“Our country, I believe, began to parallel the Roman Empire in many ways. Historians saw it, warned of it, but too few listened—until it was too late.
“The Romans had great, unworkable, and expensive social programs. So did we. The Romans built superhighways. So did we. The Romans began to scoff at great teachers, philosophers. So did we. They had social unrest. So did we. They built great arenas so the citizens could go on weekends and watch sporting events. So did we. The Roman government became top-heavy with bureaucracy. So did ours. The Roman government became corrupt. So did ours. Right on down the line. And as theirs came to an end, so did ours.
“Here in the United States, such things as patriotism, love of God, duty, honor, became the objects of ridicule. A day’s work for a fair day’s pay was replaced by greed; and if the product was faulty, the worker didn’t care. Strikes became the rule instead of the exception. Craftsmen became a thing of the past when the assembly line took over and goods were thrown together with no regard for the consumer. Those responsible forgot that we are all consumers.
“Morals sank to an all-time low. The sixties and seventies were times of great liberalism in America. It got out of hand and we went off the deep end, sinking more and more into debt. We came off the gold standard and began printing more money—without anything to back it. Just paper.
“We had great tax reforms in the Senate and House in the mid-eighties, greatly lessening the burden on the lower and middle classes. But most of them never got out of committee. Money backed many members of Congress, big business. When they spoke, Congress listened. So instead of the wealthy paying the brunt of the taxes, the lower and middle classes paid them. It was wrong, but Congress refused to correct it.
“On the world scene, the unions in Britain must share much of the blame for the country’s downfall. Massive land reforms came much too late in Central and South America. Russia’s economy finally collapsed. Guerrilla warfare spanned the globe.
“Here at home…” Ben sighed and thought for a moment. “The central government became too powerful, moving into every facet of public and private lives. Big Brother came out of fiction to become reality. Our laws became so vague and so left-leaning, the average citizen did not even have the right to protect what was his or hers.
“Anytime a government takes away the basic liberties of its citizens, it will inevitably lead to war. And it did.”
“Will we have to fight for what we have here, Governor?” a teen-age girl asked.
“Yes,” Ben said. “And probably very soon.”
“Why don’t other people just leave us alone?” another asked. “What business is it of theirs, anyway?”
“Dear,”—Ben smiled sadly—“people have been asking that of government since the first government was formed. And government has yet to come up with a satisfactory reply.”
Ben and Salina took two kids into their home, twins, a boy and a girl. They were handsome, well-mannered, and intelligent. Of course, all parents think that of their children.
Tina and Jack originally had come from Arizona. In hiding, they had watched their father shot to death by a gang of thugs and their mother raped repeatedly, then killed as she tried to run away, in the opposite direction from where her kids were hiding. But she bought them enough time to get away. Neither Jack nor Tina had any love or compassion for the lawless.
Their story was similar to that of almost every adopted child in the Tri-states. The young who lived through the holocaust, like their elders, needed very little prompting to demand harsh penalties for criminals. They had seen firsthand what permissiveness in a society can produce, and they wanted no part of it.
Jimmy Deluce, Jane Dolbeau, Jerre Hunter, and Badger Harbin remained single. Jimmy flew for the Tri- states’ small air force; Jane and Jerre worked as nurses at one of the many free clinics in the Tri-states; and Badger became Ben’s bodyguard.
That was not something Ben wanted, or really felt he needed, but after the assassination attempt, Badger announced his new job and moved in. He lived with the Raineses and became a constant shadow wherever Ben went.
Badger idolized the governor, as did most of the Rebels and residents of the Tri-states, and would have jumped through burning hoops had Ben suggested it. He was also devoted to Salina, but not in any overt sexual manner. That thought had occurred to him, but once he had become so preoccupied about it he had walked into a wall and broken his nose.
Salina noticed his attention, however, was amused by it, and finally mentioned it to Ben one night.
“Yes, honey,” Ben said, laying aside the book he was reading, “I’ve noticed it a couple of times. But I don’t know what to do about it. Has he made any advances?”
“Oh, Ben!” She laughed. “For heaven’s sake—no. I just think he needs a girl, that’s all.”
Ben smiled.
“A wife, Ben.” She returned his smile. “I’m talking about a nice girl for Badger to marry.”
“Badger’s shy, that’s all. I know he… ah… visits a lady—or ladies—at the… ah… house just outside of town.”
“Along with several hundred other men,” Salina remarked dryly.
“But it’s Jerre and Jane I can’t figure out.” Ben carried on as if his wife had said nothing. The communities in the Tri-states were small, deliberately so, and everybody knew everybody else. “Both of them young, good-looking, smart. Yet, they both seem so detached from everybody. Neither of them date. I mentioned both of them to Badger the other day, and he looked at me as if I were an idiot. Is something going on I need to know about?”
Salina smiled at her husband. Years back Ben had told her about Jerre and the relationship they had had for a few weeks. But Ben believed all that was past. Salina knew better. What good would it do to tell him Jerre was hopelessly in love with him? And Jane had also developed an enormous crush on Ben. She wondered if they had discussed their feelings with each other? What good would it do to tell him the entire Tri-states knew about it? That both of them knew Salina knew? She shook her head.
“No, darling—nothing going on that I know of.”
“Ummm.” Ben picked up his book and resumed his reading. The subject was closed.
Salina laughed at the man she loved and rose to check on the twins. Tina had a friend over that night and they were in the bedroom, discussing, of all things, karate. Ben insisted that all Rebels and dependents become at least familiar with some form of self-defense—the killing kind, preferably—and Tina had taken to karate and the other forms of gutter-fighting that were taught to Tri-states’ regular army. She had now advanced to the dangerous state, and the seventeen-year-old was considered by her instructors to be a rather mean and nasty fighter.
Jack, on the other hand, had two left feet when it came to weaponless, hand-to-hand fighting. He just could not master the quickness of unarmed combat. But he loved weapons, spending as much time as possible on the firing ranges. At seventeen, he was an expert with a dozen weapons, and a sniper in his unit of the reserves.
There had been much discussion, some of it heated, between Ben and Steven Miller as to the advisability of teaching war in public schools. In the end, however, the professor had acquiesced to Ben’s demands, agreeing, not too reluctantly, that it was, for the time being, essential in the Tri-states’ schools. The professor conceded that if the Rebel way of life was to flourish, the young had to be taught to defend it.
Jack was cleaning Ben’s old Thompson SMG when Salina entered his room. The young man looked up and smiled. “Hi, Salina.” He held up the Thompson. “Great, huh?”
Salina smiled, nodded at the weapon’s “greatness.”
“Yes, I know, Jack,” she said, her voice soft.
“Yeah. I forget sometimes, Salina. You saw combat, didn’t you?”
Her face changed expression, hardening. All the memories came rushing back to her, filling her brain with remembrances she had tried very hard to suppress: the horror of the killing and raping in Chicago; the running in pure terror for days afterward.
She blocked it out, sealing it away, shutting the memory door.
She looked at the young man she loved as her son. She looked at the gun in his hand. “Yes, Jack. I know what combat is.” She closed the door and walked back into the den to be with her husband.
“Talk to me, Ben! Put down that damned book and
Her outburst startled him and he choked on the smoke from his pipe. Ben was trying to give up cigarettes— they were very scarce and stale—and had turned to a pipe. That wasn’t much better. He looked at his wife, hands on her hips, glaring at him. “What’s going on, Salina?”
