Stars Rise

XLVII. A Memory From Marius

A/N: I debated whether to put this in the same part as the last chapter, but it seemed very long that way. If you put the book aside for a little while rather than continuing to read from the last part, then you might need a quick recap: what follows is a vision Cristo gives to Leander, showing him an answer to most all of his questions about Soliara's past.

"I wasn't born yet when these things happened," said Cristo, "but it turns out memory transferral is a cinch. Enjoy."

Leander didn't feel anything, but when Cristo walked away, he could remember exactly how the entire population of Soliara became immortal, and he remembered being very, very angry about it.

XLVII. A Memory From Marius

Spring in Soliara is damn hot and the sun feels strong, like its rays can just blast through anything, and a crowd's no place to be standing in that kind of swelter, but Justin wouldn't choose to be anywhere else. Gaia Solin needs military support — not the fighting kind, but the kind that makes the home front feel like they owe a debt to the peacekeepers, and today the peacekeepers cash in.

The softer hearted were allowed to stay home (unlike in a real battle) but that wouldn't stop anything. No one'll notice. There are enough rows of uniforms, straight backs and high chins. Justin has a loving hand on the hilt of his gun. He prefers the fighting kind of support.

The soldiers stand with the gnomon of Soliara's central sundial at their backs, and the president's podium in front of them. They face a clustered crowd of less than straight backs and chins raised straining to see the action at the front, some on tippy toes, all in disorder, a mass of some thousands that would have been countable if they would just line up in a damn row, but they won't, so they aren't.

The disorganized mass mess also had a choice to be there despite the smoldering heat they bathe in, and they brought their children along, daughters on shoulders and infants on hips and how that body heat must rival the solar heat and Justin's grateful his fellow soldiers spread out in spaced lines and their uniforms are a little airy because there's, thankfully, a half decent breeze.

Trumpets blare, and the soldiers salute. It all looks very impressive. As one the little army about-faces so that every soldier turns toward the president in a chevron.

That mere humans can achieve such perfection in a matter of steps impresses the mess of crowd. Worried faces light up a little.

Gaia Solin speaks to the receptive audience. What she says isn't important. Justin pays no attention to the speech. That's just about impressions, and those Justin can live without. He made good with the truth a long time ago — on the battlefield.

Them, they just kept attacking. They lit up the night with flesh on fire, and lights that crashed and boomed. We wanted to kill all of them, a mass cleansing of a violent people history would eventually forget — it wouldn't even take that long.

It hadn't always been like that. We came with healing hands and building tools but they destroyed our righteous intentions and now we destroy them so we can purge our guilt along with them. Burn our good intentions along with corpses and just forget.

But we also had the power to restrain, and when our good intentions healed along with our initial wounds, we put the pistols away and tied up our enemies with magic ropes, and so many prisoners of war you never did see.

The prisons were full, overflowing, because execution would be wrong. There has to be another way. Was it any more wrong than overcrowding dirty cages we can't build fast enough and a life of castigation? Miserable places where it seemed like it was always night, looking back, six or seven prisoners in a cell built for two. But you wouldn't want us to release them, not even the peaceful protestors back home, now that there was peace in the region, because trust me, then there would be no peace.