Out of the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  Tina smoothed her hair. She was not even breathing hard. She looked at Master Sergeant Roisseau. “Did I do all right, Sergeant?”

  The reporters then noticed the flap of Roisseau’s holster, lying on the desk, open, the butt of the .45 exposed. And all were glad no one had tried to interfere.

  Then, from the floor of the reception center, came the battle cry of urbane, modern, twentieth-century man. Unable to cope with a situation, either mentally or physically, or because of laws that have been deballing the species for years, man bellows the words:

  “I’ll sue you!”

  The room suddenly rocked with laughter. News commentators, reporters, camerapeople and sound-people; people who, for years, had recorded the best and worst of humankind, all howled at the words from their colleague.

  “Sue?” Clayton managed to gasp the word despite his laughter. “Sue? Sue a little teen-age girl who just whipped your big, manly butt. Really, Barney! I’ve warned you for years your mouth would someday get you in trouble.”

  Roisseau spoke to the girl still behind the desk. “Judy, get on the horn and call the medics and tell them we have a hotshot with a pulled fuse.” He faced the crowd of newspeople.

  “You’re all due at a press conference in two hours. Meanwhile, I’d suggest you all help yourselves to coffee and doughnuts and soft drinks and study the pamphlets we have for you.” He glanced at Barney, sitting on the floor, moaning and holding his head in his hands. “As for you, I’d forget about suing anyone. Our form of government discourages lawsuits. You’d lose anyway.”

  “I’ll take this to the Supreme Court!” Barney yelled.

  “Fine. Governor Raines is someday going to appoint one for us. Next twenty or thirty years. We don’t recognize yours.”

  “Well, who is the final authority on Tri-states law?” a woman asked.

  Roisseau smiled. “Just about anyone in the area . . . over the age of ten. As you study the simplicity of our judicial system, you’ll see what I mean. We don’t use any Latin base or legal double-talk. It’s all in very plain English. If you’re asking who would make the final decision on an issue—if it ever got that far—Governor Raines and half a dozen people whose names were pulled out of a hat.”

  “Well, that’s the damnedest form of law I ever heard of in my life!” Larry Spain said.

  “I’m sure that’s true,” Roisseau said. “But what is important is that it works for us.” He walked back into his office, closing the door.

  Moments later, the medics came in and looked at Barney. They said he had a split lip, several bruises, a slightly damaged eardrum—nothing serious—and a severely deflated ego. They sat him in a chair, told him to check into any clinic if he began experiencing dizzy spells, patted him on the head, told him to watch his mouth, and left, chuckling.

  “Very simple society we have here,” a reporter observed. “Live and let live, all the while respecting the rights of others who do the same. Very basic.”

  “And very unconstitutional,” another remarked.

  “I wonder,” Judith mused aloud. “I just wonder if it is.”

  “Oh, come now, Judith,” Clayton said, shaking his head. “The entire debate is superfluous. There is no government of Tri-states. It doesn’t exist. The government of the United States doesn’t recognize it. It just doesn’t exist.”

  Several Jeeps pulled into the parking area. The reporters watched a half-dozen Rebel soldiers—male and female, all in tiger-stripe-step out of the Jeeps. The soldiers were all armed with automatic weapons and sidearms.

  “Really?” Judith smiled. She pointed to the Rebels. “Well, don’t tell me Tri-states doesn’t exist—tell them!”

  FOUR

  Before leaving the reception center, each member of the press was handed a pass marked: VISITOR—PRESS. It was dated and signed by Roisseau.

  “Don’t lose those passes,” he cautioned them. “You people don’t have permanent papers with prints, pictures, and serial numbers. Our equivalent of social security.”

  “Why are those papers necessary?” a reporter asked.

  “We’ve given asylum to many so-called criminals from bordering states. Some of the police from those states have tried to come in after them, undercover, slipping in without our knowledge. They didn’t make it, but it did force us to go to a permanent ID.”

  “I don’t . . . quite understand.” Judith looked up from the pamphlet she’d been reading. She was very interested in this state. “What kind of so-called criminals?”

  “As you have probably read, or heard, our laws are different from yours. Very different. In other states, if you were to shoot a punk trying to steal your car, your TV set, or whatever, you would be put in jail and charged. Not here. There is a full investigation, of course—we’re not animals—but we do believe that a punk is a punk, and that a person has the right to protect what is his or hers from unlawful search or seizure. Using any authorized weapon.”

  “How many children have been shot?”

  “None. Our children are taught, not only in the home, but in public schools, the difference between right and wrong—as we see it.”

  “You said authorized weapons . . . ?”

  “Rifle, pistol, knife, hands, fists, feet . . . whatever is available. Our citizens”—he smiled—“do not possess nuclear weapons.”

  Barney shuddered. He had discovered how swiftly events could occur in this state. All over a little joke.

  “Explain those permanent IDs,” Roisseau was asked.

  “Each ID is numbered, the same number is on the person’s bank account, driver’s license, home title. That number is placed in a central computer bank. Along with the number is placed the person’s vital statistics. It’s very easily checked and almost impossible to hide an identity.”

  “What comes next, Sergeant: tattooing at birth?” It was sarcastically put.

  Barney resisted an impulse to tell the reporter to please watch his mouth.

  Sergeant Roisseau smiled patiently. “No, sir, it’s past 1984. Your government is the one who turned on its law-abiding, taxpaying citizens, not ours.”

  “What is the penalty for carrying a false ID?”

  Roisseau’s eyes were chilly as he said, “It’s unpleasant. I hope you all have a nice stay in our area. It will be as nice as you make it.”

  A member of the armed forces of Tri-states rode in each van and bus. As they pulled out of the reception center, a soldier rose and faced Clayton Charles’s group.

  “My name is Bridge Oliver. During the ride to the governor’s house, I’ll try to answer as many questions as possible and show you some points of interest.

  “Coming up on your left is the first emergency telephone on this highway. You’ll find them every four miles on every major highway in the Tri-states. They are hooked directly to an army HQ in whatever district the motorist is in, and each phone is numbered. Pick up the phone, give that number to whomever answers, state the nature of the problem, and someone will be there promptly.”

  “That isn’t anything new,” a reporter said. “It’s been tried before in other areas . . . before the bombings. Vandals usually ripped the phones out. Destroyed them.”

  “Sir,” Bridge said, “in other states, punks and hoodlums were—and probably still are—pampered and petted by judges, psychologists, counselors, and petunia-picking social workers. Vandalism, in your society, under your laws, is accepted, more or less, as part of a young person’s growing up. We do not subscribe to that theory. As you have been told, and will be told a hundred times more during your stay here,”—until you get it through your goddamned thick skulls, Bridge thought—“crime, lawlessness, is not tolerated here. Our children are taught that it is wrong. They are taught it in the homes, in the schools, and in the churches.”

  The same reporter who had asked about tattooing at birth, now asked: “What do you do when you catch them, shoot them?”

  Barney looked out the window while Judith busied herself with a notebook.<
br />
  Bridge held his temper in check. Ben had told his people to expect sarcasm and, in certain instances, open hostility from some members of the press.

  “No, sir,” Bridge said quietly, “we don’t shoot them. I would like all of you to understand something. Some of you—maybe all of you—seem to be under the impression that we here in Tri-states are savages, or that Governor Raines is some sort of ruthless ogre. You’re wrong. We’re all very proud of what we’ve done here: jobs for everyone who wants to work; our medical system; elimination of poor living conditions; but we’re also somewhat of a law-and-order society. Not as you people know law and order, true, but we’re not monsters.

  “We do a lot of things quite differently from what you people are accustomed to. But that’s all right, because it works for us.”

  “That’s all very good, Mr. Oliver. And, I suppose, commendable, to your way of thinking. But I would still like to know what happens to the kids when they’re caught. Just for having a little fun.”

  “Fun?” Bridge questioned. “Fun? Is destructive vandalism your idea of fun?”

  “It certainly isn’t a criminal offense.”

  “Isn’t it? What’s the difference between stealing a great deal of money or ripping out a piece of expensive equipment that might save someone’s life?”

  The reporter shook his head. “I don’t intend to argue the question with you. It still doesn’t answer my question.”

  Bridge sighed. “After they’ve all been warned, repeatedly, not to commit vandalism, and taught it in the schools, we attempt to find out why they would do so. Is it because of their home life? Are they abused? Do they have a mental problem? We try to find out and then correct the problem. But they will also work while we’re doing that: painting public buildings or working for the elderly, picking up litter—which, if you’ll observe, we don’t have much of-public-service work of some kind. But they’ll give us twenty dollars of their time for every dollar they destroyed.”

  “That’s rather harsh, don’t you think?”

  Bridge shrugged and tried not to smile. He knew their way of life, their philosophy, would not be understood by many of the younger members of the news media. About half of the newspeople now converging upon the Tri-states area were in their thirties, the products of the permissive ‘60s and ’70s, which Bridge knew, only too well, was a time of poor discipline in schools, disregard for law and order, a downgrading of patriotism, morals, values. One could blame the time, but not wholly the individual.

  “What about the police?” a woman asked. “I haven’t seen any.”

  “We don’t have police,” Bridge said. “We have peace officers. And really, not many of them.” He smiled, attempting to put the people at ease. “Here,” he tried to explain, “the people control their lives. We have very few laws, and they are voted on by the people before they become laws. A fifty-one/forty-nine percent for and against won’t make it here. It’s got to be much clearer than that. That may be a majority in your system, but not here.

  “Living here is very simple on the one hand, and very difficult—if not downright impossible—if you’re the type of person who likes to spread malicious gossip, if you’re lazy, if you like to browbeat others. If you’re inclined to cheat and lie ... you won’t make it in this society.”

  “What happens to them?”

  “Well,”—Bridge grinned—“you start spreading lies about somebody in this society, you’re liable to get the shit beat out of you. It’s happened a few times.”

  “And the law did what to the parties involved?”

  “Nothing,” Bridge said flatly. “I don’t know of anyone, male or female, who doesn’t gossip; that’s human nature. Just don’t make it vicious lies.”

  “I’m surprised there hasn’t been any killings, if that’s the kind of laws you people live under. If you want to call it law, that is.”

  “There’ve been a couple of shootings,” Bridge admitted. “But not in the past three or four years. We’re all pretty much of one mind in this area.”

  “Who shot whom, and why?” Clayton questioned.

  “One fellow was messin’ with another man’s wife. He kept messin’ with her even though, as witnesses pointed out, the woman told him, time after time, to leave her alone. She finally went to her husband and told him. The husband warned the man—once. The warning didn’t take. The husband called the man out one afternoon; told him he was going to beat hell out of him. Romeo came out with a gun in his hand. Bad mistake. Husband killed him.”

  The press waited. And waited. Finally Clayton blurted, “Well, what happened?”

  “Nothing, really.” Bridge’s face was impassive. “There was a hearing, of course. The husband was turned loose; Romeo was buried.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Perfectly. I told you all: this is not an easy place to live. But that’s only happened three ... yes, three times since the Tri-states were organized. There is an old western saying, sir: man saddles his own horses, kills his own snakes. And if I have to explain that, you’d better turn this bus around and get the hell out of here.”

  The bus driver chuckled.

  The press corps absorbed that bit of western philosophy for a moment . . . in silence. Clayton broke the silence by clearing his throat and saying, “Let’s return to the people controlling their own lives, if we ever indeed left it. Elaborate on that, please, without the High Noon scenario, if possible, and I’m not sure you weren’t just putting us on about that.”

  “I believe that Sergeant Roisseau told Mr. Barney Weston that this is a one-mistake state and he’d had his—right?”

  Barney felt his face grow hot. “Mr. Oliver, maybe I was out of line, but I just got mauled and humiliated. Don’t you think that’s going a bit far?”

  “Would you do it again?” Bridge asked.

  “Absolutely not!”

  Bridge laughed. “Well . . . you just answered your question.”

  “Mr. Oliver?” Judith said. “Are you taking us on a preselected route? I’ve seen no shacks or poor-looking people. No crummy beer joints. No malnourished kids. Nothing to indicate poverty or unhappiness.”

  “I’m not qualified to speak on the unhappiness part of your question. I’m sure there must be some unhappiness here. But I can guarantee you there is no hunger or poverty. We’ve corrected that—totally.”

  The newspeople had just left an area—America—where people were still dying from the sickness caused by the bombings: cancer-related illnesses from radiation sickness; where people were starving and out of work; where gangs of thugs still roamed parts of the nation; where the sights of devastation were still very much in evidence. Now, for Bridge Oliver to tell them that here, in the Tri-states, there was no poverty, no hunger . . . that was ludicrous.

  “Oh, come now, man!” Clayton’s tone was full of disbelief. “That is simply not possible.”

  “Perhaps not in your society, but it certainly did happen here. You’ll be free to roam the country, talk to people. The only hungry people you’ll find in Tri-states will be those people who might be on a diet.”

  “Well, would you be so kind as to tell us just how you people managed that?”

  “By ripping down any slum or shack area and building new housing, and not permitting a building to deteriorate. We have very tough housing codes, and they are enforced....”

  “I can just imagine how,” Barney muttered, his face reddening at the laughter around him.

  “. . . We have no unemployment—there are jobs going begging right now. We’re opening factories, little by little, but the process of screening takes time; it’s long and slow. As I’ve tried to explain, it takes a very special person to live in our society. We won’t tolerate freeloaders, of any kind. We have no unions here, and will not permit any to come in. They are not necessary in this society. You’ll see what I mean as you travel about. Our economy matches our growth, and wages are in line with it. Wages are paid commensurate to a person’s ability to
do a job, and a person’s sex has nothing to do with it. It’s equal pay right down the line. There is a minimum wage for certain types of work, but I defy you—any of you—to find a sweatshop anywhere in the Tri-states. The people won’t stand for it.”

  “That doctrine is somehow vaguely familiar,” a reporter said.

  “If you’re thinking socialism or communism, put it out of your mind; you haven’t got your head screwed on straight. I’d like to hear you name any communist country—ever—where the entire population was armed—to the teeth! No, none of you can. Believe me, if the people living here ever decide they don’t like the government, they’ve damned sure got the firepower to change it. But they won’t. Because, as I’ve told you, we like it this way.

  “Now in terms of wealth, it would be very difficult for a person to become a millionaire—not impossible, but difficult. Taxes get pretty steep after a certain income level. But if a person is poor, it’s that person’s own fault, and he or she can blame no one else. But, it’s as I said; we don’t have any poor people.”

  “And no rich people.”

  “That is correct.”

  “Number of churches here,” a woman observed. “Is attendance mandatory?”

  “No!” Bridge laughed. “Where in the world are you people getting these off-the-wall questions?”

  “But you people do place a lot of emphasis on religion,” Judith said. “Right?”

  Bridge shrugged. “Some do, some don’t. Hell, people! Prostitution is legal here.”

  The newspeople all looked at each other, not believing what they had just heard.