The Resistance Chapter 14 – The Children of Aws
We get a glimpse of the rule of the Suth Empire: scene opens into a garden of Suth does. A mother is comforting a daughter of the El-fal Usibil Mur, whose marriage has been arranged to a powerful regent she has never met. Then a young buck comes for the younger boys in the garden – the El-fal has returned and there is a meeting of the Inner Circle. We find out that the Inner Circle is all the male members of the Holy Family. The Holy Family is made up of all the male descendents of the prophet Sute, their wives and offspring. Does are treated like second class citizens – the emergence of daughters isn’t even announced at meetings and once a grown daughter is married off she is no longer considered part of the family. Also, bucks can have numerous wives, but it doesn’t work the other way around. So after a dramatic prayer to Marakaneshek the Inner Circle discusses the problem of the “Sons of Rek” (The Tulubians) and their heretical Evacuation Proposal. A few men call for war and for the El-fal to resign from the Council of Peace. But three call for something different: Faril – an elderly half brother of the El-fal who fought in the Terrible War, says that they cannot fight a traditional war because the Tulubians far exceed them technologically. But rather, the Suths must be secretive about their rebellion. The El-fal’s oldest son and successor, Lushi, wants to obtain Tulubian technology to fight against them by having spies posing as Progressive refugees entering the United Wakitian Nations. And Krul, one of the El-fal’s other sons, wants to start a propaganda campaign to infuriate the Suth peasantry.
There is a flashback of Faril fighting in the Terrible War. Instead of using ground forces the Tulubians had giant laser shooting walls and flying machines - this totally shocking the Suth armies since they had no idea that such advanced technology even existed.
The El-fal puts Faril in charge of the rebellion and holds a meeting with him, Lushi and Krul. Lushi wants to recruit his own son, Blish, to be their spy in the United Wakitian Nations and to hook up with the Traditionalist rebels. Krul then asks to know more about the lemos. They watch a video of a documentary about lemos and are totally offended by their perverted, primitive ways, declaring that surely Marakaneshek placed the lemos on Sribana as a physical manifestation of evil.
A vague description of someone is running from monsters – turns out to be Imo having a nightmare. Shabba wakes and comforts him.
Chapter 15 – The Change
Markis take Imo and Om to witness a “Change” ceremony of one of their playmates’ mother. Everyone in the courtyard of the Doogul Cylinder is staring at Imo, but he doesn’t yet understand that they stare at him more than anyone else. He understands that being a lemo is something unique, but compares it in his mind with Shabba being a Wakitian. During the ceremony, the playmate whose mother is having the Change is wailing. Imo and Om find out that he’s crying because his mother has decided that in her next life she doesn’t want to be his caretaker. Om says that’s mean, but Markis scolds her for judging the decisions of someone making the Change. Imo suddenly gets scared and asks when Shabba’s Change is – to which Markis replies (much to Imo’s relief) that Wakitians don’t have that custom.
Chapter 16 – The Broken Badoo
This chapter is a going back and forth between Vido reading Imo and Om a fable about self-sacrifice vs. an individual’s selfish desires, and Shabba having dinner with Ilis Et Dooly. I won’t put the details of the fable in this summary. However, there is tension building between Vido and Markis over his possessiveness of Shabba despite the fact that their affair is over. Also, Markis notices that Imo is becoming more aggressive – realization of what he is is setting in.
Shabba and Ilis (who at this point have been having social dinners together for 3 years) talk about politics quite a bit – he is rather confident that the Evacuation will go forward and that the opposition is no match for Tulubian technology. They’re relaxing and drinking sili (a liquid intoxicant) on his couch, and things turn romantic. Shabba feels torn because Ilis is such a high profile political figure. Then she gives in to her passion. Afterward he proposes marriage. She is drawn to the idea, but fears how the Traditionalists will paint her as an example of how Tulubian culture is destroying Wakitian culture. She is also concerned about how the change would affect Imo. She ends up turning him down, saying that she missing the Jungle and is not yet ready to settle down.
Chapter 17 - The Spy
Blish, the El-fal's grandson, and his cousin, Krittel, have been sent on a mission by Lushi Mur. They must travel south, through the East Bakt Province's harsh grasslands, and eventually arrive in the Gorbo Province.
In the first scene they are traveling the grasslands in East Bakt Province. They are stopped by police who think they are bandits. They show their document from the El-fal and end up stunning of the police's otobeasts to prove that their foreign weapons are effective.
The second scene they sell their own otobeasts, cross the river to Gorbo and arrive at the kraknut farm of Hagishee, a Suth farmer who runs the farm owned by the Regent Kur, with his 3 wives and numerous children. We discover that after Blish and Krittel leave, Hagishee and his family will be arrested by the Regent Kur and burned to death for housing heretics fleeing the Empire.
Chapter 18 - Escape
Shabba takes Imo on a new expedition to Sribana. Markis objects but doesn’t put up more than a verbal fight.
When they arrive Shabba is informed that a clan of Copper lemos is slowly migrating toward Amber lemo occupied territories in search of resources – this is exciting because Coppers and Ambers have never interacted and so eventually there will be a “first contact” for Shabba’s team to observe.
Imo deliberately acts dumber than he is so the interns at the camp won’t keep trying to “study” him. Imo befriends an inter-racial (Wakitian and Tulubian) gay male couple, Pa and Cha. Another fable is read to him – this one about how showing compassion to the wrong people can get you screwed.
In the last scene Iti (Shabba’s perky assistant) announces that the Copper lemos are invading an Amber lemo camp and two team members are out in the field observing it. Everyone goes to watch the live video feed – including Imo, who stands in the doorway. Shabba thinks he’s in bed. The Copper lemos kill all the Amber lemo males and pull back the tents where the old, young and female lemos are. One Copper holds a female with a bulging pouch down while another rips the baby out of her pouch and kills it. Imo leaves at that point and sits, terrified, in his bedroom.
Chapter 19 – In the Land of Machines
Blish and Krittel continue their journey. Their guide turns out to be Dona the daughter of Stugeir's brother, Dru. He takes them across the river into Deirdiok. There they are greeted by a half naked, stern looking Wakitian bodyguard (they are told they must have a bodyguard in the city if they are not in the Suth precinct.) and Dona - who is Bru's sister. Dona is now a caretaker and resigned to remain an unmarried old maid because Sede is so badly overpopulated. They live with their parents in a 2 room flat in the Suth precinct and share a communal bathroom with others on their floor. They eat meat from wild animals hunted by squatters who sell it to black markets because the domesticated animals often spread diseases. This scene ends with Blish asking Dona about meeting Traditionalists who are anti-evacuation.
Blish contacts his father, Lushi, on a public communicator, and tells him they have hooked up with the group "Thorns of Sede". Blish and Krittel will have to travel all the way to Itika because that is where the group's headquarters is and Lushi will not let them give the money chip to a branch of the organization.
Chapter 20 – Thorns of Sede
Here we meet Blish's Wakitian Traditionalist counterpart: Zu. Zu is an empoverished peasant in Itika and a guard for Thorns of Sede. In the first scene he brings home a modest bag of grain to his family: his mother, sister and three neices. We find out all the older men have gone away to make money, but only one actually sends any money home. They live in a three room makeshift shack. Zu curses the machines at the fisheries that have taken most of the jobs away. He has sold his Uncle's fishing rod and bought a gun so he would be a guard.
Zu and his cousin, Cal, travel to the headquarters of Thorns of Sede. Soon a transport arrives carrying Shaloc Mito, two more Wakitian does, and two Suths (who the reader can assume are Blish and Krittel.)
The last scene switches POV back to Blish. It backtracks to his traveling through the "cutaway" a giant highway that slices through the rainforest belt so liitens can quickly travel from Gorbo to Ludvi. They are doing this to get to an airport that flies to Itika. One in Itika everything is of even poorer quality. They arrive at the meeting, pass two guards (who the reader can assume are Zu and Cal) and enter the meeting. Since Blish and Krittel don't know Wakitian they don't know most of what is being said. Shaloc translates for them as they present the money chip that will pay for whatever dastardly act of terrorism that they are plotting.
Chapter 21 – Hell Manifests
Opens with Markis discussing the Evacuation plans with some colleagues in the Ministry of Science and Technology. Afterward he reads letters from Shabba and Imo and daydreams a bit about his family. He’s been growing apart from Vido, but in his daydreaming realizes how much he loves her. He gets up to go home, hoping to see her and Om. As he gets ready to enter a transport he thinks he hears a distant scream, but shrugs it off a moment later.
Iti wakes Shabba up in the middle of the night… Markis has been assassinated. Horrified, Shabba immediately starts reading the news transmissions. There have in fact been a number of coordinated assassinations and attempts on all the Council of Peace members except the El-fal, and Markis because he was a high profile advocate for lemo rights and the Evacuation - the Traditionalist terrorists managed to also kill the Minister of Ethics, Izadel Della Hedra, Chairman Pago Zizum and the Prime Minister Ilis Et Dooly. Upon seeing that Ilis is also dead, Shabba passes out.
