Wartime Fairytales

June 2157 It almost felt like being home again. The first thunderstorm since she'd woken up here in Vale. That boisterous blonde definitely wouldn't be getting her groceries out tonight in that motorcycle of hers. Oh well. She could make do for the night and tomorrow morning; Tukson wouldn't mind letting her borrow enough food for the small meals. A shiver ran through her and her ears flattened as the windows rattled and building shuddered. Yeah, definitely like home during the rainy season. But it meant she wouldn't get to sleep tonight. Not that it was anything new... When was the last time she'd actually slept worth a damn? And that didn't include the drug-induced sleep to keep her calm while she'd been recovering from the injuries she'd received while fleeing from Adam. (Physical therapy was a pain in the ass but she'd like to keep her full combat abilities, thank you very much.) Her ears twitched and she looked at her scroll. Home…? Maybe it was worth a shot… She clicked the light off and crawled under the covers, opening the stories folder. Maybe this would do the trick for tonight... It'd be the first time she'd get to sleep in four days if it did… She simply hit the shuffle button.   “Uh, uh, is it recording?”    Blake’s ears did twitch in amusement at her younger self. Oh how much she’d fumbled with her mother’s scroll early on.   “Yes it is, Blake.” “Oh, sorry, Miss Adri!” “It’s fine dear.” The old woman chuckled softly. “Now what tale did you want me to tell you again?” “Tell me ‘bout the Pogrom!”  A momentary silence. “Of course. I was born three years before the Great War began, though I can’t remember the time before it. But as with everybody there…I was born a slave. My mistress tried to be kind to me but my master instilled as much fear into me as possible as he would with any other. Even though I was only a young child, it was best to break us young. We wouldn’t fight back then.”  A heavy sigh. “My momma did her best to keep me safe, but there wasn’t much she could do. Once we reached about seven…we were his. But I was spirited and didn’t want to be his despite everything. That…was what ultimately informed his decision to send me off just two years later.” A long pause with the sound of creaking from a rocking chair. “In the last few years of the war, Mantle decided to try to get rid of the evidence. They knew they were slowly losing ground, and so they decided to try to get rid of us slaves.  “I was only a few years older than you when my momma and I were sent off. We were herded into the back of a big truck with nothing but the clothes on our backs—not that they even were much in the way of clothes…  “I’m not sure how long we were in there. Sometimes they’d stop and give us water, but it was sparing—just enough to keep us alive. I still remember the pitiful wailing of the babies that knew no better, the gentle words their mothers said to try to soothe them. It reverberated through the truck, keeping all of us from sleeping. We were all exhausted. “But when we stopped…I didn’t even need the door to open to smell the smoke. Oh, I’ll never forget that scent… It was acrid even through the thick doors, but opening them… I choked on the horrific taste of burning flesh… I thought it was snow…but then I saw it was black. “They herded us like the cattle they thought we were into a holding area. And then I saw their eyes… The eyes of the ones that survived. Hollow, empty, haunted. We were all thin, but they were thinner. How they survived the Mantle cold like that, I don’t know. But somehow, they did. Walking skeletons. They were even more haunted than the sixty-year-old nanny my mistress had whom my master had cursed with children more times over than any of us knew. “We were separated—men, women, children. Most of the children were sent to be killed but some of us girls were kept to the side. It was…hell. We were too young to give birth for the most part, so that was why we were kept. I…I broke for a long time. It was just too much. I can’t remember much from that time other than pain… So…much…pain. “But one day, a miracle happened… The next thing I knew, a kind woman had thrown a blanket over me and, with stumbling, heavily accented Mantaline, ‘You’re free now.’    “I was given food and water and warmth. For the first time in years, I was safe… That horrible chapter had come to an end…”   The recording ended and the only sound that could be heard was Blake’s soft breaths, fingers still wrapped around her scroll.