A Circuit of Time: Book Two of Spark (A MPHFPC Fanfiction)

Chapter Eleven

*

That night, Emma heard voices from her past. Miss Peregrine, Abe, Bronwyn, Millard and the rest of her friends, calling out to her with words barely audible.

She was back in Devil's Acre again, standing on top the corpses of people she knew and loved. A distance away, Caul's enormous silhouette punctuated the horizon.

She stood there, frozen, while everything crumble around her.

There hadn't been anything she could do, ten years ago. There still wasn't anything she could do, ten years later.

One lone spark under Caul's growing shadow.

Emma screamed, but no sound came out of her mouth. Her pain, her rage, her sorrow, all trapped inside her with the voice that couldn't find a way out.

Emma continued her silent scream, until finally, one voice managed to reach her.

It was Abe's voice.

Please save him, Emma.

Emma woke up in cold sweat. John and Blanche were sleeping next to her, seemingly unbothered by any nightmare. She got up from her make-shift bed as quiet as possible, careful not to wake up anyone, and wandered out of the meeting room.

Francesca Bittern was up too, leaning by a window, staring at the night view of an unknown era.

"Cannot sleep?" the ymbryne asked.

"Nightmares." Emma said, "I keep seeing the day we lost."

"Ten years ago, when I led the survivors of Devil's Acre into present, we were ambushed by wights and hollows. They killed many people, including Miss Avocet and my other ymbryne-in-training classmates, but most victims are peculiar children." The ymbryne said, "In the past decade, there haven't been a day I don't see their faces and hear their screams the moment I close my eyes."

"Some nightmares never really go away." Emma said.

Emma looked out the window, the streets were illuminated solely by moonlight, no sign of artificial light anywhere. They must be in a time before street lamps became common in China.

"I'm sorry about the prophecy." Francesca said, "We made it up because we thought the rebellion needs a hero. And a ward of the legendary Miss Peregrine was the easiest way to start."

"I understand." Emma said, "People need hope. So you want to give them Olive as a symbol they could rally behind."

"I should not have done this to her." Francesca said shamefully.

"You should have told her the truth from the start." Emma said, "But you did what you had to do for the cause, and it worked. Countless people are now ready to throw their lives away for their prophesized hero, we can't let this momentum go to waste."

"We are talking about thousands or even millions of people dying for a lie." Francesca said.

"No, we are talking about thousands or millions of people fighting for the hope of a better future they see on Miss Peregrine's last remaining wards." Emma corrected her.

"And if Olive refused?" Francesca countered.

"Then I will be your Chosen One." Emma said, "Or you will make up another character to be their hero. People deserve their faith rewarded, and we have already come too far to turn back now. For those who already died for this prophecy, and for those that will come after, Caul must fall at the end of this war, whatever it takes."

*

Yang Ren-Feng ran down the stairs, "People are moving toward The Peculiar Glory Plaza." he told Bodhi in Mandarin.

"Don't leave the house until this is over." Bodhi told him. "Two battalions just arrived yesterday, right after Miss Bittern left. This will be a bloodbath."

Suddenly, his walkie-talkie rang, "The cameras are ready." Someone told him through the device.

"Let's show the world who the real enemy is." Bodhi said.

The crowd gathered in The Peculiar Glory Plaza holding broads that read "STOP THE DISCRIMINATION!" "NORMALS ARE PEOPLE TOO!" or "VALERIA STEP DOWN!"

The crowd stopped in front of the barricade the Peculiar Liberation Army set up yesterday and started chanting.

"NORMAL LIVES MATTER! EQUALITY FOR ALL!"

Seven years ago, the first day this plaza was opened to the public, normal college students who were kicked out of their school because of Valeria's peculiar supremacy policies gathered here to protest. But Valeria didn't bother to listen to them. She sent in armed police and ordered them to fire at the crowd. After the incident, the media painted the students as terrorists. The police sent to murder those defenseless students were promoted as heroes, and given golden medals for defending the glory of peculiar. The tiles stained with their blood were painted over, as if all the bloodshed never happened.

But this time, there were over one hundred cameras hidden in the crowd, waiting to show the world what's going to happen here. Today, Bodhi won't let wights paint their posters with innocent blood. This time, it would be the rebellion holding the blood-soaked paintbrush.

The chant gradually died down, the then crowd started to sing their national anthem. It was a song about revolution and reckoning and refusal to live a slave's life. Bodhi listened to the chorus in his flower shop, the irony of this song never cease to bring a smile to his face.

Suddenly, a gunshot interrupted the song. The crowd panicked and tried to run, but in the chaos, many got trampled to death.

Then soldiers started gunning down civilians. The protestors collapsed into pools of their own blood or the blood of others. The rebels hidden within the crowd returned fire, but was outgunned. Some people even threw homemade Molotov cocktail at the soldiers but was met with grenades in return.

Then the tanks showed up. They came in a straight line, running over trees, bricks and whatever else in their way.

One young man stood in front of the tanks, blocking their way, trying to buy his friends some time to escape.

The first tank ran him over without any hesitation.

Soldier on those metal giants fired the mounted machine gun into the crowd.

Blood stained the marble white tiles once more.

But this time, one hundred mechanical eyes were watching, waiting to spread it all to the world.

*

It was a sixteen-hour drive from Nanjing to Liaoning. Emma passed most of the journey in dreams.

Abe kept telling her something about saving someone. But that's impossible, he's already dead. Dead people can't do a damn thing in this world.

Finally, their driver, Li Hao-Dong's voice woke her up, "We are in Liaoning province now. About thirty minutes to your loop location."

Emma took a look at the changing landscape. It was almost peaceful.

Olive told them to check their gear, getting ready for whatever this loop has to offer. Emma loaded her rifle and pistol. If this loop was anything like the one in Solnhofen, their bullets wouldn't be enough. But that's all they have.

Emma checked her expulsatator wrist watch, looked like it could still function. She nodded to Olive, telling her she's ready.

Olive looked at all of them for a moment and finally said, "May the birds in the sky look after us all."

They echoed her.

Meanwhile, the blood of over one thousand people in Nanjing were being spilled to distract their enemy and try to start a reckoning across the world.