71

Chapter 110

"And you're sure they won't eat us?" Purr asks for the hundredth time, about to step into her one-man airship, a skinny, agile thing like a dragonfly.
She nervously eyes the flood of patiently waiting Beasts, which sit motionless and watching and silent, lining the streets of the Old City for as far as the eye can see.
"Fairly certain." I shrug, closing the door on her before she can open her mouth. I step back as the engines fire up and the light aircraft zips up into the gray sky.
When I got back I found the soldiers awaiting sunrise in the square, mustering all forces and repairing aircraft, stocking weapons. I would love to have a picture of their faces when I flew in on Blarg with an army of furry fanged friends behind me.
Blarg's brethren landed on the still standing roofs in the City, along with other flying Beasts. They ruffle their feathers now, preening themselves in the light breeze, restless and ready to go.
I can't convince the soldiers to ride the flying Beasts, however hard I try, though by the looks of their worn aircraft it would be a lot safer. However, the original rebels, who've been it the program since the beginning, they all sit on Blarg's look-alikes, like me, watching the sunrise.
I try not to think that our number is now nine.
It's interesting to see that every able-bodied man and woman is a soldier, while I realize I've only seen male Servants from the First City. It's heart-wrenching to watch as couples say goodbye to children and mothers and fathers are torn away from injured sisters and brothers. The elderly and unfit stay behind to watch children- As in those under the age of ten.
I see more than one soldier who looks my age or maybe even younger- But I get it. It pains me to deal with it because I know many, or maybe none, will ever return home alive. But if I get to go and fight for my freedom, then why can't they?
There are tears which I try to ignore, shouts which I turn away from. Many young children, too young to even hold a sword, stretch out their arms to me, their eyes pleading for me to take them with me. They want to fight, like their parents and sisters and brothers. But they can't come. They're the future, after all. If this fails, then maybe, just maybe, the next generation can continue the battle, until the Order falls.
I retreat from the pleading cries of the children, the sobs of the parents who know they might not return, the terrible and most probably final farewells. I simply can't handle it anymore.
These past few months I've been pushed to and past my limits, both physically and emotionally. Now I'm done. I will go fight this war, and I will try to save Coal and do what I've always wanted to do, what I've always meant to do.
Whether or not I die trying, the Order will fall today, or we will weaken it for the next generation. I sit on Blarg's back, waiting for all the soldiers to take off in their airships. My fingers nervously knot and unknot the thick white fur. I feel the strong body rising and falling with the slow breathing pattern, the powerful throbbing of the heart inside. I close my eyes and relish in the warmth of the sun on my face, and open them to look upon the sunrise, the most glorious I think I've yet to see. It's golden and pure, with light winding through it and gold and crimson mixed together in a million rivulets that flow in one continuous streak across the horizon and onwards, far into the east. The cries of the children and the breathing of the Beasts, the propellors and engines of the soldier's aircraft and the sobbing of the parents all blend together, and I bite my lip until I taste blood.
No turning back now. I will not live another day as an Impurity, unequal and unworthy. I will live free, or die trying.
Finally all the soldiers have lifted off in their heavy, tattered aircraft, stolen over the years from the First City, many of which are broken, and all of which are outdated. I know many of them will not survive the battle, and the soldiers know it too. But they are brave, and like me, they're ready for it to end.
The children are ushered inside by their elders, and now all the Beast's eyes are on me, ten to the tenth of them all watching me, waiting for the say-go. Red and black and slit pupil-ed, narrow, slanted, and bigger than my face, they all watch me intently, from every direction.
One by one, I meet the eyes of the nine remaining rebels. Stomp, Pops (Well, I can't see past the hood, but I look in his general direction, anyways.), Bugs, Joe, Hour, Glass, Glade, and Shiver (Still scares me.). I barely know most of them, and yet they're the closest I've got to friends right now, and I'm leading them to their deaths.
I nod, and press my heels to Sir Blarg's sides. The minute we're in the air, the army of Beasts is afoot, and they follow us from the City. Flying Beasts mass in the air, becoming a dark clouds with me and Blarg at the lead, the beat of their wings like the roll of never ending thunder, the creatures roving the ground growling and snarling and flowing like a dark, angry river down the streets of the City left over from the time before time.
I look to the sun, watching the black specks of the soldier's aircraft some ways ahead, bobbing up and down like flies on the horizon.
And so it begins. A cooperative army of Man and Beast, working together to bring an end to this division, this law that divides and defines some unlucky enough to be born with ears and tails as mere mindless animals without emotion. Heck, Sir Blarg is more decent and thoughtful than many 'Purities' I've encountered. Just as the legends have foretold for a hundred years, we are coming. For the Rulers and their perfect City, we are coming.
And the Order will burn afore the night is at end.

"Ahead." Glass calls from some way behind me. The first pillars of the New City break the light grey sky ahead, tall spires and mushroom-shaped glass buildings that stab the sky and hold themselves far off the ground like the cowards that inhabit them.
The Palace towers high in the center, glittering menacingly in the center, black and golden and gleaming, not a mark or blemish on it's perfect surface. Coal's in there, somewhere.
My eyes suddenly brim with sparkling tears, and I can't blink, nor look away from the evil Palace.
How long ago was it that I was last here? I stood at that very spot in the Wold, so, so long ago! I ran through that field, slept by that tree with a bleeding leg.
I now know the full story, how the Rulers couldn't have me escape the Exams with a 71 Brand. They told Coal to hunt me down and kill me, because I couldn't live to inspire hope and start something they couldn't stop.
Well, look at me now, I think, looking below me at the army of Beasts which thunders through the Wold, the flurry of Beasts and aircraft which swarm me. I'm back, and I've brought some friends.
As we approach, the soldier's aircraft fall back into the flock of me and the old rebels. I meet nervous eyes through glass and helmets, and try to look strong and confident, though really I feel empty, with my significant other half not beside me, but somewhere, locked up ahead.
And this is what gives me strength.
"This is it." I say, and have to repeat it again in a louder voice, over the thumping of the hovering Beasts. "This. Is. It!" I call out, for the Beasts massing below us, looking up and watching, for the soldiers to hear over their radios, transmitted from the small earpiece I'm wearing. Wonder how long that'll last.
"For over a hundred years, we've let these people control us," I wave my arms at the distant City again. "They tell us who may live and who may not, as well as how we may live, out abandoned and hunted in the wilderness," I look towards the Wold, which now seems more friendly than ever. "In a run down, shackled village where we must kill for a living," I nod towards the Predators village, a little brown speck at the edge of the great field around the City. "Underground, hidden from the world, never seeing the light of day," I look to the City again, imagining the subterranean world below. "The Rulers say that those who are born 'Pure', are the only ones who deserve to live.
"Well, you know what I say?!" I call out, and there is a collective cry of response, the Beasts roaring along with the humans. "I say, it doesn't matter if you have wings, or tails, or fur," Another outraged cry, much louder this time. "In these past weeks, I've met so many people that deserved to live..." I swallow the stinging in my throat, and continue. "And didn't..."
Coal isn't there to pick up, Ash, I route myself on. Keep going.
"But they were a heck of a lot more decent than the people who enforce this law!" I come back with more energy, shouting an showing off my pointed canines. "And you, all of you," At this I sweep my arms, including both the rebels and the soldiers and all the Beasts, "Deserve a chance! You all deserve the freedom to live the way you want, without being hunted down by dirty Servants," My voice rises to a shout about the cheering and the hua-ing and the snarling. "YOU ARE EQUAL, AND YOU DESERVE TO BE TREATED AS SUCH!"
I'm screaming now, and, pulling together my courage, I rise to my feet, balancing with all my cat-like skill atop Sir Blarg's broad back, using my tail to balance myself. This results in more screaming and hollering and cheering.
"I SAY," I scream at the top of my lungs, "THAT IT DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU'RE PURE OR IMPURE, BEAST OR MAN!!!" The whooping and barking and roaring reaches a deafening level, and everyone, or thing, can hear it within a ten mile radius. "I SAY, THAT WE ALL DESERVE ONE THING!"
The response is like a bomb, and I'm nearly knocked off my feet by the massive, rolling cry that ensues.
"So," I think of Coal, suddenly, back on the mountain, all the rebels glaring at him, while he routes them into a battle-mood. "Are you ready to fight for that thing?"
There's another rolling boom of screaming and shouting and cheering and cawing and deep guttural roars. Translation: Yup!
"ARE YOU READY TO FIGHT FOR EQUALITY!" I scream again, my voice torn away from my throat, leaving it raw and sore, but I continue, louder and stronger than ever, baring my fangs and screaming now at the City. "ARE YOU READY," I close my eyes and, with all my self-control, force myself to roar the last few words, as much as I know it will hurt. "TO TAKE BACK WHAT IS OURS!"
There's a massive clap of actual thunder in the distance, and the army screams even louder in response, welcoming it like another ally.
"ARE YOU READY TO FIGHT FOR OUR FREEDOM!!!" I scream above everything else, my voice terrifying and cold and fierce, piercing the roaring and the thunder and the shouting and everything. I pull Coal's swords from the bundle of cloth on Blarg's back, and raise them above my head, the metal glinting hungrily in the red sun.
And in unspoken consent, all at once, we charge.