Revolution Dreamers

This story is based mostly on a dream I had. I have very weird dreams.
Thanks to Grace and Marcy for beta'ing



Resistance is futile. Ha.
She should have known better.
Alex walks through the hallways like nothing is wrong. Nothing is wrong.
She makes it to the room fine. She briefly sees Ronda’s face in the crowds, walking the other way. Ronda doesn’t see her. It’s better this way.
She gets in the room, closes the door quickly behind her.
“Everything ready?”
“Yeah.” Someone says.
And they wait, wait for someone to notice this room isn’t working, notice that it’s dark inside. The first guard that does so is alone. They slit his throat easily enough, after the door closes. The window is one way.
It goes like that for some time. She’s too hyped up on adrenaline to keep track of how long. The bodies pile up, slowly. She figures it must have been a while, they must have figured out something was wrong, because they send three.
The first two die, but the third gets a bullet in the side of his neck and as he dies he manages to hit the alarm. The one they couldn’t disable without setting it off.
The piercing alarm rings through the fortress. Outside she can hear people running for safety. They’re not in any danger from them.
A blond, wiry man shows up with guards. She’s heard of him. Cole. Most people like him. Alex should have known better than to try to reason with him.
“I don’t know what you think you’re trying,” he says, “But you’ll die first.” There are so many guards behind him, weapons primed.
These are her people. She’ll face execution, and maybe they’ll just get a prison sentence. She throws herself on her knees in surrender. The rest of them behind her follow suit. Cole walks around her, kicks her in the back. Alex doesn’t give any resistance and lets herself fall to the ground. Behind Cole’s back she can see Wren shaking his head at her. She can’t mouth anything at him without being seen.

They sedate all of them for transport. She should have known better. They are stupid enough to keep them all in one room, so they can still plan when they wake up. A lot of ‘when’s. When we get out. When they find us. When they don’t find us.
“What are we gonna do?” Lissa asks softly.
Alex puts a steadying hand on her arm. “I’ll figure out something, just give me a minute.”
Wren has a cut on his forehead. Alex absentmindedly pushes some dark hair away from his eyes to look at it. It’s not that bad, probably just a cut from hitting his head during transport, she hopes.
Carter asks, lowly, “Can we fight our way out?”
“We couldn’t fight in the room we fortified.” Wren says. “What makes you think we can do anything unarmed?”
“Just a thought.”
Alex isn’t surprised when Cole asks for her by name. Of course he knows her. Wren holds her tightly, before she goes, and slips something in her hand. She doesn’t look at it, slips it in her pocket.
She gets hit a few times in the hallways, hard enough the guards are holding up her entire weight. She can’t see out her left eye. Unsurprising.
Cole has the guards leave them. Alex figures he’s had enough, maybe wants to kill her himself. She is surprised when Cole kneels down, grabs her arms and whispers, “We only have so much time, you have to go.” He helps her up, leads her back to the prison through tunnels she hadn’t even known existed, and he leads her and her people out the bottom of the fortress.
“Come with us.”
“Why?” He doesn’t trust her.
She’s the one covered in bruises he gave. “Because you want to make it better.”

Cole does come with them. The journey takes all night; they end up in a city about five miles from the fortress, close enough to keep an eye on it, far away enough they’re not suspicious.
He finds her on the roof overlooking the city she’s never seen, admiring the ring Wren gave her.
“You could give that to me as payment.”
When she tries to give it to him, completely serious, Cole laughs. “No, keep it, seriously. That’s a high end ring. I don’t know how he got it.”
She doesn’t know how Wren got it either.
After he leaves, she realizes that’s the first time she’s heard someone genuinely laugh in a long time.

Alex doesn’t know what they’re going to do next. The safe house Cole took them to is, in fact, quite safe, for now. They walk through the streets in the afternoon sun (when was the last time she felt the sun?), and she holds Wren’s hand, matching bands on their fingers.
This is what she was fighting to save. The laughter she hears coming through open windows, the people milling around the markets with nothing better to do because they don’t have to worry. They don’t worry that the fortress doesn’t have their best interests at heart because they don’t know any better.
Alex is going to change that. She’ll make them all know.
And she’ll make sure they never have to fear.

The safe house is quite sizable. Enough room for everyone who cares about having their own space to have it. Apparently it used to be some communal living space. Almost the perfect size for twenty plus people.
Alex finds a room with a bed large enough for two people and calls seniority on it. Nobody really argues with her; they’ve been trying to give her space to recover. It still hurts to move. Cole never apologized. She doesn’t expect him to. The rest of them don’t trust him. Does Cole know he’s technically a hostage? That the rest of them would abandon him, turn on him, in a second, no matter what she says? Alex doesn’t know him well enough to figure him out.
Wren is so careful with her. Touches and speaks to her like the bruises aren’t yellowing and fading. Makes love to her slow, like they only have this time. Maybe they do.
Wren sleeps wrapped around her, holding her wrists in his hands so that their arms run along each other. He cocoons himself around her battered body like he’s protecting her from a storm. Maybe he thinks he is.
Alex was always going to bear the brunt of the punishment. Wren would do well to remember that.

“We have to get back at them.” Alex says at the meeting. They stand over their many floor-plans and layouts of the fortress. Cole is there, in the corner, under the withering glares of half the group. Wren stands next to her, his hand on her lower back to help hold her up. “They know we’re gone but they don’t know where. This is our chance to truly strike.”
“We could always just blow the whole thing up.” Carter says. “Just get rid of the problem at the source.”
“And I’ve told you it’s not that simple.” Alex snaps. “They’d just build another one and restaff it and then we’d have no ins.” And I don't want all those people dead.
“Then what can we do?” Lissa asks.
Alex looks at Cole. “What can we do?”
He shifts in place, uncomfortable with twenty five sets of eyes on him. “Getting rid of the source is right. You just need the right source.”
“And?” Carter shoots Alex an insufferably smug look. “Which is that?”
Cole walks forward, the group parting around him like they’re being forced back. “This,” he puts his finger at the top of the layout of the fortress, “The High Chancellor, that’s who you want dead. Everything in the past thirty years has been mostly his ideas. You take him out; you take out his supporters. You put in your own puppet.” He shrugs. “That’s what I would do.”
You’ve given this thought. Alex thinks. Out loud, “How would we get to him?”
Cole smiles thinly. “That’s the question, isn’t it?”
She should have known better.

They arm themselves first. That in and of itself takes months, putting out careful feelers for who they can trust, who works with the fortress. The weapons they get aren’t particularly cutting-edge; they’ll take anything they can get if it means securing their way through.
They plan. For hours a day, they scour maps and floor plans, marking where they remember being most guarded, where they remember being able to slip by. Memories aren’t perfect, but it’s all they have.
They get a spy, finally. A little girl, Eli, whose parents deliver food to the fortress. They pay her with treats from the bakery and time away from her family, who apparently don’t care that she starts hanging out with grown adults.
“Do you think they suspect you?”
“No.” she says. “They don’t like me. They don’t know where I go.”
Cole becomes aware of his position as a potential hostage when Eli learns the fortress thinks he’s dead. Alex watches as Carter takes in Cole’s thin, weak frame in comparison to his own strong, muscular one and looks askance at her.
No, she says with her eyes, We need him cooperative.
He doesn’t push it. For now. Some of the damage to her left eye was permanent. The group as a whole didn’t take well to that. They still think Alex threatened Cole into letting her go. They won’t listen when she explains otherwise. How she would have threatened him in the position she’d been in, kneeling on the floor with her arms bound, she has no idea.
Cole watches their silent exchange with a brief fear in his eyes, arms crossed protectively over his chest.
“Are you planning on killing me?” he asks her later, in private.
“Why? Do you want me to?” she answers back without much thought.
“No.” He takes a quick step back, like she’d actually threatened him. After a moment, “None of them trust me.”
“And they likely never will, until this is over. Not after all you’ve done.”
“I didn’t have a choice—“
“There’s always a choice.” Alex glares at him.
“And if that choice is death?”
She doesn’t have an answer for him.

“Do you have a moment?” Wren asks, low in her ear. “I want to talk to you.”
“What about?” Alex doesn’t turn around from where she’s looking at papers on her desk, “I’m sort of busy.”
“You’ve been working non-stop for hours.” Wren’s hands wrap around her shoulders and he puts a little bit of weight on her so she hunches over. “Stop.”
“I can’t just stop.” she says, “Everyone’s depending on me.”
“You can stop being our fearless leader for a few minutes.” Wren reaches down and puts his hands over hers. His fingers are long, spindly, over her calloused palms. He’s not a fighter; Alex wonders if that’s why they fit so well together.
“Alright,” She doesn’t fight it as he pulls her up to standing, wrapped in his arms. Her arms are trapped against his chest as he tips his head down to the curve where her neck meets her shoulder. “Wren…” Alex struggles briefly against his hold. There’s worry in his dark eyes.
“Hmm…?” Wren runs his nose up the line of her throat before kissing her softly on the lips.
“What are you doing?” she whispers, practically into his mouth.
He kisses the corner of her left eye. “Distracting you.”
“Wren.”
He pulls back to look her in the eyes. “It’s two am. Did you know that?”
“And I have things in the morning that can’t wait—“
“They can.” he insists. “C’mon. Pretend with me.”
He leads her to the center of the room and sways from side to side, humming.
“What are we pretending?” Alex asks, smiling.
Wren keeps humming for a moment. “Pretend we got married. Properly. Pretend we’ve gone back to our overpriced hotel room and we can just be together. Forever.”
“You think about this a lot?”
“All the time.”
“Why is the hotel so pricy?”
“Isn’t that what you do when you get married? Spend a bunch of money on things you usually wouldn’t?”
“The room we have here is fine.” Alex says into his chest.
“I’m not spending my wedding night in a safe house.”
“Fine.” She actually gives it some thought. “The little motel downtown with the flower boxes in the the windows.”
“I bet the walls are thin.”
“We can be quiet.”
“Like you’re quiet here?”
“Wren!” Alex reaches pulls her arm out of his grip so she can smack his chest.
“I’m just saying—“
“Well stop.” She drags the vowels out. “Besides…”
The silence drags.
“Besides what?”
Besides, we might not even make it out of this alive. She doesn’t want to say that and ruin the moment.
Wren sees it on her face anyway. “Stop thinking like that. Here.” He holds her face in his hands so he can kiss her properly. “Now go to bed, will you?” He won’t let her turn back to the desk. “Go to bed.”
He pulls with all his weight back to the bed, until he falls on it and Alex falls on top of him. “Wren!”
“Shhhh, shhhh.” He pins her wrists to the bed and leans over her, smiling.
“The lights are still on.”
He flicks off the light switch by the bed without even looking at it.
“Show off.” she mutters, as Wren kisses her again, more heat in it. She squirms under his weight. “You’re crushing me.”
“No I’m not.” he says into her pulse-point, making her shiver.
“You’re the worst,” Alex says when he stops to kiss her again.
“Then go to sleep.”
“Make me.”

They’re nearly ready.
Apparently, as well contained as the news of their rebellion was, something still slipped out, and there is unrest in the fortress. Unrest that can’t be quelled as easily as imprisonment or execution. Unrest that sits in the mind, unable to be ignored.
They have a plan. They know how they’re going to get in, how to get through. They have a plan for if people join them. They have a plan if people don’t.
Their weapons supplier came through. Their small group is armed to the teeth, as best outfitted as they can.
The plan is to take as little lives as possible. They don’t want people to get their own ideas of ‘overthrowing’ them, once they’re in power.
Cole will be their puppet. Enough people respected him and his attempts at leadership; apparently his ‘death’ had made the disturbance even worse. That’s why he is also their hostage. He’d agreed readily enough. Best way to keep him out of the combat is to threaten his life. They figure his popularity will keep most of the fortress from taking up arms.
“Might as well hit me, too.” Cole says from his corner.
“You wanna get hit?” Carter looks ready to deliver.
“When we go in.” It’s been long enough he’s no longer phased. “Make it look like I’m actually a prisoner.”
Alex nods. “It’s a good idea. Carter, stand down.”
Carter does so reluctantly.
Eli gets them more reliable information; when the guards change, who’s armed with what. She can only remember so much, but every bit is valuable. She skips into the hallway leading to their safe house, cheerily knocking on the door. She likes Wren best; he gives her the best candy.
“What have you got today?”
They are a horrible influence on this child. She pops the candy Wren hands her in her mouth and sits on the kitchen table with her legs crossed, the way she’d seen Alex sit.
“So,” Eli says with candy in her mouth, “A bunch a the guards are getting sent away for something off the planet.” She waves as more people come out to hear what she has to say. “So there won’t be many this next week, at least.”
“For at least this next week?” Alex asks.
“Yeah.” Eli clarifies. “‘We’ll be stretched thin for a week.’”
“So we have to go now.” Wren says into her ear. “Only makes sense.”
“Apparently.”

Steady hands, steady brain. She lets Wren do the talking as she faces down the people with her hunting rifle a comforting weight in her hands, the gas mask she’s wearing hiding most of her face while the hood does the rest.
“We’re not here for you.” Wren says calmly, one hand digging into Cole’s shoulder, the other holding a small knife. They haven’t had to threaten Cole with it, yet. Carter had got him pretty good, purple blooming across the right side of his face.
Most people had seen him and immediately stood down. Maybe respect was too light a word. The only one who’d seemed to care about the consequences of the High Chancellor’s insane policies; Cole was their hero.
Alex takes point. They move through the cramped hallways, pointing guns, fingers off the trigger, and the people part before them. The guards that do want to fight are woefully unprepared; they should have just surrendered. Alex gets the first one through the forehead with her hunting rifle, the second one with a knife to the chest, which she yanks out and keeps moving.
It appears even the guards do not want casualties, since only two fired their guns. The bullets hit the wall behind them, stuck. No ricochet damage.
Maybe nobody wants to fight back, Alex lets herself think, Maybe they’re all as tired as we are.
She should have known better.
The minute they leave the more populated areas, the better prepared the guards are. They still aren’t ready for the onslaught that comes down on them.
Maybe their guns aren’t as high tech as the fortress’, but they have surprise and planning on their side. After all, who would actually attack the fortress? Who would actually try to face down the juggernaut that ruled over their lives and put countless of its own people in the grave of its own shadow?
The initial warning shots ring out. Silence.
“Stand down.” Alex hears Cole croak out, barely loud enough for her to hear. Most of the guards lower their weapons instantly. Alex risks a quick look behind her; Wren has his arm wrapped around Cole’s shoulders, pulling him against his chest, and the knife at his throat, hard enough there’s a small trickle of blood running down his neck.
The rest of the group moves slightly aside so the guards can see Cole clearly. Alex keeps her sights trained on the guard closest to her, but doesn’t move.
The ones that haven’t lowered their weapons look at each other. One nods, aims their weapon at Wren and Cole like they’re making the decision themselves.
Alex doesn’t hesitate. Her single shot rings out in the otherwise silent room and that one drops. The bullet didn’t even exit their skull.
“Anyone else?” Her voice is distorted by the gas mask, making her sound almost inhuman. That’s the point. The rest of the guards lower their weapons, like this single act of sharpshooting is all it takes to convince them it’s not worth it.
It turns out the fortress is in a lot more turmoil than they thought. Everywhere they go, most of the guards give up at the sight of them. Some of them try to join.
“Stay back and guard the civilians.” Cole says, and they act without question.
They finally make it to an actual fight. The guards at the top are hand-picked for loyalty and skill.
That doesn’t make up for sheer numbers, though. Bulletproof vests don’t save from close range automatic weaponry. They’re clearly not prepared for this kind of situation. They decide to question the last one. He’s in pretty bad shape, bullet wound in his lower ribs, helmet lost.
“You got special orders?” Carter asks, nudging the man’s ribs with his boot.
“Yeah,” he manages to spit out, “Fuck you.”
“Shame.” Carter puts his boot on the wound. Alex hopes the Chancellor can hear the guy screaming. “You got anything else to say?”
“N—no.”
Alex sighs. “Loyal to the end.” She puts her pistol to the man’s temple and fires. Looking back at the rest of the group, everyone looks weathered, determined. Cole stares at the man’s corpse and seems to have a silent panic attack while Wren holds him upright.
“That’s not you if you just continue doing what you’re doing.” Alex can see Wren whisper in his ear. That seems to shake Cole out of the worst of it, but he’s still a little shell shocked. Somehow he’s lived this long in the fortress without seeing someone executed in front of him. Or he’s just kept his humanity better than the rest of them.
“Keep moving.” Alex says. There’s nothing between them and the Chancellor now.
The rooms are grand and spacious. The group moves through them slowly, anticipating traps of some kind. But there’s nothing. Nothing to stop them from securing the entire perimeter and every exit they can find.
“Can you hear me, you sack of shit?” Alex yells. “They’re dead. They’re all dead. No ones coming to save you.”
“I am well aware.” A quiet voice says behind her.
Alex spins around. The High Chancellor, a sickly, pale man in a dark coat, stands behind the desk in the room she’d just entered. She hefts the hunting rife from her back and aims at him.
He has the gall to smile at her. “I bet you want to know why I did what I did.” He slides a single piece of paper towards her on the desk.
“No, I don’t.” Alex has just enough time to watch his face change to panic through the scope of her rifle before she pulls the trigger.
The bullet goes straight through his forehead and he falls backward.
“Alex!” Wren yells from another room; she can hear him running to her.
Suddenly it’s all she can do not to collapse. “It’s over.” she says when he reaches her, most of the group behind him. “It’s finally over.”

The paper was of no consequence, luckily. Just some pointless dribble of ‘why he had to do the things he did’ which doesn’t actually justify anything. It’s slightly splattered with blood. Alex thinks it’d be a good warning. Wren thinks it’ll start a second rebellion. They leave it where it is.
The change doesn’t go perfectly smoothly. Some of the civilians prospered under the High Chancellor’s horrible policies, and they put up a fight. One even gets physical, a man stupid enough to run at Alex with a pipe. She dodges easily, and Carter punches the man squarely in the jaw. He drops instantly.
“Anyone have anything they want to discuss normally?” Alex asks the crowd.
Cole fixes most of the problems. He uses his pretty, no longer empty, words to assure people that what they did was for the best. The majority of people in the crowds are inclined to believe him when he describes the life outside the fortress; crowds of people happily living, not chafing under an oppressive rule. It seems to good to be true, for some of them, and they accuse them all of trying to lead them to ruin.
“Why don’t we just have them leave the fortress?” Wren asks her in her ear.
Alex relays the question to Cole. “Why not?”
He stares at her for a few seconds. “Can they handle that?”
“We did.”
“You were ready for change.”
“Aren’t they?”

They go in small groups. Day trips like the city school children take, down to the nearest towns, just to learn. Learn how to live without the fortress.
They unlearn the military conditioning. Try to teach people how to think for themselves. It’s a long process.
Sometimes Alex walks the halls of the fortress and she hears laughter. She sees people smiling and wanting and no longer afraid.
It’ll take time. Maybe more time than any of them are prepared for. But they’ll continue living, and learning.
That’s all they can do.