Trevor kicked the ball across the mansion’s side the yard. JB chased after it, missed with his kick, slipped to the ground, and laughed.
“JB! Come on! Let’s go!” Ashley called from the front side of the mansion where she stood with her father Benjamin Trump as well as two human body guards and two K9s including the Doberman Pinscher named Ajax.
JB scrambled to his feet, kicked the ball away, and then ran toward his mother. Trevor joined them.
“You guys going in to town?” He asked Ashley.
“No, security thinks we shouldn’t,” she said. “At least not until things die down.”
“My boy can’t even go in town now?”
“It will blow over,” she assured, although her assurance sounded hollow.
JB grabbed his dad’s legs in a hug.
“We’re going to Joe’s Pizza, father,” he said. “They have an air hockey game in there! Me and grandpa are going to play.”
Trevor knelt down to his son’s level.
“I bet you’re pretty good at it.”
“Nah, I’m not so hot.”
Trevor looked into the eyes of his boy. Really looked.
What was in there? What mystery to all of this was hidden behind those eyes?
Maybe…no, all he saw was a happy little boy. For now, maybe that was all there really was.
“Hey, I love you, buddy,” Trevor put his hand on his son’s cheek.
JB grew very serious. “I love you, too, daddy.”
That stunned both Ashley and Trevor. They gaped at one another as JB ran to his grandfather.
She said, “Being a parent is always full of surprises.”
“I suppose so,” he admitted as he stood again.
“We’ll be back later,” Ashley said and she followed her son and the security detail as they headed to an SUV idling in the driveway.
Trevor needed something to do now. An idea came to mind…
…Bam! Bam! Bam!
Shots from the Beretta M9 semi-automatic pistol slapped the air around the estate’s shooting range like firecrackers.
Trevor expended the last of that clip, ejected the magazine, and reloaded it from a box of bullets. Tyr yapped to alert Trevor to company.
Gordon Knox approached, holding a sheet of paper. He wore a bomber jacket in light of the lowering temperatures. The weather promised to get much colder in the days ahead.
Trevor removed his ear guards but continued to load bullets into the clip; each one harder to slip in as the spring inside the magazine grew more taut.
“Where’s the family?” Knox asked.
“Just left, went to dinner,” Trevor said.
“Oh.”
“What is it Gordon? What have you got for me? More protests in Scranton? Did they raid a food distribution center in Hagerstown again? Let me guess, this is full-fledged rebellion now.”
Gordon laughed, “Nothing of the sort, Trevor. I wouldn’t let some scattered protests get you upset. It was bound to happen sooner or later.”
Trevor smacked the reloaded clip into the pistol.
“Maybe I should just sic the canines on them.”
“Well, I think my timing couldn’t be better,” Gordon said.
“What does that mean?”
“Let’s just say, it strikes me that you need this bit of news right now.”
“Okay then, spit it out.”
“My people intercepted a message sent from Atlanta to Columbia before we captured the city. The Hivvan commander in Columbia never got the message because we took him out with a bunker buster before it got to him. We’ve finally translated it.”
Trevor turned his head and waited.
Knox told him, “It’s a directive from primary headquarters in Atlanta to the commander of Columbia. It tells that commander that after their heavy losses in North Carolina, the high command had decided to evacuate Columbia and consolidate defensive lines using the lakes and rivers on the South Carolina, Georgia border. It appears they were not planning a counter-attack on Raleigh after all.”
“Oh,” Trevor shivered. “So you’re telling me…you’re telling me they were going to evacuate Columbia, anyway? So you’re telling me…Jesus Christ…you’re telling me that it was for nothing? That…that I killed all those people for-?”
“That’s not the entire message.”
Trevor bowed his head.
Knox told him the rest.
“The commander in Columbia was ordered to begin eradication of all human slaves in custody and to use the most expeditious means.”
Stone raised his head again. His eyes stared off at something unseen.
“Trevor,” Gordon told him. “If you hadn’t pushed through New Winnabow, the commander at Columbia would have received this message. If you had gone another way or pulled back, those ten thousand people in Columbia would have been slaughtered. You did the right thing.”
Trevor chuckled but not in good humor. “The right thing, Gordon?”
“Yes,” Knox answered. “How many casualties at New Winnabow? One hundred?”
The answer lived at the tip of Trevor’s tongue, “One hundred and twenty two.”
“Against ten thousand saved? Not a bad price to pay.”
Stone cocked the slide on his pistol, chambering a new round.
“What a bargain…” Trevor echoed.
Ten thousand saved for the low price of just one soul.
“What are you going to do now, Trevor?”
The Emperor told the man the obvious.
“I’m going to do some more target practice. Have to stay sharp. Have to be ready. A lot more fighting to do.”
Trevor raised the pistol and squeezed the trigger.
A lot more killing.
