Chapter 13

A Changing Year

Gordon Mannheim was never an average boy. However, in many ways, especially emotionally, he was like an average boy of his age. He was never truly innocent in the full dictionary meaning of the word, it wasn’t possible in his environment. But in many ways he could have been accurately described as an innocent boy at the start of 2002. Yes, an unusual boy who was legally an adult; one who had already faced and bettered many dangers; one who owns and runs a very successful business. However, 2002 was a year of many changes for him, and by the year’s end he’s no longer innocent - not in any way.

As a person of great principle who’s trained to accept his responsibilities and he couldn’t push them off onto others - even when it would’ve been best for him to do so.

Young Gordie is very happy go lucky, like most of his classmates, for the first half of the year. More so than most of them because his business is doing very well and he’s happy making many other people happy. VPI gives the town access to the world and is improving business all round. The whole town is riding a high from the benefits generated.

The death of Dani-girl throws a sad note over everything for a short period. But it’s accepted, as death on duty is one of the possibilities one accepts when they join the Royal Guards in any capacity. One happy note in the incident is she made it possible to save the seven children involved. Her family sees this as a major bonus on the plus side of her life. Her passing leaves a big hole, but they close ranks and move on.

Gordie is just recovering from that emotional blow when Roberto Ruiz arrives in View Port. Gordie is a very resourceful and unusual boy for his age, but even he isn’t ready for the emotional and psychological conflicts the situation creates. He knows he can kill; he’s already faced the danger of the lions and killed them. He knows he can use violence against bad people; he did that with the bank bandits. He has no trouble executing the men about to murder the film director because that’s a straight forward issue which is very much like the bank robbery was. The men are dangerous and in the middle of committing a murder; no conflict, no issues. However, the execution of Roberto Ruiz for what he intends to do; now that’s another thing! Gordie can see the need to kill Roberto in order to protect Vicky, and Gordie is angry enough to make him want Roberto to suffer for what he did to Vicky and her mother in the past. However, he hasn’t yet worked out a way to deal with such activities within himself or within his own moral code.

He sees the need to stop Tequi from being able to harm Vicky or to give evidence against him, but he can’t bring himself to execute her because she’s done nothing to warrant it in his eyes. So he makes arrangements with the film director. Arrangements that takes her out of the equation in a safe manner.

When Gordie gets around to executing Roberto his drive to kill him to protect Vicky is very strong. However, he’s not yet reconciled this with his other principles because he hasn’t yet been able to rationalise the situation in his own mind. This leads to him disassociating himself from the actions. In this state Gordie has no moral controls on his actions and he finds a darkness within himself. He enjoys the pain and suffering he’s inflicting while executing Roberto. His own mind rebels at such enjoyment, which is why he’s frozen in the disassociated mental space when the policeman arrives. This is an extremely heavy psychological trauma for anyone, let alone a ten year old boy.