War of Elysium

Prologue: Yua

Three solid bangs on an old shack door.

Then three more...

And three more.

An explosion rang; a scream too, a cry for help. A memory, not here, not now. 

She was eight years old when her mother died, and two days older now. Her name was Yua, but  nobody cared, not anymore.

Three more bangs.

Yua's eyes rose from the dusty old looking-glass. Home, she was home. Not in the rubble. Not in the death. Her mother's corpse did not lay bloody and burnt before her. Walls sealed her from the bitter cold of the early morning. Bandages blocked the blood from her eyes. The icey winter rains were held back by shabby wooden tiles, they no longer froze her seared flesh.

"Child! Open the door this instant, by order of the ministry!" A voice rang out. A cold voice, angry and authoritative. A soldier?
Yua stood from her bed. She passed her mother's empty cot and stood to the door. "I know you are in there, child! Open the door now!" The voice rang yet again.
Yua did so. The door swang with a hollow creek and a blast of ice flooded the barely insulated shack. Yua looked up to the soldier and he looked down on her. She didn't like his face. Aged and marked in the wrong places. Wrinkled from fury not laughter.  "It is far past time for assembly, child. Punitive measures will take place." He said, raising a hand to slap her.

"What the fuck are you doing?" cried another voice. A soldier like the one before her but this one was scarred and his armour dirtied. He clasped the other's arm to stop his slap.
"My job, you fool." He retorted, pulling his arm free. "She is an hour late for assembly. She must be punished."
"Look at her, corporal. She's battered. She was probably in the attack." They spoke about her but never to her. As though she were a fine vase with a crack through the middle.
"It doesn't excuse..."
"Yes... It does." The second man interrupted. He turned to face Yua with a false smile, seemingly dismissing the cold soldier. "What's your name, kiddo?" 

Kiddo. Cold painful rains. Hot painful flames. Kiddo. She said that. She is saying that. She is burning and bleeding... and dying. She still loves her daughter, though. She says: "Run, kiddo. Run far." And she dies. She died. She's been dead. Two days dead. She isn't here, she isn't saying kiddo. Somebody else is. Somebody else is stood in front of Yua. Maybe he can help? Maybe he is here to save her mum?
No, he can't help her. She is two days dead. He is here for Yua. He is talking to Yua. He asked her a question.

"Yua... sir. My name is Yua." She eked out. She did not meet his gaze nor did her eyes wander. They were fixed forward. Not on anything in particular, just forward.
"He is right, Yua. Even if he is a prick. Assembly started an hour ago. You know your way?" The soldier tentatively asked. Yua couldn't answer; instead she nodded her head and walked past the soldier, never daring to look him in the eyes.

          A crowd had gathered. Men and women, near on 10,000. This was typical in the stacks where Yua grew up. ASAG, a fishing territory under the control of the Ministry of Galithia. Yua carved a path through the great crowd. She weaved between torn rags and wooden prosthetics. She ducked the legs of fishermen trying to get a proper view of the stage. Eventually, she had managed to reach the front rows. Before her and the crowd of ragged peasantry stood a thin line of pure white armoured soldiers, armed with rifles, holding the rabble back from the ornately carved stone stage. 

A well dressed man stood on the stage; mid-way through his address. He wore the garb of an officer, a commander. He spoke of schedules and quotas and things Yua could not understand. His words were flowery and elegant. So much so that the folk listening could barely make out the veiled threats should quotas be missed. He rambled and babbled and espoused and declared. Words and commandments Yua had grown all too weary of even at her young age. Platitudes and foreign values imported to maintain control over the furthest horizon of the Ministry's empire. Yua waited in bored silence for the end of the address, or at least for some news.