Triumph in the Ashes Read online

  Ben shook his head. “No. It would really surprise me if they were. Probably just one of the many hundreds of gangs that prowl and slither around this continent. Scouts are checking it out now.”

  “I certainly hope you cautioned them not to fall out of the damn boats,” Chase warned. “There are probably crocs in that river.”

  Ben cut his eyes, grunted a non-committal reply, and continued to watch the Scout teams as they cranked the outboards and headed for the opposite shore.

  “One of the wounded just died,” Corrie said. “The others are going to make it.”

  “Who died?” Ben asked.

  “Major Larsen.”

  “Shit,” Ben muttered. He sighed. “Bury them off the road in the brush. Deep and well. I don’t want animals digging them up. Get a chaplain up here.”

  “OK, Boss.”

  Major Larsen had been with Ben for years, starting out with the Rebels when he was just an enlisted man in his teens and working his way up through the ranks. He was well-liked by everyone, and would be sorely missed.

  Chase looked at Ben’s face for a moment and said, “Watch your blood pressure, Ben. These things happen.”

  “My blood pressure is fine, Lamar.”

  “Then what’s wrong?”

  “This damn country.”

  Chase grunted in response, frowning as Ben began rolling a cigarette.

  “Of course, wait until we hit South America,” Ben said. “Then we’ll really get bogged down in certain areas.”

  “Is that where we go next?”

  “Probably. You can bet that’s where Bruno’s heading . . . if he makes it out of Africa alive, and he probably will. The bastard has more luck than a leprechaun. He can’t go back to Europe, that’s for sure. He’s the most wanted man on the continent.”

  Chase waited for Ben to continue, sensing there was more. He was right.

  “The Secretary General warned me that we might go to South America when we finished here.” Ben shrugged. “It was all part of the deal we made.”

  “A deal that isn’t worth the paper it’s written on or the handshake that sealed it,” Doctor Chase said. “You don’t believe for a minute the federal government outside The SUSA will keep their end of the bargain. Do you?”

  Ben smiled. “Of course not, Lamar. I wouldn’t trust a liberal out of my sight. But it bought us some time. Much needed time.”

  “They don’t believe you’ll use nuclear and germ weapons against them, Ben.”

  “Then they don’t know or understand me at all, Lamar. I will personally push the buttons that let the birds fly if they invade us. Those crybaby assholes had damn well better understand that. And don’t think for a second Cecil won’t do it . . . because he damn sure will.”

  Chase studied Ben’s face for a few seconds. “Yes. Cecil will push the buttons. I’m sure of that. But do you think The SUSA will be invaded? Do you believe the federal government will really take that chance?”

  Ben lit his hand-rolled cigarette and was silent for a few heartbeats, letting a very slight breeze slip the smoke away.

  When he spoke, his words were low. “Yes, I do, Lamar. But I’m still undecided as to whether it’s going to be an all-out assault or a guerrilla, hit and run attempt.”

  “What do Mike’s people have to say about it?”

  Mike Richards was the Rebels’ Chief of Intelligence.

  “That some type of action against us is being planned, but they’re unable, so far, to break into the inner circle and pin anything down.”

  “Doesn’t leave us much to go on, does it?”

  Ben smiled. “Not a whole lot, Lamar. Except we know it’s coming. But not when or how.”

  The two men stood in silence as the wounded combat engineers were transported back to a clearing to be worked on in a MASH facility.

  One of the medics walked back to Ben and Lamar. “One is going to lose a leg, I think. The others will be back on limited duty before long.”

  Lamar thanked the medic and the young woman nodded and walked away. No one saluted in a combat zone.

  “I am beginning to truly hate this place,” Ben said. “I know I shouldn’t, but I do. Not the people, at least not most of them, but the place.”

  “If it’ll make you feel any better, Ben, the country doesn’t thrill me all that much, either, even though much of it is quite beautiful.”

  “Scouts found several alive over there,” Corrie said. “They’re bringing three of them across now.”

  “Do they speak English?” Ben asked.

  “Oh, yes, sir,” Corrie replied. “They sure do. They’re Americans.”

  TWO

  The three men had suffered only very minor wounds, and those had been attended to. They were all in good physical shape, strong, and certainly appeared very healthy. Ben studied the trio for several moments before speaking. He did not like what he was thinking.

  “How’d you boys get to Africa?” Ben finally asked.

  “Greyhound,” the bigger of the three popped back.

  “Oh,” Ben said with a smile. “A sense of humor. That’s good. You’re damn sure going to need one. Now, I’ll ask again—how did you boys get over here?”

  “Plane,” the older of the three volunteered.

  “When?” Ben asked.

  “Six, seven months ago,” the same man replied. “I’m not sure. Time sort of runs together over here.”

  Ben silently and certainly agreed with the man about that. “Go on.”

  “What do you mean, sir?”

  “Who paid you to come over here? How many of you came over? And why?”

  “Keep your damn mouth shut, Leon,” the first man to speak said.

  “Screw you, Jimmy,” the younger man said. He looked back at Ben. “Two battalions.”

  “Mercenaries,” Ben said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “All Americans?”

  “Most of them, yes sir. But other nationalities mixed in there, too. A few Canadians, half a dozen or so Germans and Russians. Some English.”

  Ben again studied the three for a moment. They were dressed in cammie BDUs. Because of the way they were dressed he couldn’t threaten them with punishment as spies, and they probably were well aware of that. “Who’s paying you?”

  This time, the bigger man spoke. “That we don’t know, General. You can believe it or not, but it’s the truth.”

  Ben believed him. But he also had a damn good idea who was paying the men. “More mercenaries coming over?”

  “Yes, sir,” the third man said. “I can tell you for a fact that recruiting has been going on for a long time.”

  Ben nodded. “And a long time is . . . how long?”

  “Over a year, General.”

  There were a lot more questions Ben wanted to ask, but he would save them and turn the man over to Intelligence for more interrogation. Ben hoped they would be honest, for if his Intel team sensed the men were lying it could get very nasty when they hauled out the drugs. Not painful, not physical torture, but the men would tell the truth . . . bet on that.

  “What happens to us now, General?” the youngest of the trio asked.

  “You’ll be turned over to our Intelligence section for further questioning. I urge you to cooperate with them.”

  “In other words,” the big one said, “here come the needle and the drugs.”

  “In other words,” Ben replied, his smile rather grim, “you’re right.”

  “We’re over here fighting for money, General. Not for any political philosophy or cause. They won’t need to use drugs on us. We’ll tell them what they want to know . . . as much as we can. Which isn’t much.”

  Ben believed that. He was reasonably sure the men had been recruited by a third party. That was the way it was usually done. The money men (in this case, he was sure it was the fast-growing and decidedly socialistic government outside The SUSA) staying anonymous in the shadows.

  Ben waved for the guards to take the prisoners away
, and then shifted the camp chair around and stretched his long legs out in front of him, away from the field desk in his tent.

  “Going socialistic again,” Ben muttered. “But this time, worse than before.”

  He poured a fresh hot mug of coffee from the thermos and shook his head and sighed, remembering all too vividly the bad days in America, before the collapse, before the terrible germ war that wiped out every government around the globe, even before the nationwide taxpayer revolt that cost hundreds of Americans their lives as hardworking citizens hard pressed by the government had protested the amount of money extorted from them every year by the government . . . and in many cases, at least in the minds of many, the money carelessly pissed away by the congress.

  Ben sat in his tent and sipped his coffee, recalling the smooth and highly effective actions of the insidious gun-grab folks who worked until they finally got their way and all handguns (except those in the hands of selected citizens—the suck-ass types) were seized by federal agents and carefully handpicked and trained members of the military.

  Ben recalled even before then, when the nation was morally sliding into the gutter.

  “Morally we were bankrupt,” Ben muttered, after taking another sip of coffee. “Many Americans were happy and content to be playing among the turds and the puke in the sewers.”

  And Ben knew the nation was definitely morally bankrupt in the years before The Great War and the collapse. There was filth and perversion every day on the television, and in the movies. The same garbage—and in many cases much worse—could be found in cyberspace, on the information highway called the Internet.

  Liberals and many members of the press screamed about freedom of speech and said that to interfere would be a violation of The Bill of Rights.

  But Ben had grave doubts about that.

  A few years before the entire world fell apart there had been a rash of schoolyard killings: kids killing kids for no apparent reason. The hysterical gun-grabbers had howled that it was the availability of guns that caused the kids to kill. But Ben and millions of others who applied common sense to everyday living knew that was pure horseshit: nothing but mealymouthed, out-of-touch-with-reality liberals making excuses for deviant and otherwise totally unacceptable behavior.

  Ben stirred restlessly in his camp chair as old memories came flooding back with startling clarity—vivid images of him, years back, sitting in the den of his home trying to watch television, but instead seething with anger at the TV news commentators and movie and TV personalities (all of them so left-leaning and liberal that it pained them to have to give a right hand turn signal), excusing the behavior of dope dealers, violent criminals, gang members, and degenerates . . . and especially talking about the Bible being passé.

  Ben had listened to those types espouse their views that the Bible didn’t really have to be followed . . . not to the letter. If a certain passage of scripture didn’t please the reader, well, he could just ignore it and go on to another passage that better suited the reader’s life-style.

  Ben had always wondered, often as he recalled, what The Almighty thought about that.

  Ben was not an overly religious man, but he certainly believed in God, and he did read the Bible: he carried a Bible with him in the wagon and read it often, taking a great deal of comfort in the words.

  He recalled a radio interview he’d done with a talk show host one time, just a few months before The Great War and the collapse. The interviewer was one of those who believed that only the police and the military should own guns, and no civilian should be allowed to carry a concealed weapon . . . except for certain select individuals—he would never say who those selected people might be. But Ben knew: people who gave lots of money to the whiny, I-want-to-run-your-life and Give-me-something-for-nothing party. The interviewer placed the blame for many of society’s ills solely on guns . . . but never, ever on the people holding the guns.

  Ben had finally lost his temper with the left-winger, and the interview turned decidedly nasty. The ratings for that show were the highest ever made.

  Ben smiled as he recalled that long ago TV show. That had been a fun interview! He had succeeded in making the left-wing, liberal prick angry, and the man had lost his cool. He had been good at doing that.

  Ben’s smile faded. Now the city where the station had been located no longer existed, except in the ashes of memory. Those wonderful people the interviewer had so staunchly defended had turned the streets into a battleground, as punk gangs fought for control . . . until the Rebels came along and killed them.

  Jersey’s voice cut into Ben’s memories. “Deep in thought, Boss?”

  Ben looked up and smiled. “Yes, I was, Jersey. For a fact.”

  “Pretty good memories?”

  “Some of them, yes. Others not so great.” Ben sighed and was silent for a couple of heartbeats. “Dwelling in the past is a sure sign I’m getting old, I guess.”

  “That’s bullshit, Boss,” she said, sitting down on a trunk as the rest of Ben’s team walked into the big squad tent. “We all have memories we unlock and look at from time to time. Nothing wrong with doing that.”

  “What’s bullshit?” Cooper asked.

  “The Boss says he’s getting old,” Jersey told him.

  “Naw,” Cooper said, as Anna took Ben’s cup and refilled it from the coffee thermos. “When you get too old for the field, Boss, we’ll tell you.”

  Ben looked at each member of his team. With the exception of Anna, the others should be married and settled, possibly raising kids of their own, not stomping all over the world laying their lives on the line in places most people never heard of . . . or really cared about.

  “Actually, I was thinking about how the world got into this mess in the first place,” Ben said, thanking Anna for the coffee refill.

  “From what I’ve been able to read and from what I remember,” Beth said, “and from what you’ve told us, America had turned into something pretty close to a cesspool. I can’t believe some of the things I read in the old newspapers. Morals, ethics, honor, faith in God, had all taken a nosedive.”

  Ben nodded his head in agreement. “That’s right. Worse than a nosedive. America was taking a bath in the sewer, and enjoying the filth it wallowed in.”

  Anna looked up and made a face at just the thought. “That is sickening, General Ben.”

  “Anybody ever thought that maybe God had a hand in all the destruction?” Cooper asked.

  Jersey cut her dark eyes to him. “Yeah, Coop. I have. Many times. I think we all have.”

  “I sure have,” Corrie said. “I think maybe He did it because He was so disgusted. He sure had reason to be all bent out of shape.”

  “Boss?” Cooper asked, looking at Ben. “You ever think that?”

  “Oh, yes, Coop. He certainly may have had a hand in destroying what He created, and forcing us to start all over. He told us it would never again be done by flood.”

  “But the government outside The SUSA is going right back to the old ways,” Beth said. “Does that mean it might happen again?”

  Ben waited a moment before replying. When he spoke, his voice was low. “It might, Beth. It just might.”

  THREE

  Before the team from Intelligence could start their work on the three American mercenaries, the men decided to tell all they knew . . . or so they insisted. Intel believed they were holding a lot back, but what they did say was enough for Ben to fit another piece of the puzzle in place. There were still gaps in the overall mystery, but Ben felt he should talk to Cecil Jefferys back in The SUSA and warn him that the government outside their borders was planning some sort of move against The SUSA.

  “We’re just beginning to get whispers about that, Ben,” Ben’s longtime friend and President of The SUSA said, “I was going to give you a bump in a few hours. Of course, we both knew it was coming eventually.”

  “Yes, that we did, Cece. I think it might be best if you had a little chat with somebody in power.”
>
  “I’d do just that, Ben. But nobody really knows who makes up the shadow government.”

  “Everything is really still all that screwed up in the new capital?”

  “That’s being kind. To be blunt, it’s a royal fuckup. The people we felt we could trust are out of the loop . . . or just out, period. And I mean all the way out. There have been half a dozen little power plays since you left. Sometimes it’s weeks before we learn of the full magnitude. And there’s something we learned just hours ago, and it’s unbelievable. The announcement just came down the line. The upcoming national elections have been postponed.”

  “Postponed? For what reason?”

  “The bottom line seems to be security concerns.”

  “Oh . . . that’s bullshit!”

  “Of course it is. But that’s the word—the party line, you might call it—the central government is putting out. And you know who they’re blaming. . . .”

  “The SUSA.”

  “Right. Those in power are claiming The SUSA is planning to move against the New Democracy . . . as it’s being called by the press. Bless their little pointy heads.”

  “The New Democracy?”

  “That’s it. Really catchy phrase, isn’t it?”

  “Sounds like something a bunch of silly ass liberals would dream up.”

  “You got it.”

  “Next we’ll have a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Where are we heading, Cece?”

  “Well . . . the military outside our borders is just not strong enough yet to tangle with us . . . but they’re slowly building to that strength. Now that the main force of the Rebels is out of the picture—so to speak—thousands of miles away, I think the people—certain types of people, that is, and you know the breed as well as I do—living outside our borders will be used for cannon fodder.”

  “Those ‘give me something for nothing, I want the government to take care of me cradle to grave, politically correct, I’ll sue you for the slightest slur’ types will attempt a swarm across our borders, and mercenaries will be right behind them, with the new military backing up the second wave.”