By David C. Daoust
The woman was a frail little thing, gaunt in the cheek, with stick-like arms. Armis Clemente, while witnessing this very sight daily, could not help but feel shocked. Wrapped in her arms was an infant, one that she bounced lightly, swaying back and forth. The child was not crying, though the frail woman seemed to calm it all the same.
Armis made his way through the underground tunnels, deep beneath the Venusborn city of Parvel. His sharp collar as stiff as the rest of the sharp cornered uniform that covered his body. He clutched a briefcase in one hand, and neatly folded longcoat draped over one arm.
The woman fell away as he marched past, only to be replaced by the crowds of starving people. Widows all, those whose husbands had fallen to the famine. Leaving their children and wives to fend for themselves. Possibly short sighted of them to give up their rations to their family, once too often.
The train could be heard in the distance, charging through the tunnels. Armis knew it would arrive in moments, and those that climbed from the cars, would be the healthy rigidly dressed uniformed men of the ruling party.
Armis kept his vision ahead, not glancing down at those sprawled along the walk of the platform. Trying to go about his business, he told himself the blockades had caused this. Their actions could not be helped. The numbers of those that died of starvation were staggering though. And the number of those convicted and summarily executed for cannibalism, downright appalling.
This is what it was to live among the Venusborn now. The Earther’s conflict had cut their supply, and forced a rationing system. A rationing system that had run long, far longer than the Venusborn had ever imagined. The majority of the manufacturing facilities had been converted to build war machines, ‘Striders’; known as Skrags among the Earthborn. The best way to gain food, was to find work in such a place, to help build it, to help pilot them. To ransack the Earthborn’s supply lines. Most of all, to destroy a Galliant—was sure to get you a belly full of food. These jobs were not infinite.
The train pulled to a stop with a great gust of steam from below. The doors parted and the uniformed men marched from within. The poor and hungry crowded them, begging for scraps. Pleading for help. Mothers offering up their children, in the hopes of giving them a home that could actually feed them.
It was a sight Armis had witnessed all too often. A sight he hoped would come to an end.
Once the passengers were clear, Armis boarded the train himself.
The anger was there, anger at himself for ignoring their plight. Anger at the Earthborn, anger at Earth for crippling them.
The Venusborn believed it was all intentional. That the Earth had used their blockades against Mars to cripple the Venusborn society, to force them under their rule. Venusborn refused to play along. They would not give up their authority, they would not plead for assistance. And yet as Armis glanced down from his window, he saw that stick-like woman, holding her small child up to him, pleading that he may take it.
The image of the child was emblazoned in his mind; it was so thin, so sickly. It did not cry, though Armis could feel the distress. He turned away as the train let out a whistle, and began to chug through the tunnels. It was an image Armis planned to carry with him, all the way to the High Council, all the way to the Premier, as he pleaded with them- to allow Ms. Donaghy in, let her set up her peace talks. Let them all end this terror.
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