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Rebels

  By Scott Powell & Judith Powell

  Copyright © 2013 Scott Powell and Judith Powell

  All rights reserved.

  Dedication:

  To the author of man’s freedom.

  Table Of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  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 an
d 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.