Alberta turned off the lamp and went to bed.
* * *
After talking for a few more moments, Darry left his cabin, and two thoroughly shocked agents, and traveled for several miles, then curled up in a small hollow and slept for several hours, awakening about an hour before dawn and making his way back to the cave just as the sun was rising.
“We were all worried about you,” Stormy said.
Darry squatted down and poured a cup of coffee. He smiled at the reporter over the rim of the cup. “No need to worry about me. I’ve been getting along quite well for... ah ... some time.” “I’m sure,” Stormy’s words were drily offered.
“What did you learn out there?” Kathy asked.
“You have several IAD people working. I spoke with Hank Wallace and Carol Murphy.”
“They’re top people. Tough, but fair,” Jack said, from his makeshift bed. “The only agents who dislike them are the ones who have something to hide. Did you tell them about us?”
“Yes. But not where you are.”
Darry ate a couple of dry and tasteless crackers and started salivating at the thought of his Other sinking teeth into fresh-killed raw meat and feeling the salty blood trickling down his throat. Those close to him saw his eyes change, glowing with a fierce light. Then as fast as it occurred, the light vanished, and Darry swallowed the gathering saliva and struggled to push the savage thoughts away.
“What were you thinking just then?” Stormy asked.
Darry smiled, doing his best to keep it a smile and not a snarl, for his Other always lay just a heartbeat away. “Oh, just remembering good things, I suppose.”
He remembered playing with Shasta and the pack; all their happy times together. Their “getting acquainted” ritual, which all wolf packs engaged in several times a day: the muzzle biting, the pushing their faces against one another, the rubbing and the tail wagging and joyful playing.
In many ways, the social order of a wolf pack was far superior to any society humans may have developed over the centuries. There was a clear and undisputed leader, and that was that. Only the strong and healthy alpha male and female breeded, once a year, thus insuring pups who had the best chance of surviving in a cruel and unfriendly environment.
“You want to come back to us, Darry?” Kathy asked, jarring the man out of memories. He looked at her, and she added, “You were miles away.”
Miles away? he thought. I was centuries away. Running wild and free with the most magnificent animals on the face of the earth. “Yes,” he said gently. “I suppose I was.”
“Are you back to earth now?” Stormy asked with a smile.
“Oh, I never left earth.” And all close to him could sense the weariness in those words, but only a few suspected the reason behind it.
17
The agents in the helicopter never had a chance. Mike Tuttle and his mercenaries hosed them down with automatic weapons fire, killing the search team and the pilot.
There was no reason for any of this, other than the fact the mercenaries had all had run-ins with the FBI before... some of the run-ins less than pleasant. The government of the United States didn’t like its citizens fighting in other country’s wars, although what business it was of big government remained a mystery to many people. Probably the overriding reason for the attack was that mercenaries lived to fight, and good wars were getting harder and harder to find.
The mercenaries stood around the dead for a time, then began collecting weapons, food, and ammo. They took fresh battery packs for their radios, then walked off a few hundred yards and squatted down.
“You boys know that George was right,” Mike said. “None of us are going to leave this area alive. Except maybe George. The rest of us will all be carried out in body bags.”
“Who gives a shit,” Bobcat Blake said.
And that just about summed up the feelings of all the men.
“I have a thought,” Mike said. “Let’s hook up with this Sam Parish and his bunch. We could not only kick some federal ass, but get some pussy in between firefights. Those survivalist cunts just might be very grateful for our help.”
“Some slap and tickle would be nice,” Nick said.
“Let’s do it,” Ike Dover said, standing up.
The other men silently stood up. Mike turned and walked toward the brush, the rest following.
* * *
Another helicopter spotted the downed chopper and radioed in. A special assault team was sent in, and reported back what they’d found. Max radioed the news to Washington. The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation was out of the country, so what to do next fell on the head of the Justice Department.
“Secure the area,” the attorney general of the United States said. “Innocent men and women and children must be allowed a place to camp and play and fish and boat without fear of being shot by those horrible, nasty, survivalists with those awful assault rifles.”
So far, the survivalists hadn’t been the ones doing most of the shooting of innocent people. That little bit of news was not pointed out to the attorney general because no one in Washington was aware of it.
The attorney general continued, “And speaking of assault rifles, they should have been removed from the hands of the American public years ago. For their own good, of course,” the AG was quick to add.
* * *
“I’ve had all this I can stand,” Johnny McBroon said. “I want a hot shower, a vodka martini on the rocks, and a large steak. In that order.”
“Me, too,” Jay Gilmore said. “But make mine a gin martini, straight up.”
“I’m low class,” Pete Cooper said. “I’ll take a beer with mine.”
“Now that we have our menus all planned,” Lew Waters said, “I’d be very interested in learning exactly how we’re getting out of here with our asses intact.”
“Oh, ye of little faith,” Johnny said. “Just wait until a patrol gets within hollering distance. Then I’ll show you.”
“You’re going to holler at a patrol?”
“Yeah,” Johnny replied.
“Can we dig this ravine a little deeper?” Lew muttered.
* * *
Upon awakening, Ranger Battle lay in his sleeping bag and reached the conclusion that he had done a very stupid thing by riding out into a free-fire zone alone. Then he remembered that the new ranger was due to report in ... yesterday! Al Follette was the name, Tom Sessions had told him, smiling as he did so. Funny that I should recall that smile now, he thought.
Rick crawled out of the warmth of the sleeping bag and pulled on his boots. He coaxed nearly dead coals into flame and filled his battered old coffeepot with water for coffee. Then he found his radio and called in. Somebody would answer the radio at the station. Damn place was crawling with federal agents.
“I think the ranger is still sleeping,” a strange voice told him. “I just got here myself late last night.”
“Will you take down some map coordinates?”
“Sure.”
That done, Rick said, “Have Ranger Follette meet me at that location ASAP—okay?”
“Will do,” the agent said.
Rick sat back and poured a cup of coffee, then sliced bacon from a slab and started fixing breakfast. Al should be along in about two hours. He would relax until then.
* * *
Highly paid, highly talented, and highly rated by viewers network reporters just simply did not vanish without a trace for days on end without causing some concern back at the network’s headquarters.
“Where the hell is Stormy?” a senior VP asked another senior VP.
“I have no idea. Did you call her secretary?”
“I tried. She’s out having a baby. Left Monday.”
“Let’s go see the news chief.”
“She’s in Idaho,” the VPs were informed. “And I’m getting worried about her.”
“Idaho! What the hell’s she doin’ in for-Christ-sake Idaho? Interviewin’ Big Foot?”
“She would if she could find him. I called Craig Hamilton yesterday. He was wrapping up a story in Montana. Told him about Stormy. He chartered a plane and left immediately. He should be in the area right now. He’ll find her.”
“Idaho?” the senior VP repeated. “Nothing newsworthy ever happens in Idaho!”
* * *
At the sounds of an approaching helicopter, Johnny McBroon stepped out of the ravine and into a clearing. He began waving his arms at the chopper. The pilot spotted Johnny and the others who had joined him in the clearing, circled a couple of times, and radioed in the coordinates.
“This could be a trap,” the pilot said. “Approach with caution. I don’t like the looks of these guys.”
“Roger that. I’ve got a team on the way. Can you circle?”
“Affirmative.”
“Well, that was easy enough,” Pete said. “We ought to be out of here before too much longer.”
“I guess you were right, Johnny,” Lew said.
“Man, oh, man,” Jay Gilmore said. “I can taste that steak now.”
The four men sat in the meadow for a time while the helicopter circled their location.
Pete looked at his watch. “I musta busted it somehow. What time is it?”
“Ten hundred hours,” Lew told him, just as a hard burst of gunfire came from the other side of a hill. The sound brought the men to their feet, into an automatic crouch, and spun them around toward the sound, all of them reaching for their pistols.
The helicopter pilot could not hear the gunfire, or see where it originated due to the thick brush and timber. But he could see the four men in the meadow grab for guns and could see the team of federal agents fast approaching from the east side of the ravine, about three hundred yards from the meadow. The pilot radioed, “All four suspects now armed. It’s a trap! You’re walking into a trap!”
“Take ’em!” the team leader shouted to his men. “Go, go, go!”
Half a dozen agents went to the north of the ravine; half a dozen went to the south. As soon as the four men in the meadow were visual, the agents opened fire.
When the lead started whistling and humming and howling all around them, Army, Navy, Air Force, and CIA hit the ground and automatically returned the fire. The range was too great for effective pistol shooting, but the returning fire did send the feds scrambling for cover and gave the men in the meadow time to go belly crawling into the timber and brush. The chopper pilot lost them from visual.
But the chopper was in fine range for Jody Hinds and the rifle he’d taken from an agent . . . after cutting his throat. Jody opened up. The lead started pinging and banging and punching through the skin of the chopper, and the pilot wisely got the hell out of that area.
And so did Johnny McBroon, Jay Gilmore, Pete Cooper, and Lew Waters, cursing the very government they worked for as they ran.
* * *
Sitting in the brush that surrounded the mouth of the cave, Darry accurately guessed what was happening all around him (although he had no way of knowing the names of those involved), and it was darkly amusing to him. He’d had seven centuries of seeing big, powerful governments eventually turn against their own citizens and knew the United States of America had rounded that corner and was now on a corrupt, twisted, and tortured path . . . and had been for the past several decades.
“What’s happening out there?” Kathy called from the cave.
“Chaos,” Darry replied. “Bloody chaos.”
“This is going to be quite a story,” Stormy said, crawling out to join Darry.
“Only if you newspeople will get off your asses and start taking a hard, realistic look at the news,” Darry said bluntly.
“I resent that!”
Behind her, Ki smiled.
“You can resent it all you like. It’s the truth. You people are the second most powerful voice in America, right behind big government. If you people would start hammering at the government to ease up on its citizens, to drastically cut federal programs, to slash income taxes—which are unconstitutional to begin with, I might add—to return control of their personal destinies back to the law-abiding citizens, to do all sorts of things that would lighten the yoke of government control on the shoulders of American citizens, you people would be hailed and revered as heroes. But as it stands now, in the minds of a large percentage of citizens, you’re all right down there in the sewer among the dubious company of snake oil salesmen and politicians.”
“Amen,” Ki said, and that got her a hot look from Stormy. “I have long supported a straight across the board tax rate for everybody. But those assholes in congress won’t even bring it to committee.”
“That would be terribly unfair to the poor,” Stormy spewed the tired old liberal cliche.
“Horseshit!” Ki responded.
* * *
The helicopter pilot was not hurt, but his chopper was. He was going to be forced to put it down, and there was nothing he could do to prevent it.
“We’re going to have company in our little valley,” Darry said. “Look.”
The chopper pilot managed to set the whirlybird down, after a couple of bounces, and then he jumped out just seconds before the crate blew. The blast knocked him to the ground, not hurt seriously, but unconscious.
“Let’s go get him,” Darry said to George Eagle Dancer, then smiled. “This cave is going to get crowded.”
* * *
Rick sat on his rolled sleeping bag and stared as Alberta dismounted from her horse. “You’re Al Follette?” he blurted.
“Yep. That’s me. It’s short for Alberta.” She walked over and stuck out her hand just as Rick was getting up.
Rick took the hand and held on while Cupid suddenly appeared, flying about them, shooting every arrow in his quiver.
Their stay in the wilderness held promise to be very interesting; in more ways than one.
* * *
Mike Tuttle and his mercenaries found and linked up with Sam Parish and his band of survivalists. Sam was both astonished and thrilled that a band of the world’s foremost mercenaries would want to join his CDL. Since the CDL subscribed to every known adventure magazine published in the United States, the exploits of Mike and his men were etched in the mind of every member.
“So what’s the first thing we do?” Sam asked.
“Attack,” Mike told him.
* * *
“Well, I thought it was a good idea,” Johnny McBroon panted the words.
The four men from intelligence had managed to elude their pursuers—temporarily—and were catching their breath in a clump of woods.
What Johnny did not immediately put into words was his thought that the Agency had set him up to get rid of him. Johnny had been a thorn in the side of the CIA for years. Johnny didn’t want to believe they would do it; but he couldn’t quite remove that little sliver of doubt. He lay for a time, allowing that little sliver to grow into a full slice.
He finally made up his mind and looked at his companions. “I think you guys better take off on your own. I think it’s me they’re after.”
“How come?” Lew asked.
“Let’s just say I didn’t always agree with policy or do exactly what was I supposed to do. I lone-wolfed it too many times when I was supposed to be a team player. Take off, guys. It’s been nice knowing you.”
“You sure about this, Johnny?” Pete asked.
“I’m sure. Besides, even if the Company isn’t out to shut me up, I’ve got the latest copy of the Ashes books in my pack. That automatically makes me a subversive in the eyes of the feds.”
“He’s right, you know,” Jay said.
“Who?” Lew asked.
“Ben Raines.”
Johnny chuckled. The fictional character of Ben Raines had gotten the author into all sorts of hot water with the feds. He’d heard that the feds had worked up a psychological profile on him, interviewed his friends, and he’d been told the Bureau had a dossier on him about the size of a Tom Clancy manuscript. Desp
ite all their efforts, and God only knew how much taxpayer money, to date, they had failed to link the author to any dangerous survivalist group or, for that matter, to any group that might have the overthrow of the government in mind (they never would because the author didn’t belong to any). Johnny had enough sense to know that any writer had no control over who bought his books or sent him fan mail. Also, to date, the author did not have the vaguest idea why the feds had singled him out for such an intense investigation.2 Johnny felt that if the government would stop wasting so much time sending their enforcement agents out to keep tabs on certain musicians and writers, they’d have a hell of a lot more time to catch crooks. Johnny also felt that the time was rapidly approaching when the First Amendment wasn’t going to be worth the paper it was written on.
“Okay, if that’s the way you want it. We’re gone, Johnny,” Pete Cooper said. “Good luck.”
Johnny smiled and wished his new-found friends well. He shook hands with each man. When the others had gone, Johnny lay for a time reviewing his situation. If the feds wanted him dead, they were going to have to work at it. For Johnny was an old pro at the art of staying alive.
“Come on, you bastards,” Johnny muttered. “Now you’re going to start really earning your money.”
* * *
After checking on the pilot, and finding him just a bit addled and not hurt, Darry sent George back to the cave to get the others. “This crash will bring the feds in here fast. They’ll find that cave eventually. We’ve got to get out of here and do it quickly.”
“Come on, you prick,” Darry said to the pilot. “Get on your feet.”
“You going to kill me?” the pilot asked.
“Don’t be stupid! It’s you people who are trying to kill us.
The pilot blinked at that.
“So far,” Darry told him, “you trigger-happy federal gunslingers have killed a dentist from Boise, wounded a schoolteacher from Kansas, attacked the cabins of law-abiding and decent people who have lived out here for years, staged an assault against an at-the-time unarmed camp of survivalists, killing and wounding no telling how many of them, roughed up a doctor from Los Angeles, whose wife is a very well known attorney from that city... and that’s just the people that I know about. God only knows what else you silly bastards have managed to screw up, all in the name of law and order.”
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