Treason in the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  General Holtz almost told Rita to get fucked. But he was afraid she might take him up on it. He cut his eyes to Blanton. “Mister President, with all due respect, without assistance from General Raines and his Rebels, we’ll be defeated in a matter of weeks, possibly days. Your presidential guard can only protect you for a short time once Revere’s people break through our lines. And when Revere takes you and your people prisoner, he’ll either shoot you all or hang you. Now, am I finally getting through to you, sir?”

  “I urge you to take General Raines’s offer,” Senator Hanrahan said.

  “As do I,” Blush Lightheart agreed.

  “Ben Raines is nothing but a nasty, filthy, disgusting Republican pig!” VP Hooter dissented.

  “And a honky, too,” Rita said.

  “Revere’s troops are on the verge of breaking through our lines,” General Holtz said. “We’ve got to act now. And I will. With or without your approval.”

  “All right,” Blanton said, bitterness in his words. “Tell General Raines I accept his kind offer of assistance.”

  General Holtz left the room immediately.

  “That decision will go down in history as the biggest blunder of your administration,” VP Hooter prophesied.

  “Oh . . . kiss my ass!” Homer told her.

  It didn’t take Revere long to discover he was in a box and the lid was about to be nailed down. He sure as hell didn’t want to have to fight both Blanton’s troops and the Rebels. He ordered an immediate retreat.

  “Pull back to the north!” he ordered all commanders. “Get the hell out of this box.”

  Ben had anticipated that and had ordered his Rebels at the top of the L to swing east. Holtz ordered his people to swing west. Those moves left Revere with only a small escape hole and it was fast closing. Ben added five battalions of his Rebels, with armor and artillery, to Holtz’s two regiments, at the bottom of the L, and ordered them to start advancing straight north.

  The walls began closing in on Revere and he could do little except watch as what began as an orderly retreat soon turned into a rout and his soldiers began fleeing north, trying to reach the dwindling hole to safety.

  General Revere got out of the trap just in the nick of time and immediately began setting up new lines in southern New York State. He sent planes and dispatched trucks to bring the punk army of Big Foot Freddie to him. But all that move did was to free General Taylor and his troops, and Ben’s 11 and 13 Battalions to beef up the eastern front. Jake Starr, facing a solid line of Cecil’s Rebels, ordered his people to retreat back into central Florida. From there, they moved over to the east coast and boarded ships. They set a course for New York, or Connecticut, or some damn place. Just get the hell away from Raines’s Rebels and somehow link up with Revere. Shazam, Carl Nations, and Jeb Moody and their followers were doing the same thing.

  Cecil sent word to Ben that Florida was more or less clear of punks.

  The defeat of Revere and his people was remarkably anticlimactic. Those troops caught in the box had sense enough to know that to continue fighting was foolish. They laid down their arms and surrendered.

  “Shoot the hard-liners,” Ben suggested to General Holtz. “They’re easy to spot if you know what you’re looking for.”

  “I can’t do that!”

  “Then you’d better realize that you’re going to have to fight them again someday.”

  “Suit yourself,” Ben told him. He turned to Corrie. “It’s over. Let’s go home.”

  * * *

  The officers and troops of Blanton’s army watched silently as the mighty machine of war called the Rebels began pulling out, heading for the new nation called the Southern United States of America. They had seen the Rebels in action, up close and personal, and they were impressed.

  In Charleston, West Virginia, Ben sat in the den of a fine home that was now the temporary White House for Homer Blanton and rolled a cigarette.

  “We don’t allow smoking in these rooms,” Homer told him.

  “Get a fan,” Ben replied, and lit up.

  The two men sat and stared at each other for a moment. Homer broke the silence. “So what happens now, General Raines?”

  “That depends entirely upon you, President Blanton. I’m going home to play with my dogs and catch up on my reading. Perhaps . . . return to writing. That’s what I started out to do years ago, after the Great War. And I’ll take some part in building a new nation. I don’t care what you do, just as long as you don’t try to interfere with the running of the Southern United States of America.”

  “Is that a threat, General Raines?”

  “You bet your ass it is.”

  There were just about as many people coming into the new Southern United States as were leaving. Certain types, of all colors, knew they could never live under the simple Rebel rules of almost total self-government, and packed up and left for the dubious umbrella of protection of a more or less so-called democratic form of government. No one who called themselves Rebel was the least bit sorry to see them go.

  Since for years Rebels had been seizing all the gold they could find, Ben ordered the money of the Southern United States to be backed by gold. They would not print more money than they had backing for.

  “Ben,” Cecil said with a smile. “We have all the gold.”

  “Yeah,” Ben replied. “That is a fact, isn’t it?”

  Revere pulled all his troops across the border into what had once been Canada and began rebuilding.

  Ben stepped down as President of the Southern United States of America and called for general elections. He threw his backing to Cecil Jefferys and the vote was very nearly unanimous. For the first time in any large, industrialized nation, a black man was elected president.

  The first thing Cecil did was to name Ben as commanding general of the armed forces.

  In Charleston, West Virginia, Rita Rivers said to Homer, “Well, now. With a black in power, perhaps we can reason with him.”

  Homer gave her a very sour look. “Cecil Jefferys is more to the right than Ben Raines. And don’t kid yourself, Ben Raines is still the power to reckon with down there. Jefferys will see to the administration of the country, Ben Raines will see to the defense of the country. They don’t have police, per se, down there. The army polices the country. Any time the army is the police, the head of the army runs the country.”

  “That’s true if the laws are reasonably complex,” Senator Benedict said. “As we tried our best to make them before the Great War. So the average person wouldn’t have a clue as to what was going on. But the laws on the books down there . . .” He shook his head. “I don’t understand it.”

  “But it works for them,” Senator Hanrahan said somberly.

  “Everything seems to work for them,” Senator Arnold said. “Damned if I can figure it out.”

  “It works because nearly everyone is of a like mind,” Hanrahan said. “But it isn’t a democracy.”

  “It’s a damn dictatorship,” VP Hooter said.

  “Run by a damned racist, honky Republican,” Rita Rivers flapped her mouth.

  But it works for them, Senator Hanrahan thought.

  Indeed it did. By the fall of that year, less than ninety days after Ben had left Blanton in his office in West Virginia, the SUSA was getting factories back into operation and putting people to work . . . those who wanted to work and could do so without complaining and whining and bitching about it.

  Hawaii had declared its independence from the United States and signed a treaty with the SUSA. Blanton was furious, but powerless to do anything about it. He had no navy, no air force to speak of, and his army and a few battalions of marines were in hard training for what they knew would be another campaign against Revere . . . sooner or later.

  * * *

  After several weeks of rest, Ben took his 1 Battalion and headed out to inspect the SUSA, to “spread a little cheer and joy,” he said with a smile.

  “Right,” Cecil said drily, knowing full well wh
at Ben was going to do, and that it was going to be extremely unpleasant for anyone who did not subscribe to the Rebel philosophy . . . and there were many thousands in the eleven states who did not, and would never go along with the Rebels. They had to be either cleaned out with extreme prejudice, put on the road, or talked to . . . firmly.

  Moments after Ben had pulled out, Cecil pointed to Striganov and the Russian grinned and left the office, hollering for his XO to get his battalion ready. They were going to bird-dog General Raines.

  There were no undesirables within a hundred mile radius of the old Base Camp One; they had either conformed to Rebel ways, or had pulled out, or had gotten themselves killed when facing off against a Rebel security team . . . or in several cases, when making the tragic mistake of getting up into the face of Ben Raines, who was known for having an extremely low boiling-point when it came to human trash . . . of any color.

  For several days, Ben had been studying field reports of hot spots within the SUSA . . . and there were literally hundreds of them. His team and battalion had been with him a long time and could read the signs. They were ready to go days before the official word reached them.

  Ben headed south, scouts ranging out several miles ahead, and MBTs right behind them. For the first few hours, the Rebels traveled relaxed, for this area had been in Rebel hands for a long time, and the fields, recently harvested of their crops, were neat, the homes well-cared for, the people open and friendly and waving at the long convoy as it passed.

  Doors were seldom locked in Rebel-controlled territory, for in the SUSA everybody was a soldier, everybody was well-armed, and crime, of any type, was virtually non-existent. Under Rebel law, a registered citizen could protect his or her property, life, family, or pets by any means at hand, including deadly force, without fear of arrest or civil lawsuit. After the first few rather violent months of birth, the Rebel-controlled territory—known previously as Base Camp One—had settled down, the word quickly spreading, and criminals giving it a wide berth. Now that the territory had been vastly expanded, the SUSA was purging itself of those people with no respect for one another’s basic rights.

  It was going to take the Rebels several years to do this, but it was something they were determined to do. And Ben Raines was flawed just enough to enjoy doing it. He had never maintained he was perfect.

  Those who chose to live a life of semi-lawlessness, those who felt that they had a right to steal, poach, disregard the law, abuse their children and anyone else who had the misfortune to come in contact with them, live a life of ignorance, and in general contribute nothing to their society, had long ago learned not to live too close to any major highway, for the RSPs (Rebel Security Patrols) had a nasty habit of showing up at the most inopportune moments and rousting them out at the point of a gun and then reading them the riot act.

  For years, the area outside of Base Camp One was known as the Zone. Now the Zone was part of the SUSA. And Ben Raines was on the prowl.

  Everybody knew that Cecil Jefferys was President of the SUSA. He saw to the political running of the vast new nation and kept things moving at an orderly pace. President Jefferys was everything an administrator should be, and everything the old Washington politicians had never been.

  But Ben Raines, now, that was another story. This was Ben Raines’s dream come true, and Ben was going to see it flourish. Cecil Jefferys was by nature a wise, prudent, kind, and giving man. Ben Raines, on the other hand, was polite to ladies, kind to animals and children, respected the rights of law-abiding citizens, and hated human trash . . . and made no apologies for it.

  Just about a hundred miles south and slightly east of what used to be known as Base Camp One, the son of a huge and thoroughly disagreeable and cretinous individual named Robert Holcombe came to his father.

  “That there Ben Raines is on the prowl, Poppa. And he’s a-headin’ this way.”

  Holcombe picked his nose and then hawked a wad of snot on the ground. “Wal, we always knowed that law and order prick would come snoopin’ around, tryin’ to run our bis-ness. Git the boys together, Malvern. We’ll settle Raines’s hash once and for all and be done with him.” He glanced at a hound, heavy with pregnancy. “And kill that goddamn bitch ’fore she births. We got enuff pups runnin’ around here.”

  THREE

  The area that Robert Holcombe controlled had for years before the Great War been infamous for the quality of its dubious citizenry. It had been known throughout the South as a bastion for rednecks, white trash, incest, illiteracy, lawlessness, terrible cruelty to animals, open, sneering contempt for any type of law enforcement, and in general it was a haven for human slime . . . but the area, strangely enough was dotted with churches, and the majority attended them. The residents interpreted the Bible as they chose, with some rather bizarre statements coming from the mouths of the so-called preachers.

  “Ben is heading straight for Deckerville,” Striganov radioed back to Cecil.

  Cecil smiled, then replied, “I guessed that was where he’d go. He’s long wanted the time to clean out that human cesspool.”

  “Orders, President Jefferys?”

  “Let Ben have his fun. Move in only if he gets in too deep.”

  Georgi’s laugh was strong. “Da, President Jefferys. I will find high ground and watch the fun through long lenses.”

  “Poppa, here come them Rebs and they’s a shit-pot full of ’em!” another of Robert’s offspring hollered, from his perch atop the old water tower. Naturally, it was no longer functional.

  “That don’t tell me jack-crap, boy!” Robert bellowed. “Be a little bit more ’pecific.”

  “They’s tanks and big ol’ guns and all sorts of shit, Poppa,” the young man, called Cletis, squalled.

  The first Hummers, driven by scouts, entered the edge of town.

  A citizen shook a double-barreled shotgun at the scouts. “Git your nigger-lovin’, Jew-lovin’, spic-lovin’, queer-lookin’ asses on outta here!” he hollered. “This yere’s our town and we don’t want your kind in yere.”

  “Yeah!” his equally ugly and yellow-toothed wife yelled. She spat at the vehicle.

  “Boy, is the general going to have a fine time with these people,” the driver of the Hummer said.

  “Watch this,” the gunner said. He was Kevlared from the waist up. He popped the hatch, stood up behind the roof-mounted .50 caliber machine gun, and swung the heavy .50 in the direction of the shotgun totin’, bad-mouthin’ citizen.

  “Whooo!” the citizen said, and took off up an alley like the devil was after him.

  “Wait for me, you son of a bitch!” his wife screamed as she went flapping after him.

  “Hey, there, soldier boy!” a large-gutted man yelled. “You cain’t come in here a-pointin’ them guns at us. You bastard!” He jerked a rifle to his shoulder and the scout stitched him with the .50. The force of the impacting slugs knocked the man spinning for several yards before he tumbled dead to the old street.

  The street filled with angry, shouting, cussing, fist-shaking white trash. The shouting and the cussing faded into shocked silence as the street suddenly filled with 60-ton Main Battle Tanks, their 120mm guns lowered dead at the crowd, as were their 7.62 and .50 caliber machine guns. Rebel troops suddenly appeared on and around the tanks, their weapons leveled at the crowds.

  “Jesus Gawd!” one man broke the shocked silence.

  Women began hurriedly shooing kids off the street and back to their homes, dress tails flapping as they rushed about.

  “Is we gonna settle Ben Raines’s hash now, Poppa?” Malvern inquired.

  “Hish your mouf, boy,” Holcombe whispered. “You tryin’ to git me kilt? And git yore brother Cletis down offen that tower ’fore he falls off and makes a big mess.”

  First Ben’s personal platoon came out of the crowd of Rebels, followed by Ben and his team, Jersey’s eyes shifting constantly. She’d faced rednecks and white trash before, and knew they were capable of doing some awfully stupid things. She had yet
to meet one she trusted.

  There were approximately three hundred to three hundred fifty armed men facing the Rebels. Ben said, “The first one of this rabble to fire a shot, kill everyone within range.”

  “Jesus Lard!” Holcombe hollered, jumping out to face the crowd. He waved in arms. “Don’t nobody git no itchy fingers. Lardy, Lardy, Lardy!”

  A scout came up and whispered in Ben’s ear. Ben’s eyes narrowed in fury. He nodded his head. The scout took off at a run, followed by a doctor and two medics.

  “You, ah, got you some sorta medical emergency, General?” Holcombe dared to speak.

  Ben walked up to the man and grimaced. Holcombe’s body odor was fierce. “That once fine mansion up on the hill, overlooking the highway . . . that’s where you and yours, ah, den-up, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, sir, that’s right! At airs the finest house in this county, by golly. But it shore is hard to keep up. Why, I reckon if I had me a dozen niggers a-steppin’ and a-fetchin’ it still would be some job. Why . . .”

  “Shut up,” Ben told him.

  Holcombe shut his mouth, but his eyes mirrored raw hate.

  “There is a very old, and worn-out Labrador bitch back there. And some goddamn, sorry, pus-brain has shot her . . .”

  Malvern wished he could suddenly be transported to the moon. Everybody knew the Rebels took very good care of their pets. And everybody knew that Ben Raines especially liked dogs.

  Oh, shit! Malvern thought.

  “That poor old girl, badly wounded, gave birth to her puppies, and badly hurt, managed to perform all the necessary after-birth functions and is trying to nurse those puppies. Did you shoot that old girl, Holcombe?”

  “How come it is you knows my name, General?”

  “I know everything about you, Holcombe. For years the Rebels have been gathering up police records and floppy discs and computer tapes and accessing hard disc drives from police departments all over the nation. You answer my question, you miserable excuse for a human being. Did you shoot that dog?”