Another question in me, one for the powers that be
It's got me thrown and so I put on my poker face
And try to figure it out, this undeniable doubt
A common occurance, feeling so out of place
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Canard stood out on the open plain and let the wind ruffle his hair and feathers. He shouldn't be out here, really, it was too dangerous. But it was hard enough to be cooped up inside the base on a regular day, on a day like this...it was nothing short of torture. What good was rank and respect if you couldn't toss it around a little.
So he stood there, completely exposed. He'd taken the oldest hunk of junk in the base out for a spin, and now he was far enough away not to be a danger to them. 'Can't let the whole world go to the Saurians because I had cabin fever.' He kicked idly at the dirt. 'Dirt. Should be snow and ice by now. Damn Dragaunus and his polution.' Canards face twisted into an angry grimace and he flung a string of curses at the absent warlord. The silence laughed menacingly. The anger built in him until he itched to draw his pucklauncher and vent it on the unsuspecting landscape.
Suddenly he realized that the gun was in his hand, and he lifted it and stared at it. He felt the weight in his hand, familiar and comforting. He wondered if he'd ever feel comfortable without it again. Thoughtfully he hefted it, turned, and sighted at a section of the cliff face in front of him.
'You'll give away your position. You'll put yourself at risk and others with you if you're captured and interrogated.'
Canard felt a pang of something he couldn't identify and let the hand gripping his pucklauncher fall slowly to his side. 'Tactical considerations. That's all anything is these days.'
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Guarded and cynical now, can't help but wondering how
My heart evolved into a rock beating inside of me
So I reel, such an historic ordeal
Where's that feeling that I don't feel
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He climbed one of the larger boulders sitting around the bottom of the cliff face and sat on top of it, staring out into nothing.
'Mission completed with twenty-five known civilian causualties.'
He said it out loud, hopeing that would bring more of a reaction, but still he felt a cold, passive detatchment. Canard tried to tell himself that it was hard to feel for people he hadn't seen and didn't know, but it was a lie and he knew it. If he didn't care, why was he fighting this war? For his own survival? He'd have a better chance turning traitor, if that was the case. There was no way this Rebellion could win. They'd need a miracle.
Canard didn't believe in miracles anymore. He wasn't sure he ever really had. And here he'd been ordered to go chasing after one. The Mask of DuCaine was a legend. Everyone knew that.
That was a lie too, and with it came memories of a young blond teenager that had believed more in simple, day to day certanties than Canard had ever believed in anything.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There was a boy who had the faith to move a mountain
And like a child he would believe without a reason
Without a trace he disappeared into the void and
I've been searching, for that missing person
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Where were they, now, he wondered, Nosdive and Wildwing, or Jaina, Updraft, Blizzard, Glacier, Kain, Crysta...He saw himself laughing and joking with them, invincible and on top of the world. They looked up to him, and he thrived on it. He could do anything.
'I can't be anyone's hero,' he thought bitterly. 'Not anymore. They look at me like I'm the next DuCaine. I'm not any more real than he was. Every day more of them die, and they still look at me like I can stop it. Geez, I'm just a kid fresh out of school that everyone thought had a plan for his life. And maybe back then I did, but now I'm just trying to survive and hoping some of my friends come out alive. I don't like what's happening to me. I see people die everyday and the first thing I think is damnit, now we have one less man to get the job done with.'
"That's what it takes to get the job done," Canard's voice was steel, though there was no one else there to hear it. "Focus. This is war, people die. You have to accept it and move on."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Under a lavendar moon, so many toughts consume me
Who dimmed the glowing light that once burned so bright in me
Is this a radical phase, a problematical age
That keeps me running from all that I used to be
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'Yeah, so I do. Why does it upset me much that seeing people die *doesn't* upset me? That's the way it has to be. When the war's over, it can go back to the way it used to be.'
Another lie. The change had crept over him so slowly he hadn't even been aware of it until that young doctor's tirade about his disregard for his recruits and the civilians he was supposed to be protecting. His own answer had shocked him as badly as it had her, though he hadn't shown it.
<<"There shouldn't *be* any civilians in this war! If they aren't fighting with us they've as good as given up and they don't deserve to live!">>
Canard let a hand drift up to his bruised jaw. He'd deserved to be hit for that, and it was lucky there hadn't been anyone else around to hear that comment. It would have destroyed moral for them to hear one of their icons talking that way, and Canard needed their loyalty. His casualty rates were always high, but no one seemed to notice. Because they thought he was right, they thought he could do it.
Canard drew a worn and faded photograph out of his pocket and stared at it. "What would you think of me now, Crysta?" he asked the beautiful young woman. "I'm not the man you fell in love with, anymore. When this is all over, if I find you again someday, will you be able to fall in love again?"
The picture smiled back at him with love and confidence, and Canard knew she would try. She'd give it everything she had, and not give up until there wasn't a shred of hope left in her gentle heart.
No, if someone failed the test, it would be him. He didn't know if he could be the kind of man Crysta could love anymore. He'd seen so much, done so much, given up so much, sacrificed the deepest parts of himself and locked them away for the sake of his mission. He wasn't sure if he could go back, now, and he wasn't sure he wanted to try. He wasn't sure he'd be able to handle failure.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Is there a way to return, is there a way to unlearn
That carnal knowledge that's chipping away at my soul
I've been gone too long, will I ever find my way home
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'Once you've lost your respect for life, can you ever get it back?' Canard wondered gloomily. Here, alone, in his thoughts where no one could ever know, he did admit it. He sighed. 'Does it have to be this way? Is this really what it takes to get the job done, or have I sacrificed more than I think for less than I want to believe?'
'It's too late to matter...'
He turned his gaze skyward and wrenched away from his gloomy thoughts, focusing on the mission Command had dumped in his lap.
It was a waste of time, pure and simple. He'd told them that. They knew his opinion and they were sending him anyway.
"Why me?"
"Because it wouldn't be the same if we sent someone else."
It was an absurd answer, really. The whole mission was absurd. A waste of time and resources.
Command didn't care. If there was even the smallest chance the Mask existed, they wanted it. And they wanted him to get it. Even if it wasn't all the legends said, they tried to pacify him, it would be an incredible boost to moral to see their fearless hero wearing it.
Lies upon lies upon lies...
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There was a boy who had the faith to move a mountain
And like a child he would believe without a reason
Without a trace he disappeared into the void and
I've been searching, for that missing person
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He'd seen the gleam in their eyes. Even they were taken in by the dream, by the legend. By the greatest hero of all time.
Canard didn't believe in heros anymore. Because if he was a hero, those other guys couldn't have been all that great either. Maybe one day a long time ago, there were heros. Maybe. Maybe there were only soldiers selling their souls to get through another day of war.
Maybe this was his chance to find out.
Maybe the Mask was the answer to it all.
Maybe if he found it, he could find hope again.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He used to want to try to walk the straight and narrow
He had a fire and he could feel it in the marrow
It's been a long time and I haven't seen him lately
I've been searching, for that missing person
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Canard didn't believe it. He told himself he didn't believe it. He told himself nothing could change what was happening to him.
But he felt it, in his stomach, a little fluttering glimmer of hope, that maybe he could get back some of what he used to be. Maybe he could do just one thing to make Crysta proud of him. He sighed, a part of him darkening even further. Because he knew, now, what hope lead to. He knew he couldn't handle it, not this time.
He hoped anyway.
--------------------------
Lyrics from 'Missing Person,' by Michael W. Smith