The Son Also Rises

282 - Talk about funeral arrangements.

I knew he probably wouldn't have wanted me to do it, but then I wasn't a soldier under his command any more.

( Contains spoilers for the series finale, 'Daybreak' parts 1 and 2 )

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253 - Awesome

The most disturbing thing about it? The quiet.

It wasn't silent on Earth, by any means. We'd picked a landing spot in a wide-open area as near to what looked like the biggest urban concentration our scanners could pick out, figuring that if it wasn't the planetary capital, then it a big city would be a good enough start. That was the plan: land, make contact with the locals and introduce ourselves to the world governing body. No one assumed that the Thirteenth Tribe would welcome us with open arms, and neither did anyone think we'd find open hostility waiting for us.

A gray, blasted and lifeless planet? That was the last thing anyone predicted.

And standing there, on that beach, the whole world feeling like it had been leeched of its color, and with no signs of life we could determine, there were still sounds. I could hear the Raptors we'd rode down in cooling off, their hulls pinging. I could hear my father sifting through the glass-like sand, and the sound of others around me, their boots crunching in it as we moved around in dazed shock.

Water rolled and splashed against jagged rocks and over black, twisted remains of what used to be buildings or a temple or... something.

But it was still too quiet. And in that quiet, the devastation and the disappointment seemed just that much more awesome.

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