Exile - Account of a Convict

         I am a political dissident, I run from the country where my home once was. Snatched away by the government. Deported. I was banned from the national political arena early in the Unification. An unfortunate minority, not needed by anyone. Awkward, wished dead by so many. An unnecessary complication in an otherwise beautiful political scheme.

         I wanted sovereignty. Why should people in faraway Malta draw up laws and directions for us? An independent nation for centuries, not needing anyone.

 

         But what does that matter now? It was but the beginning of my life as an exile. A story I here set out to describe. People must know not only the already romanticised, mythical stories of the courageous pioneers and revolutionaries. I write this hoping my words will also be remembered.

 

         Meteorites rained from the sky in the SkyFall terrorist attack in 2123. This turned the minds of so many from the beautiful individuality of nations to the grey and restraining multinational mega-state of today. Political clichés like Strength! Stability! Security! were heard everywhere, read on every site. The net was saturated with them. We in our group did our best to enlighten the public, make them see what was happening. But they would not see. They did not care, they were happy suffocating their national soul.

 

         Then the new government with Leem Sponheim in the lead made life even more miserable for us. I understood my days as a free man were numbered when the Convict Labour and Employment Decree was ratified by the people. This decree gave the state rights to exploit convicted “criminals” and gave them new charges to accuse us of. It was quite rightfully named “the deportation law” by the victims. I could not think of a better name myself.

         The decree meant nothing else. Thousands and thousands of convicts were sent and are being sent to isolated mining and exploitation colonies all over the solar system. We, the outcasts, the contra revolutionaries, feed so many millions, make the new republic tick. Provide the hungering industries with raw materials for minimal or no wages. We work where no one else will set their foot. We work beneath the opaque clouds of Venus, on the hell-hot surface of Mercury and the ice-cold outer asteroids. But who knows about us? The heavily armed security-staff. The people bringing us the food we need, but they do their best to stay unaware of who actually needs these rations. The judges prefer to forget us as soon as our sentence is read to us. We are rarely mentioned in newspapers or on the tri-dee channels.

 

* * *

 

         I think it was on a Friday they came. Me and my fellow conspirators were planning a demonstration for the following Monday. We had the whole plan ready, just polishing the details. The house we sat in was old. One of those plain early 21st century buildings without any ornamentations.

 

         They did not even bother to knock. The door flew in, splinters spreading all over the room. Two windows were pulverized by sonic guns. Men in black uniforms stormed in, brandishing mean-looking weapons, pointing them at us. They looked alien with their masks and power-armours. It took them only a few seconds to secure the whole house. Everything in complete silence, orders given on their internal communication system. All we heard after the door and windows had been taken care of, were the heavy footsteps of police boots as they searched the building. We did not even have time to get up. I remember how Jens tried to throw himself behind the sofa. He was instantly stunned. His body jerked with the initial spasms, then nothing. He was completely limp. Lying there as if in a coma.