Flames from the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  “MP One, this is MP Six,” the radio in Pat O’Malley’s hand crackled. He cut his eyes to Buddy Raines, who nodded a “this is your show” go-ahead.

  “Go, Six.”

  “We found him. Only we got a problem.”

  “Ten-twenty, Six?” O’Malley asked.

  “We — we’re over at the ammo trucks, Captain.” The strain in his voice had Buddy Raines seeing the sweat standing out on a young Rebel’s forehead.

  “Shit,” O’Malley spat, then keyed the mike. “What’s the situation?”

  “The kid — the kid’s standin’ at the back of an ammo truck, in the center of a line of them. He’s got a grenade. And he’s pulled the pin.”

  “Keep him calm, Six. Talk to him. We’re on our way,” O’Malley instructed tightly. Then, to Buddy, “Colonel? You — ah, don’t need to be in on this one.”

  “Yes, I do, Captain O’Malley,” Buddy said flatly.

  They found a pale-faced, frightened boy with a live grenade in his hand. He gripped it so tightly that his severely bitten nails made black crescents against whitened fingers. His bare knees shook so violently that the legs of his shorts fluttered. Buddy Raines took it all in and spoke softly to Pat O’Malley.

  “Let me.” He stepped forward and Tommy jerked his hand upward toward the tailgate of the loaded ammo truck. “Tommy, Tommy, it’s all right, son. Just hold on and let me get that pin and put it back in the grenade. Then we can all relax. Listen to me, Tommy.”

  “My name ain’t Tommy. I’m Dieter. Dieter Yaegel, a soldier of the Fourth Reich!” His thin voice grew loud and shrill. “I demand that you let me go and free all my comrades. Do it or I’ll blow up everything.”

  “You don’t want to die, Tommy — er — Dieter. Neither do we. Just let me safe that grenade.” Buddy took a step closer to the terrified boy.

  “No! Don’t take another step. I’ll do it. I swear.”

  “Dieter, my name is Buddy Raines. General Ben is my father.”

  Shock and confusion registered on the boy’s face. He couldn’t be over eleven, Buddy estimated. Buddy took advantage of the kid’s confusion to take another step closer. A wild light came suddenly to Dieter/Tommy’s eyes. Reading the boy’s intent, Buddy made a desperate dive forward and hooked the boy’s legs in a one-armed tackle.

  He and Dieter sprawled in the dirt, the boy kicking and screaming. Buddy’s free hand pried at Dieter’s death grip on the grenade. He managed to wrench it loose and the arming striker smacked into the primer with a metallic click. Instantly Buddy let go of Dieter and came to one knee. He made a hard, straight pitch with the armed hand bomb toward the low basement window of a smoked-out house across from the ammo vehicles.

  “Grenaaaade!” Buddy bellowed.

  The light-green spheroid bounced off the bottom of the sill and dropped from sight. Two seconds later it went off. Every Rebel in the vicinity had hit the ground, and they all jerked in reaction to the detonation. Dieter sobbed wretchedly and pounded the ground with small fists. Buddy Raines came to his feet first. He reached down and yanked Dieter off the ground.

  With cold, deliberate calmness, he carried the boy by the scruff of his shirt collar to a huge equipment tire that had been changed out. There, Buddy sat down, a lopsided grin on his face as he put the kiddie Nazi over his knees.

  Dieter found his voice. “What’re you gonna do to me? What’re you gonna do?”

  “You’re going to get what you, by god, should have gotten a damned long time ago,” Buddy informed him as he yanked down the youngster’s short trousers and underwear.

  Then, amid Dieter/Tommy’s shrieks, wails, and pitiful sobs, Buddy Raines administered a thorough and deliberately painful spanking. After the sixth application of Buddy’s big, hard palm to the boy’s buttocks, Dieter stopped wriggling and kicking. His tears continued to wet Buddy’s camo trouser leg and his sobs became whimpers on the tenth smack. Buddy quit at an even dozen.

  “That was one hell of a spanking,” Capt. Pat O’Malley commented in an awed tone.

  “Not a quarter of what he deserves,” Buddy said thickly.

  Restored to his feet, Dieter pulled up his shorts. His face held a strange expression. With effort he gulped back his hysterical sobs. His lips and throat worked and Buddy sensed he wanted to say something other than the defiance he had been uttering. He gave the boy an encouraging nod.

  “W-we’re part of the W-We-Werewolves,” the boy blurted. Then, tearfully, humiliated and feeling betrayed by the Master Race, Dieter told everything he knew about the Werewolves and Peter Volmer. Buddy and O’Malley listened with growing horror and disgust.

  “Mary an’ all the saints,” O’Malley gasped when the lad had concluded. “What kind of monsters would do that to kids? Pervert their childhood into something so twisted and violent.”

  “The world is full of them,” Buddy answered tightly. “Dad said that at least this country used to be. All it takes is a sick mind and the right kind of hate. I’d like to get my hands on that son of a bitch Volmer. Which reminds me. Lock this one up and I’ve got to get on the horn to Base Camp One.”

  Cecil Jefferys took the call from Buddy that interrupted his supper. “What’s that?” he asked in astonishment after Buddy had given his warning about the small boys soon to arrive at BCO.

  “Exactly what I said. You’ve got a basket of deadly little monsters arriving on a cargo plane any time now,” Buddy reiterated. “The Nazis call them Werewolves. They are well-trained, vicious, and deadly. Right now the ones headed your way don’t know we’ve found out about them, so they’ll no doubt play the role they used to suck Dad into their trap. Sweet-faced little boys.”

  “Don’t worry, Buddy. They’ll be taken care of the minute they step off the plane. Now what’s this about Ben in a trap?”

  “Oh!” Buddy responded in his surprise. “I thought you’d been informed about that.” He went on to describe all they knew of Ben’s capture.”

  “By damn, I’ll mobilize my division and be on the way at once “Jefferys growled, outraged at this turn of events.

  “No, General Jefferys,” Buddy responded. “I can’t give you orders, but Dr. Chase can. Right now I don’t think Dad would want you exposing Base Camp to any possible advantage the Nazis could take from this. Let’s wait and see what happens. We’re mounting an expedition to go after Dad as soon as we can get clear from here. General McGowan is taking command in the field and will coordinate everything. I — I feel rotten about Dad being taken like this, but his team feels worse.”

  “You mean they survived?” Cecil asked, astounded.

  “Yes. The Nazis left them unharmed. I gather this Volmer likes to play head games. But, we’re on it, so just keep the home fires burning.”

  Cecil Jefferys decidedly did not like that, but he agreed in principle. After all, he was now C-in-C of the entire Rebel command. He had to coordinate from somewhere.

  By use of repeated, vicious blows to the head, and later drugs, Ben Raines was kept unconscious during his transportation to where Peter Volmer had decided to confine the Rebel leader. The place chosen had been the result of careful consideration. He could have moved Ben Raines to Führer Hoffman’s headquarters at Wallowa Lake.

  That would have put all the eggs in Hoffman’s basket. Peter Volmer had his own ideas as to whom it should be who became Führer of the American Reich. Now on an equal footing with Hans Brodermann, and ranked only by the Führer himself, Peter had ambitions to enlarge his power base. Everyone loved a winner. The man who captured Ben Raines and succeeded in forcing the surrender of all Rebel forces would be the man of the hour, as Volmer saw it. With General Rasbach’s army behind him, and all of the American Nazis, he would be in a good bargaining position to present himself as the new Führer.

  People would remember and admire the one who had defeated the Rebel pirates. They would back him, he knew it. For that reason, American and Mexican Nazis had secretly placed a battalion in the environs of Villa Ahumada, Chihuahua, Mex
ico. They controlled the entire area — in particular, a large, luxurious hacienda some ten miles out of town. It was there that Volmer and his Werewolves took the comatose form of Ben Raines.

  Ben gradually regained awareness over the next two days. Still groggy, and seriously concussed, Ben could at first make little of his surroundings. He was nauseated, dizzy, his head throbbed and his vision blurred. On the third day at the hacienda, he began to retain food given him. His strength returned rapidly now.

  By what he surmised to be midafternoon he had come to the conclusion he was being held in a partly subterranean room, a sort of dungeon. The door was thick, wooden, and barred from outside. He had a crude, narrow cot, a bucket to serve as a toilet, and a three-by-three-foot table on which he took his meals. Muffled voices from outside his cell grew louder as someone approached. The door opened and Peter Volmer entered, accompanied by a man Ben figured to be a doctor, from the small black bag he carried.

  Without a word, both men approached Ben. The doctor peeled back Ben’s eyelids and flashed a penlight into each pupil. He tapped and probed and at last nodded his satisfaction.

  “Ah, it seems you are with us again, and at least conscious and rational enough to suit the purpose.”

  “What might that be?” Ben demanded.

  “We’re going up to the radio room and have a little conversation with your precious Rebels.”

  “Talk all you damn well please. We have a policy. The Rebels do not recognize hostages. Hostages are considered KIAs, and there will be no negotiations for their release.”

  Volmer chuckled condescendingly. “Come now, General Raines. I think an exception will be made in your case. Get up!” he snapped in a command voice. “You’re to be the star of the show.”

  Considerable effort had gone into development of this Nazi stronghold, Ben reflected as they waited for a response from the Rebels in the elaborate radio communications center in a towerlike second-floor room of the hacienda. The windows in its rounded outer walls looked out over a sharp drop-off from the top of the mesa, on which the Spanish colonial ranch house had been built, to the desert floor below.

  Ben had decided he was imprisoned in a Mexican hacienda when he had observed the large interior garden, with fountains, statues, and tall, ancient palm trees, the distinctive wrought-iron grilles on windows and doors, and generous use of arches. Stout, hand-hewn timbers formed the lintels of doorways and frames of arches. Yes, definitely Mexican in origin. Ironically, it raised Ben’s spirits; it put him that much closer to General Raul Payon.

  “I repeat, this is the Headquarters of the American Nazi Expeditionary Force in North America. We demand to speak to General Ike McGowan. Over.”

  Again, no reply came. Volmer gestured to a sergeant standing beside a table. The noncom picked up a captured Rebel long-range field radio and set it on the counter in front of the RT operator.

  “Try that,” Volmer commanded.

  After careful study, the RT operator attached antenna leads to the proper terminals and turned on the set. He let it warm up, then repeated his message. A crackle of static came from the speaker, then a voice, made tinny and distant by the scrambler.

  “We copy you, Nazi scum. General Ike isn’t available at the moment.”

  Volmer made an impatient gesture. “Give me that.” He took the mike in hand and pushed the talk button. “This is Brigadeführer Peter Volmer. I demand to speak to General McGowan of the criminal Rebel forces at once, or to someone else in authority. We are holding General Ben Raines as a prisoner of war.”

  “Then why didn’t you say so, asshole? I’ll get someone right away.”

  Ben cut his eyes to Volmer’s livid face. “Didn’t I tell you, Volmer? It’s Rebel policy to write off hostages. And they don’t like Nazis.”

  “Shut up!” Volmer barked. “You will speak only when told to.”

  Although it hurt his head to do so, Ben laughed at Volmer.

  “This is Lt. Col. Buddy Raines, Volmer. What is it you want?”

  Ben laughed again at the surprised gape Volmer’s mouth formed. “Your — son? Does he outrank your General McGowan?”

  “As a matter of fact, he is subordinate to Ike. But he is in charge of one of the task forces headed this way to kick your Nazi ass.”

  Volmer missed the indication that Ben knew he was in Mexico. “He will do, then.” To Buddy, he spoke into the mike. “We are holding your father as a prisoner of war. We are willing to discuss repatriation. There are, of course, certain demands, conditions if you will, affixed to returning him.”

  A heavy sigh from Buddy. “We do not deal with terrorists or hostage takers. If General Raines is indeed your prisoner, we insist he be afforded all the rights and protections of prisoners of war.”

  Volmer lost it for a moment. “You are in no position to demand anything! You will listen to our demands and do as I say. There will be an immediate cessation of hostilities by Rebel units against forces of the National Army of Liberation and the American Nazi armed forces. Within twenty-four hours, you will present a detailed plan for the laying down of Rebel arms and the peaceful dispersal of your troops. Further, you will present a plan for the surrender of all Rebel war criminals for trial before the High Reich Tribunal. Within forty-eight hours you will present a detailed plan for the delivery of all Rebel-held territory to the New American Reich. At the successful completion of these terms, General Raines will be repatriated. Are those terms clear?”

  After a long, tense thirty seconds, Buddy answered. “I stated at the start that we do not deal with terrorists. I have as yet to receive proof that you indeed hold my father and that he is alive.”

  Volmer uttered a muffled curse. “Arrogant whelp. I expected as much,” he directed at Ben. “Here, talk to that obnoxious son of yours, order him to meet my demands.”

  “I’ll talk to him, but I’ll not order him to surrender. Even if I did, he’d refuse,” Ben responded.

  “Just — talk,” Volmer snarled.

  “Buddy, this is your Dad.”

  “Yeah, Pop. I think the scrambler is flattening your voice a lot, but it’s you, right?”

  “Sure, son. I’m alive. And I’m pissed off.”

  “So are we. Are you all right, Pop?”

  “I’m fine, son. So far they haven’t pulled any fingernails.”

  “Then hang in there, Pop. Don’t worry. What does Jersey always dream about as the perfect dessert?”

  Ben produced a big smile. “She longs for a big, gooey, hot fudge sundae.”

  “That’s a big ten-four, Pop.” He went off the air for a moment, then, “Let me have that Volmer mother again.”

  “This is Brigadeführer Volmer,” Peter said icily. “Show some respect for your superiors, you repugnant woods colt.”

  “You’re the bastard, Volmer. Pop legally adopted me a long time ago,” Buddy said flippantly.

  Ben fought to suppress a big, warm smile. Buddy never called him “Pop.” It was the boy’s way of telling him something was brewing. Ben’s spirits bloomed.

  Volmer battled his rising fury and forced his voice to remain stern and demanding. “Your old-home week was touching. Now, you know your father is alive. We will deliver General Raines as specified immediately you comply with our terms.”

  “Sorry, can’t do. You know the rules, Pop. There’s nothing we can do. So I guess this is goodbye.”

  “Wait,” Volmer shouted into the mike. “General Raines — your father — mentioned torture a moment ago. He is telling the truth . . . so far. But that can change. I’m giving you this ultimatum. You have one hour in which to reconsider, or your father will be minus one finger. We’ll send it to you. Now get busy and reach agreement to comply with my terms. Volmer out.”

  ELEVEN

  An hour later, one in which Peter Volmer alternately threatened and harangued Ben Raines, the RT again contacted Buddy Raines. Volmer had summoned Heinz/Jimmy, who stood close to the mike in Volmer’s hand, while the Nazi chief caressed his ne
ck and shoulders. Ben felt his natural revulsion at flagrant perverts rising sour and hot in his throat.

  “Well, Colonel Raines. Are you ready to capitulate on our terms?”

  “What were those terms again?” Buddy asked, sounding like a man trying to stall for time.

  “You know them perfectly well. All hostilities against NAL and American Nazi troops to cease at once. Twenty-four hours to devise a plan to have all Rebel units currently engaged against us or in reserve to lay down their arms and return peacefully to their homes. Immediate surrender of all war criminals, whom we shall designate. Forty-eight hours to devise a plan to turn over all Rebel-held territory to the American Reich.”

  “Yeah. I thought that was what you had said.” Usually mild-mannered, Buddy’s voice grew hard as he spoke again. “I’m sorry, Pop. I’ll miss you. But, it’s no deal. As far as those Nazi scum are concerned, they can go fuck themselves.”

  Immediately, four burly American black-shirts grabbed Ben Raines. With considerable effort, despite his recent condition, they wrestled him to a table. There one splayed his left hand flat on the surface. Another raised an SS dagger and swiftly brought it down. Its keen edge flashed blue-white in a shaft of sunlight a moment before it severed the tip of Ben’s pinkie finger. The blade made a loud, solid thud in the wood.

  Volmer had keyed the mike while this went on and now Jimmy provided a convincing scream of agony. “Here comes the finger I promised you, Buddy Raines,” he declared, voice dripping with venom.

  Ben bit back his own pain as the Nazi thugs stanched the flow of blood and bandaged his left little finger. He had lost the tip, but he had never screamed. He trusted that Buddy would know that had been faked.

  “Get him out of here,” Volmer ordered his henchmen. To a staff officer, “See that the fingertip is delivered to Rebel lines.” Then into the open mike, “We will wait twenty-four hours after you receive our token of affection for a more reasonable reply. Volmer out.”