Courage In The Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  Ben sipped his coffee and looked over his commanders. He knew perfectly well they were also giving him a good eyeballing. They wanted to be certain that Ben was one hundred percent before shoving off.

  Ben said, “Dan, you and Therm will be taking the southernmost route. You and Buddy will split up just inside Texas, with you taking I-10 all the way to the coast, with Buddy taking I-20. Son, that will put you right through Base Camp One. Stop and tell everybody hello, shake Cecil’s hand, see how my dogs are doing, and then get back on the road.”

  Buddy grinned. “Yes, sir.”

  “Tina, you’ll be taking I-40 all the way through. Rebet, you’ll be wandering around on two-lanes most of the time, so you have fun, now, you hear?”

  Rebet laughed “I shall make a joy ride out of it, General. But always keeping my ears and eyes open and my weapon at the ready.”

  “There you go,” Ben said with a smile. “West, you’re on I-70 to the Mississippi. Find a way across and get on I-64. Start angling south to Carolina once you cross over into Virginia. Danjou, you have a straight shot on I-80. Georgi will eventually link up with Ike and me in the Chicago area. All right, boys and girls. We’ll get squared away here and then head out ASAP. Let’s get to work.”

  Once the Rebels made up their mind to do something, they usually got down and did it very quickly. And packing up and pulling out was something they were experts at. On a late summer’s day, hours before dawn, the Rebels pulled out of Alaska heading for the Canadian border, just a few hours drive away from Tok. They crossed the line early that morning, and late in the afternoon they linked up with the patrol that had been sent up Highway 5 in the Yukon to check on survivors. That patrol had angled on down to a tiny town called Haines Junction and was waiting for the main body of Rebels.

  The Rebel columns, with Ben Raines once more riding at the head, stood down at the junction for the evening. They had traveled three hundred miles that first day out of Tok and had met absolutely no resistance.

  The outlaw movement had been crushed and ground into the earth under the boots of Raines’s Rebels.

  Chase was waiting for Ben and sat him down and checked him over thoroughly. Finally, with a disgusted look on his face, the doctor said, “You’re one hundred percent, Ben. Damn, I was hoping I could find just a little something to bitch at you about.”

  “Sorry about that, Lamar. But I’ll confess that I am a little tired.”

  “Ah-hah!” Chase hollered. “Overdid it, didn’t you? See that he continues his medication and that he eats properly and gets plenty of rest, Linda.”

  “It’s my ass that’s tired, Lamar!” Ben told him. “Jesus, we’ve been riding all day.”

  The Rebels made two hundred and eighty miles the next day, stopping for the night at a small town about a hundred miles west of Watson Lake. They dropped off supplies at Watson Lake, checked over the outpost and pushed on, with Ben sending West’s battalion down Highway 37 and the rest of the column continuing on Highway 97 toward Fort Nelson. They would all link up at Prince George and push on toward the state of Washington, U.S.A.

  The Rebels had not fired a shot since leaving Alaska. But they saw signs that the survivors were once more reclaiming territory. They saw a number of bodies that had been hanged from the nearest tree or pole, many with signs around their necks saying:

  OUTLAW or MURDERER or RAPIST.

  At Prince George, Ben again split the column. Ike took half down Highways 16 and 5. Ben led the other half straight down 97. They would reconnect at Princeton, BC and a few hours later push over the line back into the United States.

  Summer was now gradually giving way to early autumn. The leaves were changing colors and a hint of approaching winter was evident in the early-morning air. The Rebels had pushed off from northern California on March the fifteenth; they reentered the United States in the middle of September.

  On their way back, the Rebels had checked out ten new outposts, resupplied those survivors, and had not fired one shot. Ben knew there were still outlaws in the brush and timber; only a fool would think otherwise. But those outlaws who had escaped the Rebels’ purge would think long and hard before resuming their criminal careers. Some would, of course, but most would simply keep a very low profile and try to behave themselves. After a few years, they would resurface with a new name and work their way into the society of an outpost. They would be photographed and fingerprinted and become a part of the new order that was rising throughout the United States and Canada.

  There would be those who would know what the ex-outlaws had once been. But as long as they remained EX-outlaws, their past could stay buried. Those who genuinely wanted it could start all over.

  Inside the borders of the U.S.A., the commanders gathered for one more meeting before they split up and began their final eastward sweep of the States. They were waiting at a small town about a hundred and fifty miles south of the Canadian border to be resupplied by plane from Base Camp One.

  “Anybody got any questions or suggestions?” Ben asked.

  No one did.

  “All right. Dan, you and Therm will be resupplied first and then shove off. Buddy, Tina, Rebet, West, Danjou, Georgi, Ike, and me—in that order. Once we’re on the road and rolling, I want everybody stood down and in camp by 1700 hours every day. We’ll make radio contact at 1800 hours, every day, until we’ve reached the East Coast and linked up.

  “People, we’re going to be gone a long time, so let’s do this right and leave Cecil a nice, orderly country to govern in our absence. We’re not going to push this time; we’re going to take it nice and slow and check it all out. We’re going to send patrols down every road and look around and talk to people. If something is wrong, we’ll try to set it right. If communities don’t want to be a part of our system, thank them, tell them goodbye, and don’t call us for help. Ever.

  “I want a complete remapping of the highway system this time around. If a bridge is out, chart it. If it needs repairs, log it and Cecil will send crews out to try to fix it. If you meet armed resistance, crush it.

  “We’re going to have planes and choppers in the sky, ranging ahead of us the entire trip. Another squadron is ready to go out of the training school, so that will give each battalion at least four helicopter gunships, and by the time we reach the coast two more squadrons will be ready to go.

  “That’s it, people. Good luck. Godspeed, and takeoff.”

  FOUR

  The battalions began departing from the staging area in Washington state. No one would start eastward until Dan’s command—the section the furthest south—was in place in El Paso.

  The gangs of outlaws who still roamed the nation, and there were many, experienced a very sudden reduction in ranks when the news spread that the Rebels were sweeping the countryside. Life had already become very nearly intolerable for the outlaws still operating in the States. The law-abiding citizens living in and around the many Rebel outposts just did not have the patience nor the inclination to show very much compassion for those who chose to follow a life of lawlessness. One ex-outlaw summed it up this way: “Damn folks will shoot you for trying to steal a cow or a car or for just trying to take some pussy from a woman who chose not to give it up.”

  And the trials now were nothing like they were back in the good old days. They were very short. The emphasis now was not on how the evidence was obtained, but whether or not the accused was innocent or guilty of the crime.

  And to the criminal mind, or to the mind of those types of people who didn’t care about the rights of others, the Rebel law was really odd. Start spreading untrue gossip about somebody, and that somebody would very likely come looking for you with a gun in his or her hand. It sure wasn’t like the old days when anybody could say anything mean and cruel and malicious about anybody else and couldn’t nobody do anything about it except argue and bicker in a so-called court of law.

  Law was now very quick in Rebel country . . . and sometimes very final.

  The criminal
mind, and the minds of those who, before the Great War, had taken a perverse delight in bullying their way through life—physically or verbally—now found that old saw was double-toothed on both sides.

  This new common-sense type of law was really hard for those types of people to comprehend. Like that fellow down there in Texas who asked that woman for some pussy and then slapped her around when she refused: woman’s husband come around and shot him dead. What did the courts do about it? Nothing. Judge said the dead man should have kept his foul mouth shut and his hands to himself. Now, shit, boys! Who could live under such laws as that?

  Obviously, a lot of people not only wanted to try the Rebel way, but after they tried it, they liked the concept, once they got used to how simple it was.

  Criminals of all types, bullies, con artists, very arrogant folks, and those people who enjoy insulting, belittling, and browbeating others did not like the new system at all.

  A lot of Rebels were amused and many were often baffled at the reluctance of some people to live in a society that had so few rules.

  “It’s too simple,” Ben told them. “Too much responsibility is placed on the individual in our society as compared to what they were accustomed to when Big Brother was constantly looking over their shoulders. Now if someone screws up, they can’t blame anyone but themselves. Many people don’t want that responsibility; they’d rather blame someone else.”

  “Like a punk that goes out and kills somebody and then blames society for it?” Ben was asked.

  “Exactly.”

  “And people really believed that crap back before the Great War?”

  “Enough of them did—or said they did—until they had our judicial system so fouled up it was unworkable.”

  “Must have been a lot of stupid people back then.”

  “That’s not exactly what those of us who were branded as conservatives called them,” Ben said, very, very dryly.

  It was going to take about a week for Dan to reach his location, so the Rebels busied themselves loading up the gear from the supply planes that landed every hour and transferring the fuel from the tankers that rolled in around the clock to their own tankers.

  The tank commanders rolled their monsters out into empty fields and checked their guns. Drivers of the deuce and a halves and their mechanics went over the trucks, replacing one part or the other and sometimes rebuilding the engines.

  The helicopter pilots and crews worked over their choppers. The medics restocked aid kits. The cooks cleaned and scrubbed and kept the Rebels fed. The nurses and doctors inventoried and kept their supplies up to date and full. The infantry people stayed sharp on rifle ranges and close combat courses. The clerks and office personnel kept ahead of the paperwork. Intelligence poured over maps and charts and reports. The engineers checked their Bailey bridges and road building and repairing equipment. Communications hummed around the clock. The commanders, from generals to sergeants, studied their routes and charted every road they would take in this final sweep of the lower forty-eight. Everybody had something to do, and they did it without being told. That also was the Rebel way.

  “Everybody reporting in place, General,” Corrie told him.

  It was cold in central Washington for this time of year; the meteorologists were predicting an early and savage winter. No one knew why the Great War had produced such a change in the earth’s climate, since few nuclear weapons had been used, but something had affected the weather: summers were hotter and winters were colder. It made no sense to those who were supposed to be the experts in such things.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Ben told them. “Someday we’ll all get a chance to ask God.”

  On this cold fall morning, Ben drained his mug of coffee and put the mug on the seat of the big armor-plated wagon. “Mount up and roll, people.”

  Danjou and West had both asked Ben about crossing Utah. Those people who ruled Utah—and they ruled with an iron hand and a religious fervor that borderlined on fanaticism—had shown no interest in joining the Rebel movement.

  “Proceed across the state,” Ben told his people. “Don’t bother anyone and be friendly. If you’re attacked, strike back with everything you’ve got and make them understand the first time around that we’re not going to take any shit off of anyone.”

  Both Danjou and West had grinned and returned to their battalions. Ben was going to let the religious community in that state run their own affairs. But he had also said that free travel would not be restricted and nobody was going to be hassled moving to and from and in and out of the state. And if he had to enforce that at the point of a gun, he would.

  From border to border, the Rebels began their long slow sweep of the lower forty-eight. Before any battalion had covered fifty miles, they found communities sprouting up, small settlements, nearly all of whom welcomed the sight of the Rebels. From lower Texas to Washington, the Rebels stopped and took pictures and fingerprints.

  “So it’s starting all over again, huh?” one man said, standing in line in a tiny town in eastern Washington.

  “What’s that?” Ben asked, leaning against a fender of a Jeep.

  “Big Brother.”

  “No one is forcing you to take part in this.”

  “You’re not going to make me get a mug shot and have my prints taken?”

  “Not if you don’t want to.”

  “What happens then?”

  “You won’t be a part of this group. Without an I.D. card with your picture on it, you can’t get medical help or help of any kind from the Rebels or from any outpost. But that choice is strictly up to you.”

  The man stared at Ben. Ben stared back. The citizen had bright, hard, mean eyes, looked to be in good physical shape, and had a demeanor that irritated Ben. He came across as a man who wanted something for nothing—a type that had always brought out the worst in Ben.

  “I don’t think I’ll go along with this,” the man said.

  “Your choice,” Ben told him, “Step out of the line and carry your ass, then.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me. Move on.”

  “I live here, Raines.”

  “Fine. But you’re going to be a very lonesome man when it comes to health care, a job, food, and other necessities for staying alive. Not to mention that you won’t be allowed to use the new money the government has printed.”

  The man stared at him. Ben sensed his words were finally getting through to him. Ben also could guess with a fair amount of accuracy what the man was going to say. He was right on the money.

  “You think you’re so high and mighty, don’t you, Raines?”

  Ben kept his temper. Barely. “Look, asshole,” he said. “I’m going to say this once, and only once. Because I don’t have the time or the patience to stand here debating how best to put this nation back on the right track with someone who is obviously suffering from a severe case of arrested development . . .”

  “Hey, you can’t talk to me like . . .”

  “Shut your goddamn mouth!” Ben yelled at him. “And listen. You’ll either follow the few rules the Rebels lay down or you can carry your ass outside this zone. That’s it, and that’s final. Now make up your mind and do it damn quick.”

  “Fine,” the man said, his face flushing with anger and resentment. “I’ll just get me a piece of ground outside this so-called zone and live the way I damn well please to live.”

  “Good. That’s fine. I’m sure the people around here will be glad to see you go.”

  About two dozen men and women nodded their heads in agreement with that.

  The surly citizen caught the nodding of heads and his angry flush deepened. He started cursing the men and women. Ben did not attempt to stop the cursing; let the man get it all out of his system. But when he started on the kids, Ben stopped it.

  “That’s all,” he said quietly. “Knock it off, mister.”

  The citizen whirled around, fists clenched. “And if I don’t?” he challenged.

  Ben hi
t him. He drove the butt of his M-14 into the man’s belly and the citizen hit the ground, choking and gasping for breath, both hands holding his bruised belly. Ben turned to the crowd.

  “Exactly what is this jerk’s problem?” he tossed the question out to anyone who could give him an answer.

  “You just said it all, General,” a woman told him. “He’s a jerk; He’s rude, he’s loud, he’s arrogant, he’s a bully, and he always has been.”

  “He’s not lazy,” a man said. “He works hard. But . . . he won’t pull with anyone else. What work he does is all for himself. I won’t say he takes away from the group; but he sure doesn’t contribute anything.”

  The citizen on the ground got to his knees, and with an effort, to his feet. He stared at the men and women of the tiny settlement. “I hate ever’ damn one of you,” he said, the words flowing like venom from his mouth. “I’m bigger and stronger than any of you and you’re jealous of that . . .”

  A man in the group sighed. “Jack, that’s not true. Ever since we came together we’ve all shared what we had with each other. But not you. If you killed a deer, you ate the best and let the rest rot rather than share it as the rest of us do. You’ve never been a part of this community. You know where the outlaws are in this area, you associate with them, and the general consensus is you run with them from time to time. Now it’s time for you to choose what life-style you want.”

  “What outlaws?” Ben asked.

  “Jack’s cousin, Glenn Barlow,” a woman said. “He’s got a gang of about fifty men who operate out of a town just north of us.”

  “Glenn’s all right,” Jack said. “He just don’t like to live under a bunch of rules, that’s all. He ain’t never bothered none of you people, has he?” He stared at the group, then smiled. “That’s right, he hasn’t. And he won’t as long as I’m here. So think about that ’fore you link up with Raines here.”

  “What town?” Ike asked.