Sondranos: The Narrative of Leon Bishop (37 page)

“
You’ve been
here for all your life. You didn’t even go with them.”

“
Fool.”

I stopped. Words alone weren’t
working. I pulled the rifle up and aimed at Velric’s chest. I
fired. Velric was taken aback, but I stepped forward and fired
again. “One human could never survive one of these shots,” I shot
again, and again. I stepped onto the bench and stopped on the table
between us. “You’ve survived through I don’t know how many. You’re
older than my family name.”

I fired, and this time, Velric
fell backwards. The chips in his chest had grown larger. The cracks
webbed out like a spider had just fashioned his chest plates. Dusty
clouds as big as my fingernails fell from where he’d been cracked.
He lay sprawled against the table’s remains, as I laid the rifle’s
energy blasts into him. Again, and again, and again.

“
You have
age,” I fired.

“
You have
strength no human could ever possess,” I fired. “The anger you have
for us is evidence enough. No human would ever hold on to anger for
as long as you, and plan something so horrible.” That was when I
remembered Davion’s story and the mention of the hive mind. I
flashed back to the Transistor Radio station – saw how it reached
so many people from the edge of the crater, recalled how the
Belovores in Annalise’s neighbourhood had communicated on multiple
levels in simplistic speech. Emotions were a shared experience.
Velric had diluted the emotional pool. His hatred and rage was so
strong that it had carried out and infected the Belovores the
moment he’d made contact with them. He had to die if the Belovores
were to survive. What had begun an idea had turned into a story,
and that story turned into action – the narrator had been lost to a
distorted sense of folklore and revenge.

“
You have
time on your side,” I fired again. “And a connection with your
people, now. You are not, and will not ever be alone. Unless you
let your people die.”

I stepped down from the table,
and stood over Velric. I fired. This time, ashes clouded up into
the air from the creases in his chest plates.

“
No human has
the tools you’ve been given, and we have flourished in ways we
never thought possible. Stop thinking about death, and start
thinking about how to survive,” I said. “When you are given the
tools to succeed, don’t give up before you’ve even
begun.”

I pressed the trigger again,
but nothing happened. The chamber whined. The red reload light came
on, and I felt my heart trying to climb out of my chest from fear.
I tossed the gun to the side. Velric stood, groaning and pushing
away from the ground to hoist himself up, and stared at me. He
stepped closer. I could smell the cracks in his skin. The area
beneath had begun to cook. It was as if someone had soldered him
together, and the smell was emanating from every pore. Velric
looked down at me and leaned in.

A loud tremor shook the
compound from beneath the Hall. The roof shook, and dust careened
down while pebbles introduced a beam crashing to the ground.
Another beam fell and cut a table in half. Velric grabbed me by the
arm and pulled me towards the door. A large block of stone
shattered to the ground in front of us, and Velric yanked me back.
Without control of my body, Velric carried me to the pulpit and
flung me to the ground. All the air in my chest exploded away.
Velric leaned over and shielded me with his arms and body. I could
feel the chest plate pressing against my skin – the imperfections
and cracks webbed out all over and made me think I was being pushed
against uncut stone. I heard his heartbeat, and the whisper of air
escaping as he breathed. He was close to dead – although, I don’t
know if that was my doing or because of his age.

Velric
whispered, “I
have
been in control.”

That was the last thing he said
before the roof caved in on both of us.

The rest of
Velric’s revelation
comes quickly – after
the gun has run out of ammunition, he looks at Leon Bishop and
contemplates why he’s never considered what Leon said. Then the
memory strikes him. And strikes him again. It plays over, because
it’s rebounding against the hive mind much like his hatred had so
long ago.

The memory is
of the first Father, years ago, asking why Velric couldn’t simply
have the Belovores return under a banner of peace, or ask for help.
The term of refugee was insulting. Velric killed the man, and
threatened to do the same to the next who denied his vengeance.
Only, it wasn’t his vengeance that he wanted to complete. It was
why the hive mind had been set under the control of the younger
generation – if the older generation took control and refused the
changes necessary for a better life, then life would never move
forward. Tradition had made it so that every Belovore over a
certain age underwent the same procedure of mind awakening. Most
took it for granted. Velric had been taught this hundreds of times,
before the
Irene
had come. But with the Belovores gone, and him behind, all
that remained was an empty, instinctive cycle.

When the crashing begins in the
Hall, Velric awakens. He breaks the feedback loop of rebounding
thoughts. He severs his emotional connection over his people. As
the only Belovore on Sondranos, Velric had never been given the
chance to allow his mind to be shaped. Age is shaped by experience,
and these emotions were always meant to be shared so that the next
generation could learn. Instead, his will had seized control. He
doesn’t know where the thought comes from, but the word ‘infection’
seeps in.

When the ceiling crashes to the
ground, Velric tells Leon this – although, he can’t be sure Leon
will remember. He describes what he can, hoping that it might stick
in Leon’s mind. Velric apologizes. The link from such an age might
not be as steady as he’d hoped, even though it had proven strong
enough to destroy a city. He doesn’t ask forgiveness, but
understands that the cycle must be completely broken if his darkest
thoughts and hatreds were ever to be severed from his people. Leon
listens, but is in pain.

It took twenty
minutes before
we heard the rumbling of
troops outside trying to dig through the refuse in the Hall. The
structure hadn’t altered much, but most of what the Forgiven had
used to make the place liveable was gone. Velric stood, stretched
out, and a large gust of wind escaped his chest. He winced. When he
saw that I was looking, he maintained his strength. He grabbed me
by the throat, but didn’t squeeze. The anger in his eyes had
gone.

Four soldiers pointed their
weapons at him and yelled for him to release me, while two others
had been pulling off the wreckage around the door with large tools
that dock loaders use to move heavy containers. The soldiers didn’t
fire. I could feel the ground shaking terribly as the podium
beneath us cracked. I dusted some of the refuse away, and felt
blood. A large gash on the side of my face felt painless, but came
screaming into existence when I touched it again; my ribs hurt, and
my legs ached. The only thing that didn’t give me issue was my
head.

The soldiers approached slowly.
The peered through large black helmets and shaded fabricated glass.
Their rifles glowed a faint blue on the holsters, and they prodded
Velric. He didn’t do anything to provoke them. I could hear his
voice in my head even then. Velric turned around, releasing my neck
and raising his arms into the air. The troops escorted him away,
and then one came up to me and helped me out of the rubble. I had
no idea what had happened, but I was not surprised when, as the
troops led us outside the door, the grounds of the commune was
swarmed with troops.

Velric went quietly, and part
of me knew that he’d only grabbed my throat so that he’d look like
a threat, after having just saved my life. I didn’t know what he
was playing at, but I knew it wouldn’t end well for him.

One long path
in the distance, near the space between the barracks and the Keep,
stretched beyond the base of the Keep and out towards the crags,
where a large cave-in sight dug into the ground. In pairs, and
around the collapsed hovel, Belovores were being pulled out and
escorted away by the
Cooper
’s troops. They were being led
towards a wall where they had rifles trained on them. The Forgiven
had dropped their weapons, and were also being rounded up. Annalise
walked up to me, dirt and soot covering her cheeks. Kayt followed
behind, looking dirtier than Annalise. They smiled, and I knew they
were responsible for the crumbling of the tunnels.

The lines of troops and
Belovores were silent. The Belovores leaned against the wall, their
eyes closed, and silenced expressions. There was something deep
inside them, something I couldn’t have begun to cope with, or have
hoped to understand. Whatever it was, they contemplated it as
heavily as I’d contemplated a great many subjects. None of them
watched Velric as he was escorted past.

But just as Velric reached an
open area, he roared. The guttural sound echoed off the walls, and
the streaming sunlight gave him the appearance of a statue. He
grabbed his front plate and ripped it off. Velric extended his
chelimbs – both of which must have been weaker than twigs – and
lunged at the closest trooper. The trooper fired. He had no idea
the claws would most likely have broken. The first gunshot was a
burst of blue energy, and hit right where I’d shot Velric. With his
chest uncovered, the energy pulse sunk into his muscles and set
fire to his insides. Two more troopers fired into Velric’s torso.
They must have thought their efforts helped. They had no idea that
the first shot had killed Velric.

“
What was that about?”
Kayt
asked.

“
Hive mind,”
I mumbled. “He’s giving control back to his people.” I blinked and
tried to regain control of myself. My head swam, and the words came
out without a filter. It was like I’d been drunk. I didn’t fully
realize what I’d said. Only bits and pieces remained from having
Davion’s story so fresh in my mind accompanied by the fire fight
Velric and I’d just had – some would have said I’d been speaking
from something deeper inside myself, the part easily buried by
surface thoughts.

Velric lay still. The dust
around his remaining chest plates rose up with a cloud, and
lingered before falling back down. The troopers watched and kept a
close eye on Velric, even though the Belovore didn’t move. Nobody
moved. It’s like we were all afraid to. The tension in the air had
dissipated. In the distance, the sun had risen on the last days of
Sondranos, and the sky went untouched by clouds and crater’s
edge.

Epilogue

No More Quiet
Spaces

There are
things you never
get over. Leon Bishop had
the comfort of his words. Kayt spends most of her time in her
quarters, grateful she could access the black box of Sondranos’
server. She was able to pull pictures and documents about her
family and life to keep her going. She spends most of her time in
the silence, though.

I visit when
I can. But I know she just wants to be alone for the moment. She
has a larger story just waiting to be told, and she’s heading to
one of those new colony planets to begin telling it. I wonder if
she’ll write. Ilosa doesn’t seem like the favoured place, but she
says it’s far enough away that she can start over. She also didn’t
tell any of us that she was pregnant. She’s going to take
Lancaster’s last name and give it to the child – Velynn. Either
way, I wish her luck.

Leon’s going
home. I’ve read what he’s written, and while it strikes me as his
own version of events, maybe one day I’ll tell my own. We all have
things that shape and define us, and I’m glad he got his out. I can
hear him in the other room, pacing. He’s planning on proposing to
Daniel when he gets back. Until then, he’s practicing like a
madman. Don’t know if Daniel will say yes, but Leon’s fairly
certain he’s not going back the man he was before.

My name is
Annalise. I never got over being punished for defending myself. I
never truly got over the fact that I had to get over it, either.
Nobody should suffer because of who they were. I want to start
again, like Kayt. I want to go to Earth with Leon. But instead, I’m
going to go back to Sondranos and help rebuild. We’ve all made
mistakes. But I refuse to let that city beat me.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like
to thank a few people in getting this story done. It’s a story
about words, and all of these words had help.

First, Lianna
Palkovick – who read so many iterations of this that I lost count.
When Leon was skirting passive and active phrases, she always knew
which should have been which, and where I’d forgotten to put
something important. Without her, the magic table would still be
there.

Michael Penn
– for also giving advice on the beginning of the story, and a few
parts in between.

Roland and
Karan, for being who they are.

Julie, for
not knowing how much she helped me when I finished the first draft,
in December of 2013.