Chapter the Seventh of Part the Second
In which the narrative recounts acts from the life of Tel Arman in the Empire.
When Tel Arman awoke, pain was burning and throbbing throughout his body. There was no room to breathe and each breath felt like a missile shot through his ribs. He blacked out again.
The next time he awoke, the pain was just as scorching. There seemed to be just a touch more room to maneuver, if only his body could move. His right arm was lifeless. His left hand pulled himself forward a few inches. It wasn’t worth the pain his effort cost. There was nothing forward or backward or up or down except rubble. Tel Arman thought of the rescue operation the cadets once watched after an earthquake hit Southsea. The imperial rescue team used huge cranes that picked up the pieces of debris one by one and cleared enough space to pull out those who were alive and the bodies of those who had perished. Impressive as the operation was, it took days to reach some of the people and very few of those were alive. The thought of waiting five days with his pain surely getting worse was more than Tel Arman could think about. But his plight was worse than those caught in that earthquake. The whole rescue team was probably dead. There might be nobody left to rescue him even in a million years. He tried to scream for help but his voice was empty. He blacked out again..
The next time he regained consciousness, Tel Arman asked himself why he was still alive. The entire Grand Imperial Festival Auditorium had fallen on him. Most likely all his fellow cadets were dead. Tel Arman would not miss any of them after the word bombing they gave him the day they died. He would hardly miss Tarboc Ductor, either. The man was nothing but a yelling machine. As Tel Arman came to think of it, everybody was a yelling machine. All the officers, the cadets, even the imperial maintenance workers and the imperial scullions, and Tel Arman himself. What had he ever done but yell back orders as he was ordered to do? His singing, even among the elite cadet singers was nothing but more yelling.
The Emperor was probably dead, incredible as that thought was. Surely the Emperor lived forever even if his giant pictures in the Grand Imperial Festival Auditorium were destroyed. But how could the Emperor survive being crushed by the largest auditorium ever made by human hands? How could a lowly cadet like Tel Arman survive it? If the cadet could survive, so could the Emperor. Tel Arman imagined gaining just enough strength to crawl out of the rubble and finding himself to be the only person alive in the entire Empire. Better than having to share it with anybody he knew, Tel Arman decided. Being lonely was better than being the object of a word bombing.
Tel Arman clawed his way forward and down with his not-totally-useless arm. Then he asked himself why he had done that. There was nothing below except the basements. That was the answer. Perhaps there would be room to move in the basements. Perhaps he could drag his way to the kitchen complex and find some food. That would be a problem if he should be the only person left in the Empire. Tel Arman had no idea of how to manufacture food. But perhaps some imperial scullions would have been deep enough to survive the explosions. The imperial scullions! The imperial maintenance workers! Surely they had aided the rebels who destroyed the Grand Imperial Festive Auditorium! If Tel Arman found them alive, he would have to mow them down with his laser rifle. Tel Arman could not move his not-totally-useless arm enough to check if the laser rifle was still strapped to his shoulder. It wouldn’t be loaded in any case and any laser charges in the basement would be there in defiance of strict imperial regulations.
Tel Arman saw his life parade through his throbbing head on its way to the darkness that is called death. Everybody dies, Tel Arman was taught, except the Emperor who lives forever. So how could he not have died when all of the chief officers were surely dead and all the cadets were dead. Tel Arman thought of the darkness called death. He did not like the thought, not even if death would stop all the pain shooting through his body. The parade of his life reminded Tel Arman of the day he was among a dozen or so small children who were ordered to step forward. The officer in charge of the children then ordered Tel Arman and the other children singled out to report for cadet training. The angry looks of the children not ordered to cadet training only fueled Tel Arman’s own elation that he was chosen. As a small boy still learning his letters on the video screens, he was proud of his straight back and even step during marching drill. Up to the time he heard the rebel song sung by those boys before they were wiped out by an imperial missile, Tel Arman had given his life to the Empire and the Emperor. At every evaluation, he was told that he was on course to be a top chief officer, one who would work directly with the Emperor himself.
Tel Arman also recalled with pride the day that Tarboc Ductor came to visit his cadet corps and listen to the cadets sing. The man looked so stern as he walked among the children, listening to their singing that Tel Arman stopped singing. Tarboc Ductor yelled an order at the little boy to resume singing and Tel Arman obeyed because he would be subjected to a word bombing if he did not. When the song was over, Tel Arman alone was ordered to stand forward and join the elite cadets’ chorus. Ever since, Tel Arman had sung the swelling phrases of music that celebrated the might and triumph of the Empire over all who would destroy civilization by opposing it. But suddenly the rebel song he was forced to hear blew up his own life just as surely as the imperial missile blew up the lives of the Fairheads. The bombs that brought the Grand Festival Imperial Auditorium down around his ears only finished the job that the rebel song had started.
Somehow, Tel Arman managed to pull himself down and over a few more inches. That rebel music was running through his head again. It was this music that ruined his life and killed the Emperor and it continued to work its poison throughout his broken body. Tel Arman tried listening to the Imperial Victory song that he was going to sing when the rebel music struck him and caused him to be ejected from the choir in front of the highest-ranking officers of the Empire. But the triumphant imperial melody exploded into the melody sung by the rebel boys just before they were blown up by the imperial missile. If only the Fairheads had accepted the gracious and righteous rule of the Empire like everybody else, they would not have been killed and Tel Arman would not have been destroyed by their rebellious music.
Another explosion shook all of the rubble around Tel Arman. He slipped down an opening and thought he would black out, but he didn’t. The pain stabbed and burned worse than ever, but there was more room to maneuver, as if a passageway of sorts had opened up in the wreckage. Instinctively, Tel Arman pulled himself over and down, inch by inch. Then he heard a soft, high-pitched sound, coming from a distance. It was just a simple nursery-type jingle at first, and then Tel Arman heard a high-pitched voice sing along with the instrument. This was rebel music for sure! It sounded like rebel music gone mad. If Tel Arman could have followed Tarboc Ductor’s orders and covered his ears, he would have, but that was impossible with his arms broken. The song he was hearing had to be a celebration of the rebels’ victory over the Empire. And yet the song was so sad! The only thing anywhere near like it that Tel Arman had ever heard was the rebel song he was forced to listen to just before the rebel holding was attacked by Shen Anna’s missile shot. If the rebels had triumphed, which they seemed to have done, why should this singer sing such a sad song? Tel Arman squirmed but could do nothing to escape hearing it. It was impossible to hear any of the imperial songs in his mind and the pain in his chest and neck made singing totally impossible. All Tel Arman could do was recall the maxims he had been taught since nursery days. “A negative thought is a stab at the heart of the Empire.” “Righteous imperial rule has no room for sorrow.”
The rebel boy’s singing grew louder and more intense as did the sound of the high-pitched instrument. The boy sang deeply to the pain Tel Arman felt over the destruction of his body and the downfall of the Empire at its moment of greatest triumph. But the thought that the Empire was defeated or could ever be defeated was a negative thought! Tel Arman was stabbing the heart of the Empire just as surely as the rebel boy was stabbing the heart of the Empire with his song. Even if he was the last imperial officer left to face the rebels, mere cadet as he was, Tel Arman owed it to the Empire to use the imperial missiles to reclaim the world to the Empire and civilization.
But the rebel singing continued to work its poison inside of Tel Arman. It made him feel as if he were the object of a word bombing. He owed it to the Empire to endure a word bombing for the good of the Empire without a negative thought. And yet the rebel boy’s song was filling him with negative thoughts about the other boys who had administered the word bombing. And then Tel Arman noticed one other thing. The pain in his body was less severe than it was before. Could it be the rebel’s song that made the pain less? That had to be impossible, but then it was impossible that his pain could become less rather than worse as long as he was in this predicament. Tel Arman moved further in the narrow tunnel. But it was not Tel Arman who was pulling himself along. Somehow, the debris itself was gently moving the wounded cadet along as if it were a narrow bathing pool of water that he was floating on. Tel Arman became conscious of a faint light coming from somewhere further along the tunnel. It didn’t seem to be an electronic light such as he was used to. Another sign that the rebels may have set up an underground holding right under the Imperial Center Complex itself!
Tel Arman was just beginning to relax a bit with the rebel singing and give up fighting it when his foot became stuck on something and he stopped moving. Frustrated, he tried to pull himself along, but he couldn’t. He tried to shake his foot loose, but he could not move that leg at all. Then he saw the face of another boy not far away. At least one other cadet had survived after all! But immediately, Tel Arman realized that this boy was not a cadet. He was a Fairhead! Not many of these ever became cadets. Tel Arman could see little of the Fairhead, but what he could see was enough to make it clear that the Fairhead was not wearing the imperial insignia. He was a rebel! In the faint light, this boy looked very much like one of the boys Tel Arman saw on the monitor singing that rebellious song. Worse, he even looked very much like the boy Tel Arman thought he saw lying dead among the rubble after the missile attack destroyed the rebel holding. How could this boy be alive unless both of them were dead and the two of them were in some Underland of the dead such as people once believed before imperial rule civilized the world? The Fairhead certainly had enough blood smeared on his body for him to be dead twenty times over. It then occurred to Tel Arman that if anybody had seen a picture of him on a monitor after the attack on the Grand Imperial Festive Auditorium, that person would have thought he was dead. And perhaps he was. But how do dead people crawl through narrow tunnels of rubble and listen to sorrowful songs striking at the heart of the Empire?
Tel Arman felt a shift in the debris around his ankle. Then he saw the Fairhead reaching for his foot. Tel Arman wanted to yell at him to keep away, but his throat muscles would not let out any words. With an effort that seemed to cause him much pain, the rebel boy moved a piece of steel and freed Tel Arman’s ankle. That was impossible. Perhaps he couldn’t read the imperial insignia on his uniform in the dim light, or perhaps his blood covered it up. Or, more likely, the Fairhead had tried to push his ankle deeper into the debris.
“Okay—now?” the Fairhead asked, obviously expending great effort in getting out those two words.
Tel Arman could answer with no more than a groan. The Fairhead must have taken him for a fellow rebel. That was the only explanation. But how could a boy with the dark hair typical of an imperial cadet possibly be taken for a fellow rebel?
“Song,” said the rebel boy, tilting his head in the direction of the dim lights and the music.
Tel Arman wanted to say the words “rebel song” but he could not. He was so helpless that he could not even set a rebel boy straight about how this music was stabbing at the heart of the Empire. With his ankle freed, Tel Arman found himself moving again with the same floating sensation.
“Help,” groaned the rebel boy.
The Fairhead’s hand seemed to be caught in something that kept him from moving any further. Tel Arman thought he might be able to kick something with his not-totally-useless foot, but it would hurt a lot to do that. In any case, there was no way Tel Arman was going to dishonor the Empire by aiding a rebel who had just destroyed the Grand Imperial Festive Auditorium and quite possibly killed the Emperor himself.
A bright flash of light almost blinded Tel Arman. Then it subsided as the song came to an end. Even so, Tel Arman could see a sparkling light up ahead that he had not seen before. Then he heard voices. The speakers sounded like boys. The singer certainly could have been a boy, although Tel Arman had not heard a boy sing like that except for the Fairheads. Tel Arman could almost, but not quite, hear what the boys were saying. Some of them seemed to be introducing themselves to each other. Somebody said something about doing something. Then another explosion pushed Tel Arman forward and he blacked out.
Proceed to Chapter the First of Part the Third