Fantasy Revolution (SPOTS OPEN)

[Arelynn]

R E V O L U T I O N

​

"Hey! What's the damn holdup?" you hear someone shout from ahead of you.


A crowd had gathered in the city plaza, and the streets leading to it were backed up with people and merchants' carts. The stuffiness and heat from the cluster of people combined with the haze of an early morning in the industrial city only served to add to the agitation. Some people are waiting for the crowd to disperse, others are leaving to find other routes, and some are pushing their way towards the front of the mob.


Curiosity getting the better of you, you decide to weave your way forward to see what's going on.


Going in the opposite direction, you hear a little girl call out, "Mom? What's going on? What's everyone looking at?" To which her mother replies, "It's nothing, dear; don't pay attention. Now let's hurry along."


Finally, you break through to the front of the crowd. Standing in front of you is a family, tied together and lined up against a wall. All of their faces are covered with black sacks. Directly in front of them is a line of soldiers, all with their steam-rifles raised.


With the chaos, you can hear voices coming from all directions.


"Please! Don't hurt my family! Take me!"


"We're not magic users, we swear!"


"Silence! Commander, begin the execution!"


"Kill the witches!"


"They're innocent! Let them go, imperial dogs!"


"We don't want your kind here!"

 

[Janus93]

Major André Mortimer

​

of the Imperial Army of Azura

​

Deaf to most every misplaced voice surrounding the spectacle, whether crying out for succour or egging him on, the major inspected the accused, almost as if his unwavering gaze could penetrate the sackcloth. Perhaps some were innocent, perhaps some were guilty. Regardless, orders were to make a public spectacle of them, and Mortimer trusted his superiors. He shared their point of view, after all. It was better to cull a few innocents for the good of the many. Magic and their users were nothing short of nefarious, deviants, depraved individuals of warped psyches and twisted moralities. He sighed. Sometimes, it were as if decency had vanished from society. It would be his job to restore it.


The ends justify the means, he thought. Boldest measures were often the safest.


He cleared his throat, which had been feeling decidedly hoarse for the past few days. Damned city air, foul and irritant. Mortimer's physician had assured him the infection would abate sooner rather than later, and the major took comfort in that. He took a quick swig from a bottle of tincture - a foul, greenish liquid even harsher on his throat than the cursed affliction - before nodding to his sergeant. It was time.


"Present arms!"


Those assembled for firing squad duty, clean cut in their dark blue uniforms, raised their rifles almost as one, leather straps flapping slightly. Some barrels wavered more than others. One of the soldiers coughed from behind their grey scarf, his face almost as obscured as those of the degenerates before them. The air was warm, and the men sweated under their heavy uniforms. At least, they told themselves it was from the heat.


"Take aim!" The sergeant's voice was almost as sharp as crisp as the sound of the rifles being cocked, a series of staccato clicks that smacked of finality. Mortimer wet his lips with the tip of a tongue idly, before succumbing to another bout of coughing. The mill of fate was inexorable, and the major prepared to give the final order.

 

[BookDragon]

Relexa Valium

​

Lex's head was spinning as she watched out of the small window of her shop, the firing squad in the middle of the crowd...again. Her heart was in a tight knot when the image of her mother flashed before her eyes. Her mother's crystal blue eyes brightly defiantly staring down the barrel of the rifle as the soldier pointed it inches from her head. No one defended her but Lex, not a person in the crowd denied she was a witch and just stood there in silence as they watched her brains splatter the cobblestone street.


Shaking her head Lex was transported back into the present and was hit by the screams of the crowd, some wanting the people dead and others trying their best to save them. Without thinking Lex found her way into the street and shuffled through the crowd to the front. The shaking rifles were aimed and ready to fire, there would be no saving them now.


The world was so cold now that it made her heart ache. With a slight wave of her hand she whispered an incantation and all the victims eyes closed slowly, she didn't want them to have to see what was going to happen so she put a walking sleep spell on them, allowing them to drift into an unknowing end rather than the last thing they ever see being the face of a ruthless rifleman with a black death cannon in their eyes.

 

[Janus93]

Major André Mortimer

​

of the Imperial Army of Azura

​

Wisps of steam drifted through the air, dissipating without a further care as the bodies slumped to the floor, bright red splashes on the wall staring back at the men who had done the deed. Some of them had found it difficult, though others had only felt the butt of their rifle slamming into their shoulder with the finality at all.


"Stand to attention!"


They did as they were bid, clicking their booted heels together as they did so, doing their best to ignore the crowd. For every one who looked on in horror, there were those that did so with evident glee, or sombre acceptance. Few things drew the fascination of the people of the Azuran capital than an execution, whatever the motivations of the observers. Many of them had little else to occupy themselves with, and what better way to while away the time?


Major Mortimer strode forward to inspect the corpses with suspicion, chewing his moustache in stern thought. His eyes narrowed, wrinkles appearing around the doubtful shade of hazel. They were inelegant in death, sprawled limbs across cobbles, the sacks covering their heads robbing them of even the small dignity of identification.


"Did you see that, Higgins?"


"See something, sir?" Replied the sergeant, making his own way over to the fallen. He thought for a moment. "Went a bit funny at the end, like, sir."


"Good man," the major mused in his baritone, kneeling down. He removed the black sackcloth from one of them, a young girl with pale skin and matted red hair. Other than three scars and the odd freckle, nothing out of the ordinary. Her eyes were closed. Mortimer stood.


"Just before the volley, all of them seemed to calm themselves, would you agree?" Before Higgins could get another word in, Mortimer coughed sharply, and ploughed on. "Some sort of trance, most likely. Most assuredly arcane."


"One of them, sir?" Higgins asked, nodding to those executed, as he touched the butt of his rifle for luck. "Or one of the onlookers?"


"Damned if I know, sergeant," replied the major. He squinted at the crowd, eyes narrowed. "Return to the barracks, and remain vigilant."

 

[BookDragon]

Relexa Valium



​

Lex's ears pricked after the shots and tried to ignore the horrible red splatters all over the street. The pieces of people who had only moments before been living, breathing, dreaming people. People who were young and old, people that had either their whole lives before them or were left dangling at the end of their lives in their old age. An entire lifetime played out in the ages of the different people now spattered, wasted horribly on the street.


Her hands clenched into fists Lex turned and was beginning to leave the scene when she heard the men talking in sort of hushed tones. Drowning out all other sound she focused on what they were saying, they had noticed her attempt to save the people one last bit of serenity, they had noticed and were on alert.


"Dammit Relexa! Be more careful! You can't keep letting your emotions take control of you... you're going to be caught...", she heard her mother's voice in her head, she heard it often even though she knew it was really her own voice modified to be her mother's. Caught up in her own head she was unaware of a rather large man standing in her path, somehow she had turned herself around in the parting crowd and ran straight into him at almost full force, her forehead hitting him square in the shoulder, hitting his rank hard.


She looked up into his cold hazel eyes and realized it was the Major, the man who called attention to the suspicious way the victims went calm at the end, the man that was so suspicious Lex dared not act anything but overly normal.


"Oh god I am so sorry sir!" She choked out and tied to work herself up as if she was just trying to leave the crowd, not expose the true meaning of her shaking knees and sweaty palms.

 

[Janus93]

Major André Mortimer

​

of the Imperial Army of Azura

​

Who wouldn't have been terrified, having barged into an officer of the guard? And little more than a common woman at that, though one of uncommon stature and fairness, a queer mix. Small wonder she was stammering and trembling like a newborn foal. Perhaps, had dark times not come to the city, and had he not just overseen execution for crimes most nefarious, the major might have simply let her leave without incident and an assurance of his own gallantry. Perhaps.


"Just a moment, girl," he commanded, his voice resonating with authority. Used to giving orders on the battlefield or in the backstreets, it was a quality of which he had no small amount of pride. Woman had swooned at his baritone, with men both quavering in their boots and meeting his eye with respect, depending upon the circumstance. "You are in quite the hurry."


While the soldiers began to file out, sergeant bringing up the rear, Mortimer inspected the hapless citizen with a critical eye. Pleasing enough, with a certain base comeliness. In the major's experience, pretty girls were often an inordinate amount of trouble. He cocked his head at her expectantly. She might have been any number of things - a merchant busying herself about town, an errand girl, or a maid scurrying to her master's townhouse. The woman could simply have been here to watch the execution, but had been unnerved by the spectacle.


Or... he mused, casting an eye about the street. She could have been a mere distraction! Bewitched into beguiling me, that the culprit themselves might take flight.

 

[BookDragon]

Relexa Valium



​

Relexa's hair shimmered brightly in the now midday sun but despite the grace of her stature she was otherwise a shaking mess. His booming voice seemed to sting her soul as he questioned her, he was definitely not just going to let her run away. With a quick mind Lex turned around to face him once more and tried not to let her lips tremble as she spoke.


"I-I uh am just on my way back to the shop sir...." She stared him right in the eyes and calmed herself. She wanted him to feel her calmness and begin to stop suspecting her.


"I could show you the way to it and you may browse in our sales for your wife or children if you'd like?" Lex's hand went straight to her pouch and she slowly pulled out a flyer she had made appear moments before pulling it out. It was bright yellow and read HUGE SALE with the name of her store on it. Handing it to him as easily as she could she continued to eye him. Upon first looking at him she had dubbed him unattractive and very cold but now that she was close enough to see him, he was quite the opposite. Sure he had his battle hardness but his clean cut jawline and well behaved hair was very much to her liking.


Had he not killed several of her kind moments before, she would have felt different towards him.

 

[Janus93]

Major André Mortimer

​

of the Imperial Army of Azura

​

"I have neither," Mortimer said offhandedly, taking the poster from her and regarding it for a few moments, flicking the crumpled paper into a more legible format. The major folded it briskly and handed it back to the maiden. She wasn't as overly flustered as could be expected of one of the arcana, and seemed, as most were, quietness by his rank and stature. It was only natural. He scratched a stubbed cheek, his nails rasping rhythmically.


"But I do have a fur pelisse in need of trim. Reckon you're up to it?"