"Are they bringing a child?" asked a young man. He looked toward the end of the path with the flashlight mounted on his safety helmet.
They were on the balcony section of the facility's lowest floor. Food waste from the upper floors was tossed down through a small pipe. These food items were then carried toward the furnace via a conveyor belt. Although this entire balcony area was the size of a small football pitch, the conveyor belt occupied only a small fraction of it. The rest had been left empty for other waste systems to be built later. The Calosians living outside the factory would sometimes secretly come to these conveyors where waste was transported and fill the capsules on their backs with as much food scrap as possible. There were two of them: one was a young man, and the other was an old man with nothing left to lose.
"Be quiet..." the old man said, placing a hand on the young man's shoulder. All the grime on his gloves smeared onto the boy. As they spoke, their voices sounded a bit strange due to the plugs in their noses. The old man gripped the lad by the shoulder and pulled him down toward the floor. Both hid between the conveyor belts.
Two robots were walking with confident, brisk steps, dragging a child behind them. This child looked more well-groomed than the other Calosians. Cleaner and healthier... This child was likely one of the upper-floor Calosians.
"Please, I beg you..." the child said. "...please, I'm so sorry."
"We have to help the kid." As the young man tried to stand up, the elder gripped his shoulder and forced him back down.
"Don't be ridiculous, Sulo..." the Elder said. "...we can't oppose the robots. Even if we could oppose them and get out of here alive, they'd add security here. Adding security means we can never come here again... Should our families starve to death?"
"But what will they do to the child, Mahu?"
"They'll throw him into the furnace; for the company, that's the cleanest death."
At the end of the conveyor belt was a massive metal pit. When food fell into that pit, the red lights of the fire rising from within were constantly striking the eye. As the child was dragged toward this metal pit, he tried to pull himself back with his feet, but it was in vain. In fact, the robots were gripping the child's arm so tightly that blood could be seen starting to flow from his arm.
"We must do something..." Sulo whispered.
"Don't be stupid! The child must have done something to be burned," Mahu whispered back.
"This factory is a TESO factory! There is no logic in TESO!" Sulo said, jumping over the conveyor belt and starting to run. "Hey!" he shouted to the robots walking toward the end of the belt. "Look over here, you rascals!" He reached into the food sludge on the conveyor belt and threw it at the robots.
One of the robots turned around and aimed its weapon at Sulo. The other robot, ignoring everything, continued to take the child to the furnace. The child, as if finding a spark of hope, began to strain his arm and squirm even more.
"Who are you?" the robot asked. "What are you doing here? Give me your ID number!"
"Hey, tell your friend to stop too! Tell him to look at me! Hey! Let the kid go!" Sulo said, balled up some of the food in his glove, and threw it at the walking robot. "Dammit! Let the kid go! The kid is going! Mahu! The kid is going, old man!"
"You son of a...!" the old man shouted as he emerged from his hiding place. "Why are you giving my name, you brat! Do you want them to throw us both into the furnace!"
"There are two of them..." the robot said. Upon this, the other robot also drew its weapon and came to stand by its comrade. One weapon was aimed at Sulmo, one at Mahu.
"Ah... Just perfect. Only one child was going to die, now two children and an old man will die! This turned out to be an incredibly good plan, Sulmo!" Mahu said with his hands raised in the air.
"ID!" the robot barked.
"Uh... my ID was going to be around here somewhere," Sulmo said, reaching behind him, but the robot fired at his feet.
"State your ID number!"
"Uh... 13..."
"There is no ID number 13," the robot said.
"Stupid boy!" the old man shouted. "When you make up a number off the top of your head, did you have to pick the most unlucky number in human history?"
"Wait a second..." said the robot in the back. "...I seem to recall there was a number 13."
"I don't have it in my data packet."
"I don't have it in my data packet either, but when was the last time we received an update? They said they would reset the numbers because so many Calosians are dying."
"In that case, we might need to ask Bolver. Please wait a moment."
The robot reached for its ear. After a while: "Very interesting... It seems communication with Bolver has been cut."
"Let me try as well. Yes... Communication is cut, very interesting."
"He's probably either busy amusing himself with Calosians or has gone to a meeting on the upper floor."
"Does this mean you're going to let us go?"
"Of course not. It means we are going to kill you."
"You're wrong, boys!" a voice rose from the darkness. "Your master Bolver is neither seeking pleasure nor is he bored."
Calmo, who was choking on his tears, stilled his whimpering and looked at the man in the shadows with great astonishment. The voice was familiar, the silhouette was familiar... He stopped pulling at his arm and left the stage to the man in the shadows.
"Hey... who's there?"
"A man who is disturbed by the order of the world... A self-sacrificing hero who has sworn to fight against sons of bitches..." The man's tone had deepened considerably to sound cool. He spoke deliberately and slowly to maintain his mysterious air in the shadows.
"A revolutionary?" Sulo asked. As the man in the shadows spoke, his stature seemed to diminish in their eyes. Sulo and Mahu could lose hope in this man at any moment.
"No!" said the man in the shadows. "Absolutely not... This man is not a revolutionary. Nor is he that stupid bioethics inspector. Maybe... maybe he is a rebel."
"A rebel? What are you rebelling against?" the robot asked.
"Against this treacherous order!" The man emerging from the shadow had a strange weapon in his hand, and he pointed it at the robot holding the child. The pistol was twice the size of normal pistols, and as the man tried to aim it, his hand was trembling due to the weapon's weight. While the trigger of the pistol was painted a light white color, the weapon itself was pitch black. Even though he had emerged from the shadow, it continued to look like a black stain in the man's hand. It was clear that this weapon, which had shapeless protrusions in many places, was made by patching together many different metal parts. Probably a robot's finger had become the sight, a pipe from a robot's spinal system had become the barrel, and many other things had been crafted by tearing them from robots.
"A weapon? Sir, bringing a weapon here is forbidden under SWR regulations and is absolutely not possible. Please lower that toy in your hand," the robot said.
"I didn't bring a weapon with me anyway."
"Of course... That's why, lower your toy and..." Just as the robot was speaking, Aldoux continued:
"I made my weapon here!" And with a clack, the trigger was pulled. The bullet emerging from the gun opened a massive hole in the robot's head. Before the other robot could even aim its weapon, Aldoux immediately shot the second robot in the head as well.
"You're amazing, big brother!" Calmo shouted. When the robot shot in the head was thrown backward with great force and collapsed, Calmo fell with it. That's why he was cheering, waving his legs from where he lay.
"Hey! Kid! Are you okay?" the young man named Sulo shouted, immediately running to the child's side. He was trying to force the robot's hand to loosen with his own. Finally, he reached for the crowbar at his waist and pried the robot's hand open. Thus, he was able to rescue the child's hand from the robot.
"This is impossible," said old Muha. He took off his beanie and scratched his lice-infested head. The food scraps on his gloves smeared onto his head. "Nothing like this has ever happened before."
Meanwhile, Aldoux, looking proudly at his weapon, blew on the smoke still drifting from the barrel. Then he blew once more... and once more... and once more... The weapon had heated up and wouldn't stop emitting smoke from its barrel. "Oh, for fuck's sake!" he shouted, threw the gun away, and dove to the ground. Before the weapon could bounce a second time on the metal floor, it turned to ash with a small explosion.
"Dammit!" Aldoux said as he slowly rose from the floor. He brushed the dust off himself. "Could you only hold up for two shots after all that!"
Calmo ran with quick steps and hugged the man's waist. "I knew you would save me!" he said.
"Oh, really..." Aldoux said. "...even I didn't know."
After the child hugged him tightly, almost suffocating Aldoux's legs: "But how did you get here? It took us hours even to come with the robots..."
Aldoux reached into his pocket and pulled out a card. "With Bolver's card..."
"Ah, sir..." Muho said. "...I don't think you realize what kind of massive trouble you've brought upon yourself. You've killed two of Bolver's robots here, and on top of that, you've stolen Bolver's card. Even if you were an SWR citizen, you've far overstepped your bounds. We thank you for saving us, but... but I'm sorry to say, Bolver will kill you."
"Bolver?" Aldoux said. "I killed him, you know..."
"How?" the old man shouted.
"That's impossible..." Sulo said.
"I didn't know it was impossible," Aldoux said. "Yet, quite simply, I tore him into nice little pieces and killed him. In fact, I made that godforsaken gun out of his parts. Tsk... what a waste."
"Ah! This is incredible! You killed Bolver, the nightmare of the Calosians, just for a young Calosian boy?" Sulo said. Then he looked at old Muha. Even Muha was just scratching his lice-ridden head in shock.
These words were enough to make Calmo's eyes sparkle. The little boy hadn't been sure of the reality of that bioethics oversight inspector in the statue. Sometimes, in the depths of his soul, he would find certain signs that the man was real. Even in his most hopeful moments, there was a question in his mind: "I wonder if that bioethics oversight inspector would have liked me?"
He would construct scenarios in his head. He saw himself as an assistant running to the inspector's aid... Sometimes he would save the inspector, sometimes he would be saved by him. The reason for such complex scenarios turning in his head was that he didn't know how to act toward a hero like a bioethics oversight inspector. Now, a hero of flesh and blood stood before him.
"It means..." the child thought. "...if there are heroes, they find you."
The child hugged Aldoux's leg tightly once more. Aldoux held his hand tentatively in the air. Then he began to run his hand through the child's hair. Love... he had felt this emotion a long time ago. During the times he had a team, he had been loved by four women. Love had sometimes kept him full. Sometimes it had kept him warm, and sometimes it had saved him from loneliness in bed. Back then, he hadn't realized that what made Ilya, Velsil, Goma, and even Alora do those things was love. Nowadays, when they weren't with him, he had come to understand this love better.
So why had he saved this child?
In the last facility he worked at before he began living as a prisoner, before he was caught by SWR teams, he had learned many things. Although most of what he learned stemmed from the things he lost, a significant portion actually stemmed from the things he gained.
Aldoux, who had managed facilities alone all his life, had realized how terrifying loneliness was. But it wasn't just that; there were many things he had learned thanks to his friends.
Ilya, for example, was a very intelligent woman. But during the time Aldoux lived with her, he had corrected the misconceptions he had about wisdom.
Aldoux used to think a person was intelligent to escape work. Yet, intelligent people were combative people. They were intelligent in order to struggle, to overcome certain troubles. An intelligent person meant someone who loved solving puzzles, pushed boundaries, and burned to realize a miracle. Was Ilya's turning that godforsaken science facility into a proper place not proof of a genius? That's why Aldoux, who had considered himself intelligent since birth, had instead labeled himself as lazy because of Ilya. And if he wanted to be intelligent, he had to be hardworking, which meant he had to struggle.
Alora had taught Aldoux idealism. Alora's fearlessly throwing herself into the wild just to live her religious beliefs freely was inspiring, however annoying it might have seemed. Alora continued to believe even though she knew some of her beliefs were lies. This was why she was constantly fighting with Ilya. But Aldo had understood why belief was important.
He had seen plenty of remnants of this belief on the planet called Platoria, where they landed to find a spaceship. What saved those colonial people from dying, what bound them together, was belief. It was their belief in the future and the past. Aldoux, who had not met an Outcast until then, had gained an idea about the people outside by meeting the boy named Kael. Perhaps a bit of empathy...
Because Kael had the same impulses Aldoux had in his youth. He was someone silly like Aldoux, tactless like Aldoux, and reckless like Aldoux. He nearly lost his life while voyeuristically trying to see a few women. This was exactly the kind of stupidity Aldoux could have done.
And Goma... Goma had taught Aldoux that one had to be indifferent in order to live. If you weren't brave enough to risk certain things, life would take your freedom away. Goma was one of the freest people Aldoux knew because she had courage that could sometimes go as far as stupidity.
Finally, Velsil... Velsil was someone who thought about helping people no matter what. Although she was clumsy and often incompetent, she would do everything in her power to help. For Aldoux, helping without expecting anything in return was a very foreign term. Because he hadn't been helped. He had been betrayed by his family, his friends, and his own lineage. He had been deemed insignificant, bruised, and wished dead. Even when the woman named Belladonna helped him, she had done so by expecting something in return.
Ilya had taught that life was full of struggles, and to cope with life, you had to love struggling; you had to have acquired the tools to struggle.
But some struggles in life didn't end. Alora was a stubborn believer. That's why she would stubbornly continue to believe even if they told her it was a lie. Alora had taught that belief was everything in the war of these unending struggles. A person was not considered defeated until they stopped believing. A person's belief protected them against defeat.
Goma, on the other hand, had given him the courage to struggle. Even if you believed you would win a struggle that was destined to be lost, belief would not be enough after a point. Courage was needed at the most painful point of the struggle to help a person strive—even if that courage was foolish...
But most importantly, whether life was worth struggling for to this extent. Since the moment he was born, Aldoux hadn't seen life as this valuable. Because his life hadn't been valued by anyone, and he hadn't been able to produce any added value throughout his life. But then he had met Velsil, who risked her own life to save his.
Velsil had taught him to live in order to help others. If your life was aimless and not worth the struggle, and if struggle was inevitable... then perhaps one should struggle for valuable lives. Moreover, this struggle would become meaningful at that moment and warm a person's heart.
Besides, Velsil would be quite angry with Aldoux if she saw that he hadn't saved this child. Aldoux had no religious beliefs, but for some reason, a tiny fragment in the remotest corner of his heart made him think Velsil was watching him. Aldoux didn't want to be ashamed before Velsil.
"So..." Sulo began. "What will you do, Mr. Rebel? We have a small town on the road to the TESO3 factory north of here. It's an interesting town with many revolutionaries. We can take you there if you wish."
"But first you need to change your clothes. You need to find Calosian clothes."
"Thank you for your offer, but I have a job right now," Aldoux said, patted Calmo's head, and pushed him from his back toward the two men. "Take this child... take good care of him."
"You can't stay in this facility anymore. As soon as it reaches the manager's ears, you're dead."
Aldoux reached for his back pocket and pulled out another weapon. "Don't worry about me, I'm already a dead man," he said.