Chapter Seventeen

Roland goes exploring, and things come to a head in the Heavenly Kingdom.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Chapter seventeen, Roland. Roland smelled the execution before it started.
There'd been a lot of strong smells in downtown Plano
when he arrived. Gunpowder and sour, fierce wet, the acrid
stink of anxiety, and the warm, wet odors of grief
and confusion. He'd smelled the stale reek of military rations,
the sharp pang of anemia, and the boiling hot testosterone

(00:24):
that wafted off the martyrs like a jet stream. But
a half hour into his time downtown, something else had
drifted over the packed masses of refugees and pilgrims and militiamen.
It was hard to define. A bit of tension, a
bit of anticipation. The odor was faint enough to suggest
something unconscious, a collective emotion, the aggregate scent of a
crowd of people who weren't consciously aware of how they felt.

(00:46):
There was no neurotransmitter, no pheromone he could identify in particular.
This scent was more elusive. He was only able to
lock it down through the memory fragments that triggered col
gray sky, a biting chill in the air. Hundreds of
men and women bundled, clustered around barrel fires, everyone talking,
excitement in their voices, Anxiety on the air mingled with
the gun oil in anticipation something was about to happen.

(01:10):
A few seconds later, the scent of anxious anticipation started
to rise. Roland heard the deep bouncing thrumb of heavy
rubber wheels on pavement. His hind brain tied the sound
to a particular species of obsolete armored personnel carrier originally
manufactured in Bulgaria. After following its route for several seconds,
his hind brain guessed the APC was bound for the
main square. Roland spent the next few minutes jockeying for

(01:33):
a good position close to the gallows. He wasn't sure
that's where the convoy was headed. It seemed like a
good guess, though, and he was quickly proven right. When
the APC pulled up to a stop just a hundred
feet away. The crowd stopped and gawked as the heavy
doors slid open. Soldiers in full body armor stepped out,
dragging six men and women and honest to God, manacles
and chains out into the dying light. The captives were

(01:55):
all l stf. Roland didn't even have to make an
educated guess on that one. The in the kingdom had
made sure to dress them in their tattered and bloodstained uniforms.
They were all of them emaciated and broken looking. The
evidence of torture was so clear that Roland's enhanced eyes
weren't even necessary. The captives had broken, bleeding fingernails, black eyes,
painful limps, and feet that looked like they could barely

(02:17):
stand to touch the ground. One of the martyrs, a
tall man wearing a red beret instead of a combat helmet,
strode ahead of the group. He had a voice hamp
in one hand. He raised the other up in the
air in a prayerful gesture that was matched by most
of the crowd. Brothers and sisters. The martyr's voice boomed, today,
the Lord and his loyal soldiers have delivered unto you.
Are blessing it. The crowd tightened around Roland. He could

(02:40):
see here feel as people rushed out from the cafes
and shops to watch. The fear and excitement was so
thick in the air. Roland was sure even unmodified humans
could have sensed it. Here. We have six prisoners from
the s DF, The martyr began. These men and women
were all captured in the last week. Rather than accept
their defeat, they chose to fight insurgents against the heavenly Kingdom.

(03:02):
God and his martyrs are merciful, but these sinners have
spat on that mercy. Now it is our privilege to
execute upon them the judgment written this honor. Have all
his saints praise he the Lord. A ragged cheer went
up from the crowd. Many of the assembled sounded less
than enthusiastic, at least to Roland's ears, but there were
still dozens and dozens of voices full of reckless hate.

(03:24):
The prisoners marched forward with their escort, ever nearer to
the gallows. Roland's ear tingled, and he sensed Manny's presence
out in the street. Now the kids smelled afraid. With
a faint, fading tinge of phrmonal arousal, Roland backed away
and escaped the main press of the crowd. In a
few seconds he was behind Manny, and he put a
hand on the fixer's back. The young man jumped and
then shot rolland a furious look the hell. Manny caught

(03:48):
himself and instead pointed up to the line of doomed
men and women. Oh I know that. Hey, a girl
ran up to them. She smelled scared too, but the
scent was much deeper on her, sunken into her skin.
She'd been scared for quite some time. She seemed to
know Manny, and he definitely knew her Sasha. Manny said,
I'm sorry, I just needed to. He paused, shook his head,

(04:08):
and then put a hand on Roland's shoulder. This is
my comrade, Martyr Aaron. We fled here together once the
SDF retreated from Farmer's branch. Aaron, This is Sasha. It's
good to meet you, Martyr Aaron, she said, and flashed
him an anxious smile. I'm so glad God's grace has
brought us all together. Oh yeah, Roland said, in his
most convincing voice. God so so good. I'm really just

(04:32):
he gestured towards the gallows. I'm a psych to see this.
Oh look crossed over, her face discussed mixed with building anxiety.
She was dressed to play the part of the good
Christian woman, her hair done up in a tasteful bun,
her face unadorned by makeup, her sleeves long, and her
clothing baggy. But her scent didn't lie, It suggested she
was pretty far from all in on this whole heavenly

(04:53):
Kingdom thing. You're not excited to see God's justice, Roland asked.
The young woman frowned and shook her head. I understand
the necessity of such brute, of such extreme measures, but
I don't have to like it, Manny, do you? She
started to ask Manny something, but the young man broke
off from their little group and darted forward towards the gallows. Oh,

(05:14):
Sasha finished in surprise. I'll er I'll go check on him.
Roland said, it's a probably best if you wait here. Huh.
She looked confused, but she nodded. Roland followed behind Manny
and caught up to him about four people deep into
the growing crowd around the scaffold. The fixer's eyes were
locked on one of the SDF prisoners, a middle aged
man with a prominent black mustache and a look of

(05:35):
courageous resignation in his brown eyes. He stood in the
middle of the gallows, calm as a stone in the ocean,
while one of the martyrs fitted a noose around his neck.
Manny Roland said, that's Mr Browne. Manny said, someone you
know then Manny swallowed and nodded his head. Tears threatened
at the corners of his watery eyes. Roland felt like
it would probably be a good idea to get the

(05:56):
kid away from the gallows before he did something stupid.
Roland's hind brain helpfully informed him that there were only
around sixty armed men in the whole square, but he
also knew there were one hundred and eighty three armed
men within a mile of their current position. If ship
started now, it wouldn't end for a while. Roland put
a hand on Manny's shoulder. We have to do something,
Manny said, What do you want me to do? Roland asked,

(06:19):
Rush up there, beat that red braid fucking I get
with his own side arm and then cock punched the
rest of him into submission. You can beat them, Manny said, yeah.
Roland nodded. But if I do, that's the end of
the mission and probably the end of those hostages. I
can't save your buddy, and you probably even that girl
if she wants to come. But the Kingdom's going to
assume some monster man from rolland fucked just terrorism them.

(06:41):
They'll bury those captives too deep for us to find,
and then Austin's as fucked as a blind pussy in
a dick forest. A man in the crowd turned and
stared at Roland volume. Man volume. Roland guessed he'd heard
just the tail end of his last sentence. The word
pussy had probably piqued his ears. Before the man could
say anything, Roland point it towards the gallows and let
out aloud whoop, followed by a Praise God, Praise God.

(07:05):
The inadvertent eavesdropper started cheering along with him and turned
back to the impending execution. Roland turned back to Manny.
The boy was quiet, his face controlled, but fat tears
ran down his cheeks, and his shoulders shook with silent sobs.
Roland directed him back away from the worst of the crowd.
Mr Perone baked the cake for my twelfth birthday. Manny whispered.
He showed us Monty Python. He dropped us off at

(07:27):
soccer practice. Manny had started to babble. He smelled on
the edge of an outright panic attack. Roland's hindbrains started
to identify potential improvised weaponry options among the crowd. He
settled on a small, thick set man. He's got a
real denscranium, good weight distribution. He'll make a great club.
Roland shook himself out of it. Then he tried to
shake Manny out of it by literally shaking him by

(07:49):
the shoulders. Hey, listen, you're friend up there. It's gonna
die or a lot of other people are going to die.
Those are the two options. I know it sucks, I
know it's ship, but we cannot fix this. If you
stay calm, though, we can fix something worse. Do you
understand me. Mannie's eyes came unglazed, The flow of tears slowed,
then stopped. It was an impressive feet of willpower. Most

(08:11):
people didn't have that kind of control over their emotions.
Roland had to guess Mannie's work as a fixer had
at least prepared him to function in the middle of
a waking nightmare. Okay, the kid said, but I have
to watch. Roland wanted to argue, but one look at
Mannie's eyes made it clear that arguing wouldn't do any good,
so instead, he stood there next to Mannie and kept

(08:31):
his hand on the boy's shoulder until the terrible thing
was done. It was as ghastly as these things always were.
Most of the crowd cheered every snap neck, every jerk
of a dying soldier's legs. Shock Waves of memory racked
Roland's mind at the sight. He felt warm spring air
blow across his cold chest. He saw a small sea
of familiar strangers, men and women he'd known once upon
a bloodier day. He felt a big gun kick in

(08:53):
his hands. He felt a warm splash of blood across
his chest and face. He heard the heavy final thump
of a tiny body heading the round. He saw Topaz,
She looked ill. He saw schoolfucker Mike with a hand
on her shoulder. He heard Jim's voice, make sure the
camera's catch this next one. Jim cried, We've got an
honest to God Shaney with us today. Back in the present,

(09:14):
Roland watched as Manny's friends turn came around. Manny swallowed,
his face went pale. Tears streamed down the boy's face,
and Roland felt a sudden, peculiar urge to bury him
in a hug. He did not do that, though. Roland
just stood still with a firm hand on Manny's shoulder
while they tightened the noose around mister Perrone's neck and
dropped him down to hang until he was dead, dead dead.

(09:35):
Roland was proud of how straight Manny stood, how the
boy held back from sobbing, and how once the sad
spectacle was over, Manny turned back around and headed towards
the Christian girl, Sasha. She still stood where they had
left her. Roland could tell she'd been crying too, although
she'd taken some pains to describe it. She was hard
to get a read on that one. She struck him
as one of the faithful, but she didn't strike him
as a nut. Maybe she'd just gotten suckered into this

(09:57):
awful place. Roland could surely understand in that. He was
pretty sure he'd been suckered into dumber things. Praise God,
she said, with hesitation. Praise God, Manny responded. Roland didn't
say much. She gave him a look, but not an
angry one. That was she locked eyes with Manny. Roland
was pretty sure she'd blocked the rest of the world out.

(10:19):
She must have seen the signs of his tears too.
She coughed a little and continued, that was awful. I
know it's necessary, but I'll never stop hating that. It's
a good thing to hate, Manny said, and then look,
we have to get back to base. Curfuse coming up soon.
But if you want to hide from those undesirables tomorrow,
I'll be waiting outside the cafe. They kept talking, but

(10:42):
what they said was beyond Roland's interest. He was busy
listening as the prison convoy drove off. Now that he
knew the sound of the prisoner transport a PC urally
tracing it back to its origin point was child's play.
Aaron Manny's voice jerked his attention back to the conversation
happening in front of him. We should probably go, Manny said.
The busses will leave soon. Oh ship, surely, surely right, right,

(11:06):
surely right, we should go. Roland smiled at Sasha. It
was lovely to meet you. Good evening. He put a
hand on Manny's shoulder, and together they headed off to
the buses. Manny only stopped twice to cry. Manny didn't
say much the rest of the night. Roland was proud
of him for holding back his tears during the bus ride,
and they walked to the barracks. The kid broke down

(11:27):
as soon as he got into bed, of course, but
he kept his sobs silent, and Roland was pretty sure
none of the other recruits noticed. It helped that they
were all exhausted. At the end of the day, Roland
puked up, then popped a handful of ambient and percocets
and washed them down with a tall glass of the
beer he'd brewed in his own guts. He offered Manny some,
but the boy declined, so Roland had a second glass,
and then a third. It wasn't enough to get him wasted,

(11:49):
but the cocktail of drugs did a tolerable job of
leading him into unconsciousness. He drifted off to sleep an
hour or so after the rest of the men of
the barracks. The next day was more army style bullshit,
bush ups and windsprints in a big dumb obstacle course.

(12:09):
Roland had to be real careful to act challenged. As
the day went on. He instructed his body to elevate
his blood pressure and temperature, to flush his face red
with blood, and to send enough sweat from his pores
to make a passable imitation of exertion. It was tedious
and he hated it, but the first half of the
day went by pretty fast. Then it was time for
a close quarters firefight drill. The men were given actual

(12:30):
rifles sans ammunition, and divided up into assault teams. They
spent the next five hours taking turns defending or attacking
different rooms in an old apartment complex that had been
commandeered by the Heavenly Kingdom. There was a lot of
shouting from instructors who sure as ship wanted the recruits
to think they knew more about urban warfare than they did.
At the end of one particularly long set of door
breach and drills, one of the instructors dropped to his

(12:52):
knees and started chanting in tongues. He seemed to be
celebrating that one of his slowest squads had finally nailed
a textbook entry. Roland wasn't sure what the to make
of it. The man almost smelled that he was having
a schizophrenic break. The heavy wash of neurotransmitters wafting off
him made it clear this wasn't just some gesture for show.
He seemed legitimately overcome with joy. Other soldiers and even

(13:12):
a couple of instructors started kneeling around him. They were
all chanting in some strange language. The first instructor kept
repeating what sounded like hom noshkalashka, hom noshkalashka. Roland's heidenbrain
knew a lot of languages, but this sounded like nonsense
to him. He noticed the speech patterns of each chanting
man were pretty consistent with American English. The actual words
were gibberish, though, and many grabbed him by the shoulder

(13:34):
and pushed gently down. Roland took the hint and then
took a knee. The kids started to chant in a
low voice, letish kila, josepha tinchala. It was more gibberish,
but Roland followed suit. He started to spend out nonsense
of his own, in a tone low enough that it
didn't rise above the din of chanting maniacs. Manny's strategy,
he realized, was to make big, exaggerated mouth motions without

(13:55):
actually speaking at a high volume. It made him look
right without drawing any attention. The whole weird scene went
on for a little over two minutes. Eventually, the instructor
stopped chanting and lay on his back, sweaty and spent.
The other soldiers seemed to have ended their fits in
the same way. Roland could tell from their heart rates
and body temperature that about half of the men had
been faking it, just like he and Manny. The humid

(14:16):
stink of guilt was heavy in the air. Roland's heart
went out for them. It must be agony to believe
so hard and something so dumb that you'd castigate yourself
for not buying into it enough. After that, they filed
into the mess hall. They said their prayers ate their dinners,
and then queued up for the buses down town. The
ride was uneventful. In the instant their feet hit the square,
Manny went off to find Sasha. Roland shook his head

(14:37):
in appreciation for the all consuming power of human desire,
and then bounded off to check out the presumed location
of the jail. It was about a three mile jog.
At full speed, Roland could have cleared the distance in
a few minutes, but a low profile was the name
of the game. He stuck to a fast walk and
kept to the shadows and alleys as best he could.
Plano hadn't been a very dense city before the martyrs
had taken over, so there were a lot of times

(14:58):
where he was basically out. He opened he had to
trust that his uniform in the general state of chaos
and the newly founded Kingdom would obscure him. This was
the first look he'd gotten of the Kingdom. On foot,
Roland decided he didn't care much for it. There was
a great deal of foot and vehicle traffic, but most
of the people seemed to be either soldiers or refugees
without anywhere else to go. He passed two checkpoints where

(15:19):
twitchy looking martyrs performed data scans on decks and personal
hard drives. He even saw one soldier sorting through paperback
books in the trunk of some poor fox car. Roland
noticed several white vans with black crosses painted on the side.
They cruised the streets, clearly on patrol for something. He
watched one stop in front of a family of refugees,
heavy with backpacks and carrying intake papers in their hands.

(15:40):
Men in white jumpsuits with gold cross badges piled out
and surrounded the family. Roland concealed himself behind a dumpster
and watched as the patriarch of the family handed them
his papers and spoke in a frantic, animated tone. One
of the men pointed at his daughter, who wore a
stained T shirt and a ragged pair of denim shorts.
They were baggy and hardly stylish, but the men in
the jump suits seemed furious. They pointed and shouted. The

(16:02):
man put his hands in the air and tried to
say something, but one of the jump suited men smashed
his head with a cane. Cold rage bubbled up inside Roland.
Fuck this place, he simmered to himself, Fuck these jinkiest
throwback fundamentalists and their fascist bullshit. He wanted to charge
out from behind the dumpster and tear into these low
rent his bomb motherfucker's. He wanted to shove those thick
wooden rods so far up their asses they'd be shipping

(16:25):
splinters for weeks. The mission, he reminded himself, the fucking mission,
And so he watched as the men in white beat
the old guy. He watched as they pulled the poor
bastard's daughter into a van and forced a hideous gray
woolen dress over her head. It didn't fit, and it
looked liable to give her heat stroke in the late
Texas summer. She didn't fight them, though. Roland moved on

(16:45):
reluctantly and found what his hind brains suspected was the
old jail. The a PCs he'd seen last night were
parked out front. The compound was guarded and busy. Roland
counted fourteen guards just outside. Mind you, there were human guards,
no powered armor, no heavy artillery, nothing at hand that
could do much more than tickle him. They wouldn't present
a danger, but they would cause a hell of a

(17:05):
lot of noise if he attempted a daylight prison break.
He scrambled up onto a half collapsed condo building that
had been abandoned after a heavy mortar shell gutted the inside.
It provided a good view of the jail. For the
next hour, Roland just watched. His hindbrain mapped the pattern
of the guard rotations and noted the security protocols they
followed when each new vehicle arrived. He took a lot
of deep breaths and gradually pulled enough sense from inside

(17:28):
the jail to have a decent idea of how many
people were in there. He'd never smelled Marigold or the
other rolling fuck negotiators before, but his nose picked up
on three people with a handful of aftermarket modifications. Most
of the martyrs he'd met had been limited to civilian
grade healing sweets and sensory upgrades. It was a safe
bet that these were their targets. Then, and you've got
the message. Put down the phone. Roland wasn't sure where

(17:51):
or when he'd heard that aphorism, but it came into
his head, and a moment later he realized the sun
was pretty low in the sky. It'd be bus time soon.
He headed back through the eyeshadows and across the cracked
and bullet scarred boulevards until he was able to merge
back into the evening crowd at the square. Manny and
the Christian girl had moved on from the cafe by
that point. He actually ran into them in front of

(18:11):
some building with a sign that identified it as the
House of Miriam. They were saying weird, chaste, religiously goodbyes,
Oh hello Aaron. Sasha smiled when she saw him. Manny
turned around and flashed him a weary smile too. Roland
could see pain in the kid's eyes, but it was
at least cut with a bit of arousal. He decided
that was a good thing. Ever since Oscar's death, Manny

(18:31):
had been writing the line between function and complete emotional collapse.
He decided to encourage the fixer's weird little friendship with
the Christian girl. Hey, Roland said, how is the guffy?
Smelled like it was mostly chickory and food die when
I walked by earlier. But maybe they sold you all
the good stuff they did not, Manny said, you must
be blessed with an exceptional nose, Sasha said, and gave

(18:53):
him an odd look. Then she asked, what did you
get up to? I had checked out the farmer's market, Roland,
I'll tell you what, some uh, some good freaking cucumbers
up in there. That's where I was cucumbers. Sasha's odd
look deepened. Manny brought a hand up to the bridge
of his nose and needed his brow and frustration. We
should head back to the buses. I'll I'll see you tomorrow, Sasha. Yeah, yes,

(19:16):
of course, Sasha replied with a genuine smile. If this
was a sane world, Rowland thought the two of them
would have had a real date by now. But this
was the Heavenly Kingdom. They were surrounded by extremist militants,
and Sasha probably wasn't even allowed to look at condoms. Also,
she's one of those militants, Roland reminded, himself. He let
the kids say their goodbyes and then walked back to
the bus with Manny. The kids seemed unsettled. I feel

(19:39):
like I'm making a real dumb decision, he said, what
Rowland asked, talking with that girl? Manny shrugged. She's told
me all she knows about those prisoners already. But we're
supposed to meet at the one shitty cafe in this
town tomorrow. I know it's stupid, but I kind of
want to make that meeting. Why is it stupid? Rowland asked.
They had to drop their voices a little as they
drew closer to the line for the buses, because Manny said,

(20:01):
we're not going to be here long. Sasha confirmed, our
people are in the jail, and you scattered it out today,
right yep, So we're confirmed twice over. It's time to
do this thing and get out. I don't have time
to eat shitty food with a pretty girl. Roland turned
and fixed his eyes on Manny's. He leaned in until
their noses were almost touching, and then he poked the
boy's chest with his index finger for emphasis while he

(20:22):
spoke Emmanuel Sanche's listen to me, there is always time
to eat shitty food with a pretty girl. Fuck the war, funk,
what's a good idea? Go eat some garbage and stare
into her eyes. Do something human in this in human place.
Late night will be a better time for the rescue. Anyway.
Manny was silent for several long seconds, then he said okay.

(20:50):
The next day started with more pete as usual. Then
it rolled right into an extra long trip to the
firing range and three more hours of close as salt drills.
Roland found himself disgusted by the king tactics. Their go
to was to dump heavy artillery on any embedded resistance.
No heed was paid to the civilian cost. They were
fine having untrained kids lob mortars in de crowded neighborhoods.

(21:11):
The Lord will recognize his own. Martyr Carruthers had said
over and over again that evening before the dinner prayer,
the raspy voiced Priest, the raspy voiced Priest came by
to speak to all the recruits in the chow hall.
Roland missed Martyr Ditmar's introduction of the priest. He was
too busy puking up and surreptitiously eating his last bag
of drugs, but his ears perked up when the wild

(21:31):
haired old nut fuck launched into his speech. The burdens
placed upon the warriors of God are great. You men
have sworn yourselves to a ponderous duty, but that duty
does not end on the battlefield. If the heavenly Kingdom
is to remain and expand, we will need you to
fight in the field and with your other God given attributes.
This elicited a dim chorus of chuckles from the audience.

(21:54):
It took Roland an embarrassing amount of time to realize
what the preacher was talking about. Not jeez, this each
is about fucking. The Lord commands us to be fruitful
and multiply. The priest wheezed. But he also calls us
to respect the sacred bonds of holy matrimony in times
of war, at the times we all live in now.
This might seem to create some difficulty, but that's only

(22:14):
because most of us are trained to think of marriage
in the secular context. The average married couple in the
American Federation dates for eight years before being wet. In California,
it's closer to ten. Of course, in both those places,
dating is more or less a form of cash less prostitution.
Roland had to strain to avoid rolling his eyes. Next

(22:34):
to him, many listened dutifully. His face was almost unreadable.
Perhaps people who don't trust their creator need years of
time to decide if another person is a suitable partner. Happily,
we have the will of God to guide us. You
young men, are strong and virile and faithful. Your Lord
wants you to find love. He wants you to bring
more children into this world. This is why, as the

(22:55):
hour of action draws closer, we still encourage each of
you to spend time every day going out into the
city and mingling with the other sheep of our great flock. Aha.
Suddenly Roland understood it. It seemed odd to him that
the Heavenly Kingdom, a state still so unformed and tumultuous,
devote time and resources to bussing their military recruits downtown.

(23:16):
It made sense now, they wanted all these young men
to find women and fill them up with babies before
they went off to die. It was grim as hell,
but it was also quite logical. The truth of it is,
the Pastor rasped. Marriage is a simple process. When you
find the right person, the right arrangements can be made
in an hour or two. That is why I'm here
along with Pastor Sandor Ellsworth and Biggins. You can find

(23:38):
us at any hour of the day or night to
bless your unions. Once God shows you to your wives,
and there are more pastors at the House of Jacob
near the square. I urge you to go out into
the kingdom in search of love and make use of us.
Our chief job and our chief joy, is to help
our noble martyrs find the love and bless God promises
every faithful man. Wives are his lessing to us. Children

(24:01):
are our duty to him. Now, the man said with
a rakish grin, go forth and multiply the flock. The
line for the buses was extra long that day. By
the time Roland and Manny actually made it to the square,
there were nearly an hour later than usual. Manny rushed
right off to find Sasha. Rowland found his way to
an alley and then darted across town and towards the jail.

(24:22):
Once again. They'd already confirmed the location of their targets,
so Rowland's last job was to mark out a good
exit route from the city. He didn't expect it be
a quiet prison break that would draw attention and fighters.
The good news was that nothing within the Heavenly Kingdom
looked particularly well organized. A ton of fighters patrolled the streets,
but most of Plano was still pretty war torn. Their

(24:44):
camera grid was far from comprehensive. If they had a
sizeable drone force, it was kept nearer to the front
than here. The quickest route seemed to be to head
straight north from the jail, up k Avenue and pasted,
an old housing development filled with crumbling mansions. That route
would take them past two fortified aces. There'd be a
couple hundred infantry to deal with, along with their attendant
d PC's and a handful of drones. Roland felt confident

(25:06):
he could have punched a hole through all that on
his own, but he expected to have four or five
civilians in tow The odds of one of them taking
a stray round were just too high. Another possible route
took him up and to the left towards an old
tollway that seemed to mark the end of the Heavenly
Kingdom's static defenses. They controlled a lot of the territory beyond,
but the patrols there looked random. There were no fortifications

(25:27):
or checkpoints. It was a much longer route than the other,
but potentially one that required a lotless fighting. The last
option was to veer right and take Park Avenue to Richardson.
The Heavenly Kingdom had controlled that territory for even less
time than they had held Plano, and the fighting there
had been heavier. They'd pass a lot of checkpoints, but
not much in the way of troop concentration, as long
as they kept south and away from Dallas proper. The

(25:49):
scouting work itself was exhilarating. Roland had a lot of
ground to cover, so he spent most of his time
sprinting and scaling buildings, leaping from roof to roof and
in between shattered windows. His senses were in full use.
There were always passing convoys of civilians, or patrols of martyrs,
or those odd white police fans somewhere nearby. He was
close to caught a dozen times, and he loved every
minute of the work. By the time he got back

(26:11):
to the main square, it was quite late and almost
time for the buses to leave. He did a quick
loop of the square to see if he could find
Manny and Sasha. He caught traces of their sense, but
neither of them seemed to be out and about. He
eventually tracked Sasha's pheromone trail back to the house of Miriam,
but Manny seemed to be gone. That was strange. Roland
headed back to the buses and the hope of finding
him there. But Manny wasn't in line or on any

(26:33):
of the buses. So Roland headed back to the base
and tried to ignore the unease as it blossomed in
his belly. Maybe he headed back early. Maybe the date
went bad. That made sense. Sasha seemed nice for a
religious extremists, but you couldn't predict Zellots. It was so
damn easy to set them off. Manny might have just
said the wrong thing. That decided it'd be safest to
head back to base and chill in the barracks. The

(26:56):
bus pulled into the school Coomb training facilities, little vehicle deep.
Roland noticed at once that Martyr Ditmar and a small
bodyguard of armed men were waiting. That was unusual. Roland's
hindbrain warned him that this was probably related to Manny's disappearance.
He felt a thin drip of adrenaline start tapping on
the back of his amygdala. It was the feeling he
associated with shit about to happen. Roland tried to enjoy

(27:18):
it without letting it push him into action. Before he
knew what was really going on, Martyr Aaron Ditmar said
as he approached Roland, the instructor's bodyguard stayed close behind.
Would you come with me. We've got some news for you.
Where's a manual? Roland asked, we'll explain everything. The older
martyr said, just come with me. Roland followed him into

(27:40):
the maze of buildings and towards a small office occupied
by a white haired man in what looked like the
Heavenly Kingdom's equivalent of a dress uniform. It was blue,
bedecked with medals and had a shining silver cross on
each apulett. The fancy man looked very tired. Roland could
smell cheap caffeine wafting from his pores. This is Commandant Dawkins,
Martyr dit Are explained, he's in charge of this facility.

(28:02):
We've been telling him about you. Martyr Ditmar is hard
to embrass, the commandant said, but to his eyes, you're
some sort of latter day sampson. The strongest man i've
ever seen, said Martyr Ditmar. He's a darn fine shot too,
something of a marvel. Where's my friend? Roland asked, where's
a manual? The commandant gave an indulgent smile. It didn't

(28:23):
meet his tired eyes. Listen, Martyr, I know you can
appreciate how important unit cohesion is during a situation as
stressful as combat. We've had to make some changes in
order to ensure unity. Emmanual is one of a number
of soldiers we've transferred to special duty. Roland could read
between the lines. He was sure if he checked in
the barracks that Manny Jonathan and the other handful of

(28:45):
non white recruits would all be absent. What kind of
special duty? Ditmar growled behind him. Now, listen, son, just
because the commandant called you a Samson doesn't mean you're
in charge around here. We're prosecuting a war. You be
privy to every decision made above you when you're just
going to have to get used to that. The commandant

(29:05):
was a bit calmer. He put his hands forward in
a placating gesture and tried it again. Your friend is fine,
he's better than fine. He's going to get a chance
to serve his Lord and the heavenly Kingdom and glorious martyrdom.
You should be happy for him. Ditmar stepped forward and
squatted down next to him. He put a hand on
Roland's thigh. A third of a second later, Roland had
calculated the best way to rip that arm free of

(29:27):
its socket and beat the other men in the room
to death with it, but he held still for now.
Manny would have been proud. Listen, boy, Ditmar said, I
know you got used to having that brown kid help
you talk with people, and I'm sure he did a
fine job. I get that you're not much for social graces,
but we're going to take care of you now, all right,
You've got a whole army of brothers here. Just do

(29:48):
what you do best and we'll handle the rest, okay,
Roland said. He put a hand on Martyr Ditmar's wrist
and clenched it hard enough that everyone in the room
heard the bones snap. The look of dawning terror on
the other man's face was the best high Roland had
gotten in days. He savored it for a quarter second
before finishing his sentence. I'll do what I do best. Then, hey,

(30:15):
I'm Robert Evans. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I
hope you enjoyed the chapters to come. You can find
the free e pub of every chapter and eventually the
whole book at a t r book dot com, complete
with illustrations. If you want to support me in writing
the sequel, you can crowdfund me at After the Revolution
the Sequel at go fund me. Just type and go
fund me after the Revolution the Sequel. Um. I'd like

(30:36):
my books to always be free, so I'm just going
to try to crowdfund the next one and see how
that works. So After the Revolution the Sequel on go
fund me. You can also find the community of fans
of this book online at our slash after the Revolution
on Reddit. So after the Revolution the Sequel on go
fund me and our slash after the Revolution on Reddit.

(30:57):
A t r book dot com for the whole book. Thanks,