Haven Uprising

Can I Change My Previous Answer?

"I understand why that's your favourite book now,"Tia remarked, as we waited outside Morwenna's office thingy.

We'd ended up finishing the entire book; me crying quietly twice, and Tia getting choked up at pretty frequent intervals.
I'd promised to read the sequel with them when this was all over, and I was really looking forwards to doing so.
"I told you there was a reason,"I smiled back.

We'd briefly dropped back by the flat on out way here, and I was glad to see nobody had assaulted it while we were gone. I'd quickly put on some white shorts (pockets!), more fond of cotton on my bare skin than denim, along with returning to one of my favourite cuddly long-sleeved jumpers. It was a nice shade of blue that was soft even to look at, with a few anime-style kittens embroidered on the front.
I loved this jumper.
I'd also forgone socks, wearing my snowboots. I really didn't know why I even had snowboots, because it didn't even snow in Haven. But they were comfortable, and that was all that mattered right now.

"Why does Morwenna even have an office in Valkyrie's lab?"Tia asked quietly. This hallway echoed far too loudly with any loud noises.
"Because I was feeling generous,"Valkyrie's voice came from a speaker somewhere, making both of us jump,"Well not generous enough to give her any of my good rooms but-"
"Were you just listening to everything, Valk?"I accused, smiling.
"Not at all, please continue,"She replied, just as Morwenna opened the doors.

"Sorry for keeping you two waiting,"She greeted, gesturing for us to go in, as she held open the pristine white doors.
It looked exactly like you'd expect an office in a lab to; every surface smooth and flawless, without much of a personal touch at all. There was a small window on our left, letting in a bit of light which fell upon the wide desk in the middle; two chairs on our side and one sitting behind it. The chairs were the only informal part there, having wheels and being spinny.
Spinny chairs were fun.

Morwenna moved behind the desk, sitting in a much more informal position than she would usually.
She seemed more relaxed for once, her butchy fashion sense casual; with an ocean-blue headscarf and a black leather jacket, along with a doctor who T-shirt underneath. I was pretty sure she was wearing leggings, although, like usual, I couldn't tell whether they were jeggings or not.

"So,"She started, closing a few holographic windows quickly, me and Tia taking our seats and holding hands behind the table,"What did you guys want to discuss?"
Tia glanced at me, looking kind of nervous. I gave their hand a small squeeze.
"Uh, we actually came here to ask about something Vindicator mentioned while..."They trailed off
"She mentioned something about The Walls,"I finished, watching Morwenna's expression carefully,"And she said you know about them."

Morwenna only looked sad, responding quietly,"I know about them, but they're not my secret to keep."
"So Vindicator wasn't lying,"I thought aloud, mainly to Celestia.
"When I was made a member of the Utopian Council, I was told many secrets,"Morwenna began, tapping her desk for a Holographic screen to pop up. She scrolled through what looked like a lot of files, finding a image file and opening it up, showing it to us. It looked like Morwenna, but a bit younger and less weary. She was laughing with some other members of the Council, a few I knew, and others who I'd known had been voted off it. "They were about Haven as a city, and some of the more... unsavoury things we'd done. Some were during, or before the Chemical war itself. I... I'm supposed to keep them. But I feel like you two, of all people deserve to know the truth."
"The Walls?"Tia prompted.

"Wait, okay. I'm giving context,"Morwenna retorted, pressing a button and the picture changing from the one of her, to a mostly blue world map. Most of the left side was red, with a large green circle just to the right of the prime meridian,"Quite a bit before the Chemical war, Haven was built. Well not all at once of course, because have you seen how big this place is, but even during it, some of the construction was still ongoing. You know how the Chemical war started; a tyrant taking over two entire continents through their disregard for rules, using chemical weapons on anyone they felt like despite the previous agreement in the UN not to."
"Wait which continents were they again?"I asked quickly. We weren't taught much about the world outside; only that it was very dangerous and we shouldn't go there, so my geographical knowledge was terrible.
"North and South America,"Morwenna answered, pointing to the respective continents and going back to the history lesson again swiftly,"Haven initially formed from the remnants of anyone who cared about democracy coming together to create this- well- safe haven in central Europe. We couldn't fight back, not strongly enough to liberate everyone, because we played by the rules; or so everyone was led to believe, anyway."
"So what actually happened?"Tia probed.
"The original founders of Haven were pretty manipulative to say the least,"Morwenna sighed,"There's always been the classic Capitalist verses Communist battle throughout modern history, always right verses left. The tyrant, his name was Reynolds I think, was pretty far right, less extreme than Vindicator, but he still wanted to govern through dictatorship, and would have done anything to secure that rule. Haven's government played that to their advantage, promoting more far left ideals until Haven was exactly what it was like before the coup."
"So Haven's founders made communism work?"I guessed
"That's not the end though,"Morwenna admitted,"In response to Reynolds, Haven churned out technological advancement never seen before in the history of humanity,"Her face bore the faintest traces of pride now,"Freedom to create whatever people wanted to was pretty inspiring; and that's where we get to the walls. The walls weren't ever made to imprison people; or so I was told anyway. They were originally intended as Haven's ultimate defence, just in case Reynolds' superweapons came right to our door, but we'd never ended up needeing it."

Morwenna's smile dropped as she inhaled, flicking to the next image. It was of what looked like an older model Energy Tank; only a single cannon atop it, but none of the glowy bits. "Haven's main orders were to fight fire with fire, and they allowed more breaches of the chemical weapons treaty, although they justified it by saying it was in self defence and some other duck crap. So we ended up becoming the very thing we swore to destroy, but the war turned out to be a lost cause."

"Lost cause how?"Tia furthered
"It's about climate change isn't it,"I suggested
"That's the thing about chemical weapons,"Morwenna replied sadly, flicking across images of wastelands,"They ended up making the environment worse than anyone could've possibly imagined; stripping away almost all of the planet's protective layers, meaning that sunlight can cook you with UV rays, near-constant acid rain that can burn holes in pretty much anything we send out there; and just generally making it a painfully large amount worse than it could've ever been if the Earth as a whole had just carried on using fossil fuels like idiots. The citizens of Haven wanted to forget what they'd done; almost all of them-"
"So they modified the Walls to make it seem like a paradise and erased it all from the history books,"Celestia finished for her,"So no one of any later generations would remember..."
"But what about Reynolds?"I questioned,"And everyone else who lived in all the the other parts of the world?"

Morwenna scrolled through again, pulling up a newspaper headline which read,'Reynolds Overthrown By American Revolt.'
"Nobody knows where he went, but he's probably dead by now,"She speculated,"The rest of the world; nobody really knows. Some of them migrated to other planets; some to Mars, others just to the moon, but from there they could've gone further- we just don't know. Everyone who stayed on Earth is either dead, or found some way to make something like The Walls. Communication just doesn't work outside at all, so we are totally isolated."
That was a lot to take in.

Even with finding out that one of my friends is a robot, that was still huge.
I glanced at Tia, and they gave my hand a quick squeeze in response.

"Morwenna, we came here to say that we've reconsidered your offer,"I announced
"So you'll join the rebellion?"
"We will join the rebellion,"Tia looked into my eyes, a silent request in them
I finished her sentence,"To liberate Haven."

"I'm so proud of you two!"Morwenna squealed happily, before recollecting herself,"Did you get any sort of information while you were in Tartarus? Literally anything would help..."
"Vindicator said something about expanding Haven and saving the Earth,"Celestia supplied.
"Well she's not wrong; it does kind of need saving,"Morwenna admitted,"But the amount of power needed to-"

"WAIT,"I exclaimed, an epiphany hitting me full in the face.
Protocol X appeared to leech people's powers. And if Vindicator needed that much power to save the Earth then she'd need power from the entire populace of Haven.

"What happens when someone loses their powers?"I asked into the air.
Valkyrie obliged,"Peoples' lives themselves are inherently linked to their powers; without powers, deaths could occur within a matter of hours."

I looked at Tia, and their eyes were as wide as mine were.
They spoke quietly, that horrific realisation being made audible,"Vindicator is going to save the world, but end up killing everyone in the world to do it."