Chapter 109

Southern Arasaka Coastline

Former Clan Hitogi ‘Fujiwara’ Plantation

Marcus was overseeing the final preparations for the assault on Yangzhao, organizing the new Oshu units into orderly columns.

I know this style of warfare will be new for you, he telepathed to them as they blinked up at him in confusion. But bear with us — an organized force will always fare better, especially when they’re outnumbered.

Sakri nodded to his men. “The Shai-Alud speaks truth! Let us practice this forma-shun until the call for battle comes!”

“Make sure they get some rest, too,” Marcus told his newest commander. “It’ll be a long night.”

He sent the Oshu away in high spirits. In the last 24 hours, they’d welcomed a few more tribesmen from the jungles — curious shadow warriors who had come seeking their freed brethren, throwing their arms open as they were reunited with their once-enslaved brothers and sisters.

Marcus walked the grounds of the plantation, inspecting the new fortifications they’d carved from bamboo and resin. Such construction was not unknown to the Oshu of the Arasaka, and the Yokun archers under Takeshi had thrown themselves into helping the primitives. It seemed to Marcus that they bore no small degree of guilt for the evils their own kind had visited on the people of the world. Takeshi was always the first man to volunteer for a job in the sweltering sun of the day.

The Tigrans were mingling with their peerless leader in the east block — the place with the most shade in the compound. Karliah was barking orders this way and that, but Marcus could tell there was an element of theatricality to her exhortations. He could see the smile that tugged at her lips every time she saw some of the younger Tigran at play like the cats of Earth. Marcus made sure not to let his eyes linger too long — no doubt the catgirl would chastise him to no end if she saw the little moments when her mask slipped.

Hialjia, however, was another story. She and her vanguard could be heard roaring and smashing the target practice dummies they’d set up using materials from the overseers’ old metal storage closets and uniforms. Marcus had expected to see her doing the same thing tonight, but it looked like the ‘Princess’ was currently engaged in a little bit of storytelling: her bulky, horned brethren listening to her tales of battle — of how she single-handedly dueled a prince of the Yokun Empire and gave the ‘dancing lizard’ a few fresh scars for his pretty little face.

The night drew on, and Marcus telepathed to more of the men that now was the time to get some rest. They had about four hours before the assault would take place, and though he appreciated that battle fervor was clearly still in the air, he wasn’t about to have people waste their lives out of a frenzied desire to keep up the momentum of their most recent successes.

Marcus headed to the main guard tower to finish up some planning before the battle proper. If he was being honest, he could have used some shut-eye. His head was still adjusting to the surface world and the humidity of the jungle coastline. He wanted nothing more than a chance to lay down, as he had done with Mari in the bowels of the Pipers' now-abandoned base…

Suddenly, a strange sound emanated from the balcony of the overseer’s office. He looked up from his papers and cocked an eyebrow at the sight he saw when he made his way outside: a collection of the army, led by its charismatic leaders, huddled around a large campfire, each of them sharing stories of their time in captivity.

“Looks like your little storytelling session inspired some people, Hialjia,” Marcus muttered.

The speakers below didn’t hear Marcus’s mumblings. Each one was too absorbed in the stories of their companions — the way their features twisted as they laid their stories bare, some coming from plantations where they were kept in lockers without air for days on end if they ‘misbehaved.’ Others spoke of their children being branded while they were made to watch. Yet even within the tales of horror being weaved between the embers of their little fire, there were moments when tranquility shone through — little sparks of hope that flared up in the faces of each storyteller and their fellows. No matter their species. No matter their experience. No matter what culture they had all but forgotten they belonged to, every one of them looked into the eyes of those around them and saw, in very different faces, a kindred spirit.

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If nothing else, it’s our suffering that brings us together.

Marcus turned to see Mari stepping out onto the balcony with him, hands clasped behind her back, hair tied back and smelling of Thea’s sweet saltwater.

“You went for a swim and didn’t invite me?” Marcus asked.

“Thought I wouldn’t interrupt my busy boy,” she winked as she came to stand beside him. “After all, we’re about to make history.”

“Heard that one before,” Marcus laughed.

They took in the night air together in silence, trying to catch the fleeting details of whatever story Marvin was spinning beneath them. Whatever he was saying, he was saying it well — he had all the former bondsmen in the palm of his hands, and even a few Tigran girls were blushing as he showed them his muscles.

“What were the Ratmen like?” Mari asked suddenly, absorbed, it seemed, in reflections of her own. “I mean — you spent such a long time down there with them. There must have been a few you grew attached to.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Marcus said sadly. “And if it wasn’t for me, some of them would still be here today.”

“There you go blaming yourself again. Do I need to get Hialjia to bonk you?”

“It’s nothing but the truth,” he replied. “I’m not bitter about it. And it doesn’t… consume me like it used to when I first got up here. But still, on the eve of another battle, I’m not going to stand here and lie to myself. I’m going to do better this time. I’m going to make a difference now.”

Mari glanced at him, her long lashes fluttering like they used to when they were first going out.

“Marc,” she said. “Look down there. Do you think it’s truth that keeps those people together?”

He followed her gaze but said nothing.

“‘Truth’ would tell them that difference breeds conflict,” she said quietly, but with enough venom that Marcus could tell she was repeating the spiteful words of another. “That’s what dictates the thoughts of the Yokun hierarchy. That’s what they’re all used to hearing every day of their short lives while people die around them. The ‘truth’ the Yokun preach is that a racially homogenous society is one where division does not exist.”

“They aren’t the first ones to come up with that idea,” Marcus sighed. “We all know where ideologies like that lead.”

“But they don’t, Marc,” she said, and this time her voice was far more insistent. “Those people down there only believe what they’ve been told all their lives. It took a lot for Jin’an and me to sow the seeds of a new idea in their minds — to give them something worth fighting for.”

“Something that’s equally dangerous.”

Mari looked at him then, her surprise flashing only briefly in her face as he held her gaze. Suddenly, for no reason he could intuit, Marcus was reminded of the jungle queen Juon he’d met earlier.

“What happens when the fighting’s over, Mari?” Marcus asked. “What keeps these people together then? A common enemy might work in the short term, but as soon as an era of peace comes around, the differences between these groups might just flare up again.”

Mari touched his arm gingerly, as though dressing a wounded soldier.

“Marc, this is Thea,” she said. “There’s been nothing but fighting for centuries of this world’s history. It mirrors Earth so perfectly in being a stage for perpetual conflict. But the reason for that is one simple thing: they lack a unified purpose.”

“Unity,” Marcus grinned. “You almost sound like Steven Barenz now.”

“Don’t compare me to that dolt,” Mari scoffed. “Look, he didn’t deserve what happened to him, but he wasn’t what this world needed. Stupid preaching about peace and love won’t solve anything. What matters is that those who tread on the weak get what they deserve. And then we can build something new. Something that’s ours, Marc. We don’t need to repeat the mistakes of the past.”

She held his arm tightly, and he stroked her blonde crown, gazing out into the coiling smoke of the free warriors’ fire, wondering about what lay behind her words.

“The mistakes of the past…” he murmured. “It’s a beautiful dream. But we’re not perfect, Mari. We’re human, and we’re fallible.”

She held him closer, sniffling in the night as a cold breeze wafted over the barricades wrapped in the dark.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “But we’re the best hope this world has.”

***

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