Every page of this project I write takes me painfully close to difficult emotional baggage I try to ignore. I look at the characters in the stories and regard each decision I put in front of them with some of my own fear. Each of us has a carefully cultivated persona based on our work-a-day world, the carefully controlled interactions within it, and the ethics behind our rule of law. Working forward to the inevitable fall of the United States (all things being finite) I struggle to find my place in a world where I would no longer be bound by the rule or law or the consequences of an ordered society.
Indeed, the Creeps of the story operate outside the protections and accountability of what civilization survived the fall of the Tenebrion. In the case of Grubbs and Nippy they will suffer nothing evil to live, hunting down Tenebrial Horrors, psychos, and other threats to the City of Light, to the bitter end. In return they will not be thanked by a populace who only regrets being reminded that evil can at any moment reach out and touch their lives. No fifteen minutes or fame, no book deal, no medal, Grubbs and Nippy do what they do because they believe someone should.
This element of being a social outsider provides a distinctive edge anyone with a desire to do good. They hope to gain nothing from their actions other than a just conclusion, and have little to lose by society's standards. This is why people often discount the deaths of soldiers, police officers, and citizens who die trying to protect their communities. They are seen as being outside of the normal societal paradigm because they put the lives of others before their own. They get labeled heroes and then quickly forgotten because society at large is uncomfortable being reminded that within their perfect and ordered existence there be evil.
Yep...
ReplyDeleteA hero is someone who does the extreme in a situation where there is no other option. A person who is willing to put everything before themselves.
ReplyDeleteThe most fortunate of heroes are those who never had to make that decision. That the situation that made them labeled a hero was spontaneous. And that their part in it was a simple reaction.
These heroes would not have to wait precious moments to know if they would jump in front of a bullet meant for someone else. For in that moment, they would have moved the target, the weapon, or the assailant before they had time to mentally deliberate on the consequences.
A hero should be recognised for this, it's true. But the greatest reward a hero can receive, is freedom from it.
There is no good without evil. There is no light without dark. And there are no heroes without catastophe.