The Twisted Reflection

I look at myself in the mirror, but can't recognize the image it brings back. Where I have long dark hair, I can only see the baldness of his skull; I have a well rounded beard, and yet his grin is barely covered by a two day lack of self-attention; if my eyes are dark and determined, his are icy blue and fully demented; he also lacks the tattoo in my face and my implants, his own hidden from sight inside his brain.

And yet, he is my mirrored image.

Where I have duty, he has blind obedience. If I see submission to the purpose and the structure, he accepts only submission to him. I understand slavery as a step toward greater freedom and unity, he accepts slavery as the perfect and final state. When I worship the Empress and the Empire, he worships himself alone. I seek peace through unity, he fights for peace through annulment. Where I believe in the unity of duty and discipline, he accepts only the unity through losing control of the self. If I value the acceptance of each one in his place, he forces them to that position and destroys the possibility of resistance.

I am life, and he is death. I am myself. He is Sansha Kuvakei, or any of the many slaves that are just broadcasting centers for his maddened self. And yet, in a way, he still is the twisted reflection of all that I value, the mockery of all I stand for. The extreme opposite of the Blood Raiders I so much hate, which are the other twisted image of who I am. To the madness annulling self of one, and the demented exaltation of the self the others are, only duty, service and honor can stand like a stone against the waves, invulnerable for eternity, resisting each and every one of their attempts to advance.