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Authors: Wind In The Ashes
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The young people’s eyes were as cold as a glacier.
“He’s asking for mercy,” the Scout said softly.
Wade glanced up at the Scout. “Mercy? Ask him how many children, both male and female, he has had sexually. Ask him how many men and women not of his race or color he has helped capture and transport to the Russian for butchering.”
The IPF soldier could speak perfect English. He dropped his eyes, refusing to meet the eyes of Wade or any of the others around him.
“Ask him,” Ro said, “how many times he’s killed men and women and children who refused to accept the IPF’s demands. Ask him how many of Ben Raines’s Rebels he has killed. And ask him if he will tell us the location of every IPF outpost in our sector?”
The Russian soldier shook his head. Ro met the Scout’s eyes. “Would Ben Raines let him live?”
“No,” the Scout replied in a low tone.
Wade reached down, jerked the soldier’s head up, and with one quick cut sliced the man’s throat. The body flopped on the ground and then was still.
The Scout’s face and eyes remained impassive. He had been warned just how savage these young people could be, and that they all, to a person, had good reason to hate the IPF and any warlord.
“We’ll rest here for a time. While we’re taking a break, I’ll assign sectors.” He walked off.
A young girl stood off to one side, but close enough to have seen the entire execution and its method. She was among the youngest of the woods-children. She was eleven. The carbine she carried was very nearly as large as she. Her name was Lora. She did not know her last name. She did not know if she even had a last name.
She was dressed in patched jeans and a man’s flannel shirt, way too big for her, the sleeves pinned back. She carried a.38 caliber pistol in a holster belted around her slim waist, right side. A very sharp hunting knife in a sheath on her left side.
She had joined Ro’s group of woods-children when she was eight, after being seized and raped repeatedly by a gang of roaming outlaws. She had managed to escape from them after a particular savage night of drinking and lust. With her blood streaking her inner thighs, so sore she could hardly walk after being raped and sodomized, Lora had slipped away from the sleeping circle of men and made her way deep into the timber of Kentucky.
But not before she killed the man who had last taken her. She had calmly and viciously, with all her strength, driven a sharpened wooden stake through his right eye, penetrating the brain.
Lora shoulder-slung her carbine and walked off to sit by herself in the shade of a huge old tree. The butt of the carbine almost dragged the ground as she walked.
Seated on the ground, she ate some berries she had picked that morning and sipped water from her canteen. Then she opened her rucksack and took out a ragged magazine she had found back in one of the buildings at the airport in the old Tri-States.
It had such pretty pictures in it. Pictures, in
color,
of kids about her own age, she guessed. But they were dressed so fine, and all of them seemed so happy. And they were so clean, with shining hair and pretty rings on their fingers. They had little gold and silver and shiny things on the bottom part of their ears.
She wondered what those things were.
But what really grabbed her attention and held it, was the fact that none of the kids carried a gun.
Not even a knife.
That seemed very odd to Lora.
And some of the girls wore fancy dresses. Lora thought she might have had a dress one time in her life. She seemed to have that memory. But she couldn’t bring the memory into full light of consciousness. But she thought she had had a dress on sometime.
Maybe it was Before.
No. She had been told that was … twelve years ago. And Lora only had eleven years. So it had to have been After.
Oh, well, she thought, suppressing a sigh. It didn’t matter.
She didn’t know anything about Before. Just After. And now that could
“He’s asking for mercy,” the Scout said softly.
Wade glanced up at the Scout. “Mercy? Ask him how many children, both male and female, he has had sexually. Ask him how many men and women not of his race or color he has helped capture and transport to the Russian for butchering.”
The IPF soldier could speak perfect English. He dropped his eyes, refusing to meet the eyes of Wade or any of the others around him.
“Ask him,” Ro said, “how many times he’s killed men and women and children who refused to accept the IPF’s demands. Ask him how many of Ben Raines’s Rebels he has killed. And ask him if he will tell us the location of every IPF outpost in our sector?”
The Russian soldier shook his head. Ro met the Scout’s eyes. “Would Ben Raines let him live?”
“No,” the Scout replied in a low tone.
Wade reached down, jerked the soldier’s head up, and with one quick cut sliced the man’s throat. The body flopped on the ground and then was still.
The Scout’s face and eyes remained impassive. He had been warned just how savage these young people could be, and that they all, to a person, had good reason to hate the IPF and any warlord.
“We’ll rest here for a time. While we’re taking a break, I’ll assign sectors.” He walked off.
A young girl stood off to one side, but close enough to have seen the entire execution and its method. She was among the youngest of the woods-children. She was eleven. The carbine she carried was very nearly as large as she. Her name was Lora. She did not know her last name. She did not know if she even had a last name.
She was dressed in patched jeans and a man’s flannel shirt, way too big for her, the sleeves pinned back. She carried a.38 caliber pistol in a holster belted around her slim waist, right side. A very sharp hunting knife in a sheath on her left side.
She had joined Ro’s group of woods-children when she was eight, after being seized and raped repeatedly by a gang of roaming outlaws. She had managed to escape from them after a particular savage night of drinking and lust. With her blood streaking her inner thighs, so sore she could hardly walk after being raped and sodomized, Lora had slipped away from the sleeping circle of men and made her way deep into the timber of Kentucky.
But not before she killed the man who had last taken her. She had calmly and viciously, with all her strength, driven a sharpened wooden stake through his right eye, penetrating the brain.
Lora shoulder-slung her carbine and walked off to sit by herself in the shade of a huge old tree. The butt of the carbine almost dragged the ground as she walked.
Seated on the ground, she ate some berries she had picked that morning and sipped water from her canteen. Then she opened her rucksack and took out a ragged magazine she had found back in one of the buildings at the airport in the old Tri-States.
It had such pretty pictures in it. Pictures, in
color,
of kids about her own age, she guessed. But they were dressed so fine, and all of them seemed so happy. And they were so clean, with shining hair and pretty rings on their fingers. They had little gold and silver and shiny things on the bottom part of their ears.
She wondered what those things were.
But what really grabbed her attention and held it, was the fact that none of the kids carried a gun.
Not even a knife.
That seemed very odd to Lora.
And some of the girls wore fancy dresses. Lora thought she might have had a dress one time in her life. She seemed to have that memory. But she couldn’t bring the memory into full light of consciousness. But she thought she had had a dress on sometime.
Maybe it was Before.
No. She had been told that was … twelve years ago. And Lora only had eleven years. So it had to have been After.
Oh, well, she thought, suppressing a sigh. It didn’t matter.
She didn’t know anything about Before. Just After. And now that could
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