Life During Wartime (1987) by Lucius Shepard

Author:Lucius Shepard [Shepard, Lucius]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SciFi-Masterwork, Science Fiction
Publisher: Gollancz
Published: 2011-12-01T01:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Some days it seemed he was moving through a vacuum, an airless gray created by his lack of purpose, and other days it seemed he wasn’t moving at all, that life was flowing past beneath a projection of rock upon which he had been stranded. He had nothing to do, nowhere to go: He had come to the end of purpose, and though the frustration caused by Debora’s rejection had acted to shore up his feelings for her, she was a problem he had no energy to solve; he thought she might be right about the comparative values of commitment and emotion, and he envied her capacity for denial, because seeing her every day drove him to distraction. Whenever their paths crossed he would – like a vampire anticipating a hot feast – relish every detail of scent and dewy fever; he would imagine himself following her to Panama, saving her life, and receiving infinite gratification. He had the idea that she was delaying her departure, that she was having trouble putting him behind her; but while this augured well for his chances with her, he knew that to take advantage of those chances he would have to endure more war, and he doubted he was capable of endurance. The memories of the dead men in his wake were weights bracketed to his heart, holding him in place. He could feel them. They were solid and fundamental restraints. And even more solid, more fundamental, was the idea that he was a pawn in a centuries-old feud. He wasn’t sure he believed that to be the case: spoken out loud it had the ring of fantasy. Yet each time he added up the elements of his experience, it seemed clear that fantasy and truth were in union. He saw that the feuding families in Pastorin’s stories, the playful way he had been maneuvered, and much of the war were imbued with a common character, a whimsical arrogance, and this enforced his belief. Belief made him angry, and anger made him eager to explore the perversity that underlay the war. But anger and eagerness were outfaced by his spiritual exhaustion, and so he did nothing.

He went often to the hollow, occasionally accompanied by Nate Lubove. Sunsets were the best time. The shafts of light bathing the chopper would burn red and orange through the canopy, kindling fiery glints from the cockpit, scalloping the black metal with gleams, and the huge silhouette would take on the aspect of an evil Easter egg waiting for a monster child to reach down and snatch it. Mingolla would feel that the light was congealing around him, armoring him in orange and black, and he would think darkly romantic thoughts concerning solitary adventures and high purpose. Whenever the computer addressed him, he would refuse to respond: he didn’t want its solace or companionship. Its skeleton pilot and divine mechanical voice seemed to him emblems of the fraudulence of the war, and he sat beside it only to remind himself of this state of affairs.

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