Winds of Vengeance by Jay Allan Read Free Book Online Page B

signed it into law, and maintained it for twenty-five years. There are NBs of all ages on Earth Two, and Tanks too. Yet we are all twenty-eight years old. We have no younger brethren, not one of us in all that time. A quarter century of our people have been lost, proscribed before they ever existed.” Achilles spoke to the other Mules in the room. His voice was controlled as always, but it was clear there was anger there, or at least determination.
    He looked around the table. There were a dozen of his people gathered. They didn’t represent the other Mules, not officially at least, but he knew the rest would follow those in the room.
    “We all agree, Achilles…the Prohibition is a travesty, one we have waited far too long to address. Yet, what can we do except continue to lobby in the Assembly?” Peleus sat at the far end of the table. He was Achilles’ loyal ally…but even he had not dared to let his mind go as far as his friend’s had.
    “There is no political answer, Peleus, my brother. There is no future in waiting, in hoping. That has been our path for many years, and it has led us nowhere, save to the brink of ruin.”
    “I think you overreact, Achilles…I agree the Prohibition is discriminatory and unjust, but I hardly think we face ruin. The republic has prospered beyond the wildest hopes of those who founded it, and for all the political disruption now threatening it, I hardly think we are at the edge of an abyss.”
    Achilles stared at the speaker. Meleager was the leader of the doves, those most opposed to taking forceful measures to secure the Mules’ rights. He knew Meleager spoke only his conscience and that his rival meant well, but he still felt annoyance. He had become increasingly unwilling to tolerate the systematic marginalization of his people, and he suspected one day, perhaps soon, if nothing was done, the Mules’ resentment would turn to anger…and then to rage. He had analyzed his own attitudes, the growing emotionality of how he viewed Earth Two’s various groupings. To an extent, at least, he resented the others, especially the ‘holier than thou’ NBs and their nonsensical notions of superiority, and he had resolved to see his people freed of the restrictions that had been placed on them. By whatever means.
    “Meleager, my friend, the humans…” He paused. “…we humans…” Achilles had begun to think of the Mules not as a version of humanity, but as an entirely new life form. It was a view that had some scientific merit to it, but it wasn’t one likely to win much support from the public at large…or even the more moderate of the Mules. “…have a dark history. I invite you to study it in detail, and to use it to reassess your judgment on the threat we face.”
    He paused. “More than twenty-five years, Meleager, that is how long the Prohibition has lasted. And for much of that time, at least since we attained adulthood, we have made repeated proposals for its repeal…all for naught. It is a permanent ban, my friends, in all but name. And if we stand here and decide to accept it, we are casting our lots for extinction. For we will age, slower than the humans…the others…perhaps, but inevitably. And when the last of us dies, we will be gone forever, for none of those who legislated our extinction are likely to allow our kind ever to exist again.”
    The room was silent. Achilles was a firebrand, known among the Mules as a bit of a revolutionary. But the truth in his words was clear to all. If the republic had any intention of lifting the Prohibition, it would have done so by now. There was no reason—there never had been any reason—for the ban. None save fear. Fear of the Mules, of their greater intelligence, their expanded capabilities. And that fear would never go away. Indeed, by most perceptions, it had only increased over the years.
    “We face a choice, my brethren, a stark and simple one. Accept marginalization and extinction. Or take action. Now.”