Warning: scenes of execution.
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Chapter 54
The next day, the Commander and Adara made their way to Mount Weather. It was time to execute those that had been complicit in hurting her people. Most of the reapers had been cured with the help of Clarke and a cadre of warriors from Trikru and Sangedakru. They helped their clansmen to overcome the disgusting drug they had been subjected to. Only seven had died during the treatment, but that was enough to cause the others to redouble their efforts to save the rest of them. Atom and several others had come to help with the clean up and to stand as wardens until the prisoners were executed.
The Commander led the way into the harvest room. Atom nodded to her and moved to the side of the room. Indra stepped up to her Commander's side as the Skaikru all stepped to the edges of the room and left it to the Trikru.
"You are all sentenced to death for the crimes you have perpetrated on my people," the Commander said.
"You can't do that, it's inhuman!" yelled Cage. The Commander looked to Atom and raised an eyebrow.
"He's been like that the entire time. He cannot see what he did to your people is the same thing that is happening to him now - minus the bloodletting."
"We can correct that right now," said Indra stepping forward with her hand on her sword, ready to draw it. The Commander put a hand up to stop her.
"Our people saved your people by force and yet you seem to think that you are their saviours. You are wrong. You are parasites. You feed off the ones you kill. That is a parasite." The Commander moved to the cage of Dante Wallace. "You are the leader of these people?"
"I was, until Cage staged a coup and made himself President."
"So your son does not believe in you?"
"I wouldn't say that."
"I would," said Adara. "After all, you did tell him that he was an idiot for having Vincent Vie beaten up just for asking to meet his benefactors."
"How did you know that?"
"Because we were listening in," said Adara. "We found the whitehouse bunker and are living in it. Your people were too stupid to find us properly and walked past several of us up trees. You really should have learned to look up. Anyway, we found the command centre and the last president before the war was a bit paranoid and had surveillance cameras changed for cameras with microphones in them. He could see and hear everything in this base - apart from your office. The graphic things we saw in Cage's office were bad enough, though." Adara pulled a disgusted face.
"The thing is, we heard enough to know the civilians in this base were in danger of being killed to keep them quiet. Cage was getting desperate. His saviour complex was taking a battering and he was in danger of doing something stupid - well even more stupid. He'd already gotten several clanswomen pregnant and had children by them. And he wasn't the only one, was he Emerson?"
"Son, why did you do that?"
"Because they weren't doing as they were told. They wanted to meet the savages and I couldn't allow that to happen."
"And the rapes?"
"If we had children by the savage women then those kids would be immune to the radiation. We were trying to breed a new generation of immune kids so they could go out and do what was necessary without needing a suit."
"You still don't understand how societies work, do you, Cage?" Dante sighed. "You can't control everyone. There will always be people who want to do something different or another way. Always. You, yourself are an example of that. You decided that you could do a better job of being president and running this community. You were wrong. You screwed up, Cage."
"But dad-"
"No Cage, you screwed up. Now we all have to live with the consequences."
"No, you don't," said Adara. "You are sentenced to death." Adara stepped back. The Commander stepped forward. She looked at them all and ordered Indra to get her warriors. Indra nodded and left. When Indra returned with her warriors, Adara had Atom dismiss the Skaikru prison detail to go to the mess and stay there until she came to get them. Adara and Atom stayed behind.
The Commander told Indra to bring one of the guards to her. When he was standing in front of her being held by two warriors, the Commander turned to Adara.
"Shaman Adara, you can read their minds?"
"Yes," said Adara.
"I would like you to read their minds and tell me how guilty they are." Adara nodded and stepped up beside her. She closed her eyes and concentrated on the mind in front of her.
"He personally killed several of your people before throwing them down the chute into the reaper tunnels. He enjoyed killing them as he thinks of them as animals to be slaughtered when their task was done."
"It's too bad we cannot take you out of the mountain and mete out clan justice," the Commander said.
"We'd die out there."
"Yes, but our justice is death by a thousand cuts."
"That's barbaric!" said Cage.
"You made us this way. Our people were peaceful just after the war. The only fighting they did was to protect their land. Your ancestors turned us into warriors." said the Commander. "Personally, I do not care if you think this is barbaric. History will show you to be the savages." She motioned to Indra. "Behead him." The guard struggled as the warriors pushed him to his knees and brought his head forward, revealing the back of his neck. Indra drew her sword and, standing beside him, raised her hand and slashed down fast. She cleaved through his spine and neck, decapitating him. Blood spurted everywhere. The dead guard was taken to the chute and placed on the platform. Adara then went over to the door and closed it. She pushed the button at its side and they all heard the platform drop and the body and head fall.
"Next!" called the Commander. One after another, the guards were brought to Adara to read their minds and then beheaded until only two guards, Dr Tsing and the Wallace's were left. The next guard, however, hadn't known about the harvest chamber. He and several of the guards had been left out of the loop and assigned solely to the civilian side. He was young and had only been a guard for eight months.
"He's innocent of any wrongdoing," Adara said.
"Take him to the infirmary to be given bone marrow," the doctor said and the two warriors holding him took him out.
"Poor bugger was duped," said Atom. The Commander raised an eyebrow, so Adara translated it. "He was deceived by his leaders." Lexa nodded.
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"Adara!" yelled Octavia. Adara held up her hand for all in the room to stop and be silent.
"Go ahead, O," Adara said.
Artigas and I are in the corridor between 101 and 103. We can hear yelling and shouting in trigedasleng. It's coming from behind the walls!"
"Wait a minute, O." Adara turned to the last guard. "You are coming with me," she said to him. She looked to Atom and Sterling. "Tie him up and bring him." They moved towards his cage as the Commander asked what was happening.
"Octavia and Artigas have heard shouts in trigedasleng coming from behind a wall. You have no people on the level they're on so it must be a hidden room. We need to find it."
"Yes, go find it," Commander Lexa said.
"I want to talk to the Wallaces before you execute them."
"I'll wait until you have finished finding the rest of my people. I'll send Indra with you."
"Good." Turning to Atom, she said, "let's go."
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They went up to the first level and found Octavia and Artigas searching the walls for any hidden panels or doorways.
"Monty?" Adara said into her throat mic.
"Yes?"
"We may have some hidden rooms. We're on the first level and Octavia and Artigas heard trigedasleng coming from behind the walls. Find those rooms, Monty."
"On it, but it may take time, those plans would have top level encryption on them."
"Do whatever it takes to break them."
"Searching now."
"Harper, can you check the camera feeds just outside the mountain? There should be some record of who was brought inside," asked Adara.
"Yep, I'm looking at them now. Anything in particular I'm looking for?"
"Yeah. I've been wondering why we never found kids in the cages in the mountain. We know they take them too, so where are they?" Indra swore at the realisation of the missing children. All warriors redoubled their efforts to find the hidden rooms. Adara stood back and used her second sight to try to find them. She scanned the wall in front of her and was looking down the entire length of it. Three quarters of the way down, she saw a void in the rock. She pushed her sight further. A room - no several rooms! She counldn't see any way to get to them from here, there must be a way in, but where?
"Monty, I can see several rooms behind the walls but no way to get to them from here. What have you found?"
"There's a secret door at the far end of 103. The staircase goes from that level all the way down to 502. Just before the top of the staircase, there's a secret door on the left. I can't see where it goes, but that must be it," said Monty.
"Adara, several children were brought into the mountain only a month ago," said Harper.
"Got that. Indra, O, Monty's found a secret door. Let's go!" They all rushed after Adara and Octavia.
At the end of the corridor in 103, they stopped by the staircase.
"Monty said it was somewhere on the left side. Check the walls carefully for cracks or buttons or pads. Try pressing on parts of the walls to see if that works too." Everyone did as she said and were looking for the hidden door. One warrior pushed aside a table to check, but found that it would only go so far and no more. He pushed again and then he pulled on the table and a door swung open.
"Found it!" he yelled. Adara, Indra and Octavia came forward. Adara stepped foot inside and automatic lights came on.
"Let's go," she said, as she stepped further into the corridor. The corridor led them further and further away from the main complex before turning back on itself in a spiral shape. It ended in a room with rows of wooden chairs and nothing else. There were six doors leading from the room other than the door they came through.
"Let's split up. O, you're with me, Indra, find four others to lead groups and we'll split the warriors up and go search each doorway." Indra nodded and soon Adara and Octavia were leading seven other warriors down a corridor. It wasn't long before they came to another door and Adara held her hand up for silence. They listened and they heard soft crying coming from the room. They sounded like children. The door was locked. Octavia didn't wait and kicked it in and burst through it. The children screamed when she burst in and several yelled. The warriors came through the doors and were appalled at the cages and the conditions of the children.
"You're okay, we're here to free you. The rest of the mountain has fallen and the Commander is in charge," said Adara. Most of the children didn't understand her as they hadn't learned gonasleng yet, so a warrior translated for her. "Find the keys," Adara said, searching the nearest closets and tables. They couldn't find the keys and the children were asked where they put the keys. They took them with them.
"Atom, ask the guard where the keys are for these cages, we can't find them," Adara said.
"Will do." A few minutes later and Atom spoke. "The keys are in the sorting room. There's a special hidden box on the wall by the door leading from the long corridor. Press on the wall just to the left of the door as you come into the room and a panel will pop out. The key is in there. It unlocks all the cages in that section." Octavia ran back and got the key and ran back into the room and started to unlock the cages.
"Atom, ask him how many rooms have kids in them."
"Four. He says there's around ninety kids in there." Adara and Octavia were shocked.
"O, get these cages open and then go free the others!" Octavia nodded as she fit the key into another padlock.
All in all, 106 children were rescued from the cages. 66 from Trikru and 40 from the Rock Line clan. Mount Weather was quite close to the border between the two clans. Monty was checking for any more hidden rooms and Harper was examining any camera footage of children taken into the mountain.
"Contact the Commander, Jones. She needs to know."
"On it." there was a pause of a few seconds before Jones spoke again.
"Adara, the Commander says if you want to talk to the prisoners, then you'd better get to the harvest chamber before she loses control and kills them."
"On my way." Adara looked around. "Octavia, lead the kids out of the mountain to the clan base and I'll send healers out to check on them."
"Got it. Go see the Commander." Adara nodded and left the room with Indra.
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When they got back to the chamber, Adara went straight over to the prisoners.
"We found the kids you stole. What did you intend to do with them?"
"They were used for the children in the mountain. We need blood from the time we're born. Using an adult was a waste so we took some savage kids too," said Cage, shrugging his shoulders.
"You really are the scum of the earth, aren't you?" spat Adara, disgusted by their lacklustre attitude to human life.
"We did what we needed to do."
"Carry on, Commander," Adara said, turning away from them before she killed them herself.
"Dr. Tsing, you're next," said the Commander. The warriors pulled her out and the Commander held up her hand to Adara. "You do not need to read her mind, Shaman, we have talked to our people who were held in the mountain and shown them pictures of these people. They have all said that Tsing was the lead healer that did this to them." Adara nodded and the Commander nodded to Indra. Once again Indra raised her sword and brought it down on her neck, slicing her head from her shoulders.
"Cage, you get to watch your father die. Bring the old man." Adara held up her hand to the Commander.
"May I talk to him before you kill him, please?" The Commander nodded and stepped back. Adara moved up to where Dante Wallace had been tied. "Can you two go stand over by the door please?" she asked of the two warriors on either side of him. They looked at their Commander who nodded, and they moved off. Adara leaned in towards Dante and whispered in his ear.
"Gromyo." Dante jerked back, eyes widening. Adara put her hand over his mouth. "Don't talk, just listen." He nodded. Adara talked to him quietly so only he heard her.
"This mountain has fallen - again. We are still alive in this time. Every single one of us hundred are still here. We have corrected the mistakes of before and your civilians are safe. We will be donating our bone marrow to your people, but only once per person. Your children will get to live free under the sky instead of under the mountain. Clarke did not irradiate the mountain and kill everyone in here. Only those of you who perpetrated this vileness get to die. If you had waited a few months, then we would have helped your people without the need to kill us. Granted, we would have fought you and made sure we were in control first, but we would have helped you."
"They get to live?"
"Yes, but they do not get to live here. We will be exiling them to one of the caribbean islands with no boats or ships. They live free, but away from us. We don't know who among them would try to kill the clans if they got the chance - a chance we will not be giving them." Adara stood back and the Commander stepped forward to deliver the deathstroke. This time though, the Commander drew her sword and levelled it at his heart. "Yu gonplei ste odon," she said before sliding the sword into him.
"Your fight is over," Adara translated for Cage. "They are very spiritual people." Cage didn't say anything. "In case you're wondering, the people of this mountain will be given bone marrow from us sky people and they will leave the mountain. We've found an island in the carribean for them to live on. They get to see the sky and sunshine. See trees and plants and the sea. These people will live on the ground, Cage. You won't and we'll make sure that they know that WE not you saved them."
He was brought out and given the deathstroke. All bodies and heads were left in the tunnels. No funerals, no burials, no cremation for them. They had treated people like animals so it was fitting that they were left for whatever animals made their way into the tunnels.
"It is done," said the Commander, wiping her sword on a cloth Indra had given her. Adara nodded. Atom looked sick, but he said nothing.
"Now we get as many of my people to donate to the rest of the mountain people when they come down. After that, we teach them to live on the land and then take them to Corda. It'll be up to them whether they live or die. We give them a chance. What they do with it is up to them," said Adara.
"We will leave that to you, though I will leave some people here to guard and guide them until they are put on the island." The Commander then walked out of the room. She had to get out of this hellhole. She felt like she was suffocating.