"Words don't heal wounds. They salt them. They keep them open, raw, screaming, until people mistake pain for purpose."
-Fragment from Ashar Vale's private notebook
Capitol Core (Ashar's Quarters)
The city outside his window was restless. Even here, in the sterile upper levels of the Core, he could feel it — the tremor of a city humming with rage. The screams, the chants, the crackle of fire on streets where there hadn't been fire in decades.
Ashar Vale sat at his desk, the old wooden one he'd insisted on keeping when others mocked him for clinging to relics. He had a pen in his hand. Ink smudged his fingers.
He wasn't writing for himself anymore. Not really.
The words he put down now were calculated, chosen like blades.
He'd tried sincerity. It had bled through. But sincerity without shape was chaos, and chaos would consume itself before it consumed the Council.
If he was going to see this through- if Zhen's death was going to mean more than grief- then he had to shape it.
He had to manipulate them.
He whispered the word aloud, as if testing how it felt in his mouth.
"Manipulate."
It tasted bitter, But he didn't stop writing.
The Broadcast "To Those Who Burn"
That night, every screen, every scavenged comm, every wall where a projector still flickered, all of them lit with Ashar's face.
He didn't appear regal. He didn't wear robes or insignia. His shirt was rumpled. His eyes shadowed. He looked tired. Human.
That was deliberate.
"Zhen is dead," he began. His voice was quiet, almost conversational. "You know this. You saw it. They wanted you to see it."
He let the silence hang, long enough that people leaned closer to broken speakers, closer to walls, waiting.
"They thought you would bow. That grief makes you obedient. That loss makes you silent."
He shook his head slowly.
"But I have seen the fires. I have heard your voices. You are not silent."
Mara and Selis stood in the freight camp, watching with a crowd pressed shoulder to shoulder. No one spoke.
"You don't need me to tell you what to do. You already know. You've already begun. You have built kitchens from wreckage. You have defended your streets with bare hands. You have buried your dead with honor.
But listen carefully: this is not the end of your strength. It is the beginning."
He leaned closer to the camera. His eyes seemed to burn.
"Do not riot. Do not waste yourselves on blind rage. Let them believe you are chaotic. Let them believe you are only fire. But fire, when directed, becomes something else. Fire becomes war. Fire becomes a blade."
He paused, long enough for the words to sink deep.
"They killed Zhen. Tomorrow, they will kill another. And another. Until you make it cost them. Until you make it so every drop of our blood burns a thousand drops of theirs."
The crowd in Sector 9 erupted (not in cheers, but in a low, rolling sound,A growl)
Selis's eyes narrowed. Mara whispered, "He's… he's turning them."
Ashar wasn't finished.
"You don't need to love me. You don't even need to trust me. But you need to listen. Because together, we can make them afraid again. We can make them understand what it means to bleed."
Freight Camp- After the Broadcast
The murmurs spread like infection. People's faces had shifted- grief now mixed with hunger, anger sharpened into purpose.
Eli stood with his arms crossed, eyes on the blackened screen. "He's right. We can't just keep burying them. We need to hit back. Hard."
Mara looked uneasy. "He's pushing them. He knows exactly what he's doing."
Selis didn't answer. She kept watching the blank wall where Ashar's face had been. Her thoughts churned like smoke in her lungs.
Was it manipulation? Yes.
But wasn't it also truth?
She turned to Mara finally. "Does it matter?"
Mara's lips pressed thin. She didn't answer.
Council Chamber (Panic)
The Council was fracturing faster now. Ashar's broadcast had lit entire sectors into coordinated unrest. Food distribution was collapsing. Security lines overwhelmed.
"They're not rioting anymore," Rhyen said, almost in awe. "They're… organizing. This isn't chaos. It's… directed."
"Directed by who?" Tyen snarled. "By him. That traitor. He's turning the grid against us."
"He's turning words against you," Rhyen countered. "And it's working."
Chancellor Virel rubbed his temples. "Then we cut the voice. End him. Quietly, decisively."
But even he didn't sound convinced.
(Ashar's Reflection)
Later, alone again, Ashar sat back in the quiet and replayed his own words. He hated how they sounded. Too sharp. Too deliberate.
But when he closed his eyes, he saw Zhen falling again.
And he whispered to himself, almost as a prayer:
"Forgive me. But we don't win by being honest. We win by surviving."