Messelia
Sovereign City of West Messelia
Things were finally looking good, thought the old man as he left work. Well, at least they looked better than they had been since the end of the war. Granted, retirement was a thing of the past, there was the ever present fear of an invasion from either side of the border, and the city was still being slowly rebuilt, but at least life was good, and that was all he needed. He wished the people at the front desk a good weekend, and started walking home. He didn’t have to walk home -public buses had been reinstated a few years ago-, but he thought it was healthy, and the fact was that, in a city where most leisure activities were frowned upon, walking was probably the more acceptable and inexpensive way to stay fit.
As he looked at the old houses on both sides of the street, Lorenzo chuckled, a sad and almost imperceptible chuckle, reminiscing the time before the war, when those houses were occupied by the wealthiest residents of Messelia, those who could afford to live comfortable and ignore the horror coming from the frontlines, those who could afford to avoid being drafted. Lorenzo had been drafted, and was proud to serve, but received a medical deferment. Things had deteriorated greatly by the time his next evaluation was due; he never served in the Sartorian Military.
He supposed he could no longer call himself a Sartorian. He knew the Gialla Government claimed sovereignty over all of the Former Sartoria, but for all practical purposes, they held little authority over the south and east, and their control over the west was almost entirely nominal. These days he was what people called a West Messelian, a resident of the section of Messelia that had not been occupied by the Sacuri, but was not ruled by Gialla either. It was a city with its own government and jurisdiction over part of the metropolitan area, and over the decades it had developed a distinct identity, apart from both the Sacuri and Gialla.
Messelia was still a nice city, despite everything, despite the food shortages of the past, the lack of entertainment, the stress over the always looming armies on both sides. It was a well known fact that Messelians were proud of their autonomy and their ability to resist the urges to join either country, in spite of their overwhelming strengths. In recent years the city had even regained some of its former colour, with a budding theatrical community, improving public transport and reasonably self-sustaining food supply.
Life was definitely easier for the younger generations, who knew little of the hardships and horrors that Lorenzo had experienced. He certainly remembered the struggles to make ends meet after the Sartorian Army left the city. When the borders were closed, shortly after the withdrawal, the local economy collapsed, there were riots and long queues for food. There was chaos and lawlessness during the early days, when nobody knew whether they would be able to withstand the impending invasion by the Sacuri, who would’ve liked nothing more than to claim for themselves the Sartorian capital.
They did invade, a couple of months after the withdrawal, and they managed to take the eastern side of the city before the few soldiers who had defied orders and remained in the city managed, somehow, to stop the Sacuri advance. They were the ones who built the barriers and kept the savages at bay, though that also meant sealing the fate of the tens of thousands who lived in the eastern half of the city, who would have no option but to survive under Sacuri rule. Things had been tough over in the west side, but the complete lack of information from the east only led to wild rumours about the horrors that were probably taking place there.
It always surprised Lorenzo how fast he got home when he let his mind wander. One moment he was leaving work, the other he was at his doorstep, searching his pocket for his key. He looked back at the city lights, and beyond that, the darkness of the eastern side. Electricity was cut off during the sacrificial season, over in the east, so those devoted to Sacur could conduct their horrendous rituals in peace. He shuddered, and pitied those poor kids who were part of the countless rituals across the city, and all over Sacuri Sartoria.
Knowing there was little he could do, Lorenzo turned his back on the city and entered his home, a loving family already waiting for him. Life went on.