False providence, p.53
False Providence, page 53
Before the Torchbearers, before New Rome and the fall of the Union. Antioch was birthed in the minds of Americans some three hundred years before.
Just as then as it was now freedom fighters forged their own Lit Path, guided by their own indomitable Glenn Wyatt, the irrepressible William Still.
The statue itself was molded from the idea of a man in his prime, with his long overcoat carved behind his legs, his face was stern like all bronze busts. His eyes were looking out towards the gate, his arm forever stretching out and holding the everyday item that symbolized the fortitude of any oppressed person. The Hurricane Lamp.
Below his feet was his plinth, his hollowed- out cast iron podium that had a large copper plaque fixed upon the side. As with all memorials, the words were the testament of his character and the destiny he founded for himself and dozens of others, thus so inscribed:
The heroism and desperate struggle that many of our people had to endure should be kept evergreen in the memory of this and coming generations
William Still 1821 - 1902
The secret Crow aware of his prejudice, would walk pass the monument with his head down like the statue saw right through the officer or perhaps was a charm to ward him off.
But Janis always felt oddly uncomfortable walking by Still until today where he saw a corner of the horizon on fire. The night was clear and the humidity of summer would waft over the Nebraskan plains, it made the tension that little more palpable.
“Cadet, hand me those binoculars” The First Lieutenant ordered while clambering up the H-shaped watchtower that hung over the gate doors.
“Ten clicks to the South, Sir. There is also a dust cloud coming at full speed towards our location” The stocky young woman noted.
“Stay vigilant, Proctor – You’re a grad, aren’t you? For June, right?” The commanding officer queried hastily.
The girl was confused and momentarily bashful, she stumbled with her words but she didn’t linger long with the tying of the tongue.
Sir? Yes, Sir I graduate with distinction, I worked hard for it Sir” She replied awkwardly while trying to remember her target that drove ever closer to them.
“Twenty-one?” Janis asked churlishly
“February 4th, Lieutenant”
“Good! Hear me, all of you! Nobody younger than twentyfold-one touches a rifle! I don’t much care for jelly hands and bad eyes, that fire isn’t no blackboard circle or A4 sheet. It’s real, most likely started by people who mean business. Grads, show me your hands?” The Cantankerous Crow railed out to the youths below him. Some that taught looked up with wariness on their faces.
An old bookish Military Historian by the name of Isaac Berg came out still dressed in yesterday’s clothes as he was packing journals and choosing what type of record to take with him for future references.
With all scholars, books were the only treasures left in such a wretched, broken world as they were equally all precious to him.
But nonetheless he did choose despite going through his small study with melancholy and great pause he eventually chose:
The History and the Decline and Fall of Rome by Edward Gibbon
Mr Lincoln’s Diary by Bruce Canton
The Gunpowder Trail by Elijah Burke
The latter was written upon the last days of America as a Union and how the beacon of democracy turned rather suddenly into a powder keg, the kind it tried to avoid from the very beginning.
It was a book of truth but hope, because even though it was a broken America, it was still America…Back then, anyway.
The tawny, tufty-haired professor disapproved of the eagerness of the raised hands, fifteen at the very least. At least youth had weaned themselves off the diet of the Invincible Gamer, the shoot ‘me up that made them into the heroes of a pixel battlefield, King of the console was a pauper in the real world…
But he didn’t want to judge too harshly, he used to be one himself way, way back.in the early noughties. But then, childhood is a friend one misses but will never see again – a necessary tragedy of life that nobody could really prevent, more’s the pity.
“Lieutenant Janis, I and I’m sure the teaching faculty will be alarmed by using cadets, graduates or not in defending this camp. That fire is from the South so…Mercenaries? You pitch green Grads against Principle War Vets?”
The Prof stammered as he scratched his scalp
“No different from that war you talk about, what was it the battle of Soma, Sumatra? Sudan?”
Janis shrugged from his platform of drunken power.
“And the Crow caws again – The very fact you don’t know mass slaughter not seen in the world since Gettysburg worries me dreadfully, sir” The learned man scoffed with exasperation.
“Isn’t this a battlefield? No pen is mightier than cold lead right now, professor and a crow is what a crow does”
Janis replied in the way the unrepentant reply, cocksure as ever.
“All Grads get packed and take a spot, that’s your ground to defend with everything you’ve got!”
The Lieutenant ordered, he was adamant in the way all so-called jimmies and Jar-heads that there was no better Christening for cadets than from a font of fire and the Baptism of War.
The green gills of the teen soldiers rose and fell in excitement, Berg was no coward and taught military history for the blunt lessons needed learning and not just the victories won. At Sixty-Two he was old enough not to want to run into infamy the way military youth always seemed to want to, regardless of country or even time.
But he didn’t like the feeling that was growing inside him, the Prof waited and watched as the Grads withered slightly as reality sunk in. They did as they were trained to do but it all seemed so wrong to do it on the grounds of their own academy.
On a roadster not far from Askuwheteau’s vehicle was a Mercenary Kingpin by the name of Remick. He was driving as rabidly as one might expect a thug to drive, dust clouds were a toy and safety was an inconvenience.
He drove carefully once he established a good flight path for the hardware that up until this point had been all but rumor. He grabbed a portable controller no bigger than the iPods he used as a child and spoke into the tiny Comms system.
“Launch Sequence: Thor 2” The Brute panted.
Behind him in the narrow cargo grip was a large, black cube, it
k
“Disable the evading vehicle” Remick ordered into the controller.
Two discs broke ranks and flew ahead, right above the closed sunroof and fired two rounds each of a chip that held quite the nasty electrical charge.
The four chips were crackling up a storm long enough to charge an Electromagnetic Pulse through the chassis of the car, along the engine and right to the battery where it unceremoniously died.
Good thing the old blue Ford was a third of a mile away from the gate, so the men jumped out of the car and started running.
“How Stupid are they to think they can harness Guatauva?” Puffed the old medic as he struggled to run beside the Chief.
The group of Native Americans rushed forward to the Terra-cotta colored gate and banged their fists loudly. Despite the several clicks of readied rifles they knocked on the door again.
“WHO GOES THERE!” Shouted a Cadet from above.
“A teacher of ignorant children it seems, Casey Abbot is that you? Who goes skulking in the corner…The Crow is it?” The elder squinted up the flickering light of battlement torches.
“I am Lieutenant, 2nd Class-”
“Simeon Janis, The Crow yes good - Sir, I know exactly who you are, I am Askuwheteau BlueCloud Chief of the Algonquin tribe of the Plains, you’re going to open this door and we are going to evacuate this compound”
He demanded gruffly while stark, brown eyes transfixed deep into the secret coward’s soul.
In a fit of indignation, the Officer fired several rounds into the dark horizon ahead, knowing the bullets may be wasted.
The ever-illustrious upper hand, as valuable to the present moment as fool’s gold was to the fevered Californian but he was a crow, was he not?
On the other side of the gate the usually gracious Prof had lost all patience and ran towards the large Garage where several busses were waiting. The depot door was about Thirty meters wide and made of sharp, ridged steel.
“Hey you two, put those down and help me?”
He ordered; the teens looked at him bewildered for his placid demeanor was slowly disappearing into something else.
They downed their weapons and shoved the rightward-rolling door with a great heave then ran with it the entire length of it’s entranceway.
The buses were sixty feet in length and were of a Clay brown color, below every window was a star within this star was an inspirational quote chosen by each Valedictorian of the academy’s past. On the opposite side were quotes from history that the Cadets thought they would always need.
‘Patriotism is supporting your country all the time and your government when it deserves it’
Mark Twain
‘The time is always right to do what is right’
Martin Luther King Jnr
But man is not made for defeat, a man can be destroyed but not defeated
Ernest Hemingway
‘Love will find a way in all languages, on it’s own’
Rumi
‘Hope is a thing with thing with feathers that perches in the soul...’
Emily Dickinson
He looked at the bus next to the one he was about to choose, upon the second row just below the window was a quote from the Valedictorian of the class of 2041.
‘Let the Embers of Justice burn strong amid the oncoming storm, for the new day is just ahead of us’
Christobelle Cortez-Wyatt
He taught her once, some years before awkward and slightly unkempt for a cadet – nobody knew who she really was until graduation day, which suited the orphan just fine. She only added a formal name once she was asked to give advice for future cadets.
Professor Berg noted in hindsight that she had lived the quote long before it was uttered, Christobelle dealt with the subtle racism and the hawkish drill Sergeants.
She was a loner who tried not to be but life-long habits ended up being exactly that, not that Christy socially engaged, her focus was absolute, something her adopted father gave her with good reason….
He heard a choked gurgle coming from outside, one of the lads that helped him open the shop was seizing up where he stood before collapsing and convoluting violently on the ground.
Berg looked over as the boy clenched his fists and jerked his arms inward like he was an epileptic, only it wasn’t epilepsy.
Isaac saw the microchip that was no bigger that a lapel pin latched on to the boy’s shoulder, he gasped in disbelief as he saw two discs flying overhead and shooting more of these tiny squares of silicon onto the teens’ bodies.
He saw several fall down, could have saw he saw sparks, maybe even Saint Elmo’s Fire. As a military historian he remembered something about the last protests.
All while America was still a union and there were rumors of how they would be abated but that was impossible as the rumor was over forty years old.
“Wrath of Prometheus – more fucking drones?? ANYBODY THAT DRIVES TAKE A BUS! Now, right now!” The Veteran roared.
Explosions boomed all around now, some mercenary thug began launching RPGs at the academy grounds. Isaac could see the Watchtower shoot back with gunfire and grenades of their own. But it was futile at this point, too many kids had already fallen.
“Janis!!” The tutor screamed out as he witnessed the flap of a typical crow on a battlefield.
Cawing to their last breath, defiantly self-righteous to the end, revealing the Arkansan as the man he truly was, hawkish and unrepentant in his beliefs and harsh in his judgements of people.
“Get the cadets on the bus!” The Historian yelled while flailing his hands.
“No, if they want to be soldiers? Let this be their baptism of hellfire!” The Jarhead whooped as he shot off another round.
“Crazy bastard! You, you – Florentino is it? You wrote me a piece about Alaric the Goth King, detailed but flawed. No Military leader can never base their campaign on revenge or rage. There is always a stratagem, always the idea of putting the men first regardless of feelings or drive”
He pandered over two or three explosions from the plaza.
The student in question was justly confused.
“Sir this is hardly the time, I apologize for the inappropriate candor Sir but in what way was it flawed?” Domenico Florentino called out as he and some friends huddled beside the scholar.
“One of the oldest sayings is: Victors write history to their will, the Roman Empire is a thing to admire but never revere. They oppressed many peoples, you wrote the Goths as a villain piece, never write about the enemy as a caricature, with that comes assumptions and underestimations”
The Cunning Professor pulled in as many cadets into this spontaneous lesson as he could, he distracted them long enough to get them beside the bus steps.
“A military leader of the enemy is still a military leader?” Teresa Florentino assessed cautiously.
“Precisely, the enemy is no more no less than you are, they’re simply on the opposite end of the battlefield now get on the bus, cadet!” The Tutor nodded approvingly.
His faith in the future reassured he ushered his charges into the bus.
He smoothed his unruly hair and shook his head as he now had to deal with the gung-ho remnant of the past. Isaac breathed a sigh of relief so deep it made him slightly woozy.
All the while dozens of cadets finally take the initiative and race to the buses themselves. For those a little shaken by the onslaught were guided by the few teachers, counsellors and cooks that remained on base.
The question of staying behind had many different answers, one of them was pride and the obvious sense of duty, others were because Phoenix Valley was the only Homestead left or that one thread of normalcy that was now nothing but ash.
Indeed, the need to fight was different for everyone but the need to survive was stronger. Surprisingly enough it was pride and not survival that made Lieutenant Janis one of the last men standing, by now most of the fleeing cadets and staff had boarded the buses.
“Stupid, fucking Crow!” The Prof grumbled to himself before running into the open driveway
“Janis! It’s too late! Get those kids out of there! Get the-”
BOOM!
The force of the blast pushed the tutor against the wall, smoke and screaming filled the air with equal density, not that it registered yet. The steel battlement and staircase that manned the entrance was blown apart.
One half smashed down like a felled tree, the other collapsed on top of the security booth, he saw two teenagers fall and remain where they lay.
He saw the Lieutenant somersault along with his impromptu wing woman, they both fell hard on the ground, both were badly bleeding.
A lone tear wet Isaac’s upper cheek it was this sensation that forced him back into the horrid reality he slipped away from. He cradled the girl in one arm while furiously hauling the Crow up in the other, Isaac pushed them into the last bus and took the wheel.
“How many?” He spluttered
“We don’t know Sir, we just piled in till there was no room” A boy croaked
“Start counting, Cadet!” The bedraggled teacher ordered.
He then stepped on the gas and charged right into the fallen gate, it smashed a headlight but they got through only for two or three cars to await them on the other side.
Isaac’s heart sank as he spied another Promethean drone hovering just yards away from the hood of the bus but then it suddenly exploded in a hail of bullets. As old men hobbled as quickly as he could towards them, after an alarming few seconds Isaac saw it was the Algonquin elder and he could feel all the air heave out of his lungs in relief.
“Chief! Chief BlueCloud, over here!!” The usually collected tutor shouldn’t have honked the horn but he did it anyway.
The stupidity of the barge-like design of the school bus gave him too much of the illusion of safety but still, they were away and running from danger.
