Blood in the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  “OK, little one,” Ike said. “We stay in the water for another mile or so, then we hit the brush and timber. Once in there, I wanna rig a few surprises for our friends.”

  “Surprises? What kind of surprises?”

  Ike’s usually friendly face took on a mean look. “Let’s just say they ain’t gonna like ’em a whole lot.”

  Ben and Gale—accompanied by a dozen Rebels laying back a few hundred yards—drove to one of the inlets of Clark Hill Reservoir, on the north side. They walked to the water’s edge.

  She took his hand. “It’s so peaceful here, Ben. So lovely and serene. It’s like ... it’s like all the trouble never happened.”

  “Get careless in this area, Gale, and you’ll see trouble quickly.”

  “Harbinger of doom!” She looked at him. “What do you mean?”

  “The peacefulness is nothing but a dangerous illusion.”

  “Will you cut the suspense, Raines!”

  “You notice we haven’t seen one human being—other than Rebels—in this area?”

  “Yeah. So what?”

  “Mutant country, I’m betting. Since I haven’t detected any of the foul odor usually associated with them, I’m thinking this may be a group with a higher level of intelligence. That’s why they haven’t bothered us.”

  “You mean they’re friendly mutants. I never heard of such a thing.”

  “No, not friendly. Cautious. Wary. They’ve probably seen how heavily armed we all are, and that we never go unarmed. They’ve had experience with people with guns. They know guns can inflict pain. We’re being watched though.”

  Gale looked around her. “Where? I don’t see any mutants.”

  “They’re in the bushes to our left. I saw one just a moment ago, while we were walking down here.”

  “And you didn’t tell me? Thank you so very much, Ben.”

  “Want to stay for a while and see if you can spot one?”

  “Hell, no! Are you nuts? I’ll be more than happy to take your word for it. Can we please leave now?”

  Ben grinned. “Sure. Come on. We’ll head on back. ”

  As they turned to leave, Gale tugging at Ben, a low growl came from the thick timber and brush by the lake.

  “Oh, shit!” Gale said.

  “Relax. I’m armed, and Roger’s got people standing guard right up there by the road. I believe the mutants are telling us to go away, rather than warning of an attack.”

  “Oh, wonderful. I’m impressed. You speak mutant now, huh?”

  Ben playfully ruffled her short dark hair and laughed. “I’m a man of many and varied talents, my dear.”

  “Great. Ben, I have this fondness for living. So tell me we’re not going to spend much time around this place.”

  “Pulling out in the morning.”

  “Best news I’ve heard all day. I wonder if there is any catfish left?” she muttered.

  THIRTY-THREE

  “We gotta figure a way to get Colonel Gray and his Scouts outta here,” Sergeant Bennett said. “I think we got enough Rebels behind us to handle things if Gray and that wild-assed bunch of his can be counted on not to interfere.”

  “I understand Gray is sending most of his people out into the field,” Captain Willette said. “So we don’t have to worry about them. But just remember this: When it goes down, it must go down nonviolently. At first.” He smiled. “At first. That is something Sister Voleta does not understand. Any act of violence on our part—at the outset—would destroy everything we have worked to build. Our new converts would turn on us faster than a striking snake should anyone be hurt—initially. In that, we must all be very careful. We will show weapons, of course, and those opposed to us must be convinced we will use those weapons. But keep violence to a minimum at all times.”

  “Unless,” Lieutenant Carter said, a smile on his lips, “the people could be convinced Ben Raines is their enemy.”

  “Interesting idea,” Willette said, fixing Carter with a steady gaze. “But just how would you go about doing that?”

  “Raines pulled out, leaving them leaderless. In the minds of many, even among those loyal to him, he should not have done that. They follow Ben Raines, not Cecil or Ike. I think it’s time we got the rumor factory cranked up again. At full steam. Really pour it on hard this time around. A statement from the doctors stating Ben Raines is seriously ill—mentally ill—should start it off very well, I’m thinking. Borderline nuts. Hell, hasn’t he done some weird things? Sure he has. Play it up. We can follow that with a rumor that Ben Raines is thinking of breaking up the Rebels; each person will have to go it alone—without Ben Raines. But we’ll have to make certain the general doesn’t pop back in here unexpectedly and screw it all up.”

  “I like it,” Willette said. “Hell, we have a person with Raines’ column. We know where he is. Our people down south—Silver’s bunch, along with some of our own—could set up skirmish lines to hold Raines up until we got the job done up here. Yeah. I like it. All right. Let’s get to it.”

  THIRTY-FOUR

  “Swing trap,” Ike told Nina. She stood quietly, watching the man work. It was obvious Ike had done this many times before. The sharpened stakes he had attached to the limber sapling looked lethal. She said as much.

  “You bet they are. It’ll catch whoever trips it gut-high. I’ll build a half dozen of these. Plus some punji pits. I wish I had some monkey shit for the punji stakes, but they’ll do the job without it. Then we’ll leave signs we came this way, sucker them in. After they hit two, three of these little darlin’s, it’ll really slow them down. They’ll be afraid to move in the woods.” He laughed grimly, a warrior’s laugh.

  Nina could certainly understand how it would affect their minds. “The dogs worry me, Ike. I’m scared of bad dogs.”

  Rising to his booted feet, Ike smiled and held out the shotgun. “This is a dog catcher, sweetheart. If they get that close, that is.” He secured the piece of rawhide that would trigger the trap. He once more grinned. “Somebody is goin’ to be awful unhappy about this. This is one stomach ache there just ain’t no cure for.”

  Ike tore a piece of cloth from his shirt. He jammed the cloth on a dead branch, sticking out chest-high on the old nature trail, actually a centuries-old Indian path. “That ought to do it,” he said.

  They could hear the dogs far away, circling in confusion, attempting to separate scents. Their baying was frantic and angry, a frustrated yelping. There was a moment of near dead silence, then the baying changed.

  “OK, kid,” Ike said. “The Baskerville Bastards have picked up the scent. It’s time for us to cut out.”

  “What kind of a dog is a Baskerville?” Nina asked.

  Ike shook his head. “Just a joke, kid. Forget it. Let’s go. Now the fun begins.”

  She picked up her rifle and slung the bandoleer of cartridges around one shoulder. “You sure have a funny idea of fun, Ike.”

  “I’ve heard that before. OK, baby—wiggle your ass.”

  She looked at him and grinned. “Now?”

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Tony Silver was wild with rage. His humiliating defeat at the hands of Ben Raines was something he could not get off his mind. And he was taking his rage out on the new young girl, Lilli.

  Tony had torn into the young girl savagely, her pitiful screaming only making him that much more angry. She now lay beneath the man, only occasionally moaning, a mewing, pitiful sound as Tony raped her brutally, again and again.

  Finally exhausting himself, mentally, physically and sexually, Tony heaved himself off the child. Her blood dotted the white sheet. “You got good gash, baby,” he said. “But you need to learn to move your ass. You lay there like a goddamned log.”

  Tony showered and dressed, stepped outside his room, and walked toward his communications room. “What’s the word, baby?” he asked the woman on duty.

  “Sister Voleta’s people called about ten minutes ago.” She grinned nastily. “I told them you were busy.”

 
; Tony returned the grin. “Damn right, I was. What’s up?”

  “They’re sending troops down from the north. You’re to mass everybody available and meet them at dawn, day after tomorrow.”

  “Where?”

  “On Highway 24. Louisville. It’s something about killing Ben Raines.”

  Tony flushed for a moment, then regained his composure. “Must be something big in the wind,” he muttered.

  “That’s all they told me, Tony.”

  Tony met her eyes. He watched as the woman licked her lips. He smiled at her. “Yeah, Patsy, you can play with one of the new girls. Get someone to relieve you and go eat a pussy.”

  “Thanks, boss.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Tony dismissed her with a wave of his hand. “Go on now. I’ll sit in here until your relief shows up.”

  She left the cramped and littered radio room and Tony sat down behind the big transmitter. He changed the frequency dial and called his base in north Florida.

  “Yeah, boss?”

  “Roll two full companies out right now, Johnny,” he ordered. “All the ammo they can stagger with. I want ’em up here by noon tomorrow. You got all that?”

  “Gotcha, boss. What’s up?”

  “Killin’ Ben Raines.”

  “Awright!”

  Tony cut off the mic and leaned back in the chair. There was a grim smile of satisfaction on his lips. First Ben Raines would be taken care of. After that, Sister Voleta was going to get a bullet up her stupid ass. After Tony shoved a dick up it just to hear her squall. He’d taken just about all the guff he was going to take from that bitch.

  At first it had seemed like a good idea, linking up with her. Goddamned ex-whore from Nashville. She’d had some good ideas—at first. Now she was taking all this religious crap too seriously. Christ! The broad actually believed she was some sort of God. Perverted bitch. Tony knew all about Sister Voleta. Betty Blackman from northwestern Arkansas. A two-bit hillbilly singer who used her pussy to fuck every record producer and agent in Nashville trying to land a recording contract.

  She had never made it. Instead, she turned to running a whorehouse.

  Then the bombs came.

  No doubt about it, though: Sister Voleta was a persuasive bitch. She began building a following right after the world exploded. Back then she confined her activities to the hills of Tennessee, gradually branching out as word spread. Now she had over two thousand followers. More than Tony, but many of Sister Voleta Betty Blackman’s group were yo-yos and fruitcakes.

  But still dangerous.

  Yeah, she was weird, all right. Tony sent many of the more uncooperative men and women up to Sister Voleta. She got her rocks off torturing them to death. But somehow the positions of the two had changed. Now Voleta thought she could give him orders. No way Tony was going to put up with that kind of crap for very long. Just no way.

  It was too bad in a way, Tony mused, alone in the silent radio room. The arrangement had been pretty good for several years. Till Voleta started gettin’ too big for her panties.

  Well . . . all things must come to an end.

  First Ben Raines gets his ticket punched. Then Sister Voleta gets sent to that big revival in the sky.

  Tony laughed at that. “Pretty good, Tony,” he said. “Maybe you should have been a writer.”

  THIRTY-SIX

  “First we take care of Ben Raines,” Sister Voleta told her inner circle. “Then Mister Tony Silver gets put out of commission. But I want him taken alive.” Her smile was ugly. “I have plans for Tony Silver. He shall amuse us all ... right to the end.”

  The robed and hooded inner circle smiled and nodded their approval.

  “Get word to our people in the timber. Keep up the harassment of Colonel McGowen and the whore-woman. Leave enough men in the timber to do that. I have given instructions for the bulk of our fighters. Go now. We all have much to do.”

  “Ike’s alive,” Cecil’s voice crackled through the speakers in the communications vehicle. “Gray’s Scouts captured a man from the Ninth Order. They got the information from him. He’s in the company of a young woman whose boyfriend was killed by the Ninth Order, at Sister Voleta’s orders. He was sexually tortured and then burned alive at the stake. Ike’s leading his pursuers on a merry chase, so I’m told.”

  Ben looked at Gale and smiled hugely. “Told you Ike would find a woman.”

  She shook her head. “Man is running for his life and has sex on the brain. I will never, ever understand men.”

  “Good Lord!” Ben feigned great consternation. “What a sexist remark.” He keyed the mic. “I’m about ready to come in, Cec.”

  There was a short pause on the other end of the transmission. “All right, Ben,” Cecil said. “I think maybe you should. I believe it’s reached the point where only your presence can defuse the situation up here. But I have to remind you, old friend: You’re going to be in a constant state of danger when you return. I can’t stress that enough.”

  “It’s that bad, Cec?”

  “It could blow at any time, Ben. It’s ... it’s just such a helpless feeling up here. We know what is going on, but are unable to do a goddamn thing about it.”

  “I get the feeling maybe I shouldn’t have pulled out.”

  “No.” Cecil was adamant on that point. “If you had stayed I think you would have had an accident, Ben. If you know what I mean.”

  “We covered this before. I know. All right, Cec. See you in two, three days.”

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  They listened to the screaming of the man as he was impaled on the stakes of the swing trap. The hoarse, hideous bellowing echoed through the otherwise silent national park. The man was calling, screaming out for someone, anyone, for God’s sake, to help him.

  A man ran toward the shrieking and stepped in one of the punji pits concealed along the ancient Indian path. The man’s leg snapped at the knee and he fell forward, his scream cut short as waves of pain abruptly plunged him into unconsciousness.

  “My, ain’t we havin’ fun?” Ike said.

  “I know I am,” Nina said. “Bastards deserve whatever they get.”

  “You turnin’ into a mean bitch, ain’t you?” Ike grinned at the young woman.

  “I watched some of those same men down there sodomize my boyfriend, Ike. They thought it was very funny. I hope we kill all of them. I really, really do.”

  “Well, little one, we are damn sure goin’ to do our best.”

  Ike and Nina lay on the bluff of a ridge line, more than a mile from the first line of searchers. The line had stopped. No one wanted to proceed any further. Ike watched them through field glasses.

  “Talkin’ to somebody on a walkie-talkie,” Ike muttered.

  “What’s up?”

  “I wish I knew. Whatever it is, you can bet that bunch is up to no good.”

  He handed Nina the binoculars. She watched for a moment, then said, “My God, Ike. Those aren’t bloodhounds down there.”

  “No. They’re Dobermans. Huntin’ dogs, man-killin’ sons of bitches. I hate those dogs. Hated them in ’Nam. Unpredictable bastards. I’ve seen ’em turn on their handlers.” He took the field glasses and swept the area below them in a slow circle. “’Bout half of them are pullin’ out,” Ike said, his tone of voice puzzled. “They may be tryin’ to circle us. I don’t know. I don’t know what’s goin’ on, but I do know I don’t like it. Come on, Nina, let’s get the hell outta here.”

  The men of the Ninth Order who had been in pursuit of Ike and Nina had received hurried instructions from Sister Voleta. Seventy percent of them were to proceed with all haste to eastern Georgia. Tony Silver’s paramilitary forces were coming up from the south to join them. Their orders had been quite brief: “Ben Raines has less than a hundred troops with him. Raines and his Rebels must be cut off and held firm. Raines must not be allowed to return to his Base Camp. No excuses for failure will be permitted. Just do it.”

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  “It’s really true,
” a young Rebel said. He had tears in his eyes. Many others with him made no effort to hide their concern and tears. “General Raines is suffering from a bad mental disorder.” He pointed to the paper he held. “See here. Read it. Says so right on this paper. It was smuggled out of Doctor Chase’s office. He and them others have been trying to hide it from us.”

  Outrage at this blatant deception caused a low rumble from the growing crowd of Rebels. They looked at each other, confusion mixed with anger.

  The crowd of mostly young Rebels, male and female, looked at the paper. For all the good it did them. Most could not read further than: See Dick run. See Dick chase Jane. See Jane whomp Dick on head with club.

  “This is awful!” a woman said. “Poor General Raines. I feel so sorry for him. But what can we do about it?”

  “I guess,” the unofficial spokesman said, “whatever Captain Willette tells us to do. We have to see to it that General Raines is helped and protected as best we can.”

  “But Carter and Bennett both told me—not fifteen minutes ago—that Colonel Gray and Colonel Jefferys know of General Raines’ condition. He said they both refuse to do anything about it.”

  “That figures,” another Rebel said. “Sure. That’s ’cause they want to run things. They don’t wanna see General Raines helped. They want him to get worse, maybe even die. You all think about it for a minute. Who stands to gain the most from General Raines being out of the picture? If you guess Colonel Ike and Colonels Jefferys and Gray, you damn sure got it right.”

  The now large group of Rebels, including both young and old, thought it over, talked it over. The group grew to more than five hundred. They came to the conclusion the spokesman was right. It was a damned conspiracy; it was a damned shame and a damned disgrace. And by God they weren’t going to sit still for it.

  Captain Willette seemingly just “strolled up.” Actually he had received a signal from one of his own people within the group of angry Rebels.