there is no greater freedom than the open road

The initial meeting between Lillian Hart and Andrew King had been anything but conventional. He had become frequent at the joint she danced at, well before the first time she ever took the stage. He had been there that night, and it started out like any other night until Lillian stepped out and put on a show he'd never forget. She became Andrew's favorite, often going to the establishment on the nights he knew she would be there and tucking whatever was left of his money between the straps of the only piece of clothing she had on. Lillian was nineteen at the time, a runaway trying to strip her way into a comfortable living situation - Andrew was twenty-six and a motorcycle enthusiast who worked in a garage specializing in building custom motorcycles. For months they played the game of him coming to watch her dance, paying for private lap dances, until one night a lap dance turned more physical than either of them had bargained for. The chemistry between the two of them was undeniable, so the fact that they hooked up in a VIP room of the gentleman's club shouldn't have come as a surprise to either of them, but it did. When the shock and awkwardness wore off, a new game was created. He would watch her dance, pay for private VIP treatment, but replaced the lap dance with sex. Andrew would often leave her not only the money her boss expected for the VIP package, but a tip to ensure she would have enough food in her fridge for a week. For six months this continued, until the tip Andrew left Lillian one night didn't show itself until two months later.

Finding out he had knocked up a stripper sent Andrew reeling, he never accused her of tricking him or sleeping with other men, he knew that the majority of the times they had hooked up neither had used protection. He knew it was a possibility, but he wasn't ready to accept fatherhood, he had no idea how to be one and that terrified him. He bottled up the fear, tried to take things to the next level with Lillian, who was eventually fired from her job once she revealed to her boss she was pregnant. Eventually that bottle burst, Andrew took off when Lillian was seven months into her pregnancy, though he would send money to make sure she and his unborn child had what they needed. He may not have been able to accept his impending parenthood, but he refused to turn into a total deadbeat dad like his own. Andrew used up all his earned vacation time from the garage, totaling two months, turning that into a statewide road trip. He had been only a few cities over from Fall River when a friend had informed him that Lillian had gone into labor, and despite himself, he made a beeline for the hospital to get back to the woman he had fallen for. Her parents were reluctant to let him into the room, but his shouts were heard by Lillian who insisted to one of the nurses to bring him to her. Through the pain and gritted teeth, Lillian still managed to tear a new hole in Andrew's backside for bailing on her and their child, and all he could do was agree that he was wrong and apologize. He promised to never leave again, though he was still afraid of failing as a father. With a final push, there was a moment of silence before tiny cries filled the room. He couldn't bring himself to cut the umbilical cord, or even hold the little boy at first, but the moment he saw Lillian holding their son, something told him he was right where he was always meant to be.

It took a day for Andrew to be able to hold his son, Zachary, but as soon as the infant wrapped in blue was placed in his arms, he felt weak in the knees. He needed to sit, to have something sturdy below him so he wouldn't feel like he might fall and drop his boy. Little eyes looked up at the bearded man, tiny fingers wrapped tightly around his pinkie and Andrew felt his paternal drive switch on, he was in absolute love. Zachary became the apple of Andrew's eye and vowed he would do everything he could to provide a healthy family situation, something he never had, and he planned on starting that vow with the intention to marry Lillian.

The first few years of Zach's life weren't exactly the greatest, it was a struggle to keep food on the table, let alone in the fridge, and when things broke they remained that way until they could afford to fix it. Lillian had taken up night classes to get herself a slightly more respectable job, but it didn't pay nearly as well as stripping had - though Andrew forbade her from returning to that lifestyle. Things at the garage weren't exactly going as smooth either, but together they made it work, barely. In 1989, months after Zach turned three, his father found himself hanging around The Knights of Hell MC. Zach was far too young to understand any of it, but that didn't make him numb to the fights it caused between his parents, the yelling often woke him up during the night. When he was six, his father was patched in, and that was when his father allowed him to start meeting some of the Knights. Most of them scared the hell out of him, but at the same time, the roar of their motorcycles fascinated him. In time, they became a second family to him, and that only frustrated his mother more when Zach preferred to go with his father and then come home covered in dirt or grease from meddling with his dad's beloved custom-built ride. Before he knew it, his father seemed to have a thicker wallet, keeping food in the house was no longer an issue, and sometimes Zach would find himself with a new toy for no apparent reason other than his dad wanted to buy him something. It caused curiosity to brew within Lillian, but being surprised with the occasional, and fairly pricey, necklace or other pieces of jewelry made her realize that she didn't want to know how he got the money after all.

Despite the typical trouble little boys often found themselves in, Zachary was a pretty good kid and very bright. At the end of third grade, he was tested and given permission to skip the fourth grade entirely. Even going straight into the fifth grade seemed like it wasn't enough, but his mother refused to let him test again. It was better for him to at least remain close to those he attended elementary school with rather than going off to middle school not knowing a soul. He continued to get good grades, and each report card he brought home bearing straight A's earned him a ride on his father's motorcycle, that was all the incentive he needed to make sure he stayed on top of his grades. When he brought home his first straight-A report card from middle school, halfway through his sixth-grade year, Zach was given a pocket motorcycle, black in color and fashioned after a Kawasaki Ninja. It pained his father to purchase him something that resembled a crotch rocket, but Zachary had come to love them more with their speed, sound, and sleek design. Of course that lead to some teasing from a few of the Knights, but he never minded it. Instead, he would put on his toughest (for a ten-year-old) face and challenge them to a race. It never came to that though.

At the age of thirteen, tragedy struck their little family. Andrew was killed while out doing a run, though nobody would ever fully tell Zach what happened, wanting to spare him the gruesome details. While Andrew's death caused Lillian to pull away from the club, Zach did the opposite, choosing to spend his free time around them, helping out in whatever way they would allow him to. It wasn't until he was fourteen that things really sunk in for him, his father not being around doing its damage. He grew rebellious, started skipping classes and his grades suffered. His father wasn't around to reward him for his straight A's, so he saw no point in putting forth the effort. He could easily do the coursework in his sleep, but he felt there was no need to turn any of it in, let alone even complete it. The only thing that kept him from ditching school completely, or letting his grades fall to a failing level, was the fact that he had to maintain a 2.0 GPA to remain on the lacrosse team. However, he found himself being suspended from games every so often because he grew too aggressive on the field. If it weren't for some of guys in the club stepping up to keep an eye on him, Zach (who now preferred to go by 'King') likely would have up and left, dropped out of school and just drift off to wherever he could go. It wasn't until he was in danger of not graduating that one of the Knights, that had become like an older brother to him, finally got through to him. He made King realize what he was throwing away, the toll it was taking on his mother, and while he was sure the intention wasn't to make him feel terrible, it did, and that was what he needed. The last six months of his senior year he turned everything around, he got his grades back up, kept his anger in check on the lacrosse field, and apologized to his mother with a promise that he would make her proud of him again, somehow. That somehow turned into a desire to enlist in the Army, but since he was only sixteen when he graduated, and a few months shy of his birthday, he had to wait until then and have parental permission. The day King turned seventeen, his mother drove him to the local recruiter's office and two hours later after discussing his options and what he wanted to do, he had signed an eight-year enlistment.

The Army was quick to set King straight, especially with the rigorous training ahead of him due to going straight for the Special Forces. It took him two years to complete his Basic and necessary training for his MOS. In January 2006, he was deployed on his first tour overseas in Iraq. It put a lot of things into perspective for him, but also tested his ability to treat wounded soldiers under extreme stress. He had saved a number of lives but still lost a few in the process, that humbled him in a lot of ways. His deployment lasted fourteen months and as soon as he was able to, he took two weeks leave to return home to Fall River to see his mother, and of course the Knights. He needed that sense of normalcy, to remind him that there were more things to life than the war he had just come back from. His leave was spent tinkering with things, enjoying the familial warmth the club gave off, and food that was not served from the mess hall. When he returned to his station, he used some of the hazard pay he had saved to purchase an actual Kawasaki Ninja that looked something like the fake replica he had as a child. Naturally, it earned him more teasing from the guys in the MC, but he loved every minute of it. It didn't hurt when he actually beat some of them in races too.

On Valentines Day 2008, King found himself heading overseas again for another tour in Iraq. He was slated to remain there a year but only made it nine months before everything went wrong. His unit was out on their routine patrol when they were attacked, an IED went off behind him, and shrapnel littered his back. Everything after that became a blur to Zach, retaining consciousness was difficult but he remembered hearing the other medic with them saying something about his femoral artery being nicked. The next solid thing he could remember was waking up in a hospital room, nurses and doctors speaking a language that wasn't from the country he was in. Or thought he was in. They had kept him heavily sedated after the attack, calling in for a medical evacuation and transporting the wounded to a field hospital before a plane took them to Germany. He had learned that two guys from his unit hadn't survived their injuries and that he had barely survived his own. His left leg had been so badly injured that it was unlikely it would ever heal fully, and after an infection had set in, he made the tough decision to let them amputate from just above the knee joint. He knew he couldn't get down on himself, he had lost friends and he wanted to live for them, for his father. While it undoubtedly meant the end of his career, it would not be the end of his life. When he arrived at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in January 2009, he had a good outlook on his future. He knew not every day would be full of roses and sunshine, but he wasn't going to let himself feel like there was a dark and gloomy cloud over his head. He spent five months at the medical center, rehabilitating himself and learning how to walk with a prosthetic. He didn't want to be bound to a wheelchair, he wanted to be able to walk, to feel normal despite losing a leg. He finally returned home to Massachusetts a week shy of his 23rd birthday. After researching different types of prosthetic's, King held a few fundraisers to help him raise the money needed to purchase the one that would better suit his needs. In December 2009, he was able to purchase an X3 waterproof prosthetic, which gave him so much more freedom than he could have ever asked for.

He had begun spending time around the club again, where he had always felt the most connected to his father, and became a prospect for them in April of 2010. Four months later he was hired as a paramedic, becoming the 55th person working in the United States with above knee amputations as an EMT or paramedic. It took some getting used to, but it felt good to be back in his field and it allowed him to be useful to the club in a way. Most of 2011 was spent fixing his father's motorcycle, first getting it in running order and then making several major modifications so that he could operate it. One of the major changes came in the form of a Kliktronic electronic shifter system, allowing him to change gears via a push-button gear selector on the handlebar. Another modification came in the form of linking the side stand to a hand lever extender below the tank. Once the bike was all fixed up, Zach began practicing with it every day, often for hours and with help until he became a proficient rider again.

In 2012, he was patched in, something he had been looking forward to as a kid. So he may have gone the road less traveled to get there, but finally becoming a Knight of Hell meant more to him than he could ever explain. He wasn't able to participate quite like the other members when it came to their operations, but King made himself very useful in other ways, or did small solo jobs that wouldn't put others at risk by slowing them down.

Present day, he's easily holding his own and doing well for himself. He lives in a three bedroom house with no roommate other than his dog, Moose. He owns a handful of different guns, including a CheyTac .408 sniper rifle - all of which he's proficient with. He goes to the range a few times a week to keep up his abilities with all of them, except for the sniper rifle since the range is not long enough or properly equipped to handle such a powerful firearm. They are all kept in a gun safe in the closet of the master bedroom, and they're all registered and legal. He just recently purchased a 2019 Harley Davidson Breakout, and now that the modifications are complete, he's finally able to operate it and retired his father's old motorcycle for good, keeping it covered in his garage.