Wings of Fire, Ch. 02 Teaser (Patreon)

“Wait, Ezio was your friend?” Laura asked.

“Yeah, he was. Not sure how that punch is going to go over with him but I’m sure that he’ll forgive me when I see him next. Though he had some ways of thinking that I didn’t agree with, he did look out for me whenever he could after your dad took over,” James told her.

“Why didn’t you tell me all of this when we were back on the ground?” Laura shot at him.

“Did I really have the time to do that, with what we had planned right off the top of our heads and the night already half gone?” Jim replied in a tone heavy with sarcasm. Laura would have said something, but she had no rebuttal for what he’d just told her, so she clamped her mouth shut, chagrined.

“So, where are we going?” she asked, changing the subject.

“To an old military base in Kentucky, that was abandoned about seven years ago. Back when the wall went up, to keep people in the US, a lot of military bases had to be shut down and soldiers relocated to keep watch on the wall,” Jim explained.

“I remember when that happened. There were a lot of unhappy people back then,” Laura remembered.

“Yeah, because nearly every man was a part of the military then. The cuts that were made sent a lot of men home and out of a job, so a lot of people were rightly pissed. I’m pretty sure that the country might have gone broke if they hadn’t made those cuts in the first place,” Jim surmised.

“But this is America, the land of plenty!” Laura said, indignant that what she’d been taught wasn’t lining up with reality.

“It was, when the Indigenous Nation and Republic of California was still part of the United States. Since they’ve seceded, it’s been all downhill for the US. Only recently have things gotten better for the common man. It took those money grubbing idiots in Washington long enough to get their act together to make things bearable for people these days,” James recounted for her.

“How do you know so much?”

“Despite being of mixed birth, I was raised in an upper class home and had tutors who taught me much of the world and the way it is. My mother paid well to make sure that I was an educated man, growing up. I’m also an ardent student of history and I like to keep abreast of current events, so that I can stay informed, rather than ignorant,” Jim told Laura.

“Your mom sounds like she was one hell of a woman, making sure you were looked after like that. I heard about her passing and I’m sorry,” Laura offered to James.

“Thanks. I appreciate that and yeah, she was. Where do you think I get my firecracker attitude from?” Jim joked. Giggling, she snorted through a brief fit before asking some more questions.

“So, how long have you been planning this for?” she wondered.