[ WP ] It does no good to speak of roads not taken .

The snow wasn ’ t cold, Anna thought, pressing her back hard against the concrete wall that protected her. It glided quiet to the ground around her, brushed her face, decorated her coat white as she waited. She tensed her thigh muscles again, trying to squeeze the ache from them. She didn ’ t move. The side of the rifle was pressed against her stomach, still hot, the muzzle brushing the ground gathering the silent snow about it. It wasn ’ t snow, she thought. The heat of the rifle would melt any snow near it. It was ash. 
 
 
 Her team flowed through the environment around her, seen only in the brief expansion and contraction of dull shadows in the gloom. The bridge high above them brought an early dark to the area, revealing thin, dimming bars of dusk ’ s light through to the ground around them. She could see her brother illuminated briefly in one of those beams as he slinked through one, his dogs loping behind him. Magnus was still there, at least, she told herself for the thousandth time. With all she had lost, with all they had all lost, they still had him. 
 
 
 Bannon had thought them dead, either vaporized in the Chicago strike or the Purification that inevitably followed. The thousand false trails the Netcrawler had laid online had proven to work better than Anna had thought possible. Tracers pinged Magnus and his army in multiple areas around the Chicago area for over two months before the bomb. Men and women were even reported as seeing him in person walking the streets. It was enough for the President, apparently. The growing resistance had been ended almost as fast as it began, the Truth Dealers of the Official Media had broadcasted, casualties of the Nuke that somehow made it through the Patriot Field and destroyed the city. God ’ s will, they called it. The OM had actually implied it was God himself who nuked the city to rid his burgeoning kingdom of its obdurate pestilence. Unauthorized media sources tore it to pieces, of course, and the Deep Web groaned and gnashed at the loss, and splinter cells were being formed all across the country in response. It all had worked almost too well. An army of 10,000 soldiers grew to 10 times that amount almost overnight. The army he had promised had been formed from his “ death ”, just as he said it would be. 
 
 
 Magnus moved toward her position, the wet ground beneath him heard only when he drew very close. He was a soldier now. A leader. Her beautiful and goofy brother who could always make her laugh, who loved to dance as a child with his mother and father to mobile videos, who had a terrible voice but loved to sing, could now move through the dark like a cat. Could kill. The Army of the Penitent had set up under the causeway a few days after Purifying the areas headed toward New Orleans. They had clearly not expected resistance. Half their force was cut down before they could regather themselves and flee. Magnus would now order the rest slain. How cold he ’ s become, she thought. She reached out to him as he neared, grabbing the back of his arm and pulling him close. He looked like he was made of bone in the dying light above. 
 
 
 He spoke, his voice quiet but hard, “ when you hear the dogs, begin. If they put up a fight for over two minutes, retreat and regroup and await my signal. Two minutes, no more. Set an alarm if you have to. We hit them good, I doubt they ’ ll be much left to them after what we did earlier, but I ’ d like to prevent any more unnecessary casualties to our numbers if we can help it. ” 
 
 
 She gripped him harder, speaking a bit too loud, “ What are we? ” 
 He just looked at her, blinking. 
 
 
 “ What are we, Magnus? Is this what we want to be? Are we any better than them if we Purge them like they do us? You wanted to be an actor, I wanted to help people. ” 
 
 
 “ You are helping people, Anna. You ’ re helping everyone that wanted to stand up against this but couldn ’ t, or was too afraid to. ” He stopped, stood upright. The dogs behind him sat in the wet earth, panting silently. “ We ’ re retribution, Anna. We ’ re revenge, revenge for Mom, for Dad. Remembering what could have been will destroy you, as it almost destroyed me. I am not an actor, nor will I ever be. I am not a brother. Or a son. Not anymore. I am nothing more than the tip of a spear that was thrown the minute the Coup happened. It does no good to speak of roads not taken. ” 
 
 

