"The Bulwark's Shadow" - A Novel in Progress via Steemit (Part I, Chapter 15)
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I'm posting up the chapters of this uncompleted book as I hope the Steemit community might offer up its criticism (which would, in turn, force me to finish it, honestly). Started in 2008, this was my first foray into novel writing and was my undergraduate thesis required to graduate. The story is about an executioner in the not-too-distant future. Executioners are highly trained individuals with extensive educations built to help them execute their prisoners in the exact same manner that the prisoner's victims died. This is called the law of retaliation or lex talionis; you may know it better as "eye for an eye."
Because I was also getting my degree in philosophy, I wanted to explore the ethics involved. While I feel I'm a better writer now and could certainly expand most of this book, I also really enjoy criticism as I'm usually too close to the work to see what's working and what's not (though in this case, there's plenty that I feel is not working). So please...feel free to criticize the work if you'd like, but be constructive about it. Simply saying "this part isn't good" doesn't tell me much; don't hesitate to tell me why it's not good or offer up possible alternatives to make it better.
Thanks in advance!
Previous Sections/Chapters:
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter One
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Two
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Three
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Four
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Five
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Six
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Seven
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Eight
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Nine
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Ten
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Eleven
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Twelve
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Thirteen
The Bulwark's Shadow - Part I, Chapter Fourteen
I could hear his shoes moving up and down on the concrete floor, bouncing in time with every mile-a-minute thought that shot through his brain waiting to be processed. He hadn’t touched his coffee, but I imagine if he tried, he’d only spill it from the palsied hands that couldn’t seem to sit still. The steam from his cup had stopped rising awhile ago, but his body kept rubber-banding after the incident. I had even put a straw in for him to sip through so he didn’t burn himself, but he hadn’t touched it and I tried to keep a straight face about the whole thing.
Had it been a new guard, he would’ve gotten some amount of razzing, but Father Josef, as long as he had been overseeing the executions, had never been put so close to the action and I really couldn’t fault him. He was from the old-school; black jacket, black t-shirt, priest collar and slacks. Nothing fancy, but you could see who he was from several city blocks away. He radiated piety, rarely slipping from that perch and had never seen madness up close.
After a half hour of calming down, he reached out a veiny, withered hand and tried to clutch the cup. The contents spilled over the lip and along his forefinger, but he didn’t seem to notice or care. The cup shivered in his hand as he put it to lips and sipped. He placed it back on the table and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and seemed to look through me. “Does that happen often?”
“Often enough,” I replied, shrugging. “Although, we don’t normally have civilians walking around with us. Thankfully, you were with me.” I gave him a half-grin as he widened his eyes and barely nodded.
“What keeps you here? Why do you continue to do this job when you know your life can be put at risk?” he asked, trying to sip again.
“Why do you try to save the souls of people who’ve been told by their own God that their soul isn’t worth saving every week?” I asked.
He licked his lips. “That’s valid. From a secular standpoint, anyway,” he said, managing a weak smile.
“I don’t mean to diminish what you do, don’t get me wrong, but flocks of people come to you every week, sometimes twice, maybe more…” He waved his hand at me, brushing me off. “But, from what I remember, the Old Testament was the product of an angry, vengeful God while the New Testament was the product of a loving, forgiving God, so which do you give them when you write a sermon? And why should they listen? They see the world as it should be, not as it is. Meanwhile, I’m down here experiencing the exact opposite, as you are to a certain extent, yet I don’t see the forgiving God anywhere unless He’s holding my knife while I work on my dirtiest days.”
He smiled at me and folded his arms across his chest. “Brein, you are the byproduct of a horrendous situation and you came out pretty alright,” he said, his jowels rising slightly. “I absolutely have to believe, if even on a smaller scale, that that can happen to others. Very few will admit to starting their day saying ‘I’m going to sin today,’ but that’s exactly what happens. The world won’t end if James, with a family of four, cheats on his wife. However, you and I both know that’s inherently wrong. That’s not a Christian ideal, that’s a human ideal and the people that don’t get it are the ones I’m preaching to. If I can turn a cheater or a thief or a murderer into a believer, then that’s absolutely worth my time behind the pulpit.” He picked up the cup and sipped deliberately, the visible shaking gone.
“Don’t you ever feel Sisyphean though? I don’t mean in the way that nothing you do feels like it matters, but that it’s just an uphill battle that gets harder and harder to win every day?”
“Don’t you? I get tired, sure, but I never forget my faith or my calling. Much like you, I know I’m doing something that needs to be done in order to help the greater populace. Your role is most definitely more empirical while mine is metaphysical, but that doesn’t change the need for either one of us, regardless of how hard it may seem some days.” He stood up slowly and paced the room, glancing at the walls covered in health notices, government required permits, and licenses for us to do what we do. “It’s hard to believe we’ve come this far without completely annihilating each other. God has been harder to find in recent years for people, and that worries me, but every time I feel weak, just being behind the pulpit seems to help. A recharge, if you will.”
“So, it’s partially for selfish reasons then?” I asked. He grinned at the wall.
“No, Brein. Without that recharge, my message, the message of God, would fall flat. I do it so that I can continue changing minds, keep those minds and hopefully a soul here and there gets taken care of later on.” He came and sat back down at the table, the chair legs scraping across the floor as he pulled it out. “Let me put it another way. If you were to come in here and simply use whatever tools you use on the prisoners without any direction or purpose, you’d simply be torturing those men. While I think that what you do currently is torture, for the sake of argument I’ll agree that there is a defined rationality and order to the execution.” I nodded and started to speak, but he held up his hand to stop me.
“What drives you to do what you do is different than what drives me. That doesn’t mean that they are mutually exclusive, just that they are different paths we take towards a goal of similar natures. Sort of. Does that make sense?”
“I see what you’re sayin. I do become different in the chamber when I’m down there. A kind of contained, focused super energy. And this isn’t really a normal kind of job, but I definitely feel like I’m doing good here. There are days though…some are just more oppressive than others,” I said, leaning back in my chair.
“Of course. You can’t appreciate a good thing without first experiencing a sprinkling of bad. But then again, I think with this Towalski character, you’ve got a more pressing moral quandary than I typically have to deal with. Although, loss of faith isn’t really something to scoff at for most of my parishioners,” he said, staring up at the ceiling.
“Want some more coffee? You might even get to enjoy it hot this time around,” I said with a smirk. The door to the break area opened. Jayce, one of our lead security guys poked his head in the room.
“Father, you ready?” he asked.
Father Josef held out his hands, stared at the backs of them, noticed they weren’t shaking anymore and smiled. “Yes. Although I must ask…how likely is it that he’ll escape again?”
Jayce snorted. “Not only is he tied down, but he’s been Nobied up.”
Father Josef looked confused. “Nobyproxil is the drug we use to keep the prisoners awake, but paralytic while we work on them. They can’t move, but they can still feel. You’ll be fine,” I said, answering his look. “Want me to walk down there with you?”
He stood up and walked over to me, blessed my forehead with his lips and declined. “Raincheck on the hot coffee?” he asked as he walked out of the break room like nothing had happened an hour ago.
“Absolutely,” I said quietly.
Father Josef had left the prison at some point while I was in my office. It wasn’t unusual for him to not stop by after a last rites meeting, but it was late in the day and I figured he might have swung through just to chat me up some more or maybe walk and talk as we both headed home. No company tonight, I supposed.
I trudged up the stairs, choosing to wear myself out even further and found comfort in the loud echoes of my footfalls reverberating off the walls. The handrail needed painting again from all the damage done by the young kids in the building. For some reason, a group of the teenagers had taken to rappelling down the stairwell. Their ropes and carabiners had marred the previously dull red and streaked it with black and silver. It was sloppy and ugly. Maybe I’m just too old to understand.
I opened the iron-heavy door to my floor and padded across the thin carpeting to my apartment. The door was ajar and I could hear someone tip-toeing around inside. As quietly as possible, I took off my shoes and ran down the hallway to the supply closet to look for something blunt to use as protection. They still wouldn’t let us take the electraprods home. Something about extra paperwork, red tape, etc. I found a large wrench and a broken mop handle and figured they’d suffice.
I made it back down to my door, snaking along the wall as quickly as possible and put my shoes back on while trying to keep my breathing to a minimum. I stole a glance through the thin sliver of open doorway and hoped to see some movement somewhere. After a long minute, I pushed the door open enough to slide in and then pushed it back into place, leaving the sliver of light from the hallway. I laid my makeshift weapons down to move a small shelf in front of the door, preventing an easy exit when I heard the footsteps behind me. I turned to look and felt something hard and cold hit the back of my skull, sending me to the floor unconscious.
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