Outcast

by Guerin Zand

  Right before I left Earth, I decided to visit Lihwa. I didn’t tell anyone else about the visit. I didn’t think anyone would understand. I wasn’t really sure why I was doing it, other than I just felt I had to. I used a transit portal to travel to her home in Chengdu. I arrived early one morning and walked up to her family home. I knocked at the door and her mother opened the door.

  “Good morning.” Her mother greeted me with a kind smile.

  “Good morning. I’m here to talk to your daughter, Lihwa. Could you tell her Guerin is here?”

  “Please come in.” Her mother opened the door fully and motioned me in. “I’ll let her know you’re here.”

  Her mother left the main room and walked down a hallway towards the back of the house. A few minutes later she reappeared with Lihwa.

  “Guerin? I must say I’m surprised to see you here, but I guess I’ve always been surprised by your actions. Is there something I can do for you?”

  “Perhaps we can take a walk? There are some things I’d like to discuss with you.”

  “Ok.” She explained to her mother that we were old friends and we needed to talk privately. Her mother appeared to understand, and we headed out the front door.

  “I was very sorry to hear about Anna, Guerin. If I had known anything about that...”

  “It’s alright, Lihwa.” We left the walkway in front of her house and started walking down a little country road. “I don’t think you had anything to do with that. That’s not why I’m here.”

  “Still, I am very sorry for what happened. My government is run by fools at times. Is there something I can help you with?”

  “Actually, I’m hoping I can help you.” I handed her an encrypted storage device. “You remember the password I assume?”

  “Yes, but what is this?”

  “It’s everything.”

  “Everything?”

  “It’s everything we have on what really happened, not the story the public knows. It contains all the names of the people involved and the actions they took. It’s a bit of a read, so it will take you some time to sort through it all.”

  “What am I supposed to do with this?”

  “I don’t know, Lihwa. I’m hoping you can do something good with it. I’ve always trusted you in the past. You’re still the only Chinese person I can trust with this.”

  “But I’m...”

  “Just an engineer? So am I. Maybe it’s time we stopped playing this little game? I don’t want anything in return. I’m leaving. I don’t know when, or if, I’ll be coming back. I just couldn’t leave without sharing this with you.”

  “Why me, Guerin? Why have you been watching over me all these years? Why did you keep me safe? Why do you trust me?”

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Why not?”

  “I thought we were going to stop playing games, Guerin?”

  “It’s not a game. I just don’t have a good reason. At least not a reason I can explain. I just have to trust my feelings. Some people say I have this ability to do the right thing without knowing why. Others say I’m just crazy or stupid. When I figure it out, I’ll let you know.”

  “I won’t hold my breath waiting for that day.” Lihwa smiled and I couldn’t help but smile back. “You know this is the sort of information that can get people killed, don’t you?”

  I nodded. “I’m hoping it will keep you safe though. I should be going.” I turned to face her. We hugged. I kissed her on the forehead. “I hope you have a long and happy life, Lihwa Zhu.”

  “What about you, Guerin? Will you be happy?”

  I smiled, yet still my eyes watered as I thought of Anna. “I was once, so I guess it’s possible.”

  Sammy opened a portal and I was gone from Lihwa’s life. I never saw her or contacted her again. Meeting her daughter and grand-daughter had brought back all those feelings I had for Lihwa. I never understood those feelings. Was it just some game we both liked playing? I don’t think I’ll ever know.

  Lihwa did use the information I gave her. She used it to gain political power for herself, and over the years she moved up in the party. She became the first woman Premier in China’s history, and she made a real difference. She reformed the Chinese government. She brought her country out into the sunlight of the modern world, and China took its place as a true world leader.

  She brought democracy to China, hidden in the guise of the communist structure that existed. Party members still selected the leaders from the lowest government positions to the highest, but being a party member was no more difficult than it was for an American to register to vote. So, when the party members gathered to select leaders, they were actually voting. Citizens voted for local leaders, who then voted for regional leaders, and so on up the power structure. It was for all intents and purposes a representative democracy, not much different than what we had in the USA. There was still only the one party, the Communist Party, but inside of that were various factions. Eventually, the word Communist was removed. It became known simply as The Party. Lihwa was even more brilliant then I had ever imagined. She had slowly changed the governing ideology of the largest nation on Earth without anyone really noticing.

  But she didn’t just change China. She changed the world. With China stepping out of the shadows of communism, they started to work with the other major powers. They were no longer trying to pit nation against nation to thwart their rivals. They quietly removed the North Korean ruling class and eventually helped bring about the reunification of Korea. A “New World Order” came into being, but not the one the people in tin foil hats had always feared. No. The nations started working together to solve common problems.

  There were still individual nations with their own concerns, but they weren’t military concerns. They were concerned with the quality of life of their citizens and the protection of human rights around the world. It wasn’t paradise, but it was a lot closer to it then mankind had ever known. The U.N. was more or less ineffectual as usual, except for the security council. That was where this “New World Order” could be seen. The members worked together to solve conflicts and bring order where there was chaos. In the past, they had preferred the chaos to keep their rivals busy and distracted. Not anymore. The IOET and NFT merged and this body embraced the future for all of mankind.

  Needless to say, Lihwa Zhu became a national hero with statues and all the other trimmings befitting someone of her stature. Her story was taught in the history classes around the world, not just China. She had made a real difference and she did it quietly. Maybe my friends were right. Sometimes I just did the right thing without even knowing it, but I can’t take any credit for what Lihwa accomplished.

  Mei had sent me a copy of Lihwa’s diary. I wasn’t ready, at the time, to read it. She had also sent me a file attachment which made me curious. When I opened the file, I heard Lihwa’s voice. It was eerie in a way, to hear the voice of someone from the past like that.

  “You do remember the password I assume?”

  I laughed and said, “Jjukkumi”.

  Lihwa appeared before me on the viewer. She was much older than I remembered her. From what Mei had told me, Lihwa had lived to the ripe old age of 140. That wasn’t uncommon in the 22nd century. Mei was actually born when Lihwa was 80 years old through the use of a surrogate mother. As Mei had explained, Lihwa had her eggs frozen prior to her MSS service as a precaution. When Mei was born, Lihwa stepped down from her position as Premier and retired to a quiet life with her family.

  Lihwa’s image smiled at me. “Guerin, or at least I hope it’s you viewing this. I had hoped you would have returned to Earth, so I would have had a chance to speak to you personally. I guess if you’re watching this, that never happened. There is so much I’ve wanted to say to you.”

  “First, I guess I should say, thank you. I don’t know what the historians have said about me, but I want you to know that I owe my success and happiness to you. Just so you know, it is the year 2114. I’m now 120 years old, and I have had a long an
d very happy life. My husband passed away earlier this year. He was the man you protected, along with me, during those hard times. I loved my husband very much. I can never tell you how grateful I am to you for making our life together possible.”

  “I’m sure history has either portrayed me as a devil or an angel, but the truth is more a bit of both. Some of the things I’ve had to do were not the actions of a good and moral person, but I had a lot of tough decisions to make over the years. Whenever I had to make a tough choice, I thought about you and what you said to me. I tried to trust my feelings and hope that I made the right decision. I guess you were right. How can we ever really know what the right thing is?”

  “When we last talked, I asked you, ‘Why me?’ I know you often asked that same question. I don’t know if you ever figured it out, but I think I have. I talked to Roger and Katie over the years and I now realize what it was you were going through. I think maybe you needed somebody to trust, someone to help you with your burden. Maybe it was just your odd way of asking for my help. I was too stupid to realize it at the time. I don’t think you knew why either. I just hope that I did help you in the end. That is what I tried to do to thank you.”

  “You were a true friend, Guerin Zand. It sounds funny to say that now. I don’t think we ever considered ourselves as friends at the time. We were both too busy using each other. I often wondered what could have been if we had met in a different life. I guess that’s just an old woman talking now about one of her many regrets. The one thing I will never regret is knowing you.”

  “I encouraged my daughter, Mei, to join up with Roger and your old team. I hope that you two will meet one day. Maybe you and her will also become friends. Your daughter Maria has visited us many times over the years. You should be very proud of her. Our daughters have become very close friends and that makes me very happy.”

  “If there is one thing I truly regret, it’s that I wasn’t able to help you when you really needed me. I can never say how truly sorry I am for what happened to Anna. I hope you believe me and know that I would have helped had I known what my government had planned. Perhaps the things I have done since then can make up for that in some little way. I know from talking to your daughter and friends how badly Anna’s death hit you, and that was why you ran off and left Earth behind. I can’t say that I blame you. Remember when we last talked you said it was possible you might be happy again? I hope you have found that happiness. I have to believe you have. If not, please don’t give up. I did what you told me to. I had a long and very happy life. You owe yourself the same.”

  “Well, I guess you’re probably tired of listening to me ramble on. I wish the best for you, Guerin. If you happen to find yourself enjoying a nice bowl of Jjukkumi, I hope you’ll think of me. I never had the chance to tell you how that was one of the nicest evenings in my life. I think I’ll have a bowl of Jjukkumi when I finish here now that I think of it. Goodbye, Guerin.”

  I don’t know why, but I couldn’t stop the tears that had started when I first saw her face. We were never that close. It was like she said. Most of the time we were just using each other and never took the time to actually become friends. It was hard to even say we were friends, but listening to her then, just made me regret what we both missed out on. Still, I felt the same about that one night we spent together enjoying our Jjukkumi. I just regretted I never had the chance to tell her as well. I just wished I could have talked back to the ghost on the viewer. I couldn’t help thinking of all the friends that were now gone. Was that what I had to look forward to in the coming centuries? A growing list of regrets and loss?

  I dried my eyes as I headed to my kitchen. I grabbed a cold bottle of Soju from the bar on the way and conjured up a steaming hot bowl of Jjukkumi from the food replicator.

  Chapter 21

  Aliens Showing Off

  When I finished telling Milly the story of Lihwa, she was surprised. I had never talked about Lihwa to anyone. Katie and Roger knew I had taken an interest in her, but even they didn’t know why. No one knew I had given her that information before I left Earth.

  “So have you read her diary, Guerin?”

  “No. Maybe I will one day. I did view the message she left for me.”

  “And?”

  “It was personal. It was just an old friend saying goodbye.”

  “You still always kept track of Lihwa’s life after you left Earth, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “I guess I don’t really understand your relationship with Lihwa. All anybody knew was that you had some interest in her. Was it romantic?”

  “Not really. I mean, she was a beautiful woman, but we only met twice in person. We couldn’t be friends. If we were friends that would have cost her dearly. Even as she rose to power in China, if anyone had suspected we were connected, it would have ended her career. You may think I saved the world, but to the Chinese, I was still the bad guy who had caused the problems in the first place.”

  “So, why did you trust her?”

  “I didn’t really. It’s hard to explain. It’s just another one of those things I’ve done without really having a good reason.”

  “I had no idea that it was you that helped Lihwa rise to power. Now that I do know, I realize that you did a lot more than prevent a world war. By helping Lihwa, you helped change the world.”

  “Lihwa did that, and she deserves all the credit. I had no idea that things would play out as they did when I passed her that information. I only did it to keep her safe.”

  “Yes, but that’s what you do. Sometimes you do something for the simplest of reasons, the right thing, and that little thing makes the biggest difference.”

  “Yea, right. I’m so special.”

  Milly could see that talking about it had upset me. “What’s wrong, Guerin?”

  “It’s the same old thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You’ll just laugh.”

  “I won’t laugh. Please. I know you don’t want to share with me but at least we can talk about it.”

  “It’s just this life of mine. The long life I’ve lived, and still have to live. It’s like it’s not me anymore. That person died a long time ago, and I miss that former life. I still can’t accept this reality fully, or maybe I’m just hoping it isn’t real. It’s different for me, Milly. I grew up knowing I’d grow old and die one day. When we first met, I was thinking more and more about my death. I was at that age where one realizes that the end is closer than we thought. It was easy to accept that what I thought I knew about the universe was all wrong. We knew we were only guessing. But to find out your basic beliefs, such as how your life would play out, are wrong, well, that’s a lot harder to accept. For you, and maybe even Maria, this may seem stupid. You both grew up thinking about things in a different way.”

  “I remember you always had these feelings, Guerin, but I thought you’d come to accept these things.”

  “When I was living on Earth, married and happy, I just ignored those thoughts or pushed them into the back of my mind. At the time, I was living a relatively normal life. It was only after I left Earth those feelings hit me again. I had no family left on Earth. My brothers, cousins, and friends were all dead. I didn’t feel like I belonged on Earth anymore. I’ve never felt that I belonged here either. That’s why I had to get away from all of this. But even that didn’t really help.”

  We continued to talk for a while until finally we got to sleep that night. In the morning we had breakfast together with the rest of my family. I went with her to the space docks to see her off. I promised, once again, I would visit her at the station I now called Milly’s station. I joked that first I’d have to figure out where it actually was, before I could go there. Milly kissed me and called me an asshole one last time before she boarded her shuttle.

  I didn’t really have any plans for the day. I visited the medical center for Julie to perform another scan. The anomaly was still there but growing smaller. The memory of that dream
was still fresh in my mind though. I left medical and decided to just go back to my quarters and have some fun with Gamma. Maria was there, and she asked to talk to me about something in private. We left Gamma with Prima and went to my office.

  “I have something I need to tell you, Dad.”

  “Ok.”

  “The Alacians.”

  “What about the Alacians?”

  “It was all my fault.”

  “What do you mean? How was it all your fault?”

  “Mei and I were friends. One time, when she asked about you, I mentioned that you were off playing pirate out in the unaligned worlds. That’s how the Alacians found you on Claorin. Mei told me she had mentioned it to them when they asked about you.”

  “That’s not your fault, Maria. We should have been more careful. There were a lot of people that wanted me dead, and we should have checked out Alrenz Gastroons before we agreed to meet with him. It was our own arrogance, and not you that was to blame.”

  “But still.”

  “Don’t worry about it, Maria. Why didn’t you tell me you and Mei were friends?”

  “I didn’t think it was important, and I didn’t want that to influence your decision on how to handle the Alacians on Ganymede.”

  “Did you know anything about Gamma?”

  “No. I had no idea about that.”

  “Are you still friends?”

  “Yes. She seems happy with the way things worked out.”

  “Well, maybe we should get together with her and her daughter sometime. Her mother told me in her message that she’d hoped we’d be friends. I’d like to try for Lihwa. We could bring Gamma as well. Sort of a weird family outing of sorts.”

  “Ok. That sounds like fun.”

  We left the office and we found Cindy waiting for us in the main living area. Her and Prima were playing with Gamma.