The Power of Five Oblivion

Scott’s lips. He felt guilty but something in the man’s voice had persuaded him. There was plenty of food on the table. He would save something and give it to Pedro later.
    “I thought not.” The man smiled again. “Pedro is different from you, Scott. And I’m afraid to say that we don’t have very much use for him. We won’t kill him. I’m told there’s not much point in killing you boys … it just complicates things. But we’ll probably keep him locked up until he’s a very old man. Maybe you can visit him from time to time if it amuses you, but my guess is that you’ll probably forget him. Anyway, do tuck in. You must be starving!”
    The food was in front of him. Scott hesitated, still wondering if this was a trick and it would all disappear the moment he reached forward. He picked up a peach. It felt soft and warm in his hand. He glanced at the man, who nodded, and he bit into it, the juice running down his chin. It was delicious. He had never tasted anything like it. And once he had started, he found himself eating ravenously, not even using a knife and fork, tearing into it with his hands. The bread was fresh, the cheese soft, the ham and salami thinly sliced and salty. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Scott was aware of the spectacle he was presenting. He was behaving like an animal. But he didn’t care. It was the first time he had eaten properly in a month.
    And all the time the man spoke to him in a voice that was pleasant and utterly reasonable. Perhaps an hour passed. Perhaps it was just a few minutes. Later on, Scott would remember it all.
    “We haven’t got a great deal of time,” the man began. “We have to leave Naples in the next forty-eight hours and we have a long journey together … for you a journey in many senses of the word. Right now, Scott, you have a choice. There’s a decision you have to make. And it’s this. Are you with me or aren’t you? Or to put it another way, do you want to travel in first-class comfort with an in-flight movie system and a choice of computer games – or are you going to leave, naked, in a cage? Nobody’s putting any pressure on you. Nobody’s hurting you. It’s entirely up to you.
    “Do you want to be a hero, Scott? Is that what you want? I’m sure you used to read lots of books about heroes who wanted to save the world. They never really had any reason. They were just ordinary people like you. But they were the hero and somehow it always worked out all right for them in the end. Harry Potter. Batman. James Bond! You name them.
    “But you and I know that real life was never quite like that. It wasn’t as simple. You’d try to help people but they were never that grateful. And I’d say that if you looked at most people living in your street, they were basically just plain bad. Did anyone ever try to help you when you were being beaten around by your foster parents in Carson City? I don’t think so. They were too busy getting on with their own lives to worry about you.
    “The fact of the matter is that since the world began – you know it and I know it – the vast majority of people on this planet have only been interested in themselves. Who are the heroes who have always been on the front pages of the press? I’ll tell you. Footballers in fast cars. Actors and singers with their drugs and fat salaries. Models preening themselves on the catwalks all over the world. People were never judged by what they did. They were judged by what they earned – and it didn’t matter that the rest of the world was going hungry. They were the heroes. Everyone wanted to be like them!
    “If you ask me, everything you were taught at school was a complete waste of time. There was only one lesson in life that mattered and that was how to be rich. The designer labels you should buy. The cars you should drive. Did you ever walk down Fifth Avenue in New York, Scott? Or Rodeo Drive in Los Angeles? You’d have seen shops crammed with things you didn’t need. You could buy a watch for fifty thousand dollars. Designer sunglasses for five hundred and ten thousand. You could even spend a thousand on a shirt! And did you want it? Of course you did! And let’s not think about the ten-year-old boy who’d been shackled to the workbench in Calcutta being paid four pence a day to sew on the buttons.
    “Of course, there were the nurses and the doctors, the charity workers, the priests. They’re still out there, even now. But what difference did they