American Assassins

Chapter 1: Kimberley

        I clutch my sister’s body in my arms as I watch my father strangle my mother’s neck.  She fights back but my father is too strong.  She is losing breath quickly and her eyes fall upon Ronnie and I.  Ronnie, who is only seven, cries in my chest, whimpering, holding a death grip on my shirt.  My mother reaches out a hand to us, trying to touch us one last time, but her eyes are fading and soon her whole body falls limp. 

            My father drops her and looks pleased as he accomplishes his goal.  “United States filth,” He spits.   What once was Canada and half of North America, has now been taken over by a government facility called the Union. The Union and America are at war with one another.  World War 5.  Mexico, however, is only allies with the people who give the country the most money.  My father fights for the Union because he was originally a Canadian citizen but my mother was an American.  Ronnie and I follow our mother as Americans.  But now, we will see how long we have to live.  Our father turns towards us.  His black hair is greased back and his beard was dripping with blood.  Our mother lies motionless, just a few feet away.  Our father walks towards us with his hand clutched into a fist, blood dripping from it.  I look over at my mom who has blood dripping from her mouth and hands.  My heart stops and I look up at my father. 

            “Ronnie you need to run,” I whisper to her.  She looks up at me before I throw her as hard as I can to one side of the room while I feel my father’s fingers clasp themselves around my neck.  I kick and scream but he just squeezes tighter around my throat.  I’m losing air and my struggling softens.  My vision becomes blurry and I realize that I’m just going to die like my mother when I’m released and I fall hard to the ground.  I cough out blood and gasp for air.  I wait for my vision to come back and see my little sister now getting strangled by him.  “You weaklings have a choice, either join me as a Union officer or die as a filthy, puny Americans,” he turns to me, “Your choice.”  His eyes are filled with hatred and fury.  He wants to kill us.  I used to think my father loved us endlessly, but now as I watch him try and kill us, everything changes rapidly.

            I huddle up against the wall and stand up.  Fresh blood was trickling down my chin, I look up at him and scowl, “I’d rather die a low class American then be supreme commander of The Union.”  Ronnie then bites down on his hand. The shock was so much he releases her and she falls to the ground with a thud.  I take a knife from the kitchen counter, run, and stab his lower body on the side.  Then I rip it out and run it down his right eye. 

He screeches out in pain and grabs his stabbed side and eye. I grab Ronnie’s hand and we head for the door.  She can’t run as fast as me so I pick her up and carry her.  Before I run out I look back to see my father looking at me with the eye he is not covering up.  I didn’t stab his eye but I did gave him a real good scar down the middle of it.  Then I look at my mother, lying still, lifeless.  Tears start to form in my eyes as I run out the door. Ronnie pushes closer to my chest, trying to keep warm in the cold night.

                                                                                                                                             

            Once we reach a forest, I set Ronnie down by a tree trunk and sit next to her.  We are runaways, outcasts, abandoned and abused by our father.  We have no home, no family.  We are alone in the world.  Our mother is dead along with our hopes and dreams. Ronnie looks up at me with her dark blue eyes; I can barely see her because of the black night.  “Kimberley,” she softly whines, “when can we go home?”  My heart sinks.  I hug her tightly and begin to cry, “Never,” I croak.  “We can never go back, that house is a murder place.  Our father is a murder do you hear me, never trust him, if you ever see him again, runaway, don’t even talk to him, do you understand?”