The Fredmon Legacy

I got a request to post this story in a thread over in the Afternow section, so here it is. A friend and I wrote this about 3 or 4 years ago and haven't worked on it since. I remember posting this on the old forum after we had written it, but I'm not sure. Here it is:

The Fredmon Legacy

It's night-time outside my window. I can smell flowers... The smell isn't natural or refreshing... It's oily, it's soapy... It smells poisonous. My name is Abbot Fredmon, and I was rotated into the general populace a couple of months ago. I worked as a security guard until about a week ago.

War is an interesting thing. I served for ten long years keeping the Chinese from taking control of Japan. Every other day I'd get a notice or hear a speech about how proud they were of us back home, and how much uncle-Sam appreciated what we were doing. When they shipped me home, or rather my new domicile, they decided that everyone in the war would be a real patriot, and donate our checks to rebuild Japan. Interesting thing about donations, it seems they used to be voluntary...At least they were when I left. When I got back, the world I had been away from had changed so much, and yet so little. It was the same old misery, the same old hate, mistrust, and greed that I had left ten years before, but with a different suit on. To tell you the truth, I don't even really know why I came back. There wasn't even really anything to come home to. No warm apple pie, no recognition, no respect. I mean, I guess it had something to do with hope. The whole time that I was over there, I hoped that my country was getting better while I was away. Stupid I know, but it kept my sorry ass alive.

When I arrived in Kyoto, it was the first time I'd be to Japan. Hell, it was the first time I'd been out of California. Kyoto had already been pretty much overrun by the Chinese. The Chinese figured that conquering a city with the historical significance of Kyoto would demoralize the Japanese. It didn't. It plunged Japan into a modern-day feudalism; the Chinese had executed their democratically elected officials, so heads of rich families started to take control of the areas around them. Poor families swore sort of a fealty to the more financially substant families, and the country started pumping out first-rate soldiers. The country was suddenly swamped with fundamentalist movements, hinting and sometimes outright condoning the return to social structure like that of the Tokagawa era. Chinese officers started to make rash decisions for the sake of fear, when the heads of their comrades appeared in the war-rooms by what seemed to be magic. I had been stationed in the "Ichi" compound, which was operated by one such fundamentalist movement.

I arrived no more than a child, 18 years seemed old when I was there, but I only had my own 18 years of life to compare it to. Kyoto had cherry trees... When the wind rippled through them, their blossoms would fall to the ground like snow. The flowers in Kyoto smelled good, they smelled pure and beautiful. I hated it. The men and women from the Ichi compound welcomed me warmly. I had never felt wanted in my life, before that day. They were all older than I was, some as young as 24, the older soldiers stationed there were in their late 40s. I was the only American in that compound; it seemed Japan didn't want many foreigners in Kyoto, so they requested that the bulk of the American forces be stationed in the heart of Tokyo. The person nearest my age was the most captivating woman I had ever met; to be honest I've failed to meet another of such wonder. Her name was Sakura... ... She taught me a lot...about love...About making love......And about losing someone you love...

The soldiers gladly accepted me into the fold, and they sort of raised me. Sure, I was an adult, and I could make decisions for myself, but I was still too young to have experienced the things that make a man. They taught me to fight, and to fight by a warrior's code. During the Tokagawa era, the country was ruled and policed by a class of people called "Bushi," which translates roughly to warrior. They taught me to be a true warrior, from Bushido. A book, who's title means "The way of the warrior." I learned how to use a Katana. Granted, I was the worst there at using the damned thing, but I learned. I killed many men and women in the last 10 years. The fighting was fierce. Both the Chinese and Japanese were vicious fighters, with courage and conviction. I would have taken more time to admire them, if I wasn't so busy killing Chinese grunts. I've killed Chinese people, Japanese people, American people, British people, and German people. I learned something... No matter how you live your life, no matter what kind of person you are... We all die equal.

It was December. December in Kyoto is cold. Not overly cold, just uncomfortable. It was dark out, and we were soon to ambush a Chinese outpost. We estimated our losses would be harsh, but we would take the outpost, and hold it until reinforcements could arrive. I rose by cup of sake up to drink, and sneezed. Someone was talking about me. I had my sake with the others, and we left the compound silently. It was 2010, and I was with the woman I loved, and the men I respected. We practically flew through the night air, silent as a spider.

We hit the outpost with devastating force; the 6 of us had killed 50-60 men within 2 minutes. We had expected no more than 20 people, and more were appearing from what seemed like the night-air. They had obviously been planning an attack, and we struck before they were ready...But their numbers soon got the better of us, and we lost most our team. The commander was hit first; a 20mm slug ripped his throat out, and threw it a few hundred yards down the line. One by one, they took us out, and the last thing I remember was the smell of burning hair.

Chinese concentration camps were interesting. I had been kept alive because I was an American. They believed I would make an excellent bargaining piece. Sakura was kept alive because she was female. I was strong by Chinese standards, as well as being large. The officers had a lot of fun having the prisoners fight each other with rocks, and bits of broken glass, roman arena style. They made bets, and even make a ring for us to fight in. It disgusted me, but it kept me fed well, and it kept me in shape. Every night I could hear the screaming of woman prisoners at the other end of the camp. I knew why they were screaming, and I knew why they were bruised and scarred more every day we passed them on the way to work areas. Every fight I fought in those camps, I imagined my opponent to be wearing a Red Chinese officer's uniform. I fought bare fisted, while my opponent usually had a weapon of some sort. I would knock the weapon out of their hands, and move in for their face, all my ears could hear was the screaming of the women at night, my fists feeling the wet and pulpy faces of my opponents. I stopped when their bodies went limp, or when I was pulled off of them.

There were less of us now... It was 2013, and the Chinese officers that were once content to see a fight every night wanted some kind of finalist round, to see who the toughest of us were. They moved the fighting ring to near the middle of the camp, and I was fighting with an actual Chinese soldier that had claimed he could beat me. He was cheating, but I didn't care, I welcomed the chance to fight one of the bastards. He had his bayonet with him. We were doing the dance, walking around the ring, occasionally testing the other with a light tap or sharp swing when I saw it... She was sitting there, watching the fight too. The Chinese guards saw her too. They beat her, and ripped her hair out of its roots. They... they... were... I stepped into the Chinese soldier, and took him by surprise, grabbing the blade of his bayonet, I could feel the blade biting into my fleshy palm, but I didn't care. I angled the blade away from me, stepped in, and bit clean through his throat. I don't remember the details of the incident, but a lot of Chinese died that night, and I walked out of the camp armed. They killed her when they were finished, and no matter how many of them I killed, or how badly or grotesquely I mutilated their bodies, I couldn't turn back time, and she would never come back.

I found myself in Shanghai. It was like the asshole of the world. Everything was polluted and dead. It fit me well. After a couple of weeks of fending for myself in Shanghai, I found someone willing to get me to Tokyo. They've been using Sampans for centuries there, and as far as I know, they still do.

I arrived on a Sampan in Tokyo, and was able to quickly find an American outpost. It seemed that they ran helicopters into the prison camp when they discovered it was no longer guarded. The people evacuated by the army had told them it was me who liberated the camp, single-handedly. I say it's bullshit. I escaped, nothing more. They said they were going to give me the Congressional Medal of Honor, fly me back home, and make sure things went well for me. I didn't want any of that. I just wanted to kill Chinese. Japan's jungle of high-rise office complexes and intricate subways swallowed me up that night, and I found another group of Japanese fundamentalists. That very night I was back in the shit, fighting the Chinese, and driving their depraved hedonistic masses away from Japan's depraved and hedonistic city. I fought until 2015, 5 or 6 months ago. That was when the army caught up with me, and identified who I was. They said the war was over. ... What did they know? The war would never be over; I would be fighting Chinese enemies, alongside Japanese allies until the end of eternity.

I suddenly found myself back in California. The place was deader than Japan. I had killed non-stop for the past 10 years, and suddenly I had to follow rules that seemed to be nothing more than silly civil policies, aimed for nothing more than to gratify greedy politicians and businessmen. San Francisco is sinking into the ocean, just as everyone had always thought it would, the economy is in shambles, and by shambles I mean that it is almost non existent. The taxation rates are incredibly high: higher than they’ve ever been. There are 2 blanket sales taxes, and a federal & state income tax. And that's only for people who are employed. State assisted living is all but shut down. In fact, only the extremely clever or extremely lucky can get it. Drug use is about the same as it has ever been. Heh, of course there are more people, so there are naturally more drug abusers. Hell, in the state the world is in now, I don’t blame them for it. I don’t use any kind of drugs myself. The reason so many illegal drugs are in use is because police forces are worthless. From what I understand there is a new drug on the street called “lithium flowers.” They are apparently 10 times the strength of cocaine, and 30 times more addictive. Anyway, the police exist solely to protect important people and important companies. Even then, they only uphold the law when it suits them. The federal government has become even more complex and corrupted over time. American dollars are pretty much worthless now. I read in a book that I found that in the 1930’s that people would take whole wheel barrels full of money just to buy a loaf of bread. That’s kind of how it is now, only we don’t have bread. We have recycled waste, and no one is really sure what is in it. But I digress. The only people who take dollars, and work with them are government-based. Agencies like the IRS, and police. Although this may sound ridiculous, the IRS has its own enforcement squad now. We call them IRSSWAT.

Due to the massive inflation rates, many big businesses have shut down and closed up shop, which would explain all of the empty sky scrapers around San Francisco, and probably in other major cities. I get the feeling that the scrapers aren’t really empty. The main thing that leads me to thinking this is that the entries are sealed off by armed guards with light .22 caliber sentry guns. I mean, if the buildings are empty, why have them so heavily guarded? I once heard that some company named Incorptec is doing experiments in some of the buildings to create some kind of “super soldier.” Heh, of course I heard that from some guy on the street, but you never know. Anyway, citizens are not allowed to have guns within any major cities, and if they want a gun it can only be a breach-loading shotgun or a single-round bolt-action rifle, and they can only have them on their property, and not many people own homes, especially outside of city borders. The general public doesn’t know anything but what the media tells them, and believe me, that information is not much. This is mainly because the media is now a government agency.

The Recording Industry and Motion Picture industry have their own enforcement squads that are given government authority, so piracy is almost non existent, and many people don’t own new music, or even old music, or any kind of media at all. Many people believe that these two industries bribed that government into giving them enforcement squads. That would have to be one hell of a bribe.

Let’s see…well, illegitimate companies run wild. Things like adult entertainment, docks, and manufacturing. They hire people for less that minimum wage. Since dollars are pretty worthless now, they pay in work-dollars. They pay in ratios. Like, 10 hours of work earns 1 work-dollar, which is much less than the standard. Well, if you are really lucky, you can get a job that pays 4 to 1. It’s a real shit hole.

Today something happened... I got up, and started getting ready to look for work. I finished my hour of physical upkeep, took a shower, and was about to clean my teeth... I had just finished drying my face, and I looked up, unto my bathroom mirror. I looked myself in the eyes, and saw something horrible staring back at me. I'm almost 30... I spent the last 10 years serving my country, some people call me a hero, and right now the best I can hope for is to be a fucking security guard. ... A god damned security guard... I don't really know who I am, or who I want to be. Even if I did, where would I really be going? It seems the best the world has to offer guys like me is a lead position in a security company.

For some reason, the very day I got back stateside, I got sat down in front of a computer. When I was a kid, I really liked computers; in fact they even trained me to be a more proficient operator during my training. I learned how to research things when I was in Japan, how to figure out things I knew. Well, it seems that a lot of things changed when I was out camping near Shanghai. In 2010, other countries began blacklisting American-based servers, and cutting off America from their networks. By 2012, the only country that hadn't cut us off was Japan. The United States government, in all their wisdom deemed that only licensed users and businesses could access the internet, claiming that the recent series of terrorist attacks were all orchestrated on the internet. I used to have terabytes of archived data, mostly pirated I might add. I had thousands of dollars of hardware when I was young, now all I have is a laptop. I have a 4 terabyte drive in it, the tech industry kind of dropped off research for storage mediums after the war started... By 2012, this hard drive was about as big as laptop drives got. After we were shut out of the internet, the need and drive for newer, better, bigger hardware lessened almost indefinitely. Now the only people who have new hardware are law enforcement, and the mega-corps. I run the 2.7.3 Linux kernel; because that's the last one I was able to get my hands on. I lost my choice for what O/S I wanted to use when windows started to only come bundled with a computer, and the software was actually a ROM IC plugged right into the motherboard.

Anyway, I grabbed my laptop, and everything else I valued from my shit-hole apartment, which consisted of... Nothing much. I didn't know what I was going to do, but I knew I was going to do something. I wandered around for a bit, watching the people around me. They seemed depressed, but for some odd reason, happy. It was the drugs. The variant of the population not on illegal drugs, were on something worse... Pharmaceuticals. It came to the point that pharmaceuticals were all over-the-counter, and they all became "anti-depressants." When I was young, they would have called these Anti-Depressants "designer drugs."

I wandered into one of the abandoned parts of the city, called "Ghost Towns." They were filled mainly with vacated corporate offices, and businesses that catered to those offices. I was told that at one time, there were roving bands of corporate security officers wandering around these buildings that killed anyone they saw. I think that's a bullshit rumor, but for a rumor, it's kept these places pretty well abandoned. I found a hotel I rather liked... It had an Olympic sized swimming pool, and probably mostly automated equipment for maintaining itself. There was a golf-course right beside it, and for some reason this place clicked for me. I don't really know why I chose it, but I did. It took me most of the day to deactivate the security devices. The place was littered with turrets. Why? I discovered that the black outside of the building wasn't just for looks... It was covered with solar panels, and there was a wind-power generation station on the roof. There were about 20 conference rooms, these rooms were immense, and had jacks for all kinds of data-transport mediums. The security sector was a whole floor of the hotel, 42 floors in all, this building was immense. This building is mine.

Most of the place was cleared out, by people who went through to collect anything of real value. I found a score; one of the lockers from the security level was left fully stocked. I understand, there are several hundred lockers, and even I haven't gotten a chance to see them all. And this brings me to now. Tomorrow I will probably till some land in the golf-course, and start a garden, if I can find anything to plant. Then of course I'll have to get the electricity working, and then plan on what I'll do next. I’ve got a long day ahead of me, I’ll record more later.

I sat with a start, and looked around. I was in the server room. It seems that the building is running on standby power, and one of the standby systems was the server room. The big mainframe machines were working on something, but I couldn't tell what. The place was obviously being used for something, at least at one time. I wonder what the machines are doing. Oh well, time to start the day.

My first stop was the kitchen; I figured I'd find some tools, and a weapon there. I found a pasta serving spoon that would work to till small patches of ground. I found a knife designed for cutting melons. It was about 14 inches long, an inch tall, and had a sharp point. The walk-in refrigerator yielded some onions that had over-grown the carton they were in, some potatoes trying to take root, and some rotten tomatoes - perfect. I found some carrots, turnips, radishes and a few other seeded fruits & vegetables. The walk-in freezer was fully stocked. Fantastic. I looked around, and found a cabinet full of spices... I took half of every container full of seeds; hopefully they hadn't all been processed by kilning. I gathered my find in a duffle-bag, concealing the knife in my BDU jacket. One more stop before heading out.

The roof was windy, and unimaginably cold, the power generation rig on top was configured to turn on whenever there was enough draw to warrant it... However there was a lock on the switch to allow it to do so. It was a simple pad-lock, and with the help of a few tools I found in the engineering bay, my training in the military paid off once more, opening the lock. I gave a quick-over to the generator, to make sure it wasn't obviously damaged and made my way down the bank of circuits on each corner of the building's solar-panels.

10 minutes of walking and elevator riding found me on the fairway of a full scale golf course. The ground was still wet from when the automated sprinkler system had gone off that morning. Damn, they didn't even turn off the sprinkler system. Well, at least that means I won’t have to water this by hand.

I spent the next few hours planting several vegetables. The carrots, radishes, and turnips needed to bloom and circulate their seeds, so none of this would actually be eaten, but several other crops like corn, tomatoes, potatoes, and onions would.

I was standing back admiring my work, when I saw something moving in the corner of my eye. About a hundred yards down the fairway; I saw what appeared to be a fight. As I walked closer, it because obvious there was a larger boy, beating up a smaller boy, who was for some reason not fighting back. The smaller boy crumpled, and the bigger one, seemingly satisfied ran off. Within a couple of minutes, I was standing over the smaller one, offering my hand up. "You should learn to defend yourself," I told him. He was young, probably 10 or 12, and his skin was pale, white as a sheet of paper. His hair was also white, and I assumed albinism. When he opened his eyes, I could see that his irises were clear, allowing someone looking at them to see the red blood vessels in his eyes, giving them a pinkish color. Definitely albino.

The kid hopped to his feet, and ran off, jumping over the concrete wall of the gold course with ease. I made pursuit, and had more difficulty following him over the fence; I landed putting my foot through a window of an abandoned car. I felt glass dig into my leg, deep. I pulled myself out of car, blood pouring down my leg. Suddenly, I felt shoulders under my arm, and looked down, to find the kid I chased over the wall trying to help me walk somewhere. I took his lead and hobbled with his surprisingly strong help to an abandoned house. I collapsed on the floor, and blacked out. I don't know how long I lay like that, but I woke up, my eyes responding slowly, my breath shallow.

I had lost a lot of blood. There was a shirt wrapped tight around my leg, and I could see a smiling face. The kid was back, and that smile sent shivers down my back. It was empty, he was grinning like a plastic toy might. I then noticed he wasn't wearing a shirt. I imagine that's what was bundled around my leg. His chest and arms were one big scar. It looked like he'd been flogged.

He stepped up to me, and unwrapped my leg, I could see now that the glass had been removed, it was sitting about 3 feet away from me in a small pile. Ouch. There were tight stitches on the wound, and I wondered who did it. "Who did these?" I asked, pointing to my leg. The boy gestured to his chest. He did them. He turned his shirt into a compression wrap, so I could use my leg, and I sat inside the house looking out the window. I slept sitting up, and the afternoon wore on.

I woke to the sound of shouting. It was evening now, and someone was shouting. I looked up, and saw a man whipping the albino kid with some kind of chain. Messed up. Then he albino kid went into a house, and from the outside it appeared he was cleaning the place up. What is this, some kind of fucking Cinderella? Whatever.

The kid came back several hours later with a little meat and bread. I wolfed it down greedily, and quickly realized that I probably just ate his dinner. I pulled the melon-slicing knife out of my jacket, and the kid got on his knees in front of me, an eager look on his face.
"You're waiting for me to kill you, aren't you?" The boy nodded, with that ugly empty smile on his face.

"Can you talk, Kid?" I asked.

He shook his head.

Great.

"Mind if I call you Eric, kid?" I asked.

He shook his head.

I put the handle of the knife in his hands and said "Alright Eric, this is yours now. Do with it what you will."

Eric got up, and walked away from me. I followed him at something of a distance, enough that I didn't think he'd know I was there. We walked into a fenced area, and he stepped up to a kid about twice his size.

"Hey you little shit!" the kid shouted.

Eric turned, jabbing the knife into the kid's stomach, stepping in and pulling up towards the sternum. Brutal. The kid fell making kind of a gurgling noise, and someone about twice his age showed up. Eric jumped, and slashed him through the neck, sending blood everywhere, and leaving another gurgling carcass. Hardcore. This kid was going through bodies pretty fast, and next I saw someone about 35 reach out and kick the knife from the kid. Eric jumped back, but the older guy had grabbed the knife. The older guy kicked Eric down, and was driving in on him with the knife when I caught his arm and flipped him over. I smashed his larynx with my good foot, and handed the knife to Eric.

I had a little trouble coming to terms with what I just saw. A 12 year old kid, not bigger than 4 and 1/2 feet just killed his whole family. He would have been good to fight with in Japan.

So Eric, he went home with me that night to my hotel. I figured he could help me with the upkeep and planting the garden, which had been interrupted and set back a day. So we returned to my place the next day, and got started on the work ahead of us. It was good having Eric around. He wasn't annoying because he couldn’t speak, so I don’t have to put up with too much stupid shit. On top of that, the kid works furiously. I mean relentlessly, without tiring. When we were planting seeds on the golf course, the kid lugged bags of seed and other gardening material without stopping or complaining. Well, I guess he couldn’t complain, because he's a mute. I don’t ever really know what Eric is thinking, and I don’t really want to. There's something about that kid that disturbs me, but I need some help that won’t get in my way. He always has a blank, kind of placid look on his face. Kind of like an old porcelain doll. I do wonder about him though.

One night I woke, with the sensation of being watched. I saw those cold and empty eyes gleaming at me through the darkness. The kid was silent, and that bothered me. He didn't know I was awake, at least I don't think he did. He was just standing there, peering at me in his little circle of darkness. Now that I think about it, I don’t think he was planning on hurting me. I think he was just shocked about what had happened in the past few days, and in some twisted way, he acknowledged me as a father figure as he looked over me.

In the morning when I woke up, I didn't see Eric anywhere. After I scrounged up some food, I went out to the golf course to check on the seeds, and maybe plant some more. I went out to find Eric, already there planting and water the seeds, tireless as ever with his emotionless face. He must have sensed me approaching, because he turned around and looked at me in my eyes. For a second I saw a bit of fear, as if he thought I was going to hurt him. He must've not recovered from the beatings, emotionally anyway. I don’t think he ever will.

"Looks like you've got everything covered out here" I said to him.

He nodded.

"I'm going to go back inside to snoop around a bit and check out the servers."

He just kept working.

I walked away, and as I glanced back I saw the scars on his back glint in the hot early morning sun.

I saw him steal a glance at me through the corner of my eye.

---END ENTRY ONE---

So, here are my qualms with the story:
*I feel that it develops too quickly, but since it is supposed to be a serial, I can go back and write more about Abbot's experience in the war.
*Not enough detail
*A tad too violent.

Let me know what you guys think. Thanks!