CHAPTER 1 — The Hill Overlooking Death
SCENE‑BY‑SCENE PROSE DRAFT (FIRST‑PERSON)
Mini‑prose for every scene, from Chapter 1 to the Epilogue.
SCENE‑BY‑SCENE OUTLINE (FIRST‑PERSON VERSION)
From the first broadcast to the epilogue.
⭐ PART I — COLLAPSE, THE SPY, AND THE END OF TRUTH
Scene 1 — The Sound of Collapse
The bombs are relentless. Over and over blasts shake the earth under me. The explosions send so much dirt into the air that the sky turns the color of bruises. I zone in as a soldier hesitantly gets out of a disabled tank, he is bleeding, and very hesitant. He has heard my reports, listened to the witnesses on my show, and still, there he was, waving his fox hole, white prayer flag. I’ve interviewed people about what comes next, Koch has countered with his propaganda. This kid has heard both sides, obviously.
This morning he would have told you Koch was full of lies, as would every Union soldier. Now, unarmed, forced out of his weapon, the Union soldier kneels, his arms up in the air, still holding his pathetic flag.. His fox hole prayer. His hope that he was wrong, that the Ellison soldier approaching him in his dark brown uniform was going to let him surrender.. No words are exchanged.
The Ellison soldier walks in close to the kid, takes hold of his head, turns him to the right, slices a laser knife across his neck. The screaming starts.... I can't hear it, but I can see the blood spray -- a kill shot, hunters used them for deer, to preserve the most meat. He begins cutting the guy's body armor while he is still bleeding out. Both men have the same hollow, sunken eyes and cheeks that show hunger is ravaging them. I watch him die and feel relief. I have my footage. Koch could no longer deny his soldiers were starving on the front, turned to cannibalism.
The soldiers on the battlefield can’t see what is happening. I watch a group run from burning a burning tank, others from trucks, some waving white flags; all get down on the ground, on their knees, toss their guns. No one fights. Tanks aim machine guns at them that make any move suicide.. Ellison's soldiers act in what has to be a practiced unison, walking over to the soldiers, like they are going to put zip ties on them, has them put their hands behind their backs, put on the zip ties. I know what is going to happen and so do they by now. Some try to fight but they are beat down with rifle buts. Next comes the unspeakable, bags and bloody canvas bags of unspeakable,
Koch was claiming every night, every day, every hour, on all his channels, that anyone could wave a white flag, surrender their weapons, and be treated with dignity, food, go back to their families and rejoin what society existed. So many believed that few even fought the small, private army. Together, if one couldn't take your mind, the other took your body.
I have been on this hill overlooking the dance of death for three days. The holo has been on waking or sleeping, recording the battle in real time and sending it out for all to see. They watched from burned‑out basements, abandoned factories and schools, moldy houses, compounds run by everything from cannibals to anarchists… others stayed away from reality altogether, watching their “shows” on the various Koch‑owned affiliates. Sanctuary 6 was the last Midwest Free station. Europe and the West were dark. For protection or the environment fucking them up, there was no way to tell?
All I knew was the existential. I’ve been embedded with a platoon for the last six months. The latest in too many in a losing war. The front moved, they moved back, a few less. In the end they were barely a squadron. The last were… gone. Just gone. I won't let those thoughts develop any further in my mind. Eastern training comes in handy when I can't deal with a memory, though the pills help a hell of a lot, too..
The Koch news was able to put down the first‑hand accounts I got of the cannibalism, even a paid a few to recant, claiming they were charmed by my Celeb status into lying. Koch’s thing, an ancient tactic of scumbags on the far right in politics, was to blame the enemy for what they were themselves doing.
Koch has all the major networks and stars, Channel 6 had three Celebs left, International Stars. The last Public Radio Station, funded with the fortunes left by a few Celebs and other trillionaires who hated the direction their going along had led the world to. I sure as hell never would have taken the Celeb path that so many dream of, but twenty years of familiarity, people growing up on my face, was enough for billions across the planet to trust me by osmosis. They also trust Celebs Kosmic Kosmo and Plumage, whose opinions change with the latest marketing campaign. So I am hardly bragging.
Ruby cuts in. A cranky elderly, misanthropic, southern woman’s voice; a beast who could hit 220 inside three seconds while firing missiles in four directions at once and ‘bullets to high heaven,’ as she liked to say. She is only to come on during emergencies she can't handle. A machine with twenty years of battle modifications, there was little beyond a platoon that Ruby could not handle.“A Union spy has approached, working in the Ellison army, who knows all about you and me. He says his connection is Maya. Want me to kill this asshole? Fucking spies.”
“Maya. Old college… you have the files.”
“He has a lead‑lined case.”
“I’ll kill him myself.”
. Ruby plays back the footage on one screen while showing real time on another as the spy gets in and they come out of hiding and make the four hundred yard drive. “Look at his face, he is beginning to wonder what he got himself into?” Ruby says.
“Name is Elias. Nice to meet you both.
The more I watch him, the more I notice the cracks in his practiced poker face. Something had spooked a spy. That should be funnier than it sounds. Sends a literal chill down my spine.
"I like the old woman."
“Ruby is the name.”
“You know how I located you? Koch spies were sent to bring you in for a personality adjustment, When they failed, more were sent. I left meat all over the hills around here while your tin can was looking for battle scavengers.,. We have been protecting you for sometime. How do you always get the platoons in the middle of the shit, where no spies are going to go? Platoons you get to know, that we have vetted. For now."
"I'm a reporter."
"Whose side are you on? Koch's side, or your side. Pretty simple."
"Yes."
"I have holos... proving Koch is a pervert, a pedo. Before their release, we need a Celeb, so they are not buried, or laughed off. No one else has your cred anymore who they don't own, other than Abby and Khalib, and they are already in Chicago. Some thinks that means they sold out."
“ Koch, he is gearing up to make you a conspiracy theorist, for a while now. He may know we planned on using you.”
“You planned…”
“They killed the other liberal Celebs, or washed them a new brain. That’s why we kept you in the field, surrounded by soldiers. Right? They still came for you, we stop them. You think you get to get out of this game, but you don’t. Maya kept you alive by sending me out here tonight. They could have sent Khalib down to the Prison, to try to lead them up.. but they have gangs there... they are, useful.. Twenty‑nine years your handler. They don’t know any of that. I am her handler. No one else knows about you. Except the tin can, which you can erase.”
‘Shut up Ruby,’ I tell her thru the AImind.
“That’s death to them.”
“Machines turn on and off, they don’t… okay, whatever.”
“She’s the most moral being I know, only one I trust to tell the truth. I am no bible thumper but there is a line in there about TRUST NO HUMAN."
"Second that, God," Ruby adds.
“I could give a shit. This will make you his enemy, hunted like never before. The pen better prove mightier than the sword.”
“You need me to do what I always do? It was… twenty‑nine years… wow. Elias, she doing okay?"
"Never better. Kicks my ass daily."
"Ah, like that would take shit."
"Can it, Ruby."
"Yeah, Ruby, hit the blasters. Start drafting my tonight’s show. Only refer to the tapes, put an adult identifier on the holo, requiring three adults present to view. I want them to fucking be afraid of this…”
Their speed increases noticeably faster, as does the banging and clanking that was part of Ruby's constant beastial roar.
“Some of them are going to enjoy it. Best get pissed and let that go now.”
“Have you?”
“No, but I have a license to kill, so I can take my frustrations out… you take pictures, take others’ souls, their tears, screams… sorry... I watch you most nights. Helps us all, you know. The warriors. Just to know there are still sane people out there. Koch stole a lot of minds.”
“Let me kill him?” Ruby asks.
“Yes, let’s start a war with the spies… so they are trying to use this hook, ex‑girlfriend, Maya? He seems okay.”
"I'll take okay." Elias voice comes in letting them know Maya had given him an over ride. "This is a sign of trust. I'm not supposed to... I can't. You can trust some people, Juan. Listening to you, you're real man. I joined up because of you. I mean, you say that shit about spies, but... I kept you alive tonight, my childhood Celeb thing. I'm over all that."
"Good," Ruby added, "because he's not a celeb."
"Perception is everything," Juan Ai-minds them.
"Where did Ruby come from?"
"I'm right here?"
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