V for Irken Vendetta
Yes, it's time for another of my grueling social commentaries. I've based this one off of the comic and movie "V for Vendetta." It's kind of an IZ-V for Vendetta crossover, but this story takes place in a post Irken conquest Earth, and V is not the same V from the movie. Think you'll enjoy it? Perhaps you will, and there's a message in this story. Take it to heart, and I'll like you very much. Bollocks, I hope this one does better than my last social commentary. Read and review.
Prologue: A Past All But Forgotten
Few remembered how it happened exactly. Many didn't wish to recall. Maybe it was because it was easier to pretend that this was the way it always was. The few remaining soldiers, rebels and civillians who had originally opposed them were dead. Killed in the experiments and "questioning" that took place in their "re-education" camps. Maybe that's why no one wanted to remember.
I remember. I was there from the beginning. They came, the Irkens. They came, and in one week, had taken control of the entire planet. Earth was theirs. It seemed the stuff of Hollywood Sci-Fi horror, these alien invaders coming from the clouds, laying waste to all the armies of Earth. The humans had nothing to defend themselves. Fighter aircraft. Tanks. Nuclear submarines. High-tech automatic rifles, they'd might as well have been throwing pebbles at the Irkens.
I saw it all. I saw the Eiffel Tower fall. A twisted mass of tangled steel that once stood in glory. I saw the fiery death of Big Ben in London, the rubble that was the Taj Mahal, and the total destruction of New York City. They didn't just want to take Earth, they seemed to want to destroy the culture and identity of it's people, to take away the last measure of hope they might have when their mighty armies were beaten, the nuclear arsenal they had kept each other in a fearful check with for decades, useless. Beaten, subverted, conquered, there are so many words for it, but few to do justice to what was done.
After the Great War, as it came to be called, came the New Order. The Irkens wanted it to be known who was in charge. A battle tank on every street. A garrison in every town. They controlled it all. The media, communications, business, the police, and of course the government. Nothing happened unless it was ordered to be so by the Tallest. If it did, the secret police, the surveillance, they were sure to know about it. They were sure to leave no good deed unpunished.
I suppose that's why no one wanted to remember. As I said, maybe it was easier not to. Perhaps it was better to imagine that there was no world without Irkens, better not to think that there was a world where peace, liberty, and freedom meant something. Maybe it was better to be asleep. To be blind. To live and die in this bleak world without a thought to the way things used to be, could be. I used to think this way. Until I met him. Until I met V.
I know it was short, but I wanted to give some backstory to the Irken invasion. I bet you're wondering who the narrator of the Prologue was, huh? And how did the Irkens come to conquer Earth? These are momentarily unnecessary questions. You'll understand when I want you to understand. What do you think thus far? Reviews, please.