THE END

Chapter 12

Around four o'clock we all go inside and crowd together in the center of the long room. The Rebel Leaders go up to the front and a bullhorn is passed around among them. "Hello, everyone, attention." One of the Rebel Leader's says with a southern twang. "As you know, we've had quite a loss today. Our numbers have been divided by ten, our town was practically destroyed, and many of us lost family members and friends."

He pauses, then says, "I promise you we will do everything we can to keep this rebellion alive. We will try as hard as we can to make this town thrive again, to continue our lives as normal, and to strike back. This attack was unprovoked. This attack was a declaration of war. This attack is proof  that the officers ain't the good guys, they ain't no heroes. They never was."

The crowd begins to murmur in agreement, saying how we need revenge, how we have to fight back. He passes the bullhorn to another Rebel Leader. She wipes tears from her eyes and stands up straighter. "I know we aren't the type of people to condone revenge, but we must  launch a counter attack. If this goes on, the people of Jupiter will be extinct, if not all of humanity." She clears her throat and continues, "We have now seen first hand the damage that the officers can do. I lost my husband in this bombing. Many of you have lost people as well. I swear on my own life that I will not let their deaths be in vain."

The room goes silent. Everyone is somber. "We need a plan to survive. We have totaled 241 people left on Jupiter. Just over a tenth of what we were. With so few of us we hardly stand a chance against the officers and their bombs. Although, we do have news from the other planets. The last people from Earth and Venus have been evacuated; humanity is only on three planets now. Mars, Saturn, and Jupiter." Allon asks her for the bullhorn and she passes it to him.

"This really is a declaration o' war, I tell ye'. The planets have divided. All them officers and everyone supporting 'em is out there on Mars. Saturn has become the neutral planet, where all them folks go who don't want no fighting. And we're the rebel planet. All the people from Mars and Saturn that are against the officers are comin' here! They tells us it's around 300 more people, which would help our numbers a lot." Allon takes a breath, "The officers though, they gots thousands. Maybe 5,000 people on their side. Saturn's got the other 2000 or so."

"Clearly we need to fight back, but even with them new recruits we wouldn't last for as long as ye' can say 'Allon's the best Rebel Leader in all the worlds.' We wouldn'a even last that long, I tell ye."

People chuckle in nervousness. "We're open to suggestions right now." Allon tells us. "At least until 5, when we's gonna give all them fallen tributes a right n' proper burial. Until then though, we want ideas. How do we attack? How do we fight back? With so few of us is it worth sendin' in our only men? Can we outwit them somehow? How long do we have to get the new trainees ready for battle? How long until they get here?" Allon jumps up and down like he's trying to get the crowd pumped, "Come on people, we need ideas!"

One of the head instructors takes the bullhorn, "They come here in different groups, just like usual evacuations, but they should all be here in three days time. And really we have no time to train them. Mars could attack again at any time. Although, on the bright side, they probably think we're all dead now. Or almost all. I mean they wouldn't expect anyone to live through an explosion like that. And they definitely wouldn't expect us to have already rebuilt everything and cleaned up the wreckage. Plus it takes them 24 hours to get here. So we have at least that long." The bullhorn gets passed around throughout the crowd as people list off ideas of possible attack.

"We definitely shouldn't send out men to attack. There are only so many of us. If they come to us, we can fight back. But the only way we should go to them is with drones and self piloted bombing planes, so no lives are at risk for us." One man says.