Drowning Utopia

Chapter 24: The Bayou Boomers

Tessa could see the look in Gray's eyes. She knew that look, one of fear and shame.

Diana must have seen it too because she asked, "What are they talking about?"

Meriwether tried to move but being pinned, gave up on such notions as he admitted, "After the swamp villages were destroyed, we...had trouble with some hired workers."

"Tell it like it is. They were forced laborers!" the masked man called Carp interjected.

Chief reiterated taping his gun, "Let him talk."

Gray glared up at his assailants as he spat, "Protests were organized. A general strike was conducted. They started a march to demand a trade union, equal rights and a limitation of the power of the landlords. But things got out of hand. The protesters were attacked by a host of concerned property owners."

"You mean Loyalists! You and your boss Charles Higgins, along with a slew of your lackeys!"

"It was Higgins who organized the whole anti-protest! Not me! The other property owners were the ones—

"Don't try to shoulder the whole blame on them. You're nothing but a spineless worm!" the masked woman shouted as she spat on Gray. "You were just as against us having the same rights as Higgins! You are no better than the nobles!"

"That's not true at all!" Meriwether protested, struggling under Carp's boot.

"Really?" Chief leaned down, blowing a smoke ring into Gray's face before sticking the ember into the soft of his cheek. Meriwether cried out in pain as the Boomer withdrew the smoke from the side of his face. "Indigo appealed to the state courts, but they were stacked with former Imperial Loyalists. He tried to go to the higher courts of the land, but the more aggressive of your kind moved while he was gone."

"That was not my fault!" Gray pleaded.

"It turned into a massacre!" Carp pressed harder on Meriwether's face with his boot, shouting. "Three-hundred-and-twenty-five people were murdered in front of the courthouse! Women, children, my wife!"

"Not to mention the state officials trying to help us!" the female Boomer interjected. "But did you do anything?"

"I couldn't!" Gray pleaded, trying to push the man's foot off his face.

"Couldn't? Or wouldn't!" the shrill woman accused. "This whole thing is your fault! You and your machines!"

For once, Tessa was glad that Gray had stolen all the credit for her ideas; otherwise, she very well could be there beside him. But it was in no means worth watching him about to be unceremoniously executed.

"So, should we end him?" Chief asked.

"It's better than he deserves," Carp hissed, "We should hand him over to the Kigezan. They will find a fitting punishment, what with their old ways—"

"No!" Taking aim, the female Boomer leveled the sights of her shotgun to Gray's head. "I don't care what the Kigezan leader does to me, I want justice!"

But Diana leaped forward from off the floor, putting herself between the gun and Gray. "Don't. Please have mercy!"

Shaking the shotgun, the Boomer shrieked, "Out of the way, She-Devil!"

But Diana shook her head. "You can't! I love him!"

The Boomer hit the tied Oni away with the butt of her gun as she spat, "You? A horn-head? How could you love a bigot like him?"

Gray surged from under the second Boomer's boot, red in the face as he shouted, "Don't you touch her!"

But the cigar man kicked him in the face, sending Meriwether sprawling to the floor. The other Boomers jumped in as they beat the inventor senseless.