The Forgiven The Fallen The Forsaken (28 page)

“The EU and
India can have it as soon as they agree to classify Islam as a terrorist
ideology and to eliminate the open practice of Islam.  From the Russians I want
an alliance to prevent any future arms races anywhere on the planet.  From the
South American countries I want them to agree not to fight our control of
Central America in any way.  I intend to make that area prosperous for a change. 

“Hammer out the
agreements quickly because we have already given the vaccine to Canada and
Australia, and they’ll pass it along sooner or later anyway.

“I want European,
Canadian, Australian, and New Zealander immigrants.  We’re going to need more
English speakers that can fit into our culture.  I’ll take non-Muslim Africans,
Indians, and Filipinos who speak English as well.  We need to repopulate
quickly.”

Al said, “That's
easy enough, but we do have a problem to deal with, sir.  The governor of
California appointed a Muslim as one of his Senators.”

Jim thought for
a moment.  “He did
what?! 
Give the Senator the chance to denounce his
religion and step down.  Get rid of him if he doesn’t.  Pick up the Governor,
give him a parachute, tell him his citizenship is revoked, and drop him off
somewhere over the Middle East.  I don’t care where.  Make it happen yesterday.

“Next, have we
figured out how to start using money again?”

Rob said, “We
don’t have much of a choice but to use the bills that have already been
printed.  We’re looking into the federal government confiscating all of the
land and assets that no longer have legitimate owners.  We can sell the land at
inflated prices to narrow the amount of dollars floating around.  We’ll have to
outlaw foreign purchases of land for some time, of course, but after an initial
grab where everyone who empties an abandoned bank buys as much land as they
can, we’ll be back to something that feels a little more normal.

“We can
gradually move toward acceptance of all US currency, even from overseas.  Also,
we do have the data on bank accounts, at least for the banks that followed the
federal disaster recovery requirements.  I'd like to combine all of the banks
into one and transfer all accounts there for now.  All loans owned by the banks
will be forgiven.  Mortgages will be wiped out and the homeowners will own
their homes outright, if they're still alive and interested.”

General Whitman
asked, “You’re going to kill off the banks.”

Jim said, “We’re
starting over.  For now everything will be cash or barter.  We’ll adjust that
later.  It’s past time for new banks and new regulations.  Besides, I think
you’ll find that we own all the banks and most other companies, too, as we
confiscate the stocks without owners." 

A few hours
after the meeting, all of the governments agreed to his terms regarding the vaccine,
so Jim ordered shipments to be sent by transport jet. 

By then, Governor
Jones of California was already on a plane headed overseas with his US
citizenship revoked.   Jim hoped that he enjoyed his flight.

LATER
THAT EVENING

In a conference
room at Caesars’, Senator Malek took one look at the pistol in the Al’s hand
and said, “I thought you would give in on this.” 

“So far we’ve
lost eighty-five percent of the worlds’ population because of your religion,
including my entire family.   Are you choosing to remain a Muslim, Senator?”

“I always hated
going to the Mosque, anyway.”

“I’ll need you
to make a statement on camera, sir.  It’s filming now.” 

“My fellow
Americans, I was raised Muslim and participated in Islam for all of my life. 
After the genocide committed by that religion, I feel that I must denounce
Islam as a false religion that can no longer be tolerated anywhere in the
world.”  Al slid an open Koran that had been soaked in lighter fluid onto the metal
table in front of Malek and lit it.  The cameraman panned down to the burning
Koran and kept the focus there. 

Al signaled for
the cameraman to stop the recording and quickly put out the fire with an
extinguisher.

Malek glared at
him and asked, “Was that really necessary, you asshole?!" 

Al said, “I
think so,” drew his weapon and shot Malek in the face.

The Marine corporal
putting away the Camera said, “That was beautiful, sir.” 

“He was going
to turn on us first chance he had.  Help me with this, would you?”

They lifted the
body into an oversized plastic trashcan on wheels.  Al took the recording and
wheeled the trashcan outside and into a waiting truck.  The corporal went to
work cleaning up the mess.  The one thing Al was sure of, the body would never
be found in his lifetime.

Al made a
mental note to get that Corporal McNeel assigned to him from here on out. 

A few hours
later, the video had been edited and uploaded on the internet.  From the video,
it looked as though Malek was the one burning the Koran. 
Perfect,
thought Al, as he destroyed the unedited original.

The next day,
the former Lt. Governor of California was only too happy to appoint a non
Muslim to the Senatorial seat when told that Malek had been killed in traffic
accident after making the video.  The new governor didn’t ask any questions
about the body.

FLAGSTAFF,
ARIZONA

It had been a
long trip and Julie was delighted to get back to the village.  They were more
than happy to be home.  It felt good to take a long hot shower and lounge for a
while. 

They all met in
the
Village Pub
after getting cleaned up and settled in.  Ann was
passing out cold beer as they walked into the room.  “Now we’re talking,” said
Julie. 

Rob and Ann had
been home long enough to look well rested.  Julie was a little jealous, but
mostly just happy to be home.  She was surprised to see the wives there, but
she knew it didn’t make sense to leave them out as they would find out about
the money anyway.

Rob was smiling
like a Cheshire cat.  “Welcome everyone.  Congratulations on a successful
mission!”  There were loud cheers throughout the room.  “I would like all of
you to know that you are now multimillionaires.”  The cheers were louder this
time. 

“I have very
good news for all of you.  President Jim has decided to continue to use the US
dollar as currency.  This means that it is now possible to purchase things
again.  Did I remember to tell you that we’re rich?!”  Everyone was laughing
and hugging now. 

“The government
is closing down all banks, transferring the accounts to the new American Bank,
and wiping out all mortgages, so the houses you had mortgages on before the virus
now belong to you outright.  So to start out, Ann and I traded in some of the
gold with some folks who don’t realize yet that the dollar will come back to
life tomorrow.  We gave them a good enough deal, but they’ll be crying tomorrow!” 
There was more laughter.

“So, here is
the bonus for this job!”  Julie looked where Rob was pointing and saw a box for
each of them with their names written in big letters across the front.  “There
is five hundred thousand dollars in each of them with which you can do whatever
the hell you would like.  Personally, I would recommend buying a place to stash
your gold, but you can do whatever flips your trigger.” 

“Last thing, we
have one more possible stash to check out when we’re ready, so plan on a road
trip in the next couple of weeks.” 

It was a great
party.  Helen and Julie were feeling the alcohol after an hour or so and decided
to take their boxes home early.  They were cozily wrapped in the covers a
couple of hours later when the first gunshots rang out.  Both jumped up, grabbed
their M4 rifles, slipped on shoes and were flat on the ground shooting at the
intruders before it even registered that the boots were all they were wearing.  Helen
nailed one of the shooters through the pelvis to drop him, and then put a round
through the top of his head to shut down the central nervous system, just like
Uncle Jim had taught them. 

A few minutes
later, the four intruders were down. 

Julio yelled,
“All clear.”

Julie and Helen
looked at each other and jumped up and ran back into the fifth wheel.  When
they came out again five minutes later, they had regained their composure.  If
anyone had noticed, they didn’t say anything.

One of the
shooters was still alive.  Julio had his knife out and was cutting on him. “Why
are you here?  Tell me
now!
”

The young man
screamed and said, “You killed my brother and my dad.  They just wanted food
and you killed them.”

Julie had never
seen Julio so angry.  He said, “And when I find out who you are I’m going to
kill the rest of your family, too.”

Julie looked
around and saw the reason for his rage.  Frank and Rita were both down and not
moving.  She ran over to find them both dead, as she expected. 

She said to
Julio.  “Let’s get him in a truck and take him into the woods.”  She looked
over to Helen and said, “Bring me two tampons and a pad.”  

Dave drove a
pickup over and they loaded the young man into the bed of the truck.  Julie
opened the tampons and savagely shoved them into the bullet wounds, saying,
"Don't worry, you're not going to bleed to death anytime soon." 

Helen took
Julie’s arm and said, “They’ll take care of him.”

“I want to be
there.”

“But I need you
to be with me.”

Julie hesitated,
and then said, “I know, you’re right.”

Dave, Ann, and
Julio slowly drove the shooter out to the woods to help with the slow death he
deserved.  The screams went on for a couple of hours.

Rob, Stewart,
and Manny took the wrapped the bodies of Frank and Rita in sheets and placed
them in the bed of another pickup.  Denise took fingerprints of the four men
and scanned them to Jim.  She soon had copies of most recent driver’s licenses
complete with addresses.  She printed out maps and had everything prepared by
the time the men finished burying the shooters bodies in a pit.

That night, Rob
and his crew went out in four separate teams and, in a period of minutes, destroyed
all four houses with incendiary grenades.  There were screams from all but one
of the houses.

Once the teams
returned, they used the backhoe to dig two graves on the far side of the
property, in a place with a beautiful view. 

They buried
Frank and Rita the next morning.  Frank Jr. was twelve years old and his
sister, Amy, was ten.  The two were in shock.  Stewart's family insisted on taking
them in, so the kids soon found themselves living with Uncle Stewart, Aunt
Kathy, and their two daughters.

AUGUST 19
^th

The village was
silent.  Luke and Jamie had spent most of the day in the Airstream.  Nothing
seemed to help the gloomy feeling.  They had even made love a couple of times,
but it only helped briefly.

Finally, they
came out of the trailer and joined up with the rest of the group in the commons
room.  Many of the adults were pouring drinks from a bottle of scotch.  They
were offered a drink but turned it down. 
I don’t see how getting falling
down drunk would help things,
thought Luke. 

He finally did
accept a shot to toast to absent companions. Luke choked it down, but wasn’t
crazy about the experience.  The storytelling started with a story about
Frank’s misadventure in a whorehouse in Thailand, long before he met Rita.  The
story had him and a whole platoon of drunken Marines fighting Thai police the
entire way back to the ship.  Several of them were laughing so hard tears were
coming down. 

Overhead he
heard choppers coming in.  He ran out to see it landing on the pad.  Once the
rotors stopped, Uncle Jim, Aunt Susan and their security team stepped out.  They
walked over and hugged him.  He escorted them into the wake, which by now was
in full swing.  It was if it had been waiting for their arrival to start.

Late in the
evening Jim took Rob aside and said, "I'm worried, Rob." 

"We took
care of them.  All of them."

"You
burned their families alive.  It's a loss of control and you don't lose
control." 

Rob was fairly intoxicated. 
"Nobody kills my people like that.  Nobody.  This is the way the game is
played."

"And I
understand that.  I'll talk to Jake and make this go away, but I need you
functional.  Alright?  Can you do that for me?"

"I'm sorry
Jim.  I'll talk to you tomorrow."

Jim put his arm
around Rob and helped Denise get him back to their RV and into bed on his
abdomen.   Afterward, he talked to Denise.  "Is he going to be ok?"

"He's
heartbroken over Frank and Rita," said Denise.  "I've never seen him
like this."

"I need
him functional.  Let me know whatever you need."

She hugged him
and said, "Thank you, Jim.  I will."

Jim gathered
Susan and his security detail and went back to the helicopter, anxious to get
back to Las Vegas.

CATALINA
ISLAND, SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

For the five
girls, it had been months of living hell.  When Lisa told a male police officer,
Officer Chapman, about the murder of their friend and how they were being held
as sex slaves, he told them that people were starving and they should be
grateful to be alive.  Within a couple of days he was stopping by the house and
taking his turn forcing truly sadistic sex on each of the women.  Greg thought
it was funny.

Before long, it
seemed like half the men in town were stopping in, paying for sex with canned
food or whatever they had on hand.  Sonya swore she would kill Greg and his
friends the first chance they had, but she would have to come up with something
special for the police officer who was making it all possible.