Out of the Ashes

“Oh, it could work, but it would take a lot of education and a lot of conforming to make it work. But I'm not concerned with the other states. Just this area.

“Let's wind this down and get it over with. Our bank interest rates are low—lower than they've been in the United States for almost twenty years. We have full employment, almost zero crime. Our pay scale is excellent, and we do it all without the threat of unions hanging over the businessman's head.”

“Do you plan to keep unions out?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“By allowing in only those people who don't want something for nothing. Profit-sharing is law in the Tri-states; which is one of the reasons it's difficult for anyone to become a millionaire. Large factories are owned by the men and women who work the factories. We have very fair labor/management practices. Businesses offer excellent fringe-benefit plans. Our Fair Labor Practices Board—which is headed by a woman, by the way—is constantly checking to see that management pulls its share, and God help them if they are not. Sexual discrimination and sexual harassment will not be found in the Tri-states. That's why some hotshot executives who moved in here from the cities moved out about a week after they got here.

“Job descriptions are defined from A to Z, and getting the boss his coffee, picking up his laundry, and looking after the family cat while he's on vacation are not part of an employee's job. I'm hitting the high spots, but you all get the overall picture.

“We have grievance committees in every shop, every factory, every business. Retirement plans are mandatory: business pays a third, labor pays a third, the state pays a third. Funds are transferrable from job to job, and there is no hassle connected with it. The same could have been done in the United States forty years ago.

“No one—repeat, no one—works six months out of a year then lays up on his or her backside drawing unemployment the other six. We'll find people jobs the same day they lose or quit them. They might not like them, but they'll work them or get the hell out.”

“How about taxes—are they high?”

“No. They are low, really, and we can keep them that way because our revenue goes to things other than fine new jails, federal grants and programs, make-work projects, investigating the sexual habits of a grubworm, and pork-barrel boondoggles. And we've done it without creating a monster bureaucracy.” He smiled. “That sticks in the craw of Logan.

“It is very true that we have broken away from the Constitution of the United States—to a degree—but we haven't broken away from it any further than your government has in the past thirty years. The only difference was in direction. Your government went left, we went right.”

“Mr. Raines, the federal government in Richmond declares what you've done is illegal, and they will eventually stop you. I'd like to hear your views on that.”

“Well, sir,” Ben said, “I'd be very interested in hearing just how they plan to stop us. The only way they possibly could do it is through another war, and they'd have to kill off every man, woman, and child in the Tri-states. That's the only way.

“We intend to live in peace as long as we're left alone. But"—Ben smiled, a wolf's baring of teeth that touched each member of the press, sending an eerie tingling up and down the spines of all present—"the man who issues that order to wipe us out is a dead man.”

The press waited, stirred, looked at each other.

“The Tri-states is broken up into districts,” Ben said. “Each district has a team of five men and women, all volunteers, all highly trained. Only a very few people know their identities. They are called zero squads because that is the odds of their coming out of their assignments—zero. They might be able to complete their assignments in a week; more than likely it will take some months, but they will complete their assignments, believe that.

“To declare war on us orders have to come from the top: the president, the House, and Senate. When, or if, that order comes down to destroy us, the president, the VP, any member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and any representative and senator who voices approval of the plan ... will die.”

SIX

All the members of the press but one came to their feet in a roar of outrage. To break away from the Union was one thing—a bit daring, glamorous. But to plan and carry out mass murder was quite another; unthinkable—in their minds. Only Judith remained seated and calm in the midst of the uproar in the Raineses’ back yard, a faint smile on her lips—a smile that could be taken as admiration. Governor General Raines had taken out quite an insurance policy on the future of the Tri-states, and she had no doubt but what he meant every word. She was finding the prospect of living in the Tri-states more exciting with every minute.

Badger was on his feet, swinging the AK-47 toward the newspeople, anticipating a rush toward the governor. Juno was standing, snarling. Ben calmed them both with a quiet voice.