in midday sun. Several more soldiers from the company plant met with them, driving up from afar, the mines outer plant processing stacks belching smoke out into the sky. The plant soldiers stepped out of their two terrain vehicles. One of them spoke, “You are now at the Aswon Strip Mining Facility of Xelon Dru. This is your station. You will be here for the next three months. You will eat here, you will sleep here and most importantly, you will work here. You are corporate, you have been acquired by hostile takeover and now you’re an asset to us, work and you remain an asset, do not work and you become a liability. A liability to the company reduces our profit margin and must be eliminated.”
Abreon looked far out deep into the pit in the distance, then at the horizon. He thought for a moment. If he could get to a crane, he could end operations in a quadrant of the pit. It was risking his life, but he could do it, and he could destroy some of the Xelon Dru soldiers. He just did not know. It was war and in war, blood is shed, but then perhaps he had shed too much already and that he had to be accountable for what he had done. All he knew at that point was he had to take one-step before he could take another.
The lot of soldiers then escorted them down the pit and to their barracks. They were given water, some bread and rest, but not fresh cloths. The next day they were brought out deeper into the strip mine. Several soldiers and employees were about. A truck was nearby. One of the soldier lowered the back hatch of the truck and pulled out a case. He opened it, pulling out a hammer, “These are capacitive hammers, you are to take them and crush the larger stones about you into smaller ones, one or two fists in diameter is approximately size you should make them. The hammers will recoil a bit, work with them and they will make your job easier, fight them and you could break your wrists.” The soldier continued, “When you are done, when we tell you that you are done, you are to load us your stones in these,” The soldier handed the hammer to a prisoner and grabbed a sack from the back of the truck showing them, “When they are full, you load them upon the back of one of our terrain vehicles. When the vehicle is full you will be given rations.”
Abreon and the others grabbed hammer. They were then escorted to where they would work. Abreon found the man to whom he talked to while they were walking. Abreon pushed through the group of weary prisoners to him. The man was gray and weak, but upright. He waited for a chance to talk to him, when their escorts would not notice, “I need you old man.”
The elderly man turned up to him, a bit surprised, “What?”
“I need your help.”
The man shaking his head, “I almost died out there, and I will die here. Please, leave me alone to die.”
“No, I need your help.”
The old man nearly dragging his hammer, ‘But why?”
Abreon grabbing his arm, helping him with support, “Because, you are chosen, that's why. You have a gift, a special one. I need your help and others. You must help me find them, please?”
The old man named Rufus, shrugged and laughed quietly at him, “Okay, I've had a life anyway.”
A soldier pointing his rifle at them, “Hey you two, shut your mouths, now!”
The prisoners took their hammers and began to work. They split the stones that lay about them, hammering them into smaller chunks, splintering off hunks of rock from the boulders and breaking those rocks into still smaller ones. Once the rocks were fist-sized, they placed them into piles. Once the piles were large enough, they bagged them and threw them onto a transport. Those who had survived the march were weak and already losing weight. They could barely stand, no less break rock from the quarry, though they must or die. Abreon stopped for a moment, lowered his hammer, took a deep breath and begin again, the soldiers watching him intently. Abreon turned looking out toward one of the cranes, cycling between movement and rest. Abreon continued to split the boulders, until every swing was punctuated by sharp splintering pain shooting from the base of his wrists up his forearms and into his shoulders. His hands blistered, then bled until finally he gave a whimper, letting the hammer go to the ground. He picked it back up and went to swing. The hammer slipped from his grip and crushed his foot. He cried out again, this time louder collapsing to the ground himself.
A soldier came over: “What’s the matter?”
Abreon crying, “I crushed my foot!” The soldier taking his rifle holding it out, “Get up now and work again or you will get more than you have!”
Abreon held his boot, the blood of his hands smeared over it, “I can’t move my foot.” while the other prisoners simply watched
The soldier, “Alright,” taking the butt of his gun and thrusting it into Abreon’s ribs once, “Get up!” then twice, as other soldiers and prisoners watched, some in horror, others in delight. Abreon was ready to die from the vicious onslaught, until a high ranker ranking captain worked his way through the crowd and pulled the Xelon off Abreon, “Enough!” the soldier yelled at him, “But, I was just-” the high ranking soldier, “No! You were not! Don’t you see if you kill him we can’t push him to work? Look how strong he is! He will work hard for us for quite a while, just don’t kill him.”
“Okay, commander.”
The Captain looking at Abreon “I will help you up.”
Abreon looking at him, “Okay.”
The commander pulling him up, looking at him and the rest around them, “Get back to work.”
Abreon picking up the hammer holding his side, Abreon looking at Rufus from over the heads of several people, looking concerned at him. Abreon took a deep breath and began to crush rocks again, thinking of his wife and children, of Marcy and Drean, perhaps he could see his wife again, perhaps Marcy again, but he needed a way out. He looked over to the Captain and for a moment, he thought he had found it. Abreon prayed his plan would work He prayed that Rufus would survive long enough
The prisoners were resting, all the prisoners sitting in the dark moonless night, the clouds blocking most of the stars, windy and cold, the soldiers doing as well, all upon the ground, those solders having given out water and nutritional bars. He had not seen a nutritional bar since before the compound, which was many days before. Many of the prisoners had not eaten in so long that, they could not properly digest the calorie bar, but attempted too anyway. Abreon was sitting next to Rufus and a few others he thought he could trust, “Rufus, were you ever in a war?”
Rufus gritted his teeth and then smiling, “Oh, yes of course. I was in the Globalist war between the Zetti Corporation against the government of Saris, the last great war of this century, the last between a corporation and a government.” Then pointing at them, “Of course, you know how that turned out. The government lost and we have this.”
Another a male: “What was your rank?”
“Oh, well, I think it was B1, commander of hundreds.” With this, all were silent.
Abreon broke the silence nodding, “Yes.”
The next day they again pounded the rocks in the quarry, the coal and rock, then the next, day in and day out one or two passing away, others growing weaker, others setting into the routine, all losing weight from lack of nutrition. Abreon began watching a strong man, of red hair and a beard, as they all were growing them now. The man was short and awkward. Abreon could use him. Abreon moved closer to him as they both continued pounding the rocks. That day it had been rainy. Abreon grabbed the red bearded man by his suit, “What do you know?”
“What?”
Abreon showing fear in his eyes, the look becoming apparent to the man with the red beard, “Shhhl Can you help me?”
Quietly the red bearded man questioned him, looking over his shoulders, “Why?”
Abreon, “Continue working,” again hammering a rock, as the man with the beard took up his hammer, “I need your help to create a disaster that will kill many Xelon Dru.”
“If you are going to kill Xelon Dru, you may have my help.”
“My name is Abreon.”
“My name is Danavar, Danavar.”
By now, the jumpsuits that they had b
een given where well worn, ripped and soaked with sweat, tears and blood. Most were ripped along the elbows and along the knees. Many of the prisoners had worn the boots that they had been captured with were also wearing thin. The days grew shorter, as they worked into the second month, then the third, as the worked in the rain, and then in the snow. Abreon and the other detainees pounded the rocks in the snow. Sometimes they worked in snow that was as up to their knees. They would break the rocks, which would then fall to the snow and to the ground. The prisoners would dig for them in the snow, their hands frost-bite. They broke rock in the biting wind, many eventually dying, and all the while the blasting continued, destroying what god made for wicked games, crumbling the rock and coal, but old man Rufus, and Danavar were alive still, and so was Abreon.
They were ordered to cease after two straight days of work, tired many collapsed into the snow. They were given some food rations and warm water. Those who survived were showing their bones, losing most of their weight during the time they were encamped. Those who could get up slowly did and made their way to rocks that they could sit on. Abreon ate and drank the water handed to him from the guard, then sat watching the soldiers warm themselves next to heaters. He watched and noticed that the captain who had saved him months before was sitting alone