Without Law 18 by Eric Vall (most difficult books to read .txt) 📗

there’s anything else he’d like us to know, and make sure to tell him that his life depends on it.”

Minji nodded and relayed the message. The soldier’s eyes flashed with fear again before he took a deep breath and replied.

“He says he has nothing else of importance,” Minji said. “But he asks for mercy.”

I thought about all the destruction we’d seen on the way down from Vermont, all the innocent lives these assholes had taken without regard for anything but their own agenda. To ask for mercy was not only cowardice, but it was pathetic. This sonofabitch had killed innocent civilians, children, anybody who wasn’t necessary to their plan, not to mention the millions of people who probably starved to death after their EMP attack. Who was he to ask for mercy?

How dare he insinuate that he’s done anything worthy of even the smallest amount of kindness.

I thought again about my baby and the world they would grow up in because these fuckers decided to come try and take away our country, our safety, our lives.

Maybe at one point, I would’ve been willing to grant mercy to this man, but that Tav was gone, and the new one didn’t have a shred of mercy left in him. Not for assholes like this, anyway.

I yanked my pistol from my hip and aimed it right at the soldier’s face. That same fear flashed over his face, and he started to speak quickly in Korean, no doubt begging for his life.

Minji didn’t even bother to translate, she just lowered her eyes and walked away.

My eyes narrowed in on the asshole in front of me, but all I could do was shake my head. His pleading was pitiful, and it only served to anger me.

I clenched my teeth and pulled the trigger.

Then I pulled it again, and again, and again, until every last soldier was on the ground with a bloody hole through their heads.

Chapter 15

Once I had finished with the soldiers, I stepped back and took a little breather while everyone else started to look through the rubble to see if there was anything valuable left.

I made my way back to the sandbags the girls and I had taken cover behind, and I placed one hand on them, bent my head forward, and took a deep, steadying breath.

It had been a long time since I’d been that angry, but the idea that these men took something away from my child was more than I could bear, and then I thought about how they’d taken so much away from so many children. I’d seen the little girl they’d left dead by the side of the road, and I knew she couldn’t have been the only one.

Regardless of if that man had taken that life personally, he’d been part of the group that had. He hadn’t stopped them, he hadn’t decided it was too much and left so he was no longer part of the heinous actions of his military. He’d remained a soldier for them, he’d fought their battle, killed civilians for them, and that was heinous enough for me.

I was a military man, but I was a human being first and foremost, and I had the free will and the conscience to say fuck you to anyone I pleased. If I had been called on to kill innocent civilians during my time overseas, I would have gone AWOL, or told my commanding officer exactly where he could stick his request.

Regardless of the matters of war, we still had to treat each other with the basic dignity that was our right as humans. These NK soldiers seemed to have completely abandoned that philosophy, though. They no longer saw us as human beings, we were only bodies standing in their way, and their orders were the most important things to them.

These soldiers had earned that bullet to the dome, and I regretted nothing.

“Tav?” Anna’s voice came from behind me, and I turned to see all my girls looking at me with concern.

“Are you okay?” Bailey asked, and my sweet hippie girl bit her lip and furrowed her brow.

“I”m fine,” I told her with a small smile, and I reached out and gently pulled her shoulder toward me so I could kiss the top of her head.

“Hey, why does she get head kisses?” Tara teased.

“Because she asked if I was alright,” I joked back.

“Weeeellll, are you alright?” Tara asked with a laugh.

“I’m fine,” I chuckled, and I leaned down and kissed the top of her head, too.

“You seemed pretty upset,” Paige noted. “Was it having to kill those guys? Because they deserved it.”

“I know they did.” I nodded. “It wasn’t killing them that upset me, it was thinking about our baby and the way these monsters have treated our country.”

“Yeah, I thought about that little girl on the side of the road,” Bailey said, and her voice shook slightly with emotion. “That’s why I didn’t say anything when Paige said it was against the rules to kill them. I didn’t care. You’re right, they’re monsters.”

“They are,” Paige agreed. “I shouldn’t have said anything in the first place. They deserve whatever comes to them.”

“What’s that sound?” Anna asked suddenly, and she looked over to Tara, who had her head down.

The platinum-blonde’s chest was heaving up and down, and her hands were up over her eyes.

“Tara?” I asked. “Are you crying?”

“I just…” she sobbed. “You said our baby, and it made me really happy.

“Soooo, these are happy tears?” I laughed.

“Yeeessss,” she cried. The poor thing had full on mascara black tear streaks down her cheeks, and her face was contorted in that terrible way it gets when someone cries so hard they can’t control themselves.

“Ummmm… I’m gonna go help everyone else,” Anna said, and she looked at me warily as