Part One: https://steemit.com/writing/@bardbarian/he-who-will-not-be-tamed
Part Two: https://steemit.com/writing/@bardbarian/the-lies-we-hope-for
Part Three: https://steemit.com/writing/@bardbarian/one-way-and-another
Part Four: https://steemit.com/writing/@bardbarian/dealing-with-freedom-fire-in-a-wet-place-and-the-limits-of-what-knowledge-may-say
Part Five: https://steemit.com/writing/@bardbarian/to-where-the-people-labor-chained
Part Six: https://steemit.com/writing/@bardbarian/an-affair-of-state
Part Seven:
This did not belong here.
The tall square plain building was close to four hundred feet on its side and it cleared six stories tall. Two hundred “citizen workers” and fifty armed guards lived here along with the machinery and the manure that supposedly produced the food to feed the Gray City. “Farm Factory 432”. Lione and Hector had gotten them all out. The guards were in the slave’s chains and the slaves watched the two men from the woods to see what they would do. The Suburb street was not entirely vacant, though the mothers had long ago called their children inside.
This did not belong here.
Lione had already reached out and felt the city, the minute he saw it he did as Hector had taught him. It hadn’t been until they were a stone’s throw away from the wall that he had been able to grasp it. From the underground to the tallest spire now and in every moment back in time the gray city felt full of reds and blues and greens: but this, this prison was pitch black. The people in the city were yellow lights that swam in the reds and blues and greens as they shifted and swayed: but the factory before him covered up the light of the last few people left inside. Their light only came back after they got out onto the street.
This did not belong here.
The building was a lie, it grew no food. Lione and Hector had searched and questioned, but could find nothing more than plantings on the roof. The guards and prisoners all pointed to gears and levers, screens and pipes when asked were the livestock was, and shrugged when asked again. There was no food, but there was a giant shaft dug straight into the earth that disappeared out of sight far before it ended.
“All clear,” Hector said, “all men accounted for.”
“Get them back.” Lione set into a shoulder width stance. He reached out his arms. He held the city and its life. Slowly, he started to wheel his arms. He shifted the flow of the city. Slowly. It picked up. Ever so slowly the strength of the city’s life was moved. His frame caught fire and all the people saw it.
“This does not belong here.” Lione stepped towards the factory farm and cast his hands towards it violently. There was a roar, a shaking of the ground, and a fire no one could stand to look at. Lione gasped. Gasped for air. He was. He was out of breath, that was a hard thing to do. The freed slaves and the chained guards, they were all stunned. Hector stood tall, stood proud.
“Do you see? Do you feel it? You are this city’s avatar, like I was. The Gray City itself lends you her strength. But only to set things more right than they are.” The two men turned to the others and walked among them. There were bruises and cuts, hunger and fear. Hector and Lione did what they could. Lione, vain as he was accustomed to being, marveled at himself: He could lay hands on a bruise and it would vanish, as soon as his fire neared a hungry man he was hungry no more.
The train tracks came right up alongside the roads outside the walls. There was a special track for official business closest to where this particular factory had been. That was why there was a crowd here now, to see the Queen herself take back the keys from the Captain ceremoniously. Well, at least, that is why they had gathered. Now they were taking pictures and murmuring about the two men aflame who had made a warehouse disappear. The Queen, the Senators, they all stood on the platform, and stood in shock. The factory had been unmade, is the only way to say it. There was nothing left. Just a clear city block covered in grass.
The Envoy was the first to speak. “This, this is...what is this, some sort of joke?” He saw the Watchers in chains, “Why are honest public servants subject to this treatment? What madness, what choas...my request for a review will be officially changed to a full on expulsion! The confederation cannot be associated with this, this anarchy!” Carlton was wild, and moved close to the Queen, his arms wheeling this way and that.
Daniel could hear what wasn’t being said. The whispers told him what was to happen next. He yelled out, his eyes burst into yellow flames, and he pounced on Carlton quicker than even the royal guards could act.
The envoy had a moment of terror and then his face softened. “My lord!” He said, “It’s you!”
“We cannot have our plans spoilt, my good and faithful servant,” Daniel was aflame, and the flames took Carlton, who vanished.
“Daniel, stop this!”
“You know not my name, dear queen, your words mean nothing to me.” Daniel’s look of indifference to Sara crippled her. “Blue Queen, they call you. Well, you may say I am the Yellow King.” Daniel hissed and whispered, but the voice was heard by everyone who could see him. The queen’s guards stepped forward, but they did not know what this was, so Daniel just passed through them. He moved fast to where Hector and Lione were. All the others scattered. The guards stood by the Queen they were sworn to defend, and Lord Hellsmith wired for aid.
Lione set himself again, but Hector knew better. “Run!” the old man called out as he pulled at Lione. They fell back to the grassy lot.
“Lionheart! Always you flee before me!”
Lione roared his offence, stood and turned. Daniel was hardly himself, he looked more like a demon of yellow with wings flung wide and cruel weapons in his hands. Lione reached down, down, down, all the way to the roots of the city. That was where the power was, Hector had shown him in the forest. But here, where...Lione could not seem to find it.
“No!” Hector had kept running, he was too far away now.
Daniel overtook Lione. The yellow mist wrapped itself around the man. Lione burned, every inch of him was on fire, but try as he might he could not burn away the dream.
“Avatar,” it was hissed as an insult, “I have drained this city dry, you hold no strength any longer.” Lione felt ever more trapped as he struggled. “I am the city now.”
From outside the mist where Lione was captive a great fire burned through. Daniel drew back and screamed like no living man should be able to. He vanished. Hector picked up his son. When Daniel had left a cloud of something hazey, something chemical instantly dispersed. All the people around stood still for a minute, and then went about their day as if nothing happened. The Queen’s guards looked at their drawn weapons, and quickly holstered them. Some of the people who found themselves cowered or in odd positions they would not usually find themselves in laughed for a moment, and then all was tranquil. There was a sickly sweetness draped over everything. But Sara, Lione and Hector, they were awake, and they could understand.
Lione and Sara’s gaze met though they were far away from one another. “I’m sorry,” Lione said, “I cannot promise anything. I may have to kill him.”
Sara heard him clearly, and she could help but let a tear free.
