story of rebels

100

Author

February 03, 2008 06:38 PM

Please critique my writing and style. ------------------------------------- Bia Bokonamet opened his eyes to his environment. Two friendly guys made this small area a warm environment. Where was he in his life now? Bia pondered of the moment and felt an insecurity. It was two years already since he had been living on the move but his heart yearned to leave. Eventhough his civilian life had all the comforts and he had an easy life, and a social life, he didn't feel like a fit. It felt like a wrongly shaped jigsaw wedged into anothers place. And then in characteristic of his character he made a decision. He would leave. And not next year when he had monetary security, not next month when he had travel security, not next week when he had any security but the next day after he'd had a good nights sleep. Bia was awoken the next day and looked at the time. Already too late but I'll wake up later. He went back to sleep. Later he rose when he felt well rested. 14:00, already evening. Far too late for any plans. He'd been sleeping later and later. This wheel of the day continued for many days. Bia was running out of money and soon if he didn't sort out his life he would be nowhere and in deep trouble. Like a colour graded sensor system, he was feeling that already he was at the red part- "Critical! Critical!" it'd warn. Fuck! He couldn't wait any longer! Two years ago Bia had found a job working in Ayonbar. It wasn't anything exciting but the chance to go to a Hispanya cultural capitol was too much to resist. He set foot into this huge historical square where all the buildings where fine examples of Archadian colonial culture. The air smelt of freshly baked bread for tourists and a gathering of people reading poetry on a makeshift stage waving striped red yellow flags. People shouted support for Ayonbar and spoke in a language unintelligible to Bia. Banners hung from either side of the buildings and a Bia noticed a pale faced girl with sharp dark features that made her bold from the crowd, with a red cloth hang from her arm. He wanted this girl. Her role didn't seem particularly pivotal, nor unimportant. Nonetheless there was now a smaller gathering of public and event participants away from the main stage where the girl was involved in what looked like a Q&A. Bia had followed this girl into an organisation for a doctrine he cared not for. After a while he lost in interest in her though and realised this was something different. Something that was worth fighting for. The atmosphere of Ayonbar was a changing communal one where people had learnt to live in a new way that didn't mean people being throned on the back of starving workers. There was no currency and only big industries where people traded skills like money. The city had been split into several competitive organisations where each built a relationship based on services they could trade with the other sector. A skilled group of economists was setup that constrained everything to make sure everything stayed within equillibrium. This is as much as Bia knew. But Ayonbar was under threat. A vassal state, it's people was increasingly growing restless and Hispana, fighting a wars on her eastern and southeastern empire's fronts was wary of any separist attempts from within. Any such moves would be put down quickly. In the tip of the splinter in Hispana's sides, Bia had found himself from a nobody to a well respected fighter within short time. Already the Ayonbarya had been preparing for a war, a civil war. Men where trained but severely under equipped with weapons coming from Hispana's enemies. It was clear they stood no chance against the might of the empire. But men where keen to fight and there was a revolutionary excitement around. A blandly decorated room was where all of us new where training together. A broad dark man bounded over to me and extended his hand. "Dorus!". I immediately liked him and his hand was rougher than mine. Encounters like this were common in Ayonbar. Several of the younger boys Tomas, Behrev and Petrey was at the breakfast table. They'd become my regular consorts, us small group of foreigners but all people in this environment were in solidarity, all were comrades. Tomas and Behrev were both Slaavaks, a former nation within Hispana that was massacred after a rebellion. Tomas was tall well built but softly spoken and Behrev, also well built spoke with a calmness. Slaavaks are not humans but had only recently become industrialised as a race after having lived for a long time on the sides of mountains. Petrey was also Parisian like me through his father and generally agreeable. Petrey would never come to discuss problems with you and you had to always chase information off him. He also had a tendency to ignore requests but was direct in speech. When Hispana invaded my Parisia they had introduced the national language of Hispana as the standard lingua franca, but when people had been slow in uptaking the language and Parsian still pervaded strong laws were brought in that outlawed Parsian use with more than wrist slapping. Hispanya language was made the only allowed standard language and after a century Parsian was a dying language falling into disuse. Ferdowsi a Parsian poet has a unique position in Parsian history because of the strides he made in reviving and regenerating Parsian language and traditions. With his great epic about the Dynast Kings of past he revived national interest in Parsian culture, pulling back the penetrating culture of the empire. Hispanya dominance in this respect had been the most damaging to the ancient Parsian language. Many traditions had been lost and the language now irreversibly changed by the motherland. The training area was a course for fitness, gun training and practise training in the woods. Everyday would start with rollcall and running around the mountain path with backpacks filled with bricks. At the top breakfast was prepared. Some days breakfast would be forfeit. For lunch we were taught to scavenge and survive off what we found- worms, deliberately placed rubbish with scraps, rarely a rodent. Tomas tried to hunt birds with throwing stones always repeating the story of hunting small pidgins when as a child which he took home for his sister to prepare and cook. A few times he caught some but the meat never was much. The woods of Ayonbar had thick Magick. So thick that the Mist was visible in the forest. Any incantations you performed here was a lot stronger and it was always easy to replenish your power with many laylines and focal points where the Magick flowed. It was also a good place to learn Magicks. The camp was placed on the edge of a flat headed mountain behind a forest. On one side was visible ruins of a tower stretching up into the sky, but inaccessible since the forest had grown up strong there. The camp overlooked the city Plateau in a semi-good defensive position. I used to stare in curiosity at the city expanded and expanding down the sides of the plateau. The girl as it turned out was from the city, performing logistics and feeding information to the fighters. She had come from a bourgeois family. My contact with her was minimal but fighting was my new priority. Tomas, Behrev, Petrey and me made a small group of foreign fighters together with two fighters from Hispana who had been around time enough to speak the local language well enough to freely mix. After eight months the men were yearning for fighting against the advancing Hispana armies. Word had been heard of an alliance of the resistance forming after a splinter group from a nation North of Ayonbar had put up fight against Hispana. What with the wars on the two eastern fronts, Hispana had responded in only half effort but with the separtist fighters becoming increasingly daring they were expected to smash down like tsunami waters on unconformists. Everyone was expecting to be fighting. Of the resistance, a large component was Slavaaks and one of the most sucessful. Tomas and Behrev both were keen for information on the Slavaak contingency- Tomas most of all. An officer called to the camp asking for reinforcements. Tomas followed closely to him seeking info on Slavaak progress. Tomas in typical Slaavak dialect, "What move the Slaavaks contingents?". "They are wheeling round enemy lines but there is some problem with logistics" replied the officer. Tomas tries to push him for more information but the officer is scant on details shrugging him off- "I really shouldn't tell you more". "Both us are volunteer willing". Tomas and Behrev both wanted to serve in the resistance but our troop commander decided we were not skilled enough yet. Instead a smaller skilled troop of infantry and black mages was sent. All soldiers for the first weeks were tested on their abilities and assigned to different roles depending on how well they seemed to do. There also was the choice to specialise however you wished. My choice was a mixture of fighting and general magick. Unusual for a Slavaak, Behrev was an excellent mage with his own defensive style mixing unusual distortion spells. Myself I tried to cross train in areas for an advantage against specialised fighters. Against a physical fighter I could resort to keeping the distance and use magick. Several days after the officer had left, a column of assorted troops left to an undisclosed destination. They kept us back for training. Hours after they left the lowcity of Ayonbar was suddenly under attack. Smoke poured in a high column in the sky. Our men panicked since the proper command had left with the last column. Our officers and troop commandeers started to quickly organise the men. From the edges of the plateau empire troops could be seen populating the streets of the city. Evidently they didn't fear reprisals since they patrolled brazenly along the main road of the street. The main road linking the trade sectors crossing Ayonbar was a famous attraction where businesses and performers setup on the side- but now it was devoid of activity. Our men started gathering what arms we can and assigning accordingly for our guerilla attack down below. Everything was now moving fast. We had to get out soon and find cover in the civilian city! Our troop commander was a youngish man with a distinct accent. The remaining troops had been sent to the woodland to hideout until we were ready to make the short descent into Ayonbar. With not much than a couple of hours we started to prepare, with the specialised mages spreading themselves across troops. A young man came and sat next to me on the log. "You want a drink?" I offered some water. "No thanks. In a few hours we will be fighting. It will get cold tonight." he said. To help his morale I told him "You know it's tough, but we all must protect our lands from the invading empire, and after we're all free we can build a new society based on fairness." The man stared at the floor, "My older brother was enlisted by the empire and died on the Eastern Front. They swallow nations and give money to foreign rebels while their and our people starve". A third man came and sat nex to us and I got up turned away and walked a little distance. Without warning a mortar exploded. Thrown to the ground, the two men behind me were obliterated. The empires troops were already aggressively pushing up the mountain from the plateau. Unexpected and on the defense, three of our druids starting chanting to create a defensive shield. Our scattered men were running without order in all directions and in the chaos I found Tomas, Behrev and Petrey. Petrey handed me a gun. Already it was clear to me all was lost and we had to protect ourselves as priority. Behrev shouted "We must get to open sunlight! There I can create defense!". With speed we moved across woodland to were there was small opening. We drove deep into the forest for some hours trying to escape the soldiers and had found a stretch with sparse sunlight. Behrev made the sun shine strong light on us which made our position difficult to discern at distance. Without chance to go back we decided to push on. Truth is we knew we had no chance against better experienced empire soldiers. Eventually we found a small path down to the city. I went straight to the headquarters of our organisation. It turns out that it was dangerous to be out and members were already being supressed. Also our organisation had split into two groups and degenerated into street fighting. A group holding a building near were we were held up started squabbling amongst themselves and started fighting. It ended with them shooting three. Quickly we had to choose sides. One group favoured extreme doctrine with no government and the other was more concerned with the practicality of fighting the empire. Instead of focusing efforts on the empire, we were infighting already splintering into groups. In the headquarters, men were hanging around waiting for something to do. With Behrev I was put in a group of mages and sent to a place down the main commercial road. In an apartment with thirty others I saw this girl again. Miriam was organising the mages and seeing each other we both exchanged greetings. The commander opened to group. "The empires troops are walked into our city to prevent our uprising and the inevitable. But to secure our immediate survival we must beg the gods for power. Up on Mashadi mountain lies an ancient tower where an old summoner was gifted the power of control of souls. If we ascend we should ask the gods that they may help us now and grant their power. Should we win this battle the empire will collapse like a house of playing cards. Already we have traitors in our midst who serve in the will of the empire and wish not for us to win. Should we find evidence of your consort you will be burned without trial." We started our ascent up the mountain. Myself was one of the strongest our of a group of weak mages. Funnily enough it seemed the Katana was a preferred weapon of choice rather than the earth fashioned staff. Behrev had a white staff he had fashioned himself from wood and enchanted with the earths spirit. As a group of weak mages we was vulnerable and so took a discreet route. Our destination would be that tower. [Edited by - Genjix on February 5, 2008 9:46:27 AM]