Chaos Quarter: Syndicate Ways (The Chaos Quarter, Book 5) by David Welch

Author:David Welch [Welch, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-08-15T16:00:00+00:00

***

Rex sat on a metal crate, near the edge of the hamlet. He faced the distant city of Yega, a fuzzy light in the darkness of an overcast night. He figured it would probably rain soon; it felt like it would.

Second was near him, as was Birch. Their new friend Marley loitered a few feet back, looking sheepish and uncertain. Rex figured that was to be expected. Admitting your entire worldview was wrong was a big step; overcoming the mental effects of a lifetime of slavery was something else. The man would need some time.

“I told you,” Birch said. “A lot of my people, they’re not ready.”

“Well, we don’t exactly have much choice,” Rex said. “It’s frustrating. I was once on a world called Anglesey, helping former Europan serfs escape an imperial invasion. They fought tooth and nail. They were willing to die, rather than go back to the hell they’d known.”

He shook his head in disgust.

“My people have no history of using force,” Birch said.

“Neither did the serfs,” Rex replied.

“It is disgraceful,” Second added.

Birch looked over at her, curious. Second seemed to realize he expected her to elaborate.

“I was a slave, and I could not escape,” she explained. “Rex had to free me. The idea that a slave would not want to be free? It’s disgraceful.”

Birch shook his head. “I know, it’s strange. But you have to understand where they’re coming from.”

“Second was enslaved more completely than you could ever imagine,” Rex said. “When she talks about this, she’s right.”

“Well, it is what it is.” Birch sighed. “I warned you they might not be receptive.”

Rex rubbed at his chin, still unsettled by it. He kept running the memory of it through his mind, not quite believing what Featherdove had said. It seemed unreal, their reaction. Maybe Birch was right, and he just didn’t understand the propaganda they’d been raised with. But it still didn’t seem possible to him that a person would refuse to protect their own existence, no matter how much ideological programming they’d received. Hell, self-preservation was a damn instinct! What had they been teaching here, before the Mardonnas had come? How could they so completely diminish one of the basest impulses of the human species? He doubted even the Hegemons had done that, and they had altered themselves to the point that they were literally brains who moved from body to body as they wished!

At some level, all his thoughts were meaningless. He wasn’t fighting for these people, he was fighting to get Lucius back, to get home. But the questions still lingered. These pacifists were the enemy of his enemy, which made them his de facto friends, for the moment. But he wasn’t really sure if he wanted them to be. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to fight for them. Who would? If a person wasn’t willing to risk any violent action to protect their existence, did they really value that existence?

Was it worth fighting for somebody who was unwilling to fight for themselves? He didn’t know, and that frightened him a bit.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.