Essan returned to the bar after showing Kaleb to one of the rooms at the back.

“Another?” he asked Erid, who nodded.

Essan poured them both drinks and then they sat again at the table. The ring of condensation evaporated where Kaleb’s drink had sat.

“Erid”

Erid looked up. Essan’s face was serious, set in a way Erid had not seen often. He gave the man his full attention.

“What is it?”

“I want to know your opinion on something… but first I want to tell you what I see.”

“Go on.” said Erid carefully, wondering what it could be. Essan settled himself and began.

“I moved out here not long after you and your group were busted. But in that time, a few of the other safe-houses have been raided, people taken, others merely compromised and forced on the run. Others… What I mean to say is that something is moving against the brethren– though something is always moving against the brethren. The difference… Well, the difference is that I have a fear, something that has been growing and building these past few months into something that I now am absolutely sure of, and that I think you need to hear.” Essan paused “I think the brethren is dead” He let this revelation fall on Erid, and stared at him, gauging his reaction. Erid said nothing, knowing that there was something else coming. “Our numbers have been dwindling. Or should I say that they have dwindled. Because to be honest, I am out on a limb here. There isn’t a central directive to the brethren, nor is there any particular organised motion, but there are rules and there are processes that require the existence of at least a few members –members who can be contacted. You probably haven’t realised this, you were never one for caring much about the organisation of things. You’re also… well you’re also a fair bit younger than me. Time was, this bar would be full at a time like this. But look around us.” He gestured to the empty room “We are dying, our network is gone. All our power has got us nothing, and to be honest the future looks grim for the few of us who remain, especially if, unlike you, we can’t move around all the time.” Essan took a sip of his drink, and Erid mirrored him, though his heart was anything but unperturbed by what the man was telling him, his gaze nor his grip did not betray it.

“Quite simply, there are not enough people around for me to pass a decision to anyone else. The means for us to make a collective decision requires the collectivity of our organisation. But there is no group, no collection. There is no one left. And so what I mean to do now is speak to you as one of the last remnants of an organisation that is, I think it is fair to say, past the point of return.”

Erid watched Essan calmly, but his vision was blurring. Essan looked away and pulled a napkin from his jacket, handing it to Erid, who used it to wipe his face silently.

“I know this sounds harsh. The brethren saved me, after all, as they did for you I’m sure.” It was true, after all– the brethren had saved Erid. He owed them everything he was. He loved his brothers and sisters. They were his family. But the tears told him what his heart still denied– that they were gone, and he remained. “Yet it is undeniably what I perceive in this world. The brethren had their myths, and now surely we will all pass into that realm of half-remembered history too. Well, of course, that is just what I see. What I want, naturally, is to fight to my last breath for the values and strengths of the brethren, and etch our purpose into the heart of the world.”

Erid coughed up a harsh laugh

“Yet it is true.” Essan held up his hands “I can’t deny my heart, nor what I believe my purpose is.” He paused again, taking a thoughtful breath “Yet there are a few ways to proceed, some more likely to end in immediate death than others… we could, naturally, storm the gates of our enemies, demand their heads, and an end to the injustices of the world.”

Erid sniggered

“Yes, yes, I am simply making a point, I know. But I wonder… about our fight, about our crusade for justice, for truth… for clarity.” Essan pondered his beer “Tell me, do you think that having spikes is a moral crime?”

Erid looked, to see if this was time for him to speak. Essan watched him, waiting. He turned his mind –his clear mind– to the question. “No,” he said, finally.

“Hmmm…. And why is that?”

“I have seen people use them for violence, but I have also seen people use them to improve themselves”

“And so why did the brethren decide on the course of action it did – taking on the manufacturers and creators of the capacitance spikes and trying to rid the world of them?”

“The complacency of people, the crimes of the companies that made them. The unnecessary suffering”

“Yes, and yet you do not believe it. You do not truly believe in the brethren’s attempt to make spikes in general the problem with this world.”

“I have seen worse problems than a few easy power ups. It is nothing I haven’t been able to handle”

“Well, it probably comes as no surprise that this old traitorous soul also believes as you do. Yet I would, I think, go one further. I would argue, no, I would state as fact that the brethren of old, who set us down this path, I would say that they were fools.” Erid was surprised at the tightly wound anger that Essan placed in his words. He could feel a field trembling to life before him. Essan’s anger was materialising. The old man got a hold of himself, and Erid breathed again – the man still far outranked him, even now.

“They were fools who commited us to a cause that we couldn’t win, and against enemies who couldn’t be beaten. They – no! We wanted to hold onto our values and our power, we disdained both those who succumbed to the tempation of easy power while we tried to maintain our own strength through secrecy. We didn’t teach our knowledge freely, and now there’s no one left to give it to… we lost because we were fools who picked a war we could never win. I do not know if others believed in the cause that was espoused, that we were protecting and liberating people, but as far as I can tell, we have done nothing” Essan took another moment, and another sip of his beer “That doesn’t mean we are bound by the errors of the past, though there is nothing I can do to correct them. But I can correct the errors that are happening in front of my eyes… And so I want to ask you, Erid. I don’t want to tell you to give up your search. I don’t even think you have to. But you have the potential to be of help to people. And so I want to ask you… will you help that boy? I am going to leave here, and try to find my way to this ‘Haethea’ he spoke of, but I do not believe that you wish to stay somewhere, without any possibility of news… much good as it might do you. So I want you to become a teacher, for now. I want you to teach him to defend himself.”

“But old man! The Brethren!... these… this isn’t something! I mean, the acceptance… the admission to the brethren…” Erid choked on all the indignant things he wanted to say. It had taken him years not to learn but to earn the secrets of the brethren, and now he was just being asked to give them away… to somebody who had undertaken no test, no tribulation. Essan held up his hand.

“Peace, please! I know. I do not ask you to teach him as the brethren. I do not ask you to reveal everything. I ask you to teach him how to defend himself, and judge for yourself the quality of his mettle. I want you to learn how to teach people these things. Because I do not want this to be the end. The brethren are over, Erid, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t lessons to be learned from it. I said that those of us in the past were fools, and perhaps I am also a fool to think this way, and if that is what you believe, then say so. But first think about it, and hear me out. We need to teach what we know to others, but there are few enough who are receptive or need our teachings. Yet your ‘silent knife’ has, perhaps unwittingly, perhaps intentionally, given us a gift. The possibility of passing on the wisdom we have been privy to.”

“But old man… the brethren might be gone, but they aren’t dead. I won’t believe it unless I see it with my own eyes. They’re still alive, somewhere, in hiding or imprisoned.”

“I am not saying to abandon your brothers and sisters. I would never say such a thing. Look for them even while you are travelling, if you even wish to continue to travel and follow rumours, do what you will. But I do task you to keep that boy safe, and I do task you to teach him, and teach him well. Because the error you are making is to wallow in uncertainty and indecision, Erid, and it is not a path to the clarity of mind we seek. The path you are currently taking is no passage to the future, only one where the certainty of the brethren’s demise is absolute.”

“Do you really believe these things you say? That the brethren are over?”

“I do. And I do not think that if we truly have the opportunity to change things, that we should build it in the same form it was before…”

“And what do you think should change”

“There is not much that must. We must still help those who cannot help themselves. We must still defend the weak, but not let weakness become them. We must be strong, and in our strength be true. We must be resolute in our decisions – and in this decision in particular. But eventually, Erid, I suspect that we will have to make our peace with the world as it is. We will have to admit that capacitance spikes might not cloud the body or the mind, that there is harmony also in the combination of body and prosthesis. There are still those to whom we must bring the fight for justice, but we should not do it alone, without allies, or without people with spikes.”

“But the manufacture of such things… even the organ trade… the cruelty”

“All these things we must address, it is true. But I think that there are only two options, Erid, and whichever you choose I would not think less of you for it: either we are to fall to memory fighting for an ideal that will never come to pass, or we are to survive and work for a better future within the compromise that this world is not one we would have chosen.”

Erid stood up abruptly. “Old man, you’ve given me much to think about. Too much. I cannot give you an answer. Do you have anything else to add before I think this over?”

“No, you’ve heard everything I have to say.”

“Then I’ll think on it, and I’ll let you know what I’ve decided.”

“Thank you”

“What for?”

“For considering it. There are not many among us who would”

Erid made a face that could be taken as the approximate of a smile

“It’s by necessity. As you’ve so accurately pointed out, there aren’t many among us at all anymore.”