer's problem was that he had surrounded himself with a nest of vipers and when his turn came to call in the favours, they were suddenly nowhere to be found.

I knew it was all up with him as soon as he arrived back at the apartment the evening before they came for him. He was later than usual, even taking into account an unscheduled stop at the soma bar and arrived half drunk, half sick with something that I later recognized must have been fear.

"I'm so dreadfully sorry that I've let you down Kerr," he began to say in a tearful way that I had rapidly learned to find nauseating. He was so prone to sentimentality when under the influence that I had begun to ignore any sign of it in him as merely a symptom of his drug-induced stupor. Even so, I hated to see him degrade himself and usually struggled to help him find some dignity.
"You haven't let me down. My expectations were low enough. You provided me with shelter. You kept me away from them. What more have I ever asked?"
He tugged at my arm insistently and it was all I could do not to fling him away from me.
"I did try, you've got to know that. But it was harder than I thought! They really want you back! Well, she does. And what she wants, he has to deny, so in effect, he has to have you back too."
"So...?" I heard my voice become chilly as I waited for the inevitable.
"They are powerful, Kerr. Don't underestimate them for one moment."
I didn't think I had.
"They've got to people...people I work with, people I depend on. I'm afraid...dreadfully afraid that I'm in some trouble."
"You said your friends were reliable. You said I could trust you."
"I know, I know...." His features had clouded over with confusion, shame, disgust. "I meant it too. If I'm going down, it's because you can at least trust your brother."
"What are you saying? That you're in this trouble because of me? Because you made an impossible promise, a promise you could never keep?" I was shouting now, shouting, reduced almost to boyish tears at what I was beginning to understand.

Krommer spoke firmly then, exerting what little self control he still had over that slurred inflection of his.
"I want you to know I don't blame you. I did it for me. I hate them too. Believe me Kerr, what they've done to you is nothing to what they did to me. What they are doing. You're the favoured one. I tried, tried to give us the sort of family life we should have had...I'm sorry. I suppose, in the end, neither of us knows much about what that should be."
I could hear the sorrow in his voice but could think of nothing beyond my dawning realisation that Krommer could no longer provide me with a haven, that soon this life, which I had come to enjoy as I had never imagined I could enjoy any existence, would revert to the misery I had previously known.
"So they are coming?"
"No...they're getting me out of the way though. I know that. After that, I don't know. If I were you though Kerr, I'd expect the worst."
I did. I thought quickly.
"Why don't you run?"
"Where to? There's no way off this planet for a man like me. I told you, they've got to people."

"Then I'll run," I said decisively. Krommer just looked at me blankly. But I already knew the solution and as soon as I thought of it my feelings of anxiety began to quell. I looked down at Krommer with his pathetic eyes and almost felt sorry for him. That very night I put my plan into action. I didn't want to be there when the denouement came; I knew that I would be helpless and that was not a situation which I relished.

As much as I despised Krommer, I missed him. His loss left me aware of an uncomfortable sensation of inadequacy, as though something I could have done or said might have helped, mitigated or even prevented his fate. But logically, I reasoned, his own actions, his own misplaced trust, had brought about his demise. By then I was fourteen.

My solution was to join the military. I knew they were after me because my grades in school had already begun to attract the attention of the attendant military recruitment officer. They had interviewed me too, although that had happened entirely by accident, a complete misunderstanding on my part. I had seen a line of boys waiting outside a room at the school and had joined it, assuming that, as was usual at the end of such a line, some rations were being given out...food rations, book rations, entertainment rations...all these items were given out amidst tedious bureaucratic ceremony which inevitably involved waiting in line. Since boys only ever made lines for such events, one quickly aqcuired the habit of joining a line as a matter of course.

In this particular line were no boys which I recognised from any class so, as was the custom of the school, I refrained from speaking to any of them and naturally, so did they to me. When it came to be my turn, I followed the previous boy into the room and was quite taken aback to find myself facing a panel of Federation officers.

"And you are...?"
"Kerr Avon." They typed in the name on a keyboard on the desk at which they all sat, waited a moment and then one of them spoke.
"Want to be a civilian all your life do you boy?"
I made no reply but looked at each of the four officers in turn. No rank lower than a Captain.
"Of course he doesn't; that's why he's here!" laughed one of the men.
"What is wrong with being a civilian?" I had asked calmly.
The one who had posed the original question looked a little taken aback but said, kindly enough,"Nothing, of course, provided that you are well connected and rich. Aside from that you'd be a fool to take a job with the civvies over a career in the army, or the navy. Any section leader has twice the privileges accorded to even the most loyal alpha worker."

"If you joined us now you could make Section Leader in two years. We've seen your grades, read what your teachers have to say about you. With your ability it wouldn't take you long to work your way up to a really worthwhile grade. Think of it Avon, you could be a starship captain by the time you're twenty."
Then another man spoke, a sandy-haired man of about thirty who had as yet said nothing, merely reading the text before him.
"Or perhaps not." He looked straight into my eyes. "According to his records this one has a problem with authority."
I gazed back at him. "Who hasn't, at the age of fourteen?"
"In our army boys of any age learn to take orders from their elders. You take orders or you take punishment."
"Punishments like that merely separates the weak from the strong. A real leader doesn't need the threat of punishment to enforce his will. There's no advantage to being cowed by a bully, even if he ranks higher."
"The army doesn't want mavericks, Avon."
"Only whipping boys? Then maybe you are right after all...sir."

It was probably not the way I would have conducted the interview had I known what awaited me, or had I even planned to take the event seriously. Nevertheless, I was later informed that if I wanted it, the place at the Academy was mine - until my sixteenth birthday.
"They want you, Avon, but they want you young. Said that youngsters like you can go off the rails if left for too long. They reckon your shelf life is almost up!"

So that was my escape route - signing the next four years of my life away to the military. Perhaps this gives some idea of the desperation of those days. I simply sought to put space and obstacles between myself and those who wished to control me. I was not the first youth to put his mental freedom before physical freedom. The only way to legally live apart from one's parents at that age was to enrol in a military academy - in fact familial disharmony was almost encouraged amongst the younger recruits. The Federation wanted to be your family; they thought that if they took you early enough that is exactly what they would be.

It soon became clear that I had escaped one questionable fate only to be ensnared in another. Whilst the academic facilities outstripped even what I had experienced at the school to which my parents had subscribed (it was true, clearly, that the Federation kept the best of everything to themselves), living conditions afforded precious few moments of privacy, the company was mostly atrocious and the discipline a constant thorn in one's side. Few of us were there by our own free will; more usually, boys attended at the behest of their parents, often themselves officers; a few, like myself had used the parental escape clause.

It seems, suddenly, important that I have a good death. I always assumed I would be gunned down in battle or else by a young, conscripted and ultimately innocent Federation guard but that was not to be; the real horror and indignity of a public execution never really occurred to me. Well, perhaps the idea did once or twice cross my mind; a dark shadow of concern, never for me, never a fear for myself. Now that the event is imminent I find myself curiously preoccupied, as oddly irrational as that sounds. It is an event which is unavoidable and immutable; I should therefore give it no further thought. Why then do I find my nights haunted by visions of such substantial and sickening imagery that the fear extends even into the days? In my own mind I have by now died this death one hundred times over; I have envisaged, in miniscule detail, the final moments; in some versions I go wordlessly to my death; in others I am verbose, even eloquent. In some I make a great show of courage until the end...and then I dissolve, disintegrate, despair. I weep, I struggle. I beg; beg, as I did to Shrinker...as I pretended to beg? No; that part was real; the very stuff of nightmares.

Walking along the corridor this morning I caught sight of a new prisoner. Something made me look at him and for a few minutes I studied him at my leisure, my eyes hidden from view by a sheet of glass between us. He was poorly lit and I could make out only the shape of his head, the silhouette of his hair, the round curve of his shoulders. Initially he did not look very much like Blake but I found that the longer I stared at him, the more I could see similarities. He blinked and heavy lids closed slowly over his eyes, whose shape I could barely make out (and so imagined to be Blake's); he lifted, ever so slightly, his chin and the shape of his jaw, the angle with the line of his throat struck a sudden resonance. I continued to gaze and before my eyes, he was transformed; every gesture recalled to me something of the man I had known. I stood as though transfixed; I was gripped by an irrational desire to talk to the man, as though he really were Blake. Then he stepped forward into the light and I almost laughed. Apart from a head of dark curls he bore little or no resemblance to Blake. The apparition disappeared.

There really is no justice. If there were, I'd have been executed long before I despatched Blake. What determines the curious regulations which govern the crimes for which we are punished and those for which we go free while others die? There are no rules; it transpires that there is, after all, no such thing as 'right'.

I knew that already at fourteen and that was before the 'accident'.

I hated almost every minute of my life at the academy until I met Tynus and Grant. Grant was by then a member of the elite college gangsters and bully boys; the self-styled 'Panzas'. Really they were nothing more than jumped-up sixteen-year old hooligans with something a little harder than knives as weapons and something a little stronger than cigarettes for recreation.

That recruiting officer had meant it when he had told me that sixteen year old boys were given licence to tyrannise younger boys in the 'mid-years'; the so-called 'Midsters'. Fourteen and fifteen year olds were the thugs-in-waiting and our training was conducted by those by then well versed in the methods of cruelty and brutality so esteemed by the military.

I tried to keep myself to myself, to lose myself in extra hours of coding, to read, alone in the only privacy afforded in that place; the latrines. That was a mistake.

One night I grew reckless enough to escape my barracks at night and instead of uselessly tossing and turning in the dark, on my pallet, I read by the steady light of the latrines. An hour passed before I realised that I was soon to have company. The door to my cubicle was slowly pushed open to reveal the sardonically grinning face of a blond boy, a member of the 'Panzas' whom I recognized as Del Grant.

"Hello midster. Do you know what the punishment is for smoking in the latrines?"
I pointed out that I was not smoking.
"Your loss and a criminal waste if I may say so." He sighed, leaning against the wall. "Well, midster, what am I going to do with you?"
"That's up to you, Cadet."
"Have you got any cigarettes?"
I shook my head. He shook his own, sadly. "I'm trying to help you out here but you're not giving me much to go on..."
I hesitated, then; "How about I do you a favour?"
His eyebrows raised. "I don't go in for that, midster, thanks anyway..."
"That's not what I meant...maybe I can do some assignment for you...an errand or something..."
"Better. Yes...that could work. Look, everyone in the Panzas has had their exit passes revoked for the next week because some idiot lost his helmet when the Supreme Commander made his last inspection. I need to get a message to my girl. You could take it. Is your pass good?"

Grant was expecting his girl to visit him at his family home and wanted to get a letter to her to explain why he'd been incommunicado for the past few days. I noted down his address and agreed to pick up the letter before the following evening's sojourn.

Grant could have beaten me, robbed me, or even worse. Such treatments were routinely handed down by the Panzas on the Midsters. Sometimes Midsters would be taken from their barracks as they slept by Panzas whose viciousness was spoken of only in hushed tones after lights out. Most Midsters feigned boredom with such tales, only appearing surprised by accounts of really astonishing brutality, at which they would often nod in respect, saying "Yes...he's a real soldier, that one, a real hard man...you have to watch out for him."

It stood to reason that there was a tacit approval of such activities; even though we were the victims now the time would very shortly come when the Midsters would become Panzas and fill the gaps left by graduating psychopaths as they joined the army.

Grant was one of the few sane men I ever encountered in that place. He survived, I think, by the fact of his close proximity to home, a place which came to mean something similar to me after I visited his place to deliver the message to his girl.

His girl was older than me: I knew she would be; she was beautiful: I had imagined that too. So there it was, within hours of meeting him, I discovered that Grant had most of the things which I wanted in my own life. His girl was the type that looks down on younger boys, treats them like baby brothers, even though I was probably only a couple of years younger than her; well at any rate that counts for a good deal at that age. She smiled indulgently at me when I delivered the note, asked me in and offered me a drink of fruit juice.

"Sure," I said, my expression blank, "why not."

I followed her through to the kitchen, where she took out a glass and put it under the jiuce dispenser. Then I saw Anna. That was the very first time. She was sitting in the 'conservatory' - a white room bathed with artificial plant-sustaining light and filled with plants and flowers. I realised that the Grants were probably the richest people I had met since leaving my parents. Anna was thirteen then, very thin, her features as delicate and fine as porcelain; she looked as though she would break if touched. I must have been staring because when she turned around, her grey eyes burrowed curiously into mine.

"Another soldier boy?" she said with a slight smile, obviously flirting.
"There's a few of us where your brother lives."
"Since when does he hang around with midsters then?"
I grinned. "He has his own little army. We follow him around...we're a regular Del Grant brigade." Luckily she understood my sarcasm, because I had begun to worry that my phrasing had been perhaps too subtle. She grinned too.
"He's a bossy so-an-so, isn't he? I don't know why you didn't tell him to take his message and put it..." Suddenly she seemed to reconsider what she had been about to say. "...somewhere else..." she finished, rather wanly.
Changing the subject, she asked, "So what do you normally do when you get out on a pass?"
"I take a walk...or go to a vid...or go to eat some real food..." I answered, puzzled. Was she going to make some suggestion?
"If you like, you can take me out sometime, when you're next on a pass."
There: as simply as that. I was breathless with the audacity of it whereas she barely seemed to have registered anything out of the usual. I managed to say, "Alright. If you like. We could go to a vid together." She smiled again, radiantly and then turned back to her plants. I stood there like a fool, feeling as though somehow, I had just been dismissed. "My name is Anna," she said, still facing away from me. "What's yours?"
"Avon."
"Until next week then, Avon."

It wasn't just Del and Anna; I was later to learn that the whole of the Grant family had a sort of smooth and benign arrogance which allowed them to behave as though their will should be gratefully carried out by those around them. Unlike my own family, who achieved everything through threats and manipulation; the Grants simply charmed everyone who knew them and consequently were amongst the best connected families in the Dome. I almost didn't turn up for my first date with Anna but Del met me earlier in the day and pressed ten credits into my palm.

"Take her somewhere good, be a gentleman and I'll be in your debt."
"She's too young for me Grant," was all I could say. His eyebrows raised in surprise. "Of course she is, that plus she's too good for you, midster. You are a chaperone so that our parents will let her out; what did you think this was about?" I gazed evenly at him. "She's too young for me now and I may not be such a gentleman in the future."

I never did learn my lesson about retiring to the latrines for my moments of nocturnal solitude. Unfortunately for me, the second time I was discovered, danger presented rather more acutely.

I first heard them approaching from the back stairs and holding my breath, quickly drew up my feet onto the toilet seat.

"Now then little carrot-top, would you mind telling these cadets what you were doing in the Panza barracks after lights out, you little sneak?"
A frightened voice answered; "I was returning a helmet, Cadet, sir."
"A helmet, Ginger? Not yours, by any chance?"
There was a pause. "No, Cadet."
Another voice said, "Not having that helmet cost us all plenty at last week's inspection, Ginger." I heard a dull thud, like a foot being driven into something soft and the low, gasped groan of another voice.
"What was that, Ginger, I didn't catch it?"
A choked whisper. "I know, Cadet. I'm sorry. I borrowed it. that's all. I needed one for inspection and mine was stolen. I was going to return it..."
With a sinking heart I realised that I knew the voice of 'Ginger'; it was Tynus, one of the smallest boys in our barrack; a promising intellect, almost a genius; the only other student who had ever beaten me at chess.
"What are you going to do with him, Jaspa?"
"This little ginger whore?" Another kick. "I'm going to teach him what happens to them as steal from the Panzas. Get his trousers off. Hold him down if you have to. Are you crying, Ginger, you little snivelling sissy? Well, you'd better start. Turn him around now; see, Ginger? Your eyes are going to water from just looking at me."

Tynus began to wail now, begging for Jaspa not to do it, until his voice was suddenly muffled, after which I could hear only stifled sobs. Then the breathless, panting voice of Jaspa saying, "Not bad, Ginger, not bad at all. But you'd better shut that whimpering mouth of yours; your whining is distracting me..."

Something must have given me away; perhaps the treacherous trembling which had swept through me as I realised what was happening. The door to my cubicle was pushed open by a boot; I looked up and my eyes were met by those of Tynus.

The expression on his face was to haunt me for many years. Jaspa's hand was pressed tightly over his mouth and covered most of his face but for just a second I saw in his eyes a look of such abject shame and humiliation that I felt no sympathy, only disgust, exactly as I had with Krommer. Tynus showed no sign of resistance; only resignation; no anger, only mortification; when he saw me, his eyes filled with pleading. Then Jaspa pushed his head down and I looked up into the cold, almost vacant gaze of Jaspa as he stood behind Tynus. His breathing was ragged; lifting a finger to point at me he whispered, "You...midster...you're next."

I jumped to my feet and kicking my way past Jaspa and his companion, I made for the exit. As I reached it my path was suddenly blocked by a familiar figure, Del Grant. Grant's anxious gaze flicked beyond me, into the latrines and then back to me. Ganic, Jaspa's sidekick, had come after me and had already grabbed hold of my jacket. There was silence for a second which was broken only by the sound of Tynus being pushed to the floor, groaning and sobbing as he fell.

"Leave it, Grant," Ganic said, "We found these two."
Grant looked from Ganic to Jaspa. "What's the matter, Jaspa, will no-one let you do it to them these days? Everyone outgrowing it except you?"
Jaspa laughed nastily and swore at Grant.
"Grant: if you had plans for this midster then I'm sorry if I've been playing your turf.. Ginger here had to pay a little forfeit but the other one is all yours."
As he said this, Jaspa stood up, rearranging his clothes. Pushing the hair back away from his face, he signalled to Ganic to move away from me.
Grant said; "Avon, Tynus, get out of here."

We needed no further bidding. I helped Tynus to his feet and took him back to our quarters. He didn't stop shaking for a long time and I could only watch as sobs of impotent rage tore through him. When he finally became coherent, he kept repeating; "I have to get them, Avon...that's as sure as we're standing here...you'll help me, won't you...I need you to help me...if it hadn't been for your Panza friend they'd have done you too..."

He was right. I knew only too well to what I owed my fortuitous escape. That ghastly expression of Tynus's would not leave my memory; I felt nauseous every time I imagined my own features thus contorted; I answered Tynus in the only way I knew how: "Of course I'll help you, Tynus...I give you my word."

Does it matter, what we did? I am no longer certain. I know only that from the moment that the various fragments of the incident assembled themselves in my memory, I closed off that part of myself; I washed my hands of the whole affair. Examining my motives I can say in all honesty that I acted not in my own interest but out of sympathy for Tynus. Revenge was never part of my own agenda; Tynus had enough vengeance for the two of us. For me, it was just pity, that and an adolescent idea of justice. And I will add in my own defence that we had not planned for anyone to die; at least, such was my understanding of the scheme. Shame, public humilation and loss of face seemed to me to be an apt punishment for what Jaspa had done to Tynus.

I think...in fact I have always thought...that Tynus had planned the outcome right from the start. But I let him believe that I too was convinced that our plan had simply gone wrong, that the telemetry mechanism had been incorrectly programmed and that the death of Ganic, Jaspa and Koleh were nothing more than a tragic accident. In the end what else could I do? To have revealed my own involvement, as innocently intended as it was, would surely have resulted in the most severe consequences for myself. I realised that if it looked like murder to me then it would look at least as bad to anyone else. And I would have lost Del and Anna. Those were the days when I still allowed my decisions to be based almost entirely by the nature of my personal relationships.

Why did I not just turn him in to the authorities at the very first opportunity? Well, it scarcely matters now.