Legon Restoration (12 page)

"I think so, what is that seed supposed to be?"
 

"Merely a basic structure, but in it there are functions ranging from lighting, heating, things of that nature, this seed will be the building that cleans this camp’s water supply. You may watch if you like," she said.

"How long does it take?" Keither asked. "I am sorry, I want to watch but I am always running behind."
 

The woman smiled warmly in reply. She placed the master seed in a small hole in the ground not bothering to cover it with dirt. She placed both of her slender hands on either side of the hole and Keither watched as green shoots shot up from the seed. At first it was slow but became faster as the plant grew. Once there was a substantial stock, the Elf rose holding a branch. An odd looking tree took shape bulging in places, branches reached down to the ground digging in creating tree trunks. The tree creaked as more branches went into the ground and others reached skyward, after a half hour the growth seemed to stop and the Elf looked at him.

"There is still much more to be done but it will be underground with the roots," she said in a honey voice.

Keither took in the small one story building before him in amazement.

"Wow that is amazing, does everything grow this fast?" he asked.

"No, master seeds help, though we only use them when working on simple projects, you must remember that plants naturally filter and clean water, building a sanitization unit does not require near the work most buildings do."
 

"How long will it live on its own?" he asked still mesmerized by the building.

"Without an Elf to support it, maybe ten years, with an Elf near to maintain it this tree will never die," she looked him over, "Is everything alright?"

Keither looked down, laughing once without humor. "Just remembering something is all." He wasn't going to say anything, but changed his mind. "When Legon and I were traveling south the first town we saw was Salkay. I remember seeing its sanitizer and thinking to myself, the Iumenta must be great. I thought the others in my group were off base in seeing the Iumenta as bad. Arkin said that humans fought Elves putting in sanitization units like the one you've made here. It all just seems so different to me now."
 

She paused, "Your race did fight us, I think that growing plants seemed...unnatural to them, but the Iumenta sanitizer is ceramics and stone, something that humans can build on their own. Perhaps if we had not thought of our own technology to be the solution for your race and taught them that of the Iumenta, they would have embraced it sooner."
 

A question came to him. "Did it ever bother you? You know, dealing with us?"

She laughed. "Frequently." Then she stopped. "Forgive me, I do not mean to be rude. You are a different race, you think different than us, you see the world different. It is not your unwillingness to listen that frustrates, but our inability to figure out why."

They didn't speak anymore after that and Keither contented himself with inspecting the work of his teams, all the time asking himself
why is it we don't listen?

* * * * *

Barnin looked over the roaster of yet more replacements. He rubbed where his wounds had been, the healer healed them all the way, he knew that but it didn't seem right to him. After that Iumenta had worked him over, Barnin fought to stay awake, knowing that if he let himself go unconscious that he would cease to exist. Then he was healed, only suffering from the loss of blood and shaken nerves. He shook the thought from his mind and went back to what he was doing.

Ankle walked in the command tent joining him, "Morning Sir, do we have a plan for the day?"
 

They were still in Bonta, the front was slowly moving north and Barnin figured that at some point the front would be where his unit was going. The only reason they weren't there now was due to Barnin getting tore up by an Iumenta, and that was fine with him.
 

"We are going to do knock and talks today on the east side of town," Barnin explained.

"Is there any reason we are doing it and not regular infantry?" Ankle asked.

Barnin understood the question, knock and talks were when an army took over a town or city. Units would knock on every door in the town, collect information like names, jobs, family and all that; while they did that other units would search buildings for contraband. Barnin hated doing it, people did not like having an invading force in their house looking in their belongings, but it was a necessary evil.
 

"Yes actually, the area we are going to has been hit before, but command thinks there are insurgents there. I'll explain more with the men," he said.
 

Ankle didn't push the subject anymore and waited for their troop’s standard meeting time. Barnin looked his men over, in some ways it would be good to get to the front line. He hated dealing with security; most of his men had black eyes or split lips from when town folk resisted or when they found groups of insurgents.
 

"We are going on knock and talks today," he said, none of the men said anything but he could see their faces droop. "We are looking for people this time, we will not need to question people with the normal questions," he pointed to a map of the section of town they were going too. "As you can see we are going to a mixed part of town, there are going to be houses and a few businesses. We are looking for a group of three men that we think tried to burn a supply depot the other night." Barnin pointed at a man with a hand raised.
 

"What did they burn sir?" the man asked.

"We think they were going for medical supplies that were due to go to the front, at least the map they dropped showed medical supplies being the target. That being said, you know the amount of materials moving around here, the supplies had moved out that day and instead they burned..." Barnin looked at some papers, "they burned a crate of clothing, looks like, socks and undershirts."
 

There was a chuckle from the group and the same man spoke sarcastic, "Sir, how are we supposed to win this war with smelly socks?"

Barnin smirked, "You're missing the point son, what if we get killed with dirty underwear, think of the shame." Everyone laughed. "But on a serious note, we just got lucky, if these guys have gotten past security before, they could do it again. Our job is to find them, arrest them and bring them in. That’s it," Barnin dismissed his men so they could get ready for the day’s work.
 

* * * * *

Ankle walked with two other men up a street of tightly packed homes. They had been working the area for some time and had yet to find neither hide nor hair of their targets. Ankle knew that didn't mean much, the problem with people like who they were looking for was that they were normal; no one in the area would think anything of them. He made his way to a two story house with graying wood and knocked on the front door.
 

A woman answered looking up at him. "Yes?" she asked.

"We are looking for some people who have been burning medical supplies." he said, thinking
there is no need for her to know that they only got some socks
.

Her brows furrowed and he went on, "Have you seen anyone acting oddly lately or has anyone new come to town?"
 

She held her chin in her hand for a moment thinking, "You know what, now that you say something I have seen all of those things."

"Can you tell me more please?" Ankle asked.

She nodded. "Yes, not too long ago a bunch of rebels started attacking the town. Since then they have moved in and acted quite oddly; you see they spend their time harassing people as if they have the right to be here when really....you don't," she said with venom.

Ankle rolled his eyes. "Right, right, OK we are going to search your house now," he said walking in, moving the woman out of the way.

She shouted at the top of her lungs, "COMPANY!"
 

Ankle heard a thud from the floor above him and then at the bottom of a stair case. Running from the second floor, three men spilled out into the first floor of the house. All three matched descriptions of who Ankle and his unit were looking for.

"STOP!" Ankle yelled as all three made for the back door.
 

Ankle tore after them turning to yell to his two companions to go around to the back of the house and call for backup. Glass exploded by Ankles head as the still screaming woman threw something at him; he ignored her and ran after the men. He passed through a kitchen and to a back door that was closing. He rammed the door with his shoulder almost falling out into an alleyway behind the house. Ankle ran into the back of another house and turned, following the men. They were running along the alley, as the last one passed by the edge of the house, he was tackled by one of Ankle’s companions, sending the beefy man to the ground punching and kicking. Ankle couldn't jump over the two men on the ground, the beefy one wasn't getting an upper hand on Ankle’s man, but he wasn't going down either. Ankle drew his sword and smacked the suspect on top of the head with the flat. He dropped.
 

Ankle made his way around and kept running after the retreating forms of the two other men. He watched as both were hit by others in Ankle’s unit.

* * * * *

Heath entered the house where the three insurgents were found. The woman, whose name was Ashley, was still in the home, her hands bound, and to Heath’s surprise she was also gagged. "Can I talk to her?" he asked a man standing next to her. The man nodded and Heath noticed a bruise forming on his chin, "Did she?" The man nodded again.
 

Heath untied the gag and understood at once why it was in place. She started to yell at him, her voice growing higher with each word and she spat at him too. Heath leaned into her, looking right into her blazing eyes holding up his hand, "Flamma," he said as yellow flames burst into life in his palm. Ashley went dead silent. "Better," Heath said.

He closed his hand stopping the spell. "I need to look around your house and ask some questions, will you be cooperative?"
 

Ashley who looked scared now spoke with fear, "Y-yes I will, I won’t make trouble."

Heath looked at some papers. "You aren't on our list for having anyone live with you here. Can you tell me who those men were?"
 

She eyed him, apprehensive with just the hint of defiance. "My brother and his friends," she finally said.

"Thank you, and what does your brother do for a living?"
 

"He doesn't have a living anymore," she said a little angry.

Heath smiled, "But before that..."

"He worked in a storage yard," she said looking down.

That made sense. "That was how he and his buddies got in then wasn't it?"

She looked up. "They are brave t-"
 

She was cut off by Heath, "Were trying to burn medical supplies assigned to helping refugees of the war, not those assigned to military units."

Her eyes widened. "I don't believe you," she said not sounding sure.

"I promise you that, I have no reason to lie to you. Did you know that's what those supplies were for?" he asked, trying to nudge her mind slightly.

She looked up at him reading his face, "They told me that it was weapons, I didn't know it was for hurt people." She looked down.
 

"We found a map they had, they knew what they were hitting, and thankfully the shipment had been moved so instead they took out some clothing items."
 

Ashley breathed out a sigh. She chewed her bottom lip for a moment. "What is going to happen to them?" she asked.

"We will question them and then decide from there, they will likely be prisoners for a short time at least." Heath watched as Ashley's eyes teared up. "Look, I'm sure your brother isn't a bad guy, I'm sure he was told to do something. It may not have been his choice, we find that a lot."
 

She looked up, "What do you mean?"
 

"Most of the people, like your brother, we find had no intention of actually doing anything bad, most are angry with us for being here and a few will fight back. But what we see most times is that the people who do things like burning supplies are forced into it. Has your brother seemed off in the last few weeks or months?"
 

She looked confused. "Last few weeks or months? You lot attacked us by surprise," she said.

Heath shook his head. "That's not true. It has taken months of prep for this invasion, plus we had to sail here and then attack, not to mention that the Elves and Iumenta announce their intentions when they are going to start a war. I am sorry to tell you this, but Hoelaria received a declaration of war several weeks before we landed. That was why there have been so many dragons around here for so long, you must have noticed."
 

Heath watched as her eyes darkened. "We were told that there was training exercises in the area..." she looked up from the floor, "if the government knew that you were coming, why didn't they tell us?"

Heath was unsure of what to say to her, he needed information, she was starting to warm up to him and if he was being honest he felt for her. He wondered what it would have been like thinking that everything was peachy in the world and then to have an invading force at your door step. That in and of itself would shake someone, but to find out that the people in charge of keeping you safe knew an attack was coming and didn't tell you..."I'm sorry, your town has been preparing for a long time now, for years I suspect. The tension between our nations has been getting stronger and stronger for some time now. That being said, does it really surprise you that you were not told of an impending invasion?"

Before she could answer Heath heard Ankle speak from behind him. "You get anything yet Heath?" he asked. Heath looked at Ashley, she was staring up at Ankle from behind a curtain of bronze hair, and she didn't look as hostile as she did before.