• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 809 0

storm clouds sometimes, when she came face-to-face with those parts of her past that were too painful to recall, the things she had come to Hazimot to run away from. But those moods were rare. She had not, Kyle decided, let tragedy destroy her. She used it, even now, to spur her on to action, as she had done today. He’d watched the whole thing in a neighborhood tavern just outside The End, where the interruption of the parade had at first drawn horrified gasps but then acceptance and finally raucous laughter as the city’s minor, unloved officials fell all over each other trying to run away.

He had gone home after that, arriving just a few minutes before Michelle burst in wearing a smile that involved her entire body, from the spring of her step to the way she shook her head, whipping her hair out to the sides. “It was fabulous!” she gushed. “Did you see, Joe?” Even in private, she still called him Joe, to make sure she didn’t slip up with others around.

“I saw,” he assured her. He held out his arms and she rushed into them, laughing. “You were great. All of you.”

“We were, weren’t we?” A momentary glimmer of dread passed over her face. “Some got arrested, though.”

“They were supposed to,” Kyle reminded her. That had been discussed, in great depth, at some of the meetings. Arrests were certain at this early stage. It was when the government stopped arresting and started killing that things would get really difficult.

“No, I mean of the ones who weren’t supposed to. At least, one was, from my group. Maybe others I don’t know about.”

“We knew that could happen.”

“Yes, we did, didn’t we?” The smile was back. She was so charged up, holding her was like hanging on to a live wire. “I am sorry they were caught, but even so… even so, it was a huge success, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?”

“I believe it was,” he told her. “You did what you set out to do. It doesn’t get much better than that.”

“One thing could make it better,” she said, holding his gaze with her clear eyes.

He didn’t know what she meant, and said so.

“This,” she whispered, and kissed his chin, then his cheek, then his lips. At the same time, she began to move her hands all over his body. “I feel so… so ready. So hungry,” she said.

Now that he thought about it, so did he.

Much later, they went back into the streets. There was a notable difference now that Kyle could feel with all of his senses. It might pass again, he knew, but for the moment people seemed excited, optimistic. They greeted one another as they passed, exchanging grins that seemed fraught with the promise of better things to come. They passed clusters of people standing together, talking about the morning’s events, discussing what they might mean in the short and long term. Michelle and Kyle strolled, hand in hand, not engaging anyone in dialogue but simply soaking up the atmosphere. The mood was celebratory and it fed into Michelle’s already elevated state.

After they had walked for a while Michelle leaned into his arm. “This might be real,” she said. “It really, truly might.”

“Isn’t that the point?”

“Yeah, but… it’s always seemed like kind of a pipe dream, you know? Like something we wanted to happen but not necessarily something that would. Or something that I could help bring about. But now, it seems like it’s all those things.”

“You definitely helped bring it about,” he assured her, happily inhaling her scent.

“I know. It feels funny.” She laughed, then released him and did a pirouette in the street. “I’m a star.”

“A star of the revolution,” Kyle agreed. “George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and you.”

“Wrong revolution,” she said, wrinkling her nose at him. “But right idea.” The smile vanished from her face again. “What if it’s a bad idea?”

“What, revolution?” Kyle asked. He had struggled with the concept many times himself. Maybe armed conflict wasn’t the way to change social conditions here.

“What if history is effectively over?” she wondered. “I mean, maybe the time for revolution was hundreds and hundreds of years ago. The universe is a different place now. What impact might an