The Chronicles of Riddick - Alan Dean Foster [36]
Nodding, the Purifier continued. “So you see that it is our ’verse—and not the one popularly thought of as the beyond or the end or any one of a number of other equally inaccurate designations—that must be cleansed of life so that the UnderVerse can populate and prosper.”
The threat of the circle of watching soldiers notwithstanding, rumbles of discontent began to rise from the assembled Helion leaders. Not only from the clerics, whose own deeply held faiths were being so casually disparaged, but from their secular counterparts as well.
“I know the true name of your ’verse,” someone shouted from within the crowd. “The perverse!”
Muting the rising discontent through the sheer force of his personality, the Lord Marshal stepped forward and replied. “Look around you. Look—are you afraid?” He waited while the sullen eyes of the subjugated scrutinized their vanquishers. “Every Necromonger in this hall—every one of the Legion Vast that just swept aside your planetary defenses in one night—was once like you. Fought as feebly as you. Commander, officer, soldier. Supporter, technician, adviser. All came from elsewhere, from else-when. From other empty, meaningless lives. From worlds not conquered by us, but liberated by us. From ignorance and delusion. Because every Necromonger who lives today and who serves the cause is a convert. A convert from ignorance and delusion.”
His speech did not have the intended effect. The roiling sounds of discontent filled the chamber even louder than before. Why was it always so difficult? he wondered. Why were there always those who felt compelled to resist? He had come to think of it as a reflex action, no more planned than it was predictable. Some worlds were worse than others. He had not yet decided about Helion Prime. But it was always the leadership that was the most difficult to convince. Perhaps because they felt they had the most to lose. If only they realized that they had the most to gain.
It would not matter. The end would be the same. As it always was.
“We all began as something else,” the Purifier boomed, his voice rising above the swelling clamor. “I was once no different from you. No less resentful, no less angry. And no less uninformed. It was hard for me to accept, too, when I first heard these words. But I listened, and reflected, and in listening and reflecting I was changed. I let the words take away my pain. Just as you will, too, when you realize and accept that the Threshold to the UnderVerse will be crossed only by those who have received the Necromonger faith. For those who will, for those who are willing to challenge accepted ignorance on behalf of revealed truth, right now, drop to your knees and ask to be purified.” Lowering his head, he stretched out his arms toward the crowd, as if willing them to give a positive response.
Emboldened by the semiconciliatory nature of the words that had been spoken, more and more in the crowd began to give voice to feelings that had been suppressed since the inevitability of their military collapse.
“You cannot expect us to do this, or to ask it so brazenly of our citizenry. So much has happened so quickly. They need time to recover, to consider, to discuss and debate the fine points of what you assert. Do you really expect all of us who believe, to on such short notice—”
“Renounce our faith?” a Meccan cleric interjected in disbelief.
“No one here will do what you ask,” another well-known, well-respected politician declared boldly. He did not back down as the Lord Marshal descended from the dais and came toward him. Eyes locked on the approaching armored figure, the politician continued, making sure that everyone around him could hear.
“It’s unthinkable. This is a world of many peoples, many religions. Our diversity is our pride. We simply cannot and will not cast all that aside, not even on the word of a military conqueror. You may triumph by military means, but your philosophy is alien to us, as it is alien to common sense, to reality, to—”
He gasped and sucked in his breath, his speech cut off in mid-sentence.