Rebels (John Bates)

By Scott Powell and Judith Powell

Copyright © 2013 Scott Powell and Judith Powell

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 149280813X

ISBN-13: 978-1492808138

Dedication:

To the author of man’s freedom.

Chapter 1

My
name is John Hancock Bates. I am fifteen years old. I have brown hair, brown eyes, and I am the owner of an augmented heart. This could be anyone’s story, but it’s mine and so the burden of telling it is mine and mine alone.

I have always thought of myself as a healthy person, my father having encouraged personal health and well-being in our family. He is a mixed martial artist as was his father before him and as am I. I was trained in Tae Kwon Do, kickboxing, Krav Maga, grappling, and in advanced street fighting. One would wonder why, and more importantly, for what? But nowadays, survival is something I must always be prepared for.

I go to public school like all young people, eat and sleep and watch TV when and what the State tells us to. My dad says that we were once free to choose to be what we wanted, but this changed due to the Great World Fires and our freedoms were lost.

The Great Fires were started when nations throughout the world had too much debt. They could not pay it so instead, the government started to print money. The more money the governments printed the more expensive things became. People could not afford things like food and clothes. They could not afford the money to put gas in their car so they could go to work.

Hyperinflation is when a government prints too much money and it becomes almost worthless. It led to one financial system after another collapsing, taking their nations with them, angry mobs demanding someone do something ran rampant in the street. Fires burned uncontrollably, some set on purpose, others just burning with no one around to put it out, until every nation on earth was left destitute. By the time the people realized what was happening, it was too late.

With everything in ruin, no one knew what to do, but suddenly America stood and offered its help, under one condition: surrender and become Americans. It was that day freedom was lost. It seemed great at first; America had always been the land of freedom. Too late, the world discovered it was not freedom America was selling, but servitude.

Many fought back, including my grandfather, who was one of the leaders of the freedom fighters. My dad still speaks of his father and his council before Grandfather died, and how no matter what, to always remember as long as there is one individual willing to stand for freedom, there will always be hope.

But it was my grandmother who had been caught by the State, she was more bold than wise, my dad says. But the State didn’t have my grandfather or my dad. My grandmother had gotten word to them to flee. They changed their names and moved to Alabama in order to hide from the State.

This all happened before I was born, before my dad even met my mom. Some young people don’t even know about the Great Fires. Some don’t even know that there was anything before the State. We are not allowed to talk about it, but my parents do anyway.

I am fortunate to be part of the Young Army, a position that gives me special rights, privileges, and popularity. It is similar to what a high school football player may have had, before the government outlawed football as a dangerous sport. It is supposedly for only the best athletes and students who show promise for the State.

In the past, I have seen others in the Young Army go places and have benefitted from doing well, receiving special treatment and eventually becoming part of the State if they do what is asked. Seeing this, I push myself each day hoping I will be picked to benefit my family.

I have seen many suffer because of the lack of basic needs being met. This included food, medicine, and even housing.  The State takes no interest in individuals  deemed   insignificant to them. Almost everything is owned by the State. One only gets something—or gets the use of it—if they are deemed necessary or they are important enough.

But unlike the others, my parents have made me commit to memory the preamble of the Constitution of the United States of America, a document outlawed by the State, and every night my father pulls out a very old Bible hidden in a compartment in our wall, and we listen to him read aloud its words. If it is found out we have such a book, the penalty is death, but we read it anyway.

Our government is called the State of America and consists of most of the civilized world. I do not know what schools were like before the Great Fires, but ours are old and moldy, full to the breaking point with youth and children. The conditions have worsened through the years since the State has taken over and slowly broken down society much like strip mining, leaving nothing in place of what they have taken. In many ways, we are no more than cattle waiting to be taken to the slaughter, only to serve the State and its needs. It is here at school my life changed forever and I could no longer sit and do nothing while others decided my fate for me.

It is a late spring day, the kind that is already full of heat in the South, the index will probably be eighty degrees plus today here in the city of Montgomery, in the territory of Alabama, but still, the heater is on at full blast.
Don’t they know how hot it is down here?
But as I have come to realize, the State has made everything the same for everyone except for the few they deem special. Generally, I would have thought no different of our circumstances, but my parents have raised me to think otherwise. The land once known as the United States stood for freedom and hope for all those who sought for such. But now it is gone. Buried in the ashes of history; the same ashes the State now stands on.

I sit up, kicking off the thin sheet that covers me and place both feet on the matted carpet, staring momentarily at my particleboard dresser it is more full of air than clothing. I kneel down beside my bed and start my prayer, a general prayer, something along the lines of,
Hey God, it’s me, John, you know I’m really grateful for what you do for me, please help me that I can do well in school today, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
I stand up and check my watch. It registers nothing unusual—prayer is allowed and required by the State, but they are set prayers written and dictated by the rules and regulations of the State. There are one hundred thirty set prayers and I know every one, but I don’t use them. I try to pray as my parents have taught me, from the heart. The watches don’t seem to register the difference between a State prayer and my own personal one.

I grab my gray sweatpants that are hanging over the end of my bed and a T-shirt from my drawer. My bedroom is a little bit longer than my bed in one direction and half the size of the other, so I have to be careful not to bang my hands and arms on the walls and ceiling that make up my room. It has only one single solitary light overhead, but there is just enough natural light to see by to get dressed—no need to turn it on and waste an electric credit. I am already starting to sweat because of the immense heat in the house.

“Why won’t the government let us have control over our own thermostats?” I ask to no one in particular. All winter we had barely stayed warm. Mother became very ill, and I was very worried about her. With the lines at the doctors so long and medicine in such short supply, Mother decided to wait and see if God would have mercy upon her, and he had. Hot as it is in my room at six o’clock in the morning, I am grateful it is spring and the heat is warming her. I can barely tell she has a cough anymore. I pull on my socks and go down into the kitchen where my mother is quietly stirring a pot of oatmeal. I kiss her on the cheek. She looks much better, and my fears concerning her are gone.

“Would you like some breakfast, John?” she asks, her face smiling, her cheeks rosy with heat.

“No, Mom, it’s far too hot to eat.” I say, walking over to the front door and putting on my shoes. I am very lucky; I have been given two pairs of shoes: one for running and exercising, and one pair to go with my school uniform. Not everyone owns a pair of tennis shoes like I do, it makes running much easier. My mother follows me and when I’m done putting on my shoes, we bow our heads and fold our arms as my mother says a prayer of praises to God for our blessings and asks for his continued blessings to be upon our family and for my personal well-being.

Normally my father would join us but he had to go to work early today, because he had too much work and too few hard working people and hours to get all the work done. Why work hard when everyone is going to get the same pay anyway? No reason I can think of except perhaps to please God, or that’s what my father tells me. I believe him, hard work does please God. Does not God work hard every day for our benefit? My mother ends the prayer, and we both check our watches. It’s odd to think we have to be aware of these watches, but they are far from ordinary—they are the watchdogs of the State. These devices ensure the State is aware of everyone’s actions all the time.

“All right then, here’s your lunch, you might as well be going to school,” my mother says, handing me a brown paper bag.

I nod as I give her a kiss on the cheek. I grab my gray backpack that stands in the corner of the living room and sling it over my shoulder. It is full of little more than a few books and my Young Army uniform. In school, everyone has to wear the same thing, except those in the Young Army. On most days, those of us privileged enough to be part of the Young Army get to wear our official Army uniform in school. My father had insisted I join the Young Army, but I like it well enough. I excel at hand-to-hand combat, and I even get to work with real guns which everyday citizens can no longer own in the State. This is why my father wanted me to join the Young Army, despite all the propaganda he felt went on inside. Though I personally don’t see any reason to, he wanted me to know how to use firearms.

I open the front screen door, as my mother calls out, “Remember who you serve.” I nod as I jump off the little stoop, almost tripping over the morning paper. We all receive the newspaper, as it is required, but most of the time we use it to keep warm. No more use for it now, it just lays on the walk. I throw it back inside, and I do some basic stretching on the cobblestone walkway that is placed there in order to keep people from walking through the dandelions that makes up our front yard.

For a moment, I look up into the blue sky with the sun blazing down upon me and ponder how beautiful the sky is today. But then I look down at the houses that are crumbling from lack of repair—cracks in the walls and apparent leaks in roofs. The once-paved roads are now full of pot holes and bumps. But of course the State says the houses and roads are in good condition even though we submit requests that say otherwise. I shake my head, wondering why the State ignores the needs of its people but then I realize I will be late to school if I don’t get going.

I stand and begin my run to school, past other houses similar to ours with yards and rotting roofs, waiting for government approval and money for their repair. Very few people own their own homes anymore, most live in government owned housing, and I am sad to say we are one of them. Homes had been bought up by the government before the Great Fires, during some type of housing crisis years ago. People gladly sold their homes to the government rather than face bankruptcy. Now we all live, eat, and sleep in small two to three bedroom homes that are so close together I could literally jump from roof to roof, if they didn’t cave in first.

I pick up my pace, over the uneven asphalt, taking giant leaps over any pot
holes. I run alone—one of the few, if any, who run to school. I run past Mark Jenkins’s house, an extraordinary family with so many children I have lost count. All of them crammed into the typical three-bedroom house that most everyone has. Mark has been my best friend since pre-school. But because Mark is not in the Young Army, I hardly ever get to see him any more except at lunch. Stephanie, Mark’s sister, sees me through the window. She must have been waiting for me, as she runs out to greet me.

“John,” she calls out to me. I slow my pace and finally, begrudgingly, I halt my run.

“What is it, Stephanie?” I ask with my hands on my knees trying to catch my breath. I still have at least a mile to run, and I know it will be harder to get going again once I stop.

“Dad lost his job yesterday,” she says. I stand up to look at her fully, and her green eyes fill with tears. What does she think I can do, what does she want from me? I am only fifteen, what could I do to help? It will be months before the proper paperwork can even be obtained in order to apply for the needed aid for their family, by then, some, if not all, of the young children will die of starvation.

“What happened?” I ask, knowing perfectly well it is very difficult to lose one’s job.

“He smarted off to one of his bosses about how cold we had been this winter and that the State was letting us freeze to death,” she says, looking down at her feet, embarrassed by her father’s actions. It is common for the State to teach children they must always listen to the State and never to their parents because the State knows what’s best for them.

“I’ll see what I can do.” I said while doing a calf stretch and flopping my arms across my chest warming them up again for the run.

“Thank you, John, thank you for anything you can do.” I start my run again, running past more houses and wonder what lies behind the other doors, how many families are hurting, hungry, helpless, while my family has more than enough. Why does the government steal from its own people? So, what, they can have bigger, more lavish parties in the Capitol, once called Washington D.C. now referred to as the District, so they can have more and we less? Don’t they know there is more than enough? If they just let people work for themselves. Don’t they know people want to do good, it’s in our nature to help one another? If they will give us back what is rightfully ours in the first place then we can, as a people, do all the things they promised they would do.

I stop in front of the monstrous building that is my school. It is square and cream with one giant red stripe all the way around the middle. It’s apparent that parts of the outside walls are starting to crumble from age and other parts of the building have been patched with different types of material due to the lack of funding. What appears to be the outside playground is nothing more than metal rods sticking out of the ground since play equipment is rarely replaced or repaired. I go in through the gym entrance, in order to shower and change for the school day. Sergeant Epps, the leader of my Young Army platoon, is already in the locker room.

“Good to see you here this early, John, it shows motivation and strength of character. Do you run to school every day?” I nod yes.

“Good, no wonder you’re ahead of everyone else. Keep up the good work.” He turns and leaves me to my shower. I turn the water on as warm as it can go, which is barely above freezing. I will only get two pushes on the water button, so I better hurry. I wash my hair in a flurry of movement, rinse, push the button again and quickly wash the rest of my body as the last drop comes out of the showerhead. I dry myself on an old towel I keep in my gym locker and hang it up to dry momentarily before folding it and placing it back. I dress in my smart Young Army uniform, studying myself in the mirror for a moment. I have a thin, wiry but fit build, nothing particularly special about me but still overall I think I’m a good-looking guy.

Checking my watch, I see I have more than enough time to go to the hall locker and then get to class. My watch isn’t like a traditional watch—the one with straps that come on and off according to one’s pleasure.  I received mine like everyone else on my twelfth birthday. When I went in for my yearly checkup at the doctors, they placed a circular disk on my wrist. It sat there for a moment, warming up, configuring to me, then chains, or bands as they are called, came out of either side and burrowed under my skin where they hooked up to my nervous system, holding the watch firmly in place.

I can still see the black bands underneath my skin reminding me I am not my own. Did it hurt? Yes, it sure did, as link after link of the chain burrowed into my skin. What does the government say about the pain? That it is offset by all the good the watches do. From then on, it tells me what to do, when to sleep, how often to laugh, how much exercise I need, and it allows the State to know where I am at all times. It keeps record of all governmental credits, this makes sure no one can buy anything that is not government approved and, by the way, it also tells perfectly good time.