By David C. Daoust
Arguing- That was all Raymond Haul had been doing for the past few days. It seemed as though every time he got people to see his rather askew point of view, someone else posed a new threat to the planned secession.
Raymond, most days, could not believe the words that were pouring out of his mouth. After so many years of pulling away from a past engulfed with an overbearing government, now, he was trying to build one. Not only that, but also trying to get those once akin to his old point of view, to see the benefits of playing along now.
Was he starting to believe his own bullshit? He started out playing the long con. Now it was as though, those once akin to him, posed as a different aspect of his own mind… with every defeat of their position, he lost another part of his own stance– Or rather his old stance. Now he was just building so much, to see his own ends come to fruition, that he we wasn’t sure where he stood anymore.
He felt like a different man- A talkative man.
Ultimately, he was protecting his family. His son, Ratchet, was taking the full brunt of the repercussions, for Craiden’s action to strike back against Grady, which could lead the boy into more and more perilous ground. He wasn’t going to stand for it. He didn’t know where Craiden had gotten off to, but he wouldn’t stand for these Confederate Judges messing with his nephew’s life either.
They were AU’s from the Core. So many, Raymond could not comprehend why these people thought they could interfere with those on the farthest reaches of the Belt.
Raymond felt they all just needed to push back once, one time, set a new precedence for independence from the rest. If joining the UM would further it, all the better. If Grady needed to be led into it, no problem; they were followers, they’d follow. It was the First Wave, the First Wave that needed to be dragged, kicking and screaming.
Raymond was on his bunk, the Sand Crawler parked miles from the Starport with its ring of wreckage surrounding it. To view the scene from above, one would find a caravan of Sand Crawlers, all parked in a spiral, surrounded by the vast sea of sands that made up the desert moon, Twin Crown.
He lay within trying to get his mind to unwind.
The First Wave gathering was no mean feat to pull off. Again, and much to his chagrin, he used the tragedy of Sadie Blue’s beating, to further his own aims. He packed Sadie and Farah both within his Sand Crawler and dragged all his crew out into the desert- he knew the holdouts would come for this. Everyone was angry about what had happened to the young woman.
His plan was to pounce on the holdouts, the first chance he got.
First Wave ‘authority’ was a thing all but avoided. These holdouts especially, were people that truly did not want anything to do those around them.
On occasion, if someone was wronged among the spread out and sparse crews of nomads, some sort of gathering would be called.
Despite their love of Justice, they had a fairly strong belief, that to mete out punishment in such a way (among trials and councils) was to create authority. And authority was the very thing they had all escaped the Royal Alliance’s clutches to begin with.
Thus when they came together, to deal with these instances, they did not look to any one person or any one group.
There was no jail, no true judge, just an old dark sack full of marbles, and a random pull.
A pull that may make any member of those participating in said gathering, into judge, jury, and ‘punisher’, for whatever crime could get such people to actually stop and look at each other’s actions.
Past punishments had spanned the gamut- from a week-long fair, held for the entire First Wave, as one offender was trapped naked within stocks; all the way to another offender having his dessert taken from him, everyday, for a year. It was actually a young boy who came up with the latter punishment. No one missed the fact that the boy was now a much chunkier eleven year old, than he was a ten year old.
No one was happy about what had happened to Sadie, yet they had never held such a meeting for a crime that involved anyone outside of the First Wave; for anyone that had not opted in to their life style.
It was not beyond Raymond, that many expected to charge into Grady, breaking heads. This was something he had to contend with, even with those that had brought aid after the Drone attack.
The offenders were of Grady, the only names they had, were the Bram brothers—yet, all knew they were but a small portion of those involved. They wanted some form of action, yet to ask most of these people to press authority on those outside of their culture- was anathema to them. This provided a small route, in which Raymond could push for unification of the two separate populations.
Raymond did not miss the fact, that no one was happy about his exploitation of the gathering. The more he talked, however –the more he pushed how oppressed they all still were– the more started to come around to his side.
Again and again, he brought out the whole ‘just one push back’ line, it became old shtick fast, but it sold.
The ‘First Wave were about freedom, all of them. They’d all come to the moon for the same reason he did, to get out of the grip of overbearing laws and overpowered police. Twin Crown served them well, but if the Confederation thought they could just drop out of the stars and tell them how it was going to be, they had another thing coming.
Now was the time to show them.
To say it.
To make sure ‘they’ knew, what the First Wave had dedicated their lives to– And how far they would take it, to make sure all the Onion knew.
It took him days- but Raymond had them all, the holdouts were no more.
The problem now, as he lay there trying to unwind, was what he was going to do with the tiny white marble he’d pulled from that sack full of black marbles.
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