Rahn watched in horror as the male up in front of the auditorium spoke. Daielle couldn't be serious, could he? As he continued his words, it became all too apparent to her that he was, in fact, serious.

"For too long have we stayed dormant!" He yelled to the crowd, gaining some head nods and some grunts of affirmation, causing him to smile. "For years our old leadership tried to do things peacefully, to make the changes necessary for our people to thrive. But the years of secrecy and peaceful acts have become ineffective. The time for action has come!

This just couldn't be good, Rahn thought. Somehow the crazy glint in the male's eyes appeared to be even worse than the day before, when she had sat across from him in his office.

"They snuck in during the night and stole our people! Good, innocent people who love the homeland, and were only trying to do their best by it! So it is time we bring the fight to them!"

Daielle's words were met with cheers, but Rahn was dumbfounded. The guards had only come in and arrested people because that organization had first come in and kidnapped innocent people. Why was everyone listening to this?

"But we're not trained to fight!" A male called out from the crowd, but Rahn couldn't tell who it was. Hope swelled within her.

Daielle stood calmly at the front of the stage. He was smiling but it wasn't kind. Rahn felt her skin tingle with the need to defend herself, even though he wasn't looking at her. She followed his eyes to a male a few rows ahead and to the opposite side from her.

He stood up and continued. "We don't have any weapons, or any type of training. And now our numbers are far fewer than the guard. How can we possibly defend ourselves from the guard, let alone attack them?"

The crowd began to murmur loudly, many seeming to agree with this male. Hope swelled within her chest. But it died as quickly as it came.

"Of course, of course." Daielle held up his hands to calm the crowd. He then motioned to the side of the stage where a female opened a side door and two dozen Qarthans came marching in. They were dressed in a type of armor and carried large weapons of some kind that looked to require both hands to hold.

"These will ensure our victory." Daielle said excitedly, his chest puffing out with pride. "Our own engineers have designed and built these state of the art weapons. There is nothing else like them in all of Domu. Designed based off of a weapon we were able to acquire from the visit from our friends on the nearby planet."

Rahn's ears perked up. Alien technology?! Our guards may not have anything to combat them. She didn't like feeling so blind. She needed to see one of these things work and get an up close look so she could figure out how to defend from them and hopefully how to dismantle or destroy them.

"All held by members of our team with strong training in combat, former members of the Grand Hall guards who were wrongly dismissed from a corrupt and unjust system. But their loss is our gain!"

Former guards? Rahn cursed under her breath. This kept getting worse. There were only two dozen of them, but they had these unknown weapons. Even if the actual grand hall guards came out victorious, this group could do some serious damage and hurt countless Qarthans before it was all finished.

"Come! We will enjoy a demonstration!"

Daielle exited the stage through the door the armed Qarthans had entered through, then they motioned for everyone else to follow behind him. Eventually they were all outside and watching Daielle as he stood on top of a large crate, holding one of the weapons.

Rahn glanced around to see the armored guards surrounding the onlookers, yet no one seemed to notice but her. She cursed again as she looked for exit strategies. As she continued to assess the situation, keeping her head down in case any of the former guards recognized her, Daielle got the attention of the crowd again.

"The premier will feel our swift justice and we will control the grand hall!" As he shouted the last word, he pressed a button on the device and a beam shot out from the weapon, appearing to be pure electric energy. Another crate several yards away exploded into an infinite amount of tiny shards and flew in every direction. The crowd gasped and ducked for cover as the debris rained down. A weight dropped into Rahn's gut at the sight.

Daielle stood and laughed. "Before first light tomorrow, while the premier and the spoiled lords and ladies are still asleep within the grand hall, we will bring swift justice for our land! We will free our comrades from their cells! And we will rid our homeland of those unfit to rule!"

The armored guards and a handful of others cheered but Rahn noticed the majority of the crowd seemed to be in just as much shock and confusion as she was.

"And what will be our part in all of this?" The same male from earlier asked as he motioned to the crowd.

Danielle's sick smile split his face again. "I'm so glad you asked! For these males and females to get into the grand hall, we need to pull the guards out and away. We need a distraction. That's where the rest of you come in. You will travel in one large group, as a riot. Burning and pillaging along the way. Anything you can do to draw the guards out."

"Burning and pillaging the homes and businesses on the outskirts? Those are our homes and businesses!"

The crowd murmured loudly and Danielle's smile turned into an angry frown. Rahn noticed the guards circling them begin to shift in anticipation. This wasn't good.

She agreed with the man's train of thought, but they were surrounded by heavily armed, trained Qarthans with assumedly less than standard morals, being led by a sociopath. Now wasn't the right time to speak up. Unfortunately she was proven right just a moment later. Daielle motioned with his hands and one of the guards stepped forward, forcefully dragging the male to sit on his knees in front of the crate Daielle was standing on.

"Sacrifices must be made for the good of all, Mingu." The male tried to stand but Daielle used his foot to kick him hard in the face, causing him to slump onto the ground and hold his now bleeding brow bone.

"You're crazy!" The male called out. "Are all of you actually going to follow this madman?! You'll all be ki-!" Before Mingu could get out the last word, the guard next to him reached over and snapped his neck. His lifeless body fell to the ground as the crowd gasped and several tried to run. They stopped short as they finally realized they were surrounded, with weapons pointed right at them.

"Now, now." Daielle held up his hands and the crowd eventually quieted and stilled. "We don't want any more of our beloved members to get hurt. So let's all do as were told and keep our mouths shut. For now, you will all return to the auditorium and rest for the night. We have to get up early!"

Daielle jumped off of the crate and walked off in the opposite direction as the armed guards pushed the crowd back into the auditorium. Once the last of them was inside, the door was quickly closed and locked. Rahn watched as the group spread out, looking for exits, but found every door and window locked tight.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Something's happening." Butok told Kahal as soon as he entered the room to the rundown shack they had decided on as a meeting place.

"Tell me." Kahal said.

"Every remaining member was called to a special meeting. Every single one except for me and the handful of others that they know are not in line with their goals. Some of us tried to get in anyway and listen. But half of us were killed, and the rest of us had no choice but to flee."

"Killed?"

Butok nodded. "Daielle has officially crossed the line into violence and murder. And within our own people!" He added angrily.

Kahal cursed. "You didn't get any wind of what his plans were? What about Rahn, was she able to fill you in after?"

"That's just it. No one has left since the meeting. The entire place is on lockdown."

Kahal cursed again. "If they're already killing people and have their facility on lockdown, then they plan to do something big. Soon."

"Exactly." Butok agreed. "You need to get your guards ready. I don't think they're planning on being sneaky this time, and they obviously don't care who gets hurt in the process."

"Agreed. Do you have any other information that might help us? What are their numbers? What type of weapons do they hold?"

Butok shook his head. "I've been pretty much shut out of everything since the raid. I don't know anything. We were relying on Rahn and a few others to help us gain information. And the very reason we brought Rahn in was because we were worried that the others within our part of the group may have been compromised. Such turned out to be true, when not a single one of them were invited to the meeting. With how much his state has deteriorated, I'm surprised they didn't kill all of us off already."

"Because if he's turned into a madman, as you say, then he's also getting sloppy and not thinking clearly. Which is the only good thing about any of this."

"It is also why this entire situation is extremely dangerous." Butok added.

Kahal nodded in agreement.



~~~~~~~~~~~

Author's Note: Short chapter but I couldn't add more to it from the next one. I hope all the build up is getting you excited though!

This will be the last chapter I post before I do a mass upload of the entire rest of the story. Hopefully, that won't be too long from now but I never know what my crazy schedule is going to allow.