Alone in the Ashes Read online

  “You stick to healing, Barnes,” Ben told him. “Leave the rest for people who have the stomach for it.”

  “General Raines, you want what never was and never will be: a perfect society. But you cannot build a perfect society when the architects are imperfect human beings.”

  Ben smiled again. “The man said, quoting Ben Raines.”

  The doctor’s smile matched Ben’s. “That’s right, you did write that, didn’t you? I’ll live in your society, General. But I’ll do so because of the safety it affords me, not because I agree with its basic philosophy.”

  “Then that makes you a hypocrite, doesn’t it, Mr. Barnes?”

  The doctor chose not to reply. He studied Ben for a moment, then walked away.

  Ben noticed the seat of the man’s jeans had been crudely patched with a piece of canvas. For all his education and lofty thoughts, the man could just barely keep his ass from showing through.

  6

  “Still angry at me?” Ben asked Judy.

  “Mad!” she said.

  “Very well. When you get your rabies shot, let me know. I’ll be around.”

  She grabbed his arm with surprising strength and spun him around as he turned to go. “Ben, these people were beaten down—whipped. Now they’ve had a small victory and they’re happy. And you think it’s funny.”

  “Judy ...” Ben stepped closer. “I’m amused, but not in the way you think. My Rebels have played out this same scenario for years. Has it occurred to you that we just might be weary of it?”

  “Then why don’t you and your people just quit?” she asked hotly.

  “We can’t. For our own sake, we can’t. It’s never-ending for us. I see that now. If I—we—have a destiny, this is it.”

  “Yeah, you said that—something like it—back in the truck. But you don’t have to act so ... so smart-assed about it!”

  He laughed at her and took her hand. “Come on, fireball. We’ve got to start setting up a defense line against West and his people.”

  “And it annoys you that you have to remind the people to do it, right, Ben?”

  “Oh, not really. I guess it’s second nature for me.” He smiled. “Just one of my many talents.”

  Judy muttered something extremely profane under her breath.

  “You don’t know the exact location of West’s base camp?” Ben asked.

  “Not his main camp,” Leighton said. “We know where most of his work camps are, though.”

  They were taking a break from setting up a first line of defense on the north side of town.

  “After we arm ourselves better with the weapons taken from the next contingent of West’s people, we’ll hit the first labor camp and free your friends. By that time, my Rebels should be here with some heavier stuff.”

  Barnes looked horrified. “You plan to fight West’s people before your troops get here?”

  “Sure,” Ben said.

  “Are you mad or just insufferably arrogant?” the doctor asked.

  “Neither one, I hope,” Ben said with a smile.

  “Look around you, General!” Barnes almost shouted the words. “You have thirty people armed, and not well-armed, at that. West has between four hundred and six hundred well-armed and trained men.”

  “But he can’t send all of them at once,” Ben said gently. “That would leave his labor camps unguarded. He can’t leave his base camp unguarded; that’s probably where he stashes his weapons and ammo. Warlords down through history share many things in common, one of which is a monumental ego. I’m counting on this West person to fit the mold. He will find where we ambushed and killed his people. I’m counting on that. It’s kind of hard to miss a half-dozen hanging bodies,” Ben added drily. “That’s going to make West either awfully angry or awfully cautious. I’m betting on angry. We’re going to let him bust through this first line of barricades with very little resistance. See how they’re placed close to deep ditches so we can jump into their protection and run screaming and frightened away from the Big Bad West? You notice I have the other teams working just around that curve, one mile down the road. Row after row of drums filled with water, concrete blocks, old junked cars. No way he can get through. When his column grinds to a halt, what’s going to be directly over and behind him, Doctor?”

  The doctor smiled grudgingly. “An overpass, General. And you and Leighton and Canby and Morris will be up there with automatic weapons and bombs, right?”

  “You’re learning, Ralph. I’ll make a fighter out of you yet.”

  “I’ll stick with medicine,” the doctor replied, turning away.

  “That man does not have much use for me,” Ben told Dot.

  “He resents the ease with which you handle things,” the woman told him. “We’ve been plotting and scheming for a year around here, trying to come up with some solution to our problem. Then you walk in and take over. And get it done,” she added.

  Ben looked at the woman. “Dot, no nation whose citizens were fully armed was ever conquered by an outside force. I might get some argument on that, but in the main it’s true. Just as it’s true that many nations went from right-wing dictatorships to a democratic form of government. But no nation ever went from a communist form of government to a democratic form of government. The people who control the guns control it all.”

  She smiled at him. “I’m old enough to remember that the writer Ben Raines was a liberal hater in print. A liberal hater in person, too, it appears.”

  Judy came to Ben’s side, two cups of what currently passed for coffee in her hands. More chicory than anything else. But at least it was hot, and if enough honey was added, not too bad.

  “Thank you,” Ben said, not sure if Judy was still angry at him, for whatever reason.

  “You’re welcome.” She handed the second cup to Dot. A quiet peace offering from woman to woman. “The lookouts are reporting everything is quiet. No sign of West.”

  Dot sipped her coffee. “They’ll be here. What worries me is what happens if West and Campo join forces?”

  “We fight them,” Ben said. “My people will be here in the morning; possibly late this evening. Campo doesn’t have artillery and no one here has seen any type of artillery in the hands of West. There’ll be a mortar crew with my Rebels and at least two .50-caliber machine guns—maybe four of them. That, plus our discipline and experience, will make up the difference.”

  “Here they come!” the excited call was passed down the line. “A whole great line of them.”

  “Get into position,” Ben ordered. “You all know what to do. Do it, and we’ll come out of this alive. Fuck up, and we’re dead.”

  Ben and those with him, all armed with M-16’s, crouched on the overpass and watched and waited. Ben saw the twenty-odd vehicles of the column slow, then stop. Using binoculars, Ben watched the lead vehicle, a van. A man got out and stood with hands on hips, surveying the flimsy barricade that stretched across the road. The bearded man laughed at the obstacle and pointed toward it.

  Ben handed the binoculars to Leighton. “Is that West?”

  Leighton looked. “That’s him.” He counted the vehicles in the column. “Figuring five men to a vehicle, I make it about a hundred twenty-five men we’re up against.”

  “Yes,” Ben said. He lifted his walkie-talkie. Judy was behind the second, as yet unseen, barricade around the curve. “Judy? Everybody in place and ready?”

  “Ready, Ben,” she radioed back. The young lady had never seen a walkie-talkie before meeting Ben.

  “Stay loose,” Ben said.

  “One guy got too loose,” Judy radioed back. “He messed his pants.”

  Ben grinned and rehooked the walkie-talkie to his chest harness. “Here they come.”

  A few desultory shots were fired at the advancing column by those behind the first barricade. They then jumped into the ditch, running and yelling as if in mortal fear.

  A bob truck with a steel grate welded in front of the hood was waved on past West’s van. The bob
truck slammed through the barricade, the column following.

  “So far, so good,” Ben muttered.

  When the last vehicle had passed the wrecked barricade, people ran out from the thick weeds and brush on both sides of the highway. They carried concrete blocks, wooden planks with long nails driven through, sacks of broken glass. Others rolled water-filled fifty-five-gallon drums. Still others unrolled barbed wire, securing the ends on both sides of the highway.

  They quickly and effectively closed the highway to West and his people.

  Rounding the curve, the second barricade looked at first glance to be as flimsy as the first. The bob truck picked up speed, preparing to ram right through the barricade. The bob truck’s right front tire struck a series of concrete blocks, tipped to one side, and rolled over, spilling the men riding in the back. The men were shot down before they could rise to their feet. From behind the barricade, men and women darted out, grabbed up weapons and ammo belts, then raced back behind the shelter.

  In the van, West realized he had driven right into a well-thought-out trap. He spun the steering wheel, the van slewing around, facing the direction he’d come. On the overpass, Ben leveled his scope-mounted, .30-06, lined up West’s ugly face in the cross hairs, and pulled the trigger. The slug slammed through the windshield, deflected upward several inches, and struck West on the side of the head. The slug blew off the man’s ear, taking a thick patch of hide and hair with it. He jumped out of the van, howling in pain, one hand to the side of his bloody head, and tried to run. Ben shot him in the knee, almost blowing the lower part of the leg off. If he could do it, he wanted West alive.

  West’s men found themselves trapped in an increasingly bloody box. There seemed to be no way out. The rage of the men and women they had brutally subdued and abused and oppressed howled to the surface, erupting like a savage trapped beast. When the men attempted to surrender, they were hacked to pieces by axe- and machete-wielding men and women. The blood and gore slicked the old highway.

  “Cease fire!” Ben yelled. “Cease fire! Back off, people! Back off! It’s over, goddamn it!”

  Silence settled over the smoky, bloody carnage-filled highway. The men and women looked at what was left of that which they had so feared for so long.

  “Doctor Barnes!” Ben yelled, standing up.

  “Here, General.”

  “See to West’s wounds. We want him alive for barter. The rest of you gather up the weapons and tear down the barricades. Get the road clear of nails and glass.”

  “We did it!” a woman cried, crying tears of joy and relief and disbelief. “We really did it!”

  Ben looked down from the overpass, his eyes touching Doctor Barnes.

  “Might rules once again, right, General?” the doctor called.

  “An armed, disciplined, organized people cannot be enslaved, Doctor. Were I you, I would keep that in mind.”

  “Still the writer, aren’t you, General?” Barnes said, his voice carrying to the top of the overpass. “Still carrying your liberal-hating message to the masses, right?”

  “Somebody damn well better continue doing it,” Ben said.

  The doctor turned away. The canvas patch on the seat of his trousers had worked loose.

  His ass was showing.

  7

  One hundred and fifty of the town’s residents were now armed, with plenty of ammunition for the weapons. Only a handful of West’s men made it out of the ambush alive, and two of those died during the night. West’s leg, from the knee down, was amputated by Doctor Barnes. It really was not that tough an operation, for Ben’s bullet had done most of the work. When Barnes complained that he had nothing to knock the man out with, Ben looked at the doctor as if he were an idiot.

  The doctor got the message.

  “It’s going to be very difficult closing all this off,” the doctor bitched.

  “Cauterize it,” Ben said.

  The doctor finally lost his temper. “You’re a fucking savage, Raines! Goddamn it, the man is a human being.”

  Ben met the man’s hot eyes. “West has killed, in cold blood, no telling how many hundreds of people. He has raped, tortured, mutilated, degraded, enslaved, and God only knows what else, to countless hundreds more. If you’re expecting me to feel any degree of pity for that scum, you’re going to have a long wait, doctor. Like forever!”

  “Now I know why the Tri-States was virtually crime-free!”

  “That’s right, Doctor. We just didn’t tolerate it.”

  West lay on the table, tied down with ropes, and cursed Ben.

  Ben looked at the man and spoke quietly. After his words, West shut his mouth and kept it shut.

  Ben had placed the muzzle of his pistol against West’s temple and said, “I can put you out of your pain permanently, West. The choice is yours.”

  Doctor Barnes said, “God, Raines! I’d hate to have to live with your conscience.”

  “I don’t have any problems with it at all, Ralph,” Ben replied.

  The contingent of Rebels rolled in just after first light. They were commanded by a Captain Chad.

  “You made good time, Captain,” Ben told the young officer.

  “We took shifts at the wheel, General. Only had to detour three times and then not too far.” He looked around at the looted and nearly destroyed city. “This going to be our first outpost, General?”

  “One of the first, I suppose. I’d like to set up at least two more between Base Camp One and here. We’ll see how this one works out.”

  The Rebels were introduced all around. The men and women of what was left of Dyersburg could only stand and stare at the healthy, well-dressed, and fit Rebels. A young woman, dressed exactly like her Rebel counterparts, walked up to Ben. She wore a .45 belted at her waist and looked very comfortable with it.

  “I’m Doctor Walland, General. We met briefly back at Base Camp One.”

  “Yes, I remember, Doctor,” Ben said, shaking the woman’s hand. He waved for Doctor Barnes to come over. He introduced them and said, “I’ll leave you two alone. Doctor Barnes doesn’t care for my company.”

  Gloria Walland looked at Ben and smiled. “You’re joking, of course, General.”

  “According to Doctor Barnes, I am a barbarian and a savage,” Ben said bluntly. “He doesn’t care for the Rebel system of justice.”

  Doctor Gloria Walland, a captain in the Rebel Army, faced Doctor Ralph Barnes.

  Ben leaned over to see if the doctor had changed trousers. He had.

  “Let’s clear the air, Doctor Barnes,” Gloria said.

  “That would probably be best, Doctor Walland,” Ralph said.

  “Captain Walland,” Gloria corrected.

  “But of course.”

  “I am a physician, Doctor Barnes. If you bring two wounded people to me, one a member of the Rebel Army, the other a prisoner of war, I will check to see which person is the more severely wounded. But I would not, and will not, allow a member of the Rebel Army to die in order to save the life of the enemy. Is that clear, Doctor?”

  “Perfectly clear, Captain,” Barnes said stiffly.

  “One more thing, Doctor Barnes,” Gloria said. “Two years ago I was seized at gunpoint by armed men. Scavengers, looters, scum. They raped me. One of them made a mistake and turned his back to me when he had finished. I grabbed his pistol, a .38-caliber revolver, took very careful aim, and shot the bastard squarely and precisely in his asshole. He was still screaming as I killed the other two and drove away. Does that give you some insight as to what I think about criminals, Doctor?”

  “I get a very clear picture, Captain Walland.”

  “Fine, Doctor Barnes. Now if you’ll help me with my equipment, we’ll see about giving everybody here a checkup and see where we have to go concerning vitamins and diet.”

  “With pleasure ... Doctor,” Ralph said. As Walland walked away, Ralph looked at Ben and smiled. “Very ... ah, forceful young woman, General. I think we’re going to get on splendidly.”

&
nbsp; “I hope so, Ralph. I’m told she’s an expert shot.”

  When Ralph had gone, Captain Chad said, “General? I’ve known Gloria for five years. She never was raped.”

  Ben smiled. “Yes. I’ve read her file. She’s just telling Doctor Barnes how the show is going to be run, that’s all.”

  Leaving half the newly arrived contingent of the Rebels behind, Ben took the mortar crews, the machine gunners, and one hundred of the newly armed citizens with their newly acquired vehicles and led the column toward the first of West’s labor camps. Ben’s heavily armed force rolled up to the gates of the forced labor camp, located some twenty-odd miles from Dyersburg.

  A strange silence greeted them. There were no guards in the crudely built towers, no guards to be seen behind the high barbed wire that surrounded the camp.

  “I don’t think we’re going to like what we’ll see in those barracks, General,” Captain Chad said.

  “Nor I, Captain,” Ben replied. “Blow the gates and let’s take a look.”

  Several of the civilians lost their breakfast and many more turned green around the mouth.

  The prisoners in the labor camp had been machine-gunned in their barracks. The rough wooden floors were slick with blood. The stench of loosened bowels was nearly overpowering.

  “Why, General?” a man asked. “Why did they do this?”

  “Revenge. West must have had observers behind the main column yesterday. They reported back, and this,” he waved his hand, “is their reply to us.” Ben turned to Dot. “You know where the other camps are located?”

  “Most of them. But ... what about the dead here?” she asked.

  “You have no earthmoving equipment, Dot. And I didn’t bring any body bags with me. So unless you people want to spend several days digging holes for the bodies—which the dogs and other wild animals will dig up as soon as you’re gone—I suggest we put all the bodies in one barracks and burn them.”