His first act was to hire a couple of assassins to take out some well-respected men on the outside of the city where the biggest population of New Vegas was. After the job was done, he had them captured, cut their tongues out so they couldn’t tell anyone it was he who hired them, and had them executed in front of a more than willing audience outside of New Vegas. In fact, the people seemed to revel in a little death when he made it seem like the executed were evil.
Next, he took further steps and made the pit. At first, men could fight freely for credits. That was the important thing. Right then, he couldn’t overstep and take control too quickly. He had to make them accustomed to a society built on strength.
As months turned into years, he found that he had been acting ruler for three long years. In that time, the people had developed a bloodlust with executions at an all-time high and more people than ever coming out to watch the fights. It was finally time for the rest of his plan to materialize.
Charles sent people to spread rumors about the former city of Los Angeles, which now had a colony of its own. According to messengers, the people there wanted nothing more than to take what was theirs. There were reports of robbery, rape, and even killing. It was all lies, but that didn’t matter. Charles was finding quickly that power wasn’t about money or titles. Power was an illusion that only the best storyteller could truly hold. If you controlled the narrative, then you controlled society as a whole. Within three months, the people were ready for war.
Next came training and scouting. He sent his best people to train the citizens and give everyone guns when they had learned well enough to kill. Meanwhile, Charles sent some scouts out to see exactly what Los Angeles was hiding. What kind of supplies did they have, and what kind of firepower would New Vegas be up against if they did attack them? The answer was that Los Angeles had more than most but was a little unprepared for a fight. They were the perfect target, and when his people got used to their new weapons and were just terrified enough to do something drastic, Charles presented them with a plan. It was better to strike first than to be taken by surprise.
He was met with mainly support, and they took Los Angeles within the month. Most of their enemies died quickly, but the few who were lucky enough to live had the choice between slavery or the fighting pits. Some chose to fight, but little did they know that the bouts they participated in weren’t going to be fair. They would be put through a ten-round gauntlet that always resulted in failure. It was a waste of people, but the citizens of New Vegas loved seeing them torn apart. After all, they were a living example of the madness that would have supposedly found its way to their city if their fearless leader hadn’t led them in facing the threat head on.
In the following years, Charles would lead them on many other conquests against smaller settlements. For a while, he had to present their enemies in a bad light, casting them as savages or thieves, but after enough time had passed, the people only craved two things - blood and the spoils of war. He had changed their entire society in only a decade, and as far as Charles could tell, they were the most powerful colony in North America.
“How is he?” a very anxious Sarah asked as Charles walked into the bedroom that had been serving as the holding cell for all of them.
“He’s stable. He’s awake and talking. Alex won’t be walking for a few weeks, though. The surgery was complicated. He should live and serve me for many years to come, however. You can see him if you want,” Charles answered.
“Really? All of us?” Sarah asked in surprise.
“Of course. I have nothing to fear in my home surrounded by hundreds of loyal servants. Be warned, however. I saved your lives out there, but with one wrong move, all of you could forfeit them. Do we understand each other?” he asked sternly.
“Absolutely.”
“Then follow Melvin. He’ll show you to Alex’s room,” Charles said while pointing to the butler standing outside.
They walked with him down the hallway, nervous the whole time. Alex had looked so fragile at the end of the fight. Would he really be okay? Sarah had her doubts, but when she walked through the door, she could see that Alex was still the same. He looked tired and like he was in a lot of pain, but he was whole. Right then, that was enough.
“Thank God you’re all right,” she said and ran to him. Sarah wrapped her arms around him and whispered into his ear. “How are we going to get out of here?”
“We can’t talk now. He has eyes and ears everywhere,” Alex whispered and cut his eyes toward the door where a guard was looking intently at them.
“Well, at least we’re all alive. I love you so much. I don’t know what I would have done without you,” Sarah said and gave him a peck on the lips.
“You would’ve been fine, but believe me when I say I’m glad, too. We’re not exactly in a good situation, though. I’m stuck in this bed, and who knows what you four will have to be doing before it’s all over,” Alex said and shook his head.
“We’ll be fine,” Lee assured him, looking braver than Alex thought he would.
“He’s right. We can survive this,” Travis said, also looking surprisingly sure of himself.
“And what do you think? We can’t all be sure about being here,” Alex said and looked at Alisa.
“It’s not ideal, and I would rather be anywhere other than where my brother’s killers are, but I’ve stayed in much worse places than a palace. Then there’s the fact that I thought I was as good as dead a few hours ago. I would say this is an improvement,” she said, although Alisa didn’t hide her rage as well as Lee and Travis.
She wanted revenge for her brother and everything she had been through. She wanted the same things that Alex had dreamed of a long time ago in Raines. Back then, he wanted a fairer city where he didn’t have to fight to survive or watch those he loved die needlessly. Those feelings would do one of two things. They would spark real change in time, or they would get her killed quickly. Alex had to hope for the former.
“Then I guess we’re lucky. Let’s roll with this and cooperate . . . for now,” Alex mouthed as the guard turned his head for a moment.
Clearly now wasn’t the time to make a prison break when Alex could barely move, but it would come. When it did, Alex would make sure that Charles Boyd regretted ever thinking he could make him his slave.
Chapter 17
Slaves and Loyalty
Six Weeks Later
Lee awoke just as the sun was peeking through his servant’s room window. He sighed, knowing what the day would hold. It had been six long weeks, and they had made no headway on escaping. In fact, Alex was just now able to stand and walk a short distance without assistance. How Charles thought he was going to be able to work in two more weeks, Lee had no idea.
In a way, he thought his father was lucky. Sure, being injured wasn’t luxurious, but it was better than the alternative. Over the last few days, Lee had been forced to do so many things. He cooked, cleaned, unstopped drains, and even fixed the air conditioner, which he had no idea how to do, but Charles had assured him that if he didn’t figure it out everyone he loved would die. Thankfully, Alisa had helped him, and between the two of them, they finally figured out that absolutely nothing was wrong with the air conditioner besides the fact that some garbage had been sucked into the fan, keeping it from running. Once it was removed, it nearly chopped Lee’s fingers off, but at least everyone he knew would get to live.
The only decent part of his day was getting to see Alisa. She was used to doing whatever she had to in order to survive, so this was easier on her. At first, Lee had turned his nose up at the thought of serving someone else, but he quickly learned to get with the program when Charles threatened to take Alisa into a bedroom and let his guards do whatever they wanted with her. He was in a position of weakness, and until that changed, all he could do was protect the ones he loved by playing the part of a slave.
“Hey, you better get up. We’ve got to get the kitchen ready. If we’re late, they won’t be happy,” Al
isa said as she popped her head into his room.
“I suppose,” Lee said and sighed as he stood and slipped his servant’s shirt on. It looked formal with a black and white design, but the truth was that it was a cheaply made shirt that was starting to unwind at the seams. Lee guessed that these rags were all Charles was willing to spare for servants, considering that he obviously thought they were no more valuable than the dirt on his shoes.
“When it’s just us, it’s all right to have that attitude, but when we’re out there, you have to smile and pretend you’re glad to be here. You know that, right?” Alisa asked, sounding slightly desperate. Then she closed the door and stepped inside.
“And why is that?”
“That’s how they trained us, and you know about the quarterly review. Not everyone makes the cut, and not making the cut for us doesn’t mean getting a demotion . . . whatever that would be for the lowest of lows. It means losing our lives.”
“I get it, and I’ll be better. I promise. I’m just so frustrated. When are we getting out of here, and why haven’t Veronica and Roger come back with help yet? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Actually, it makes perfect sense. Your parents might have been important in the past, but they’re just two people. Whoever runs your city now obviously isn’t willing to risk the lives of so many people just to save us. I get that, too.”
“You do? You know we’re the ones who need saving, right?”
“Of course, but what would you do in his situation? Would you really march your people all the way here?”
“I don’t know, but I guess it doesn’t matter. We’re stuck in this place, and until my dad is actually able to, we can’t even try to escape.”
“Don’t worry. We will get out of here eventually.”
“Well, I’m glad one of us is sure. Anyway, how do I look?” Lee asked as he ran his hands through his hair and put on the most awkward fake smile Alisa had ever seen.
“Don’t ever make that face again,” she said and cringed.
“Oh, you know I’m handsome,” he joked.
“Maybe, but you’re certainly not an actor. Just don’t look angry. I think that’s the best we’re going to be able to do today without making you look like you’re a madman.”
They walked out of the room and made their way to the kitchen where Travis was already thawing all the meat. He looked as tired as Lee felt. He had dark circles and squinted eyes that could barely stay open. It was obvious that Travis hadn’t slept much the night before.
“Are you okay?” Alisa asked him.
“Yeah. I just didn’t get any sleep last night.”
“Why not? After ten, we’re done,” Lee said.
“Some of us are, and some aren’t. Charles still doesn’t like that I lied about my identity before, so guess what I got to do last night? I was on guard duty, and before you ask, no, they didn’t give me a gun or even a nightstick. I think he just wanted me to have to stay awake all night and then do all of this again today,” Travis said.
“I’m sorry. What can we do?”
“Just help me stack the dishes and wake me up if I pass out.”
They got everything ready for the cooks and stayed until after breakfast was over. At that point, they washed dishes and thought of what they desired most in the world. By now, they had learned their routines so well that they didn’t even have to think about them. Lee would pick up around the palace, while Alisa dusted furniture and scrubbed toilets. Meanwhile, Travis would be the official yard boy, even if the grass didn’t need cutting. Lee was starting to think that Travis was right. Maybe Charles did hate him.
For Lee, his greatest desire was simply to escape with the people he cared about. Travis and Alisa had other ideas, however. More than anything, they wanted to plunge a knife into Charles Boyd’s chest. He was the one who had built a savage society that ultimately killed Alisa’s brother, and he was the man who had made Travis’s life a living hell for six weeks straight. If they could, they would have strung him up right there, but as usual, they were powerless.
Thankfully, Sarah’s job wasn’t quite as bad. Upstairs, she was getting the children of the palace ready for the day. She was highly educated, so she also acted as a teacher for them. Sarah didn’t particularly love looking after kids all day, but it was better than the alternative, and it wasn’t the kids’ faults that their father was a warmongering psychopath. It was, however, shocking when she first learned that Charles Boyd had children. She had never pictured him as a father, but then again, he wasn’t much of one. It takes more than DNA to make a dad, and these children barely knew him, even though they lived in the same palace.
The children all had different mothers. Charles had forced himself on a lot of the maids in the past. He didn’t call it rape because they didn’t say no. Could they have said no, though? Sarah didn’t think so. No one in the palace could even utter a bad word about him and get away with it, so what would happen if someone said no to anything he asked for? Sarah had considered testing it out by saying she couldn’t work one day, but she knew that would be foolish. This was the same man who reveled in violence and had killed a maid in front of Alex just to prove a point.
“Mrs. Morgan, what’s wrong?” a little girl named Gretchen asked.
She was only four, and she particularly loved reading time, which was in the mornings. Sarah had opened a book to the first page and then gotten lost in thought. She had no idea how long she had been standing there either, just dreaming of what had been and what seemed like could never be again. Would Sarah ever see her daughter again? Would her son get to go home? Those questions seemed more cruel than anything. With every passing day, the chance of escape lessened, and she was starting to see that this was just their new reality.
“I’m okay, baby. Now, let’s start with Dr. Seuss,” Sarah answered and faked a smile for Gretchen’s sake. After all, a child that young had no idea that slaves were doing everything in the place she lived. As a matter of fact, Gretchen might have thought of Sarah as more like family than Charles at that point.
In the third-floor bedroom that he had been placed in so long ago, Alex forced himself to stand. Pain shot through his hip and radiated down his leg and up into his lower back. It was almost too much to take, but Alex still had to smile as he saw his reflection in the mirror. They hadn’t fed him very well, only giving him the bare minimum he needed to survive. He had lost weight. The extra pounds he used to have were gone, but his muscles were fading, too.
What would they think, Alex wondered and shook his head while grinning. If Jake and Will could see him now, they would be looking at an old man by that time’s standards, and even worse, he would be a man without a lot of muscle definition and a bad hip. What would Jake say to him? Would he scold him for ever getting his family into this situation to begin with, or would he simply help him recover as quickly as possible? Alex could just hear him now. You’ve got to get out of bed, kid. The sooner you do, the sooner we can blow this joint and go home. He would be right, too. It seemed impossible, but in two weeks, Alex needed to not only be ready to work. He had to be ready to fight because once he could run, that was exactly what he planned to do.
As Alex was limping down the hall, he saw Charles coming from the other way. He looked pleased, as usual, but in the same off-putting way that Alex had come to know. This man was cocky, and he enjoyed seeing others suffer, but why was he so happy right now? Alex feared the answer to that question, because when Charles was happy, someone always suffered.
“I have good news!” Charles said cheerfully.
“I could use some,” Alex said, feigning enthusiasm.
“In a few weeks, we’re making our move on Raines! Now I know what you’re thinking. Some of your people will die, but some will survive, too. We’ll bring them back here to serve us. Who knows? You might even get to work with someone you used to know,” he said and carefully watched for Alex’s reaction. He wanted him to fly off the handle. Charles wanted to punish
him.
“That’s incredible. I can’t say I love the idea of you invading my homeland, but I already knew it would happen. Getting to see some of them again would be a blessing,” Alex lied, knowing he shouldn’t give Charles a reason to hurt him.
“Well, you’ve certainly learned the rules. I can’t say that you’re as much fun anymore, however,” Charles said before kicking the cane that was helping support Alex’s weight out from under him. Alex crashed to the floor, and Charles smiled before going on his way.
He wanted to lash out, but Alex didn’t react. He simply lay on the floor for a few seconds and took a deep calming breath. For as much as he wanted to rip Charles’s throat out, he wasn’t in any shape to do that. His time would come, and when it did, Alex would make sure that Charles suffered far worse than any of them had. For then, however, all he could do was pull himself up and take one step at a time quite literally. Soon those steps would lead to so much more, and Charles would rue the day he ever set his eyes upon Raines.
* * * * *
Back in Raines, Roger and Veronica were busy. They had gone back thinking that people would immediately rally behind them, but things weren’t that simple. The new leader of Raines had no interest in war, and when she told him that a war might be coming to them if they didn’t act, he simply took defensive measures. He made one thing clear, however. They weren’t sending their best fighters away just so they could get Veronica’s family back. Sure, everyone was grateful for the society her parents had made, but they weren’t willing to throw away their lives for people who didn’t matter in the political life of Raines anymore.
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