The four press types took their crews and pulled out the next morning. They were never heard from again.
From Port Loko, the column crossed the Rokel River and headed for Moyamba Junction. The Rebels found a few people still in the town and the doctors went to work. Ben and team, trailed by several members of the press, walked around the town during a break in the rains. There wasn’t that much left to see in the battle-ravaged town.
“General,” Stan Travis asked, as they strolled along. “How many people would you estimate have died on this continent since the Great War?”
“Stan, I have absolutely no idea. But I would guess several million at least. Perhaps as many as ten times that number. I doubt that anyone will ever really know. And we really don’t know what has happened in Asia, China, South America, or what used to be known as Russia.”
“Do you plan to visit those areas?” Marilyn asked, in a surprisingly civil tone of voice.
“Yes, if I live that long, Ms. Dickson. Of course, a lot hinges on what happens back home.”
“You’re speaking of the reunification of the States, General?” Ford asked.
“Yes.”
“Your section is the last holdout,” a reporter Ben didn’t know stated.
Ben smiled as they continued strolling along through the deserted town. “The SUSA is a sovereign nation, sir. We have our own constitution and bill of rights, both patterned after the original documents; indeed they are almost identical—except ours give the law-abiding citizen a lot more rights. We will not rejoin the Union.”
“Under any conditions, General?” Alex Marsh asked. It was the first question he’d asked since Ben got all over his case miles back.
“We are a separate nation, Mr. Marsh. We intend to remain that way.”
“The United States of America might use force in order to preserve the Union, sir,” another reporter said.
“They might, indeed,” Ben replied, never stopping his walking. “But when they do it will be the end of America as any of you know it.”
“Is that a threat, sir?”
“That’s a fact, son. A fact.”
* * *
Within twenty-four hours, newspapers all across the reunited USA hit the streets with the glaring headlines: GENERAL RAINES PROMISES WAR IF USA USES FORCE AGAINST SUSA.
SUSA THREATENS WAR AGAINST AMERICA
WAR TALK BETWEEN SUSA AND USA DEEPENS TENSIONS
WAR LOOMS ON HORIZON
“Horseshit,” Ben said, after hearing the news. “The only way there will be a war is if the reunited states start it. We won’t.”
“You think the reunited states really want a war with us?” Anna asked.
“Some politicians do. But they won’t be the ones to fight it. They never are. Cecil says a recent poll shows the people outside the SUSA fairly evenly split about it . . . which sort of surprises me. You would think after suffering through the worst war ever fought on American soil and several years of all sorts of deprivation, the last thing any of them would want would be more war. It shows how much the rest of the nation hates the South . . . and how much they hate me.”
“And our way of life,” Beth added.
“Oh, yes. Let’s don’t forget that. They hate it because we have full employment, almost zero crime, a laidback way of life, easy-to-understand laws, a workable healthcare system, no bureaucracy . . . and that’s just hitting a few points.” Ben laughed aloud as the column rolled along through the rain.
The Rebels had passed through towns of varying sizes and had seen few signs of life. The old festering tribal hatreds and years-long civil war had just about wiped out the population except for the towns along the coast, which the Rebels had decided to avoid. Rebel analysts had concluded that at the present rate, the country would be finished in a few more years.
Ben studied a map for a few moments, then folded it and stuck it back in a map case. “We’ve got to be resupplied with food, water, and medical supplies. But Liberia is out of the question for flights in or out or for docking facilities along the coast. The country’s been torn apart by civil war for a decade or more. Fly-bys show the old international airport at Monrovia unusable. Docking facilities are nil. Warlords have been controlling the country for years and have wrecked it. That’s why we’re taking the northern route, and will link up with Nick Stafford and his 18 Batt. We’ll crawl along the top of the nation until we reach the border of Côte d’Ivoire, the old Ivory Coast. That will probably be the most stable country we’ll find anywhere. And won’t that be a relief.”
“Then we travel south to Abidjan?” Cooper asked.
“Right. We have no choice in the matter. It’s our best bet for a port and they have a good airport.”
“But getting through Liberia is going to be a tad hairy, right?” Jersey asked.
“I think you’d be safe in saying that.”
Ben spat out a mouthful of mud and wiped his muddy face with an equally muddy hand. All in all it was a futile gesture.
“Shit!” he cussed, then wiped a sleeve across his face. That helped.
Ben’s 1 Batt had linked up with Nick’s 18 Batt between Foya and Kolahun and within minutes had come under attack from a large force, pinning down the Rebels and splitting the columns. The roads were a mess: tanks bogging down every few miles, trucks getting stuck along with them. Everyone in the column was soaked through and through, with mud all over them. Several thousand highly pissed-off Rebels were in no mood to fuck around with anybody.
Ben was under a deuce and a half filled with supplies, on his belly in the muddy road, his team left and right of him.
“How many damn people hit us?” Jersey asked. “The two columns together must be five miles long. That’s a hell of a force.”
“Somebody’s throwing everything they’ve got at us,” Ben said, raising his voice to be heard over the hammering rain and the yammer and clatter of weapons on full auto.
Cooper cut loose with a burst from his SAW and out of the corner of his eyes, Ben saw three or four figures fold up and go down.
“Stupid bastards,” Cooper said, his words just audible over the sounds of weather and battle.
“18 Batt just dragged a wounded prisoner in,” Corrie said, working her way close to Ben in the mud. “They say the man is nothing but skin and bones. Doctors say the prisoner is suffering from malnutrition. The prisoner says all they want is food.”
“Tell the doctors the bastards might be hungry, but they’re still strong enough to pull a fucking trigger,” Ben replied.
A wide grin split Corrie’s mud-streaked face. “I will relay your message.”
“You do that.”
A long burst of gunfire kicked up mud and water and small stones very close to the truck, flinging the debris into Ben’s face. Ben wiped his face and cussed, then out of sheer frustration, he leveled his CAR and gave the brush and jungle close to the road a full magazine of 5.56 rounds. He doubted he’d hit anything, but the action made him feel better. He ejected the empty and fitted a full magazine into place. He waited.
“Nick’s 18 Batt coming under what appears to be a suicide charge,” Corrie said. “They’re holding.”
A couple of minutes later, the sounds of battle faded, leaving only the drum of rain. “Maintain positions,” Ben ordered. “No pursuit. Scouts out.”
Five minutes ticked past without a shot being heard. Corrie said, “Scouts report the enemy has withdrawn. They left their wounded behind.”
“Ask the Scouts how the dead and wounded are fixed for ammo.”
“Scouts report all weapons and ammo were taken by the enemy.”
“They’re low on ammo as well as food,” Ben said, crawling out from under the truck. “Bet on it. This was a desperation attack.”
Ben began walking toward the front of the column, his team slogging along with him on the muddy road, the mud clinging to their boots in great globs, making their feet appear to weigh fifty pounds each.
“The enemy,” Ben sa
id, “at least this bunch, don’t have rockets. We didn’t sustain a single rocket hit. Corrie, ask Nick if they received any grenades.”
“Not a one,” she quickly reported.
“Whoever they are, they’re out of nearly everything. Okay. Let’s get this show on the road. There’s a village or town just up ahead. We’ll patch up the prisoners and leave them there. The Scouts should be near the town now.”
“They’re stuck in the road just outside of the village,” Corrie reported. “Both vehicles mired up to the axles.”
“Wonderful,” Ben said wearily. “All right. Tell them we’ll be along as quickly as possible. How about our wounded?”
“Two dead. Five wounded.”
“Let’s get moving.” Ben stamped his feet, trying to dislodge the clinging mud. “If at all possible.”
It wasn’t much of a town, but most of the buildings were still standing and the doctors quickly set up shop and began working on the wounded . . . Rebel wounded first, then the enemy. That was a Rebel rule, adhered to hard and fast, without exception.
The Rebels played by no rules other than their own. They were bound by no convention or treaty. Just another reason why so many around the world, who had studied the Rebels, did not want to tangle with them.
Ben stuck his head inside a small house and almost burst out laughing. Marilyn Dickson and Paula Preston were sitting on the bare floor in a side room, out of sight of the male reporters, who were behind the house, naked, soaping as they stood in the rain. Both of the women were covered head to feet with mud.
“Enjoying the trip, ladies?” Ben asked.
Marilyn solemnly lifted her right hand and gave him the finger.
Ben laughed at her and walked on.
“Hoity-toity bitch is human after all,” Jersey remarked.
“I think she is, Jersey.”
Ben turned into the building Lamar Chase had set up for a hospital. Lamar looked up from his inspection of a case of some sort of medicines, carefully packed against breakage. “We lost one of our people, Ben. The other four will make it. But we’re going to have to hole up here for a couple of days.”
“Suits me, Lamar. How about the prisoners?”
“A couple of them will make it. The others died.”
“Other than their wounds, what about their physical condition?”
“They’re very malnourished. I don’t know what they’ve been living on, but it hasn’t been very nutritious.”
Finally out of the rain, Ben rolled a cigarette.
“Don’t smoke in my hospital, Raines,” Lamar warned.
Ben ignored him and lit up.
“Asshole,” Lamar said.
“You smoked for forty goddamn years, Lamar, and smoked more cigarettes in a day than I do in a month. So shut up about it.”
“The older you get the more difficult you are to get along with, Raines. You’re becoming an insufferable prick.”
“So sue me.”
Lamar gave him the middle finger and walked off to see to the patients.
“Two rigid-digits in one day,” Ben muttered. “Must be something in the air.”
“Some raggedy-assed people in what’s left of field clothes approaching the town, boss,” Corrie said. “They’re under a white flag and do not appear to be armed.”
“Probably part of the bunch who attacked us. All right, let’s go see them.”
Raggedy-assed is right, Ben thought, as he approached the group, standing under the awning of a building at the edge of the small town. Their clothing was tattered and torn, and most wore some sort of sandals made from old tires.
“We need food,” one of the men said, speaking in near-perfect English, only slightly accented. “We are hungry.”
“And what will you do after I’ve given you food?” Ben replied. “Go back to making war on your own people?”
“What we do is none of your business,” the man said, his tone a bit more harder and demanding. “This is our country, not yours. You were not invited here.”
“That’s right. And we’re only passing through. We help whenever we find sick civilians. But we won’t help either side of warring factions.”
“We can take all the food and all your guns, if we want to.” The man’s eyes had turned hard and mean.
“You can try,” Ben said softly.
The man pointed a finger at Ben. “This is the only warning you will get. Share with us or die while you sleep!”
“Hit the trail,” Ben told him. “If you don’t understand that, it means carry your ass on away from here.”
The man’s face suddenly became a mask of rage, and for one quick moment, Ben thought the guy was actually going to try to jump him. The man fought his temper under control and managed a smile. “Soon we will be the best-equipped and best-fed army in the country. Then we will march on the capital and seize power. And you will all be dead, your flesh eaten by animals and your bones scattered.”
“Fuck you!” Ben told him, using the words that are almost universally understood.
“You have made the greatest mistake of your life,” the guerrilla told Ben. “But you will not have long to regret it.”
Ben yawned in his face.
The guerrillas wheeled around and marched off through the rain into the tangle of brush and jungle.
“They’ll be coming at us soon,” Ben said. “So let’s get ready to meet them.”
“Ah . . . look, boss,” Jersey said, cutting her eyes.
Ben looked. The guerrilla leader was standing at the edge of the forest, giving him the middle finger.
“Must be my day for it,” Ben muttered.
NINETEEN
“If they do attack us,” Nick said to Ben later on that afternoon. “They have got to be just about the dumbest bunch in Africa.”
“Dumb and desperate, Nick. Little men with big ideas.”
Tanks now encircled the town. Two battalions of Rebels were dug in, waiting to throw their considerable firepower at the enemy.
“What’s the latest from the other battalions?” Nick asked, after unwrapping a stick of gum and chewing for a moment to soften it up.
“Just like us. They’re all reporting more and more hostile encounters with guerrilla groups the further south we go. I’m betting the going will get slower and slower from this point on.”
“You think Bruno Bottger is behind this bunch making noises at us?”
Ben shook his head. “No. I think this bunch is a holdover from the early days of the civil war in this country. They’ve been having at each other since before the Great War.”
Nick looked at him. “You think they even know there has been a worldwide war and collapse?”
Ben chuckled at the thought. “Hell, Nick. The possibility is remote, but they might not know. I hadn’t thought about that.”
Lamar Chase strolled up and stepped out of the rain to stand under the awning with the two men. “Our people are going to make it. Only one of the prisoners is still alive and I don’t hold out much hope for him.”
Ben glanced at the chief of medicine, surprise in his eyes. “One of the medics told me his wounds were not that severe.”
“The medic was right. It isn’t his wounds alone that are killing. His entire system is shot—to use a non-medical explanation. He doesn’t have the strength to fight off this latest attack on his body. But don’t waste your time feeling a bit sorry for him; I sure as hell don’t. All the man does is lie there and cuss us all.”
Nick stopped chewing his gum. “Why, Dr. Chase?”
“We’re capitalists, he’s an avowed Marxist—this entire bunch attacking us, or threatening to attack us is. One of those goddamn People’s Liberation Army groups, or some such shit as that.”
Ben grunted his disgust. He knew from long experience that anytime some group used the “Peoples”-whatever in their name, they were more than likely communist.
Chase looked out at the pouring rain. “They’ll hit us tonight, won’t they, Ben?”
“In all likelihood, yes. I don’t believe they have the strength or the firepower to launch another daylight attack. Today was a desperation move on their part; hoping to take us by surprise.”
“The prisoner told me we can expect a lot more of this as we move across this nation.”
“He’s probably right, Lamar. But we’ll be two battalions strong as we roll—or slip and slide, as the case may be—across what’s left of this country and into Côte d’Ivoire. According to intel there isn’t a guerrilla group in the country strong enough now to do us much damage. But they’ll sure try.”
Cooper came running through the rain, sliding to a halt under the awning. “We found another mass grave, boss, about a thousand meters behind the town. The rain washed away the thin covering of dirt over the bones.”
“Men, women, and children?” Nick asked.
“Yes, sir,” Cooper said.
Lamar shook his head in disgust. “Centuries-old tribal hatreds. It’s pathetic.”
“Maybe something good will come out of it, Lamar,” Ben opined.
“I’d like to know what,” the doctor demanded.
“The animals are making a comeback. That’s something.”
Lamar stared at Ben for a moment to see if he was serious. He was. The doctor walked off into the rain, back to his makeshift hospital, muttering under his breath.
Ben smiled as he watched his old friend walk away, a heavy security guard around him.
“Boss, we’ve got everything at our disposal trained to bang,” Cooper said. “You really think this ragtag bunch will attack us tonight?”
“I do, and they will. Bet on it. They’ve got to have our supplies or they’ll die. They have no choice in the matter. It’s going to be short and savage and bloody. They’ll be fighting to the last round they have. When it comes, don’t let up.”
“It’ll be this way all across this screwed-up country, won’t it?” Cooper asked.
“I’m afraid so, Coop. And as I have warned, worse the further south we go.”
“You want to go view that mass grave?” Cooper asked.
Ben shook his head. “No. I don’t. I imagine we’ll be seeing a lot of mass graves before we butt heads with Bruno. And then when we’ve kicked that bastard’s ass, we’ll be uncovering mass grave sites all over the country he’s occupied. And you can tattoo that on your arm.” Ben looked up as the rain diminished somewhat. “Come on, gang. Let’s walk the town.”
Ambush in the Ashes Page 13
