“Children?” Ben asked him.
“We got some,” the man said. “They’re with the women. We didn’t think it would work. But we didn’t know what else to do. What happens now?”
“You will be turned over to British authorities.”
“In other words, we’re dead.”
“Some of you.”
“We had a good thing goin’ ’til you popped in.”
Ben looked at the man’s slovenly appearance. “Yes. I can see that you have been living in the lap of luxury.”
“Beats work,” the outlaw admitted.
“Any sickness among you?” Ben asked, not putting any emphasis on his words.
The outlaw shook his head. “Some of the kids got colds, that’s all. Nothin’ major. What’s the matter, General — and yeah, I know who you are — you afraid we’ll contaminate your pure and precious do-gooder army?”
“Something like that.” Ben turned and walked away. He leaned against a fender and sipped hot coffee, watching as BRF people tied the prisoners’ hands behind their backs and tossed them into trucks for the long ride back to a prison in the south of the country where the slime and crud were being held, pending trial.
Buddy returned from his inspection of the town. “Filthy,” he said. “These people lived like degenerates. We don’t want to bivouac here.”
“No. We’ll roll on. Our eyes in the skies say there is a town just north of here that appears to be deserted. Check it out.”
The town was void of human life and had been for some time. The Rebels found a huge mass grave on the edge of town and Ben ordered it opened. The bones of men and women and children and even family pets were uncovered.
“They appear to have been shot,” a Rebel doctor said, after an examination of a few of the skeletons. “And judging from the size of this grave, there must be several hundred people buried here.”
“Cover it up,” Ben said. “We’ll probably never know the why of it.”
“General,” Corrie said. “Our eyes in the skies say there is a mass retreat north. Highways are clogged with vehicles.”
“Where are Tina and Therm?”
“They’ve pushed all the way up to Middlesbrough.”
“We can’t send gunships in to strafe those retreating because we don’t know for sure who they are — even though we all have a good idea.” Ben looked at a map. “There’s an airport near there. Have planes pick them up and take them to Aberdeen. Also have planes pick up Georgi’s people and set them down at this airstrip here.” He pointed to a small town just north and somewhat west of the Grampian Mountains. “Tell them to carry all the supplies they can stagger with. And start supply planes moving now. When they are in position, have them move toward the south. Dan and Tina’s battalions will secure Dundee and Perth. Therm’s bunch will join Georgi and move down to here, on the west side of the mountain range. That will give us four battalions to hold from the north while we use troops, armor, and artillery to smash in from the south.”
Troops began moving and shifting while the punks and creeps and crud in the cities listened and waited nervously.
“Raines is boxing them in,” Butch said. “It won’t be long now.” He looked at a clipboard filled with dispatches from communications. “I wish I could figure out what is happening on the Continent. There appears to some type of mild panic going on over there. But I haven’t the foggiest what it is. It’s baffling.”
“Whatever could it be?” Lulu questioned.
Butch shook his head. “I just don’t know. But I got a feelin’ in my guts that it’s bad.”
“Butch!” the radio operator called. “Two of them old tubs out in the Channel just sank a couple of boats trying to make it across.”
“That don’t make any sense. Why would anybody over there want to come over here?” He frowned, his brow furrowing. “Folks, this is gettin’ weird.”
Using a small two-engine plane, Ben crisscrossed the island south of the Cheviot Hills as his troops got into place. Jersey and Corrie sat in the rear seats.
“How come you picked this old baby to fly in, General,” the pilot asked, “instead of a chopper? I mean, I’m flattered, but puzzled.”
“I don’t trust helicopters,” Ben said. “Or boats. Helicopters fall out of the sky and boats sink. One engine quits on this plane, you can fly it with the other one. Both engines fail, it glides and you can land it on a highway. Now you know.”
The pilot, who was both fixed-wing- and chopper-qualified, laughed. “Well . . . I guess you got a point, sir. I never looked at it quite that way.”
Ben smiled. “Look down there, Jersey, Corrie. That’s highway A696. Pretty impressive from the air, isn’t it?”
Rebel armor was rolling north, toward the Cheviot Hills. The tanks and artillery stretched for a long way. The road flashed under them as they headed for the coast highway. The pilot circled for a moment before he sat down on a grassy strip just south of Berwick Upon Tweed, the northernmost town in England before crossing the river into Scotland.
“See those white cattle down there?” the pilot said. “I read about them. They’re wild. They’re called the wild white cattle of Chillingham. They’re led by a king bull and they’re direct descendants of the cattle that lived in Britian thousands of years ago.”
“You’re puttin’ me on!” Jersey said.
“No, I’m not. I read it in a tourist guide and talked to folks in this area when I flew in supplies. Even though these people were hungry, they wouldn’t kill those cattle. That kind of makes you feel good about things, you know?”
“Yes. Then there is hope for humankind yet,” Ben said. “Unselfish acts like that can lift the hearts of us all.”
“That’s pretty, General,” Jersey said. “Did you ever write poetry?”
Ben laughed. “When I was young and in love, Jersey. It was really bad. Luckily, my father found it and burned it.”
Jersey and Corrie exchanged glances. They wanted Ben off the subject of love. Both knew he was still in love with Jerre and probably would be until his death. They knew that Ben publicly said that she was behind him. They also knew — being females — that Ben was lying, and both of them hoped that someday some good man would love them as much as Ben loved Jerre.
Ben met with his daughter, Tina, commander of Nine Battalion, and Therm, who commanded Eight Battalion. They were only minutes from lifting off to the north.
“Everyone in your command’s been inoculated?” Ben asked.
“That’s ten-four, Dad. And so have Dan and his jumpers.”
“That’s it, then. Every one of our people is secure and most of the residents — that are not opposed to us, that is.” He shook hands with Therm and kissed Tina. “You two be careful. Godspeed.”
It was a bitterly cold day, and the winds were coming straight off the North Sea as Ben stood and watched the cargo planes take off, make their slow half circle, and turn north over the sea.
“Let’s get back,” Ben said. “Jumpoff time is looking us in the face.”
“We play by the same rules,” Ben told his people. “We take it slow and clear every town and village as we go. We make sure we don’t have any hostiles behind us when we pull out. We crash through tomorrow at dawn and take Hawick and Dumfries before nightfall. We’re not going to get ahead of our supply trucks this time. That’s it.”
They needn’t have worried about hostiles at their backs. Dumfries and Hawick were void of unfriendlies. Each town had only a few hundred citizens left in it, all of them hungry and sick and cold.
“They left us several days ago, General,” a man told Ben. “Took every scrap of food we had and fled north like frightened rabbits.”
“I’m going to probably destroy your cities,” Ben told the man, and the others who had crowded around. “I don’t see the point of losing people to save a building.”
“Then bring them down, General,” a woman said. “They’re as useless to us now as horns on a hen.”
Th
e medics checked out the people and the supply trucks dropped off food, blankets, clothing, and fuel.
“All units settled in for the night and reporting no contact with the enemy today,” Corrie told Ben. “It’s a milk run.”
Buddy shook his head. “They do it everytime. They’re as predictable as a good watch. They run to the cities. I don’t understand it.”
“They’re punks, boy,” his father told him. “They feel safe with all that concrete and steel around them. Street punks are like rats. They’ve got to have a hole to run into and hide in. They’re cowards – just like most bullies. Anyone who joins a gang is a punk. Have you ever seen a bully pick on anyone his own size? I haven’t.”
“But they must know by now that we’re going to grind them down.”
“I’m sure some of them do, son. But look how we fight. We don’t leave them any holes to hide in. They don’t have any place to run. They actually help us box them in.”
A runner came in and handed Ben a note from Communications. Corrie was relaxing away from her radio . . . at Ben’s orders.
“People are beginning to flee the Continent,” Ben said, reading the note aloud by a hissing gas lantern. “Carrington’s armada has sunk more than half a dozen ships in two days. It must really be getting bad over there.”
“You had to give those orders to sink those ships, General,” Jersey said. “You didn’t have any choice in the matter. You had to contain that plague.”
Ben smiled at her. “Thank you, Jersey. Keep reminding me of that, please.”
A Scout came in and set her rifle down and shrugged out of a light pack. “It’s clear for forty miles north up A74, General. Not one bogie to be found anywhere. The industrial belt must be filled up with punks.”
“Yes,” Ben agreed. “The area from Glasgow to Edinburgh is crawling with punks and other assorted two-legged vermin. But it won’t be for long.”
Corrie returned and Ben looked up in surprise. “I thought I told you to relax.”
“You did. I went over to Communications to visit with friends. It’s jumping over there, General.” She sat down behind a bank of radios that was set up for her nightly in Ben’s CP – wherever that might be — and slipped on a head set.
“What’s happening, Corrie?” Ben asked.
“All up and down the European coast, starting about an hour ago, there have been a series of explosions. No one can figure out what’s happening.”
A runner from Communications hustled in and pinned a map to a wall, then began placing tiny colored flags along the coastline. “These are the newest ones, Corrie,” he said. “They’re coming in fast now. These were received by radio. Not confirmed.” He left the room.
Ben walked over and studied the map for a moment. “Those are ports. Get some birds up, Corrie. I want to know what the hell is going on.”
“Right, sir.”
Ben looked around the room. “The rest of you people get some sleep. We’ve still got a war to fight.”
An hour later, they were all confirmed. All up and down the French coast, fires were burning out of control. Corrie received a communique and wrote it out, handing the paper to Ben.
He read it with his expression growing grimmer.
“What is it, General?” Jersey asked. She had paid no attention to Ben’s order to go to bed.
“The French Resistance forces are blowing all the ships and ports along the coast. Same with other resistance forces in Europe. They’re trying to contain the Black Death over there, keep infected people from leaving by sea.”
“They’re signing their own death warrants,” she said softly.
“Yes,” Ben’s reply was just as softly given. “In order to save others. What next, Lord?” he asked. “What next?”
Eight
As usual, Dr. Lamar Chase had flown up and was ready to set up a mobile field hospital very close to the front lines. He was summoned and was now speaking through an interpreter to the commander of the Free French. Ben had coordinated drop zones for the vaccine and planes had already left the states. Ben had ordered vaccine flown in from the states, and had put the laboratories working around the clock.
He listened as Chase conferred with the Free French. “Save the vaccine for those who do not show any signs of the disease. It’s useless for those already infected. Anyone showing signs of edema is gone. Pneumonic plague is a killer ninety-nine times out of a hundred. Save the vaccine for those showing no signs and save the other medicines we’re dropping for the less severe cases of the infected. Isolate the patients. We’re dropping you streptomycin, tetracyline, and sulfonamides to treat the infected. Spray yourselves with a flea repellent. Burn the dead. Burn down the houses. Clear out trash and garbage. Then pray,” he signed off.
Chase turned to face Ben. “Don’t let any ships through, Ben. Not a one. We can’t take the chance.”
“I understand, Lamar. Do we have any reported cases here in England?”
“A few. None up here. And I don’t think we will. But I have a strong suspicion that London is only a few days, a week at most, toward becoming a death city. Didn’t you get reports before we sailed that troops from the Continent had come over to beef up London?”
“Yes. But how about those that we know pulled out by sea right after we landed?”
Chase spread his hands. “Who knows?”
“Wait a minute!” Corrie said, turning around in her chair. “That might account for the strange messages that Communications has been receiving. Or had, I should say. They stopped about ten days ago.”
“What messages?” Ben asked.
“They were garbled and hysterical and no one could make any sense out of them. Communications pinpointed them as coming from south of Cape Horn.”
“Can you recall anything else about them?” Chase asked.
She shrugged her shoulders. “The words were ‘Sick, dying, alone.’ Then, ‘Ships wallowing. All dead. All dead.’ That was the last we heard. No more transmissions.”
“Ben, what do we have in South America?” Chase asked.
“Chaos. Wars. A total breakdown.”
“No one you could radio to sink those ships?”
“Oh, no. Nothing.”
“Right now, those ships are floating flea factories. The rats are eating off the dead. They’ll be enough dead flesh to keep them alive for weeks, maybe months. Whatever inhabited land those ships bump into . . .” He shook his head. “God help the people who might live there.”
“Can you imagine somebody boarding those ships?” Jersey said, then shuddered. “Jesus!”
Ben moved to a world map and studied it. “Hell, it’s probably seven thousand miles from here to Cape Horn. Even if we had the ships to send, it’d be like that needle in a haystack. I guess we have to leave it in the hands of the Lord.”
“Yes,” Chase agreed. “But I have to conclude that He hasn’t looked too favorably on Earth the past decade or so. Maybe this is Hell after all.” He threw up his hands. “What do I know? I’m just a doctor trying to keep decent people alive in a world gone mad.”
Ben smiled. “You hear your own words, Lamar? ‘Keeping decent people alive.’ You judge just as much as I do, and I’m not sure that either of us has that right.”
Chase looked at him for a long moment. “Well, Ben, maybe I don’t have the right, since I did take that oath when I became a doctor. Maybe you don’t either. But in this crazy, gone-wild world, if mortal men don’t make those decisions, we may as well all go back to the caves and paint ourselves blue.”
Ben nodded. “Maybe you’re right, Lamar. Maybe you’re right.”
“When do you kick off this next campaign?”
“Tomorrow morning.”
But it was the shortest and least bloody campaign in anyone’s memory. The news of the Black Death now sweeping Europe had reached those in the cities of Scotland. They didn’t wish to die in some horrible fashion any more than anyone else, so it didn’t take them long to decide which was the best w
ay to go. Ninety percent of them elected to throw down their guns and walk out under a white flag of surrender, knowing they would be given the precious vaccine if for no other reason than to keep the disease off this island.
“Bastards!” Ben said. “Now we’ve got to give precious medicines to crap like that while withholding it from decent people. Goddamn sons of bitches.”
Ben was so mad he stalked up and down the highway like some enraged panther, while his Rebels gave him a wide berth. Finally he calmed down long enough to study a map for a moment. Then he turned to Corrie. “What’s up here in the Shetland Islands, Corrie?”
“I can answer that for you,” Dan Gray said. “I had my pilots check it out. They are totally void of human life.”
“Get ships readied, Corrie,” Ben ordered. “We’ll haul this human garbage up there and dump them. Buddy!”
“Sir!” Buddy jumped.
“Take two companies up to the Shetlands and either destroy or sail back everything that’ll float. We’re going to isolate these people up there and see if any develop the plague. I’ll send ships up with food and other provisions for them. But, I’ll be God-damned if I’ll waste vaccines and medicines on trash like this.”
“Father, if just one of them has the Black Death, they all will die.”
“Did you hear me, boy?”
“Yes, sir!”
“Then move!”
“Moving, Father. Like right now!”
“You black-hearted son of a bitch!” a motley-looking warlord screamed when he heard the news. “We demand our rights. You hear me, you bastard? We’re prisoners of war.”
Glasgow Scotty sat on an overturned bucket and kept his head down and his mouth shut. He’d been a convict before the Great War and quickly fell back into the con’s role: you kept your mouth shut and didn’t make waves. He felt they were getting a raw deal, but he was realist enough to see Ben’s point in doing this.
“Shut up, cheese-dick,” a Rebel guard whispered to the warlord. “You want to die right here and now?”
“Fuck you, pretty-boy,” the warlord said. “Hey, Raines,” he shouted. “You peckerhead. I’m talkin’ to you.”
Terror in the Ashes Page 21
