Out of the Ashes Read online

  “We won’t do anything, Canadian. We shall be dead.” Malelov chuckled. “But . . . perhaps out of the ashes, eh?”

  “Fatalistic son of a bitch!” Larousse cursed him. “You could, we could, stop all this before it starts.”

  “That’s what the English just told me moments ago.” Malelov laughed, his dark humor tumbling through the miles of cold space. “I told them to pour a spot of vodka in their tea.”

  “We are not invading your borders,” Travee reminded the Russian.

  “Oh, hell, Travee!” Malelov replied impatiently. “Don’t be so naive. You know perfectly well—as I do—it’s time. We’ve been rattling sabers and growling at one another for more than forty years. Isn’t-that right, Crazy Horse?” He chuckled. “I do so envy you Americans your nicknames. We Russians have to be so damned formal. I used to be known as the Wolf, but the central committee frowned on that nickname.”

  “Liked the ladies, eh?” Travee said.

  “Oh, yes, Crazy Horse. But, like you, I’m getting old. Content with just one woman, even if she does look like a baked potato.”

  Travee had to laugh at the man. “Just enough time for some chitchat, eh, Malelov?”

  “Just about, Travee,” the Russian replied. “Yes, I think that is aptly put. No more time for serious talk... well, maybe a bit of talk before we enter that long sleep. Larousse, you silly Frenchman—I have some firecrackers for you. Coming your way very soon, now. What do you think about that, you who are—or were—always so afraid of helping your southernmost neighbor in her times of stress. Cowardly Canadians.”

  A moment of silence and outrage, then the PM spoke. “Bâtard!” He spat the word with all the venom he could muster.

  Malelov laughed, the sounds of his howling echoing through the miles. “So I am a bastard, eh? Well, that would come as a considerable shock to my poor mother.” The Russian then said something neither American nor Canadian could understand. Then, “I am glad my mother is in her grave, so she does not have to witness Russian fighting Russian.”

  Travee felt, after the Russian had spoken in his native tongue, that Malelov was up to something, buying time while he got the jump on the American missiles. The soldier in him surfaced. “Are we going to have war or a debating society?”

  “Ah, American,” Malelov spoke softly. “Can we not have a few moments of camaraderie before we explode the world? Are you that anxious to die—I am not.”

  “No.” Travee’s voice was emotion-charged as he thought of his wife of thirty-five years, and of his sons and daughters and his grandchildren. He had sent them all to his birthplace—where he owned land—up in the far north of Wisconsin. Perhaps they would be safe there, but he doubted it. “No, I’m not that anxious to die. Malelov, you seem to be overcome with philosophical meanderings. . . . Perhaps you can tell us what brought the world to this point?”

  “But of course,” Malelov said. “General Travee ... oh, excuse me, you are President Travee now, aren’t you?” He laughed. “As I am now premier. As to the cause of this . . . misfortune we are about to bring to the world—or did we bring it? Oh . . . anger, frustration, helplessness, greed. No one cause. It was our country meddling in your business; your country meddling in everybody’s business. And . . . perhaps it was the fact that both of our governments neglected a middle ground: something between the extremes. Not communism or socialism or democracy—but, well, I don’t know. I will admit, now, that I am having serious doubts about my own political philosophies. One can only enslave a people for so long, be it physically, mentally, socially, or economically; then they revolt.” He chuckled. “Is that not correct, Mr. President-General?”

  “That is correct,” Travee said.

  “Your constitution is a most interesting document,” the Russian said. “I have read it many times. Interesting, but vague. And totally unworkable to the satisfaction of all the people it must encompass. I believe, Travee, that from out of the ashes both of us will produce with our missiles, there will arise a great number of small nations—including many within the United States. That is what I believe. Nations, small ones, that will serve their own people—those being willing to live under the particular laws of that nation. All, in the main, answering to some degree to one central flag, but not in the whole. Yes, that is what I believe. Have you ever given that any thought, Travee?”

  “Yes,” Travee admitted. “I have. But it won’t work, Malelov.”

  “How do we know?” the Russian challenged. “Have either of our countries ever tried it?”

  “Could we try it now?” Prime Minister Larousse suggested hopefully.

  “No!” Malelov said, flatly and quickly. “It is too late. Too late for us. Ah! Enough small talk.”

  Travee was in constant communication with his northernmost tracking stations. No blips had yet appeared.

  “No,” Malelov said, his voice holding sadness. “It is too late. Crazy Horse knows. We are both soldiers. We know what we must do. Our generation, in both our countries, brought all this on: your country, Travee, with its maze of conflicting laws and rules; mine with its repression—I will admit it. So, our world is closing around us. However,”—he sighed—“from out of the ashes . . . and all that nonsense.”

  The men were silent for a time, their breathing heavy over the miles.

  Suddenly, Malelov laughed. A great, booming laugh. “All right, you silly Frenchman. I have a present coming your way. Not many, but enough.”

  The PM cursed the Russian general.

  “And you, President-General of the United States. Good joke, eh? United States? With your little secret army of rebels. Well, are you afraid, Travee? Are you holding your water well? Are you trembling with fear?”

  “I’m not afraid of anything!” Travee thundered, the soldier in him rearing up.

  “Good, good!” the Russian said. “We shall all be brave men to the end, da?” He laughed, but it was a sad laugh. “Well, American, Canadian—there seems to be nothing left to say . . . except, and as odd as it seems, I mean this: good luck, Crazy Horse.”

  “Good luck, Wolf.”

  The connection was broken.

  “May God smile on our countries,” Larousse said, then hung up.

  Travee very gently set the hotline receiver into its cradle. He turned to a colonel standing nearby. “Codes activated?”

  “Yes, sir. Tapes running, all systems go. Missiles ready for launch.”

  “Patch me through to General Hyde.”

  After a few seconds, the scratchy voice of Paul Hyde popped into the room. “We made it, C.H. The old bird held together and we’re through Russian air defenses. I’m going to shove this payload right down their throats.”

  “Luck to you, Paul.”

  “Thanks, Charlie.” The speaker went dead.

  Blips appeared all over the Alaskan screen. “Russia has pushed the button, General. We’re going to take a few. Eighteen minutes to impact on American soil. God! China is really getting creamed.”

  Travee nodded. “First launch intercept. Now! Now!”

  The men were deep in the bowels of Weather Mountain, not too many miles outside of Washington, D.C.

  Travee said, “Condition Red—strike. No turning back. No verbal orders to be obeyed past this point. Get me Admiral Divico.”

  Divico’s voice rang through the room, clear and loud from his flagship. “It’s still a beautiful sight, Charlie—launching these jets. Last time I’ll get to see it, that’s for sure.”

  “How’s it look, Ed?”

  “Awesome.” He was very calm.

  “General Malelov was very philosophical about the situation,” Travee said.

  “He should be standing where I’m standing,” Divico said. “He might change his tune. Well, Charlie, here they come, dead at me. I—”

  The speaker screamed an electronic outrage. Travee knew the flagship had taken a hit.

  “Sir?” an aide said. “Word from Cuba is General Dowling’s marines are really raising hell
on the island. Kicking ass all over the place.”

  Travee grinned. “With Dowling personally leading a charge, I’m sure.”

  “MIGs dogfighting with our people over the Keys, sir.”

  Travee nodded. “Order those designated subs to hit the bottom and stay there. Roll their DD tapes and be quiet. Order those designated silos to roll doomsday tapes and sit it out.” He looked at the aide. “May God forgive me for what I’m about to do. Launch missiles! Fire! Fire! Fire!”

  TWO

  Ben awoke a few minutes before noon, his mouth cotton-dry. He stumbled into the kitchen, drank a glass of water, and took two aspirin. He looked out the window and grinned.

  “World’s still in one piece,” he muttered. “Guess it was a false alarm.” He opened the back door and stepped out on the porch, letting the screen door bang behind him. An angry buzzing followed the slamming of the screen door.

  Ben looked around just in time to see a dozen or more yellowjackets charging out of the nest—at him. He threw up his hand and one stung him in the center of the palm. Wincing from the sudden pain, Ben struggled with the door. It had a habit of sticking, and chose this time to become obstinate. Several more of the wasps hit him, on the neck and face. Another stung him just below the left eye. His world began to spin. Just as he got the door open, a wasp buried its stinger behind Ben’s right ear and Ben slumped to the kitchen floor, his feet hanging outside, holding the door open.

  Yellowjackets swarmed him, stinging him on the arms, face, and neck. Using the last of his fading strength, Ben pulled his feet inside and the door closed. He slapped at his face, knocking several wasps spinning. He crawled into the den and there, fell to the tile, unconscious. His face was swelling rapidly. He shuddered as the venom raced through his system; his breathing became shallow and his skin was clammy.

  Ben slipped deeper into unconsciousness.

  The United States fared well in the nuclear aspect of missiles landing on her soil. Most of the enemy missiles did not make it through our penetration screens. But several did. Washington D.C. took the first hit, turning the residents into dust. Several more cities met the same fate.

  Nuclear warfare had progressed considerably during the decade just past. Almost all the missiles, of the nuclear type, that landed in America were of the so-called “clean” type. That is to say there was not much deadly fallout associated with them. But most of the missiles landing on American soil carried bacterial-type warheads that killed everything within a certain number of miles—depending on the prevailing winds. This was accomplished in a short time, then the deadly bacteria died.

  Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Detroit, Miami, Omaha, Boston, Philadephia, Memphis, and some fifty other cities went under during the strike. The first strike. Some of them were reduced to smoking dangerous ash, most to the state in which their citizens staggered about, dying on their feet of the plague or of Tabun-produced death. New York City no longer existed. The famous lady with her welcoming torch of freedom was now and would forever be only a memory.

  The island of Cuba still floated, but most of her people, including the naval contingent and marines at Gitmo, were reduced to very small piles of dust.

  Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa—gone.

  Subs roamed the oceans of the world: Chinese, Russian, American, Australian, English—to name a few. Now, with the war plug pulled, and none of them knowing if there was to be a home base for their return, they all did their thing in proper style, thank you.

  Melbourne, Sidney, and Brisbane were gone. Mexico City exploded and died in a raging hail of nuclear fire. Lisbon, Rome, and the monuments to justice and truth and philosophy in Athens were no more. Also destroyed were Karachi, Bombay, Madras, Calcutta, Rangoon, Bangkok, Hanoi, and Uncle Ho’s city, better known as Saigon. No real reason for those cities to explode, but what good are spoils if there is no victor?

  Europe blew apart: London, Dublin, Paris, Berlin, Warsaw, Brussels, and more. The major cities of Russia erupted under the impact of Chinese and American missiles. Troops clashed and fought and died because it is the nature of troops to do just that. To follow orders.

  Montevideo, Buenos Aires, Rio, Santiago, the Canal Zone. Why not? The pilots and the skippers who ordered the pushing of buttons had no place to return.

  There were many cities around the globe who came through unscathed—this time around. The first wave of missiles killed only about three-quarters of a billion people.

  But governments—all governments—no matter how noble they might proclaim themselves to be, are vindictive.

  And the doomsday tapes were silently rolling.

  Ben did not know how long he was out; how long he had been lying on the floor of his den, but it was full dark when he awoke. He looked at his hands: they were swollen grotesquely. He could not open one eye, and putting his hands to his face, he felt a mass of welts and swollen flesh. He tried to crawl to the bathroom where he kept his Benadryl—he was allergic to any kind of wasp or bee sting—but strength left him and he collapsed back to the floor.

  In his dreams, his nightmares, he thought he was back in Nam. And as the sweat rolled from his body, he refought every battle a dozen times, screaming out occasionally.

  It was dawn when he awakened, pulled himself to his feet, and staggered into the bathroom. There, he took several Benadryl tablets and thought of driving into town to the hospital. But he knew he’d never make it.

  The phone. He stumbled to the phone to call his doctor. In the semidarkness of the den, his foot caught in a rocker and he fell to the floor, banging his head. Spinning colors became blackness as he fell tumbling into the darkness of unconsciousness.

  The Air Force had lost nearly seventy-five percent of its planes and more than half its men. The Marine Corps was almost totally wiped out. The Army was reduced by more than sixty percent, and the Navy cut by more than fifty percent, with almost no ships or planes left.

  The government of the United States, for all practical purposes, had ceased to exist. Weather Mountain had taken a hit dead on. Travee was dead.

  Twenty-four hours after the first wave of bombings, many citizens of America still did not really know what had happened to them. They did not know what to do or where to go. They wandered about in a daze. This was America, they thought, and things like this just don’t happen in America. Do they? Didn’t Big Brother promise to take care of us? What happened?

  There were those who lived on the fringe areas of the hot blasts; they were horribly burned, waiting to die—wanting to die. There were those close to the blasts who had instinctively turned their heads to look at the brilliant flashes and had felt their eyeballs turn to liquid and roll down their cheeks, leaving only empty sockets and unbelievable pain. Those people died; they were killed by others who panicked and trampled them wantonly.

  Women of all ages were raped, tortured, and left to suffer and die in empty houses or barns or alleys or gutters. Children, raped, molested, hurt, wandered about, screaming their misery, alone and frightened; many of them were finally brought down by roaming packs of dogs.

  In the prisons and jails, men and women, locked in their cells, were forgotten, left to die from exposure and starvation. Those roaming the walkways and runarounds would commit unspeakable acts on their fellow prisoners and then, in one final moment of desperation, they would hang themselves, hack open their wrists, or beat their brains out against steel bars or cell walls.

  In the nursing homes and mental institutions, the insane and the old died without knowing why or how this was happening to them, left alone when the first panic struck the nation; actually, for many this was the second time they had been abandoned, the first having been when their children decided they didn’t want old people around, messing up their social lives.

  The old people and the insane soiled themselves, vomited on themselves, and then died as horribly as they had been forced to live.

  Two days after the world exploded in nuclear and bacteriological madness,
it began again as the doomsday tapes cued out and began the overkill. From deep in underground silos, the missiles roared toward their preset targets. Subs from Russia, China, and America, and a dozen other countries surfaced and hurled their payloads. The overkill began.

  When there were no more cities or military bases to strike, or they were out of range, the captains of the subs fired their last missiles and let them fall where they may. It was a seemingly brutal, senseless act that most civilians would not understand. But military men and women who had served their respective countries lifelong understood it all too well.

  Death was everywhere. Chaos and panic ran rampant world-wide. Live now! Who knows if there will be a dawn tomorrow. Surely there is no God, for He would not have permitted this. Rape, steal, kill—there is no promised land. This is all there is or ever will be.

  After exhausting their payloads, the subs surfaced and raised the flags of their countries. The captains stood calmly and stoically on their conning towers and saluted the pilots who blew them into history. Many of the American pilots, out of fuel, with carriers and bases gone or out of range, cursed the enemy and rammed their jets into its subs, going down with their foes.

  The former world, in which people were capable of producing constructive results, no longer existed.

  THREE

  He remembered getting up from the cold floor and slipping in his own blood. His head was a huge mass of pain. He stumbled into the bathroom and, using his one good eye, washed the cut and put antiseptic on the gash. Just that much effort exhausted him. He stretched out on the couch and went to sleep. Sometime during the night—what night, he wasn’t certain—Ben rose stiffly and painfully from the couch to fix a bowl of soup. He kept it down for about five minutes before staggering to the bathroom and vomiting. Then it was back to the couch and a deep, almost comalike sleep.

  On yet another morning, Ben managed to keep some soup and milk down and to take a shower before his weakness drove him to bed. He had glanced out the window and viewed a perfectly lovely day. He thought he had heard horns honking frantically sometime during the previous night, but he wasn’t sure.