Danger in the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  “Why?” Ben’s word was harsh.

  “I simply cannot.” She knew better than to use the word magic.

  Easy, Ben, he cautioned himself. Don’t let this backfire on you. Avoid the words powers or magic. She’s a smart old gal, and she’ll twist those words around and use them against you. She is being careful not to use them herself.

  Both were right to a degree.

  “Don’t you ever again fill these kid’s heads full of garbage, old woman. You hear me?”

  “I hear you and I will obey your commands. Shall I leave the country?”

  “That won’t be necessary. Just stay out of my way and keep your mumbo-jumbo to those ignorant enough to believe it.” He looked straight at Hiram as he said it.

  The man’s mouth was open so wide it looked like his upper plate might fall out.

  “Take her back, boy,” Ben told Harry Larry.

  Harry Larry got back in his rattletrap pickup so fast he lost one shoe.

  “Betsy Ann,” Ben looked at the little girl. “Do you live here in this . . . place?” He waved a hand at the shack.

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Raines.”

  “Get your things. Just a few things. We’re going to give you new clothes when we get to town.”

  “Yes, sir!” the girl ran into the shack.

  Ben and Hiram walked around each other like a couple of stiff-legged dogs.

  “That’s cold, Ben Raines. Takin’ folks kids from them.”

  “Come on, Hiram.” Ben tossed his Thompson to a startled Rebel, who luckily managed to catch it. “Come on. Let’s do it, Hiram. Fight for leadership. You and me. Best man wins, the other pulls out. How about it, redneck?”

  Hiram wanted to do just that . . . sort of. But he still had very vivid memories of a barroom brawl with this man, during which not only did Ben kick his ass, but two other pretty salty ol’ boys’ as well.

  “You’d lak ’at, wouldn’t you, Ben?”

  “Oh, yes, Hiram. Very much.”

  “If you thank you so much smarter than me, Ben Raines, how come it is you fight? I thought smart, uppity people didn’t do sich thangs?”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Hiram. Boo!” Ben suddenly jumped at Hiram and the man almost fell down trying to get away.

  All the kids and a goodly number of adults got a laugh out of that.

  “Smart people, Hiram, have had to fight, in one way or another, for thousands of years. Simply to keep ignorant assholes like you from taking over the world. The garnering of knowledge has always been an uphill struggle, Hiram. Because fools like you keep trying to push us back.”

  “Whup him, Daddy!” Efrom Silas yelled. “Whup his ass good!”

  “I’m waiting, Hiram. Come on. Let’s go a couple of rounds.”

  “Straight-up fistfightin’, Raines? None of that tricky stuff?”

  “Why, sure, Hiram.” Ben then stepped forward and landed a right on Hiram’s jaw, knocking the man down.

  Hiram jumped up, shook his head, and came in flailing, both fists pumping.

  Ben stepped aside and clubbed the man on the back of the neck, knocking him to the dirt again.

  Hiram tried to knee-tackle Ben and got a boot in the belly for his efforts. He crawled around on the ground, gagging from the boot in the gut, until he caught his breath.

  Ben took that time to take a drink of water from his canteen. He replaced the canteen in the canvas-covered cup and snapped it closed.

  “Hiram, is this the best you can do? You want me to get one of my women Rebels to come finish the job?”

  William Watson started jumpin’ up and down. He threw his hat on the ground. “Ain’t no damned woman gonna whup no man.” He stepped out of the crowd and screamed. “Come on. Any of you bitches wanna fight me? Just step up here and have a go at it.” He looked at his father. “I’ll take over, Paw.”

  Hiram was sitting on the ground, both hands holding his aching stomach.

  A Rebel stepped from the ranks, handing her Uzi to a friend. Ben smiled. Tama. One of Dan’s close-combat instructors. An expert in judo.

  Tama said, “Would it not grieve a woman to be overmastered with a piece of valiant dust? to make an account of her life to a clod of wayward marl?”

  “Haw?” William Watson squalled.

  “Shakespeare, you dumbass!” she told him, never stopping her walking toward him.

  Tama kicked him on the kneecap with a boot, spun as gracefully as a ballet dancer and kicked him on the kidney. Willie went down squalling and did not make any attempt to get up.

  She faced the crowd of stunned and silent people. “Any of you women who would like to learn to defend yourselves, come on into town and look me up. I’ll be happy to teach you. It’s something you should all know.”

  “Oh, shhiitt!” one man said.

  Willie tried to grab hold of Tama’s ankle. She stomped on his hand. The sounds of bones crunching was loud in the still air.

  Willie rolled on the ground, screaming in agony, holding his broken hand.

  “You!” Ben pointed at Charlie Jimmy.

  “Sar?” Charlie Jimmy hollered. “I ain’t done nothin’!”

  “Did I say you had? Bring that fool there,” he pointed to Willie, “into town, to our hospital. We’ll fix up his hand.” Ben walked to the porch and swept up Betsy Ann in his arms.

  He looked at the knot of kids. “It will be all right with your parents if you come into town with us.” He looked at the adults. “Won’t it?”

  They mumbled and nodded their heads.

  “How many want to come in and spend some time with us?”

  Nearly all of them.

  “Well, then . . . pile in the trucks, and let’s go!”

  Ben grinned. “You don’t have to worry about getting anything. You’ll get new clothes when we get to town.”

  After the sounds of the last vehicle had faded away, Hiram pounded his fists on the dirt and cursed Ben Raines. “I’ll kill you, Ben Raines. Gawd-damn you, I’ll kill ya!”

  But he was speaking to only a few people. Most had left. They wanted no more trouble with Ben Raines and his Rebels.

  NINE

  “It’s eerie,” Sharon said to Tina as they drove closer to Nashville. “The last human being we saw was a good forty-fifty miles back.”

  “Yeah. I know. And Nashville is just about fifty miles away. What are your thoughts on it?”

  “I think people have moved away from the cities as far as they can.”

  “I’m with you.” She checked her map. “Pull off at the Kingston Springs exit. Let’s check it out.”

  The area was devoid of any living thing, human or animal.

  But there was a good, easily defended place for a camp, and after testing the water, the Scouts found it safe to drink. At a service station by the Interstate they found a full underground tank of fuel; that would be used in topping off the tanker trucks that traveled with them and to fill up other vehicles.

  By the time they had checked out the area and marked out the bivouac site, the first of Ike’s convoy was pulling in, Ike in the lead Jeep.

  “The last fifty miles was like traveling on the moon,” Ike said. “I didn’t see any sign of life, Tina. How about you?”

  “Same here. I think Nashville is going to be crawling with unfriendlies.”

  “Yeah.” Ike looked around and nodded his approval of the bivouac site. “Double the guards tonight,” he said, more to himself than anyone else. “Tina, when the camp is secured and everyone in, lay Claymores outside the perimeter.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The electronically detonated Claymores would blow when any hostile came within a certain distance, breaking a beam.

  Ike glanced up at the sky. “Be dark in less than two hours. Let’s get cracking, gang.”

  The Rebels worked quickly but carefully in the setting up of camp; it was something all had done hundreds of times. There were no neat little rows of tents, which would allow any hostiles to smoke half the camp with on
e burst. Some slept under trucks; others pitched tents in staggered fashion; still others chose to utilize only a ground sheet and blanket.

  The evening meal was cooked, then the fires extinguished. Guards would mount and stand a two-hour watch; two hours was long enough with all senses working overtime. Anything past that created a totally unnecessary strain. The camp became dark and silent.

  At full dark, all were very much aware of quiet movement in the thick underbrush that had grown wild for years, some of it nearly impenetrable.

  “Not going to be much sleep for us this night,” Major Tom Broadhurst said.

  “Christ!” a Rebel bitched. “Don’t those . . . whatever they are out there ever bathe? The stench is sickening.”

  “They certainly seem to have an aversion to water,” Tina said, sniffing. She remembered only too vividly the fetid body of the Night Person and the stinking hands clawing at her neck at the airport.

  The night suddenly roared as the damning beam of light was broken and a Claymore unleashed its fury, sending hundreds of lead and steel pellets into the still air. The explosion was soon followed by the sounds of wailing and screaming as the mangled bodies coughed up blood and spat out life.

  Automatic rifle fire split the darkness; few sparks could be seen, since the Rebels used flash suppressors. The biting barking of a .60 caliber machine gun yammered and the screaming of the wounded grew louder.

  A spear jammed its steel head into the door of a pickup; arrows began slamming into the ground; a few hostile rifle and pistol shots came from outside the perimeter.

  “Take positions and return the fire!” Ike yelled.

  And the night roared and slammed with Rebel gunfire.

  “Grenades!” Ike shouted. “Fire-frag.”

  The grenades, probably the most lethal ever manufactured, split the night with steel and fire. Burning, howling shapes could be seen racing through the woods and brush, some with their hair on fire, to fall shrieking to the earth, kicking out their life, illuminated by the glow from burning forms of other unfriendlies.

  “Cease fire!” Ike shouted down the din of battle. “Report!”

  The posts began calling in. Several wounded Rebels, none seriously, no dead.

  “Put an end to any suffering that you can see,” Ike ordered.

  Well-placed single shots cut short the terrible shrieking of the wounded or burning Night People.

  “Guard shifts change,” Ike ordered. “Heads up and drop anything that moves outside our perimeter.”

  “You’ll die like all the rest!” The shout came from the timber. “Only more slowly and horribly . . . I promise you all.”

  “Keep it quiet,” Ike said. “Pass the word. Let’s see if we can get a fix on his position. Tina, set up mortar teams. HE and WP.”

  “Yes, sir.” She slipped away, into the gloom.

  “Die, die, die, die!” The chanting began.

  “Stubborn bastards, aren’t they?” Broadhurst spoke softly.

  “Let’s keep them talking, Tom. I figure no more than a hundred yards out.”

  “Just about right. Hey, Stinky!” Ike yelled. “Why don’t you crawl back into the hole where you came from before you piss us all off?”

  Wild cursing ripped the night.

  “Tell Tina to drop in a few. Let’s see what happens.”

  In a few seconds, the area a hundred yards out was ripped and torn by mortar fire.

  “Goddamn tubes are up all the way, general,” a mortar crew chief called.

  “Rake it with machine gun fire,” Ike ordered.

  The chugging of big .50s hammered, every third round a tracer, and the position of the Night People was spotted.

  “Rifle grenades!” Ike yelled.

  The area was blasted and pounded and torn until Ike yelled for a cease-fire.

  No more chanting or cursing was heard.

  “Get some sleep,” Ike told his people. “We’re gonna need some rest before we tackle that airport in the morning.”

  Ben shut down his office and stepped outside to sit on the steps of he old bank building. Dan had stopped by just before dusk to tell him that all the kids they’d brought back with them were housed and safe and content.

  Ben hadn’t seen Denise since the Rebels had pulled into the area. She had volunteered to work with some of Chase’s medical people and was staying busy. And away from Ben.

  The Rebels had set up one firm outpost, in Great Bend, Kansas, back early in the summer. And from all indications, the outpost was doing well. One tiny dot of civilization in the middle of ignorance and barbarism and the ashes of war. And soon, there would be another outpost.

  One more tiny step toward restoring order out of ruin.

  But we still have such a long, long way to go, Ben mused.

  Buddy walked out of the gloom of night to sit beside his father. Ben smiled at his son. Buddy was square-jawed and tanned, very heavily muscled. His hair was dark and curly. The young man was handsome, but not in the pretty-boy way. His was a solid, rugged handsomeness. And he was never without the bandana tied around his forehead. Like his father, Buddy carried a .45 caliber Thompson SMG.

  “Have you had word on General Ike and Tina, Father?”

  “Spoke with both of them about an hour ago. They’re settled in just outside of Nashville. They’ll clear the airport in the morning. Where the hell have you been all day?”

  “Getting to know the lay of the land.”

  “And?”

  “It’s flat.”

  Ben laughed in the night. A friend of his had once said that flat, commercial land produces flat, commercial people. He wondered why he had thought of that now.

  “How’d you get around, son?”

  “Found a motorcycle. A Harley-Davidson. Took a little work, but I got it running. Monroe is filled with Night People.” He added that last bit with no more emotion than if he were discussing a slice of apple pie.

  “You went there?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Don’t do it again. Not by yourself. Do I have to make that an order?”

  “No, sir. I will admit it was a bit rash on my part.”

  “No, son. It was just plain stupid.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I thought you found a girlfriend?”

  He smiled in the night. “Several of them, Father.”

  “Going to play the field, huh?”

  “What a quaint expression. But, yes, that sums it up rather well.”

  “Thank you. Since you seem to have a lot of time on your hands, and are not married with children to help look after, perhaps I’d best assign you something to do.”

  “I thought perhaps that would be coming.”

  Ben looked at him. The young man’s expression was bland. But his eyes were twinkling.

  “Tomorrow morning, first thing, you tell General Jefferys I’ve OK’d a full platoon for you. Draw rations for a full week. Double quota of ammo for each person.”

  “Yes, sir. And then what?”

  “Clean out Monroe.”

  “Yes, sir. Consider it done. There are several houses that were filled with Night People. We won’t have to worry about them, though.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I took care of them today.”

  “Boy! You are foolhardy, you know that?”

  “Like father, like son, some might say.”

  Ben grumbled under his breath.

  “Any further orders, sir?”

  “Why, you got a hot date?”

  “Another quaint expression. No, I just thought I’d turn in early.”

  “Goodnight, son.”

  “Goodnight, Father.”

  Ben watched him walk away. He smiled, thinking: Oh, to be twenty-one again!

  That primal sense that combat personnel soon develop took over as a warning light clicked on in Ben’s head. He threw himself to one side just as the rifle barked, the slug whining off the concrete steps.

  Ben burned a clip of .45 ammo just
as Buddy’s Thompson was barking out the same message. Both men saw a man stand up on his tiptoes and do an odd dance of death across the street. In less than thirty seconds, the area was ringed and sealed off by Rebels, and Ben and Buddy were standing over the bullet-riddled body of the man who had just tried to kill Ben from ambush.

  “You know, him, general?” Ben was asked.

  “Unfortunately. That’s one of Hiram’s sons. His name is, was, Harry Larry.”

  “Shame,” Buddy said.

  “You might say that,” Ben replied, looking at his son. “Or you could say there is one less redneck in the world.”

  “Yes, one could.”

  Cecil pulled up in his Jeep and Ben climbed in. “Buddy will be in to see you in the morning. I’ve assigned him a full platoon.”

  “To do what?”

  Ben explained. When Cecil remained silent, Ben asked, “Aren’t you going to say what a fool thing it was for him to do?”

  “No. Hell, you’d do the same damn thing. You’re notorious for it.”

  For the second time that evening, Ben grumbled under his breath.

  “No point in bitching about it. You know it’s true.”

  “Are you aware there is a movement in town, among blacks, to start a New Africa?”

  “I’d heard,” Cecil said drily. “And no, I’m not going down to talk to them. I have absolutely no patience with those nitwits.”

  “Why, Cec! I thought you were all brothers?”

  Cecil glared at him. “How would you like the troops to see two middle-aged men duking it out in the middle of the street, Raines?”

  Ben threw back his head and laughed.

  The smell of gunsmoke had not yet dissipated.

  “All right, Cec. I just thought it’d be better if you did the talking.”

  “I’ll talk to them, Ben.”

  Cecil put the Jeep in gear and drove off into the night.

  The medics who were loading the body of Harry Larry into the back of a meat wagon looked at each other.

  One said, “Have you ever noticed that all officers are weird?”

  “Have the kids been told about Harry’s shooting last night?” Ben asked Cecil over breakfast coffee. Still a good hour before dawn. They were the only ones in the mess tent.

  “Not to my knowledge. And Hiram came for the body last night. He doesn’t believe that his son took a shot at you. Their kind never does anything wrong. It’s always the other person.”