Children of the Gamma

chapter three || vii

[ word count : 1,938 ]

"Your father?" Kenji sounds like he didn't mean for it to come out. He lowers his head, keeping his eyes on April. "Did you just say—"

"I did." Her expression isn't harsh, but brims with the determination she'll need to get through this.

"Maroe's your dad?" Confusion drips from Sora's voice.

"In the loosest sense of the word, yes." April crosses her legs.

Spider huffs a soft sigh. Says nothing.

"How could you have never told us?" Kenji sounds wounded. I almost reproach him for it until I remember what Grayson told me yesterday.

April seems unfazed, to her credit. "I didn't want you to see him in me. Because somedays...I feel him in me. He's in my anger, in my hate of the world." She runs a hand over her scalp. "Sometimes it feels like he's shaped the way I think."

A wrinkle forms between Kenji's thick eyebrows.

"And you know what really makes me angry about that man? It's not what he did to me." A spark flares in her eyes. "It's what he's led the Azurdins to believe. That he's their Moses, parting the Red Sea of their oppression, clearing a path of violence."

In my mind, I replay footage I've seen of Maroe's rallies. Sweat pouring down his scarred face, eyes bright with bloodlust. He speaks with such conviction that his audience's uncertainty begins to melt.

Maybe he should scare me.

"You know what he wants from his followers, right?" April doesn't give us a chance to answer. "He believes that there's this bloodlust inside of us, this potential for violence. He wants us to tap into this—what's he call it?—ancestral desire for savagery. Know what that is? Some stereotype made up by an unmarked bastard trying to explain why we're so angry. Heads up—people get pissy when you treat them like shit."

"They call it violence when you act out," I say, "because they think you deserve to be oppressed. To suffer for who you are."

Smiling blandly, April taps her nose, points at me. "Though I guess being myself and doing my job are perpetuating that stereotype..."

"She said to the gay artist," Spider says, deadpanning.

"And the genius Asian," Kenji adds. When Sora elbows him, he amends, "Asians."

We laugh, dispelling the tension.

April scrubs a hand under her eye. "That doesn't really matter, though. Once you realize you're more than that and come to terms with it." She looks at Spider. "Maroe wants freedom like the rest of us, but his definition of freedom isn't what it should be. If he could have it his way, he would enslave the unmarked, treat them the way Grayson treats the Azurdins. If he were given the chance to overthrow Grayson, he'd be the hero of Solada."

"You'd think it be easy to find, like, middle ground," Spider says, frustration lining his half-smile. "Like, a leader who doesn't hate our guts. Or a revolutionary who just wants equal rights. But no, we've got Caesar Racistus and Radical Roderick."

Dizzy gives April a meaningful look that goes unnoticed.

"Not that it matters now, though," April says. "But I'm willing to bet that Maroe will assume leadership once we're exiled. So maybe take comfort in that, Spider."