OVERTURE to Nocturn (Part Two)

"Damned if I knew how", the old, dark cowboy drags on a ciggarette. "But he's just a novelty at best."

Captain Mausser watched his aging mentor from his desk with an air of disgust. "You mean 'it' is just a novelty."

Finally losing his temper, Mausser slams both fists on his desk, and the nameplate falls off onto the carpet. "Damn you, old man, IT says its name is Trash, IT! Now get on out of here, I though I'd have something you would be interested in, but you're only wasting my time."

For a brief moment the cowboy's eyes gleamed in the most threatening and serious way possible: "You seem to have forgotten that I made you what you are and I can take it all away any time I choose. You're wasting my time just by speaking, captain." Then immediately the cowboy's famouis grin spreads again, wild eyes twinkling. "Now why does our small friend call himself Trash?"

Mausser's fingers keep stumbling around a fountain pen, as it clumsily slips on the wood again and again. "We understand that fools are born without names. They simply have no need for individuality. Maybe they don't understand it. Once they have been assimilated into living among us--" He pauses while the old man puts a finger to the side of his nose and blows, then nodding a 'please continue' "-- er, once this happens they seem to take anything we call them as a name."

"Mhmm"
"Yes", affirms Mausser.
"Well?"
"Excuse me?"
"Anything else?"

The captain rises from his seat and takes a step around his desk to retrieve the nameplate while choosing his words carefully. The cowboy impatiently shifts from one foot to the other in the silence. Polishing the nameplate on his jacket and returning to his seat, Mausser begins. "This one is special. A fine specimen, muscle tone bordering that of a human, and while a fool nonetheless, he seems to bear a degree of intelligence. Craves a name more than the others. But that's not all."

He rises to pull aside the curtain to a window that is easy to miss, and gazes out. The light doesn't seem real. "This one is the only fool that I've ever seen or heard of to make eye contact."

The old man ruffles his unkempt white hair, curls his mustache: "That's not all. Usually you would kill a fool in a second. You'll say 'good boy' to a dog but not even admit this fool's a 'he'. So it's not that you feel this one is more human. What's eating you, then?"

"He's the only fool to not obey an order by a human", silently cursing himself for not referring to the fool as an 'it' as he turns around to face the old man. "It took three strong officers to drag him away from scrubbing the floor, which was covered in another fool's blood."

"Fools kill?", his ears perk up.

"This one did. Usually they will only attack if death is imminent. It happened right after a soldier roughted the two up. Something else made him snap, though."

"How'd he do it?"

"Tore... tore the other one limb from limb, neck broken, jaw ripped off. So any one of those." "Damn... A man after my own heart!"

Mausser forgot how disturbing the cowboy's presence was. The old man continued: "Well I have no interest for a defective subhuman. Put him in your troops, though."

"Preposterous! Fools don't fight, and fools will do anything they're told, regardless what side of the battlefield you're from."

"Apparently this one doesn't. Just think about it. I have work to do. Take care, and be a good girl."

...

With that he turns around, trench coat flitting about behind him, leaving only the clicking of boots and a plume of ciggarette smoke to reassure the Captain he didn't dream up the ludicrous idea he was now toying with.