by Jerry Ahern
Chapter 6
General Varakov stood looking out from the mezzanine onto the main hall. Over the time he had used the lakeside Museum as his headquarters, since his arrival from Moscow shortly after the Night of the War, he had studied the skeletons of the mastodons, fighting and dominating the main hall of the Museum. Varakov smiled— it was either here or down by the lakeside where he did most of his thinking these days. He tried to remember where he had done most of his thinking in Moscow, then realized that perhaps he had not done as much as he could there. Shaking his head, he walked back from the railing and sat on one of the low benches, still overlooking the great hall. He had practically memorized the reports which littered his desk. The Cubans, always the Cubans.
After the War, Florida had been ceded to them to appease the Communist leader of their island nation. He decided that had been a policy mistake on the part of the Premier and the Politburo. Reports indicated the Communist Cubans had made several incursions into southernmost Georgia— Soviet territory. There were reports of concentration camps, mass executions of Cuban Americans. It was that sort of thing, Varakov knew, that undermined anything positive he could do to relieve the pressure from American Resistance groups. His own command had prisons established to hold captured Resistance personnel and other suspected undesirables; but the camps were humanely run— he checked on them personally. There were few executions, and only those of Resistance people caught in the act of taking a Soviet life. It was, after all, war. The Cubans, he thought.... What they reportedly did was not war. There had been two dangerous confrontations between Soviet patrols and Cuban forces in southern Georgia already. Doubtlessly there would be more, he knew.
“Castro,” Varakov muttered.
It was clear, he felt, that something had to be done with the Cubans— and quickly. He had no desire for “border” conflicts over something he considered as useless as Florida. And his assessments over the years of the Communist Cuban regime had always led to what he felt was an inescapable conclusion— it was immature. With persons who behaved as irresponsible juvenile delinquents, he decided, one could never be too cautious.
After sifting through the reports, he had spent an almost equal amount of time perusing personnel files. He rubbed his hands together, standing on his sore feet and walking back toward the railing, his uniform jacket unbuttoned. Varakov wiggled his toes inside his shoes, staring down into the main hall. Col. Constantine Miklov was the perfect man— a senior officer and a prudent individual, experienced in dealing with the Cubans after three years as a military adviser there. Miklov’s Spanish, Varakov understood from the file, was faultless.
A smile crossed Varakov’s lips. In the one area where Miklov was slightly lacking— intelligence background— Varakov could compensate and at the same time achieve an ancillary goal. Natalia Tiemerovna. He had recently promoted her to major. Almost fully recovered from the beating Vladmir Karamatsov— her now-dead husband thanks to the American Rourke— had administered to her, she was wanting an assignment. She spoke Spanish well, Varakov knew, and her natural frankness— the quality that so much endeared her to him— made her more important and more valuable than her relationship to him as his niece. All this would make it easier for her to discover what rationale were behind the Cuban incursions into Soviet occupied territory.
He leaned against the railing, amused at his own thinking. Was he really sending her because of his needs, or because he saw a need in her that this would fulfill?
He shrugged the problem away, thinking that perhaps of late he had become more of an uncle and less of a general in matters concerning Natalia. He should have engineered things to have Rourke killed, he knew, following the assassination of Karamatsov. But Rourke had not really assassinated the man— afterwards it had appeared there had been a “fair” fight between them, Rourke winning. Varakov shrugged again— he liked Rourke. A good man was a good man, Varakov thought, despite his politics. He smiled, then— whether Natalia admitted it to herself or not, and despite her vow to kill Rourke after learning he had killed her husband, the incredibly beautiful Natalia loved the wild and deadly American.
Varakov began to laugh out loud, turning from the balcony railing and starting down the long, low stairs back toward the main hall and his adjoining office. It amused him that he was so concerned over a potentially volatile situation between Russia and Cuba. “I should be more concerned about that,” he muttered as he reached the base of the stairs, wondering what he would do if something were to happen that brought Natalia and Rourke together— the KGB major and the ex-C.I.A. covert operations officer.
“Amusing,” he said, passing his tall, young secretary, then chuckling again as it seemed evident her eyes were trying to decipher his laughter. “Nothing,” he told her good-naturedly, walking toward his desk. Then under his breath he muttered, “Nothing yet.”
Chapter 7
“Who is it?”
“If they’re close enough to answer, it’s usually too late to shoot,” John Rourke said, stepping out of the shadows of the small stand of pines, less than six feet from the reddish-brown-haired woman, her hair almost black in the twilight.
“My God— do you always—“
“No, I don’t usually creep up on people— just wanted to make certain you were alone,” Rourke told her, taking two steps and standing beside her as she sat on the ground, her back propped against some rocks. “How are you feeling, Sissy?” he asked, bending down beside her, studying her face despite the shadows.
“Tired, nervous— better though, I think,” she said. “Here— take this back.” She handed Rourke the Metalifed two-inch Colt Lawman .357 he’d left with her earlier. “Guns make me nervous.”
“No reason guns should do anything to you,” he told her, his voice low. “A gun is just like a screwdriver, a saw, a stethoscope, a scalpel— or a seismograph,” Rourke added.
“You can’t kill someone with a seismograph, though,” the girl said, her voice tired.
Lighting one of the small cigars with the Zippo, then clicking the lighter shut and studying it in his left hand, Rourke inhaled hard, exhaling and watching as the gray smoke trailed up into the dim sunlight above the level of the rocks. “You can misuse anything, or you can use it for good— guns aren’t any different. I could take one of these—“ and he opened his coat, patting the butt of the stainless Detonics under his left arm—“and go become a Brigand like those people chasing you this morning. Or, do what I did— fight the Brigands. I can use the gun for either job, can’t I? It doesn’t change the nature of the gun, the gun itself has no personality, does it?”
“Well, no...”
“Guns bother people because the people don’t understand them. People are generally afraid of something they don’t understand. Try showing a seismograph to an Australian bushman and the stylus moving along the graph paper making strange lines will scare him to death— just like you and this.” Rourke balanced the little Colt in his right hand, then slipped it under his jacket in the small of his back.
“Maybe you’re right,” the girl said. “But— weapons, all of that— it caused this,” she said as she stared toward the orange-red horizon.
“No,” Rourke whispered. “Just like my analogy with the Brigands. Nuclear power could have been used for good, and in a lot of ways it was— maybe it still will be. It’s the same thing with people not understanding something, being afraid of it. The Russians never really understood us; we never really understood them. The few on both sides who did understand didn’t start the war. It was the people who never took the time to understand, or the ones who didn’t want to. That’s why you’re trying to alert what’s left of Army Intelligence to an impending disaster, that’s why I’m searching for my wife and children. Not enough people understood or cared to. That’s why we’re here now.”
“It’s all over, really— isn’t it?” the girl whispered hoarsely, her words choked and halting.
“I think so— I’m not sure. I don’t kno
w if anybody is. But you can’t just lie down and die. As long as you’re breathing there’s a chance.”
“But the sunsets, the sunrises, the weather— all of it—“ the woman began.
“We’ve done something that may never have been done before, or maybe the world reached a level of sophistication like ours eons ago— I don’t know,” he whispered slowly. “Maybe history does repeat itself. All the crap we belted into the atmosphere— it hasn’t been like that since there was mass vulcanism millions of years ago. What kind of effect it’s going to have, I don’t know. I’m a doctor— you’re a scientist. Do you know?”
“No, but...”
“Maybe you’re lucky— maybe we’re both lucky.”
Rourke looked up at the sky again. The sun had finally winked below the horizon and stars were visible, though the sky seemed purple more than black or deep blue.
“Do you think there’s anyone out there?” she asked, her voice soft, little-girl sounding.
“Maybe that’s the greatest tragedy of this whole thing,” Rourke answered slowly. “Maybe we’ll never know. I kind of think there has to be. Maybe if we’d encountered a civilization that had gotten itself over the technological hump and still survived we could have learned how to do it.”
“You’re a strange man, John— I mean, a doctor who runs around on a motorcycle and carries guns. You don’t fit any mold I ever encountered.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” Rourke smiled in the darkness. “We’d better get on the way to Savannah— see what we can do to contact what government there is.”
“Then you got the gas for your motorcycle?”
“Uh-huh,” Rourke answered absently. He stared starward— wondering.
Chapter 8
“I think I’m the last— Jeez! That hurts!”
Sarah Rourke bent over the blond-haired man’s left thigh, her face close to it. The wound didn’t smell and she surmised that was a good sign. She wished she’d taken her hospital volunteer work more seriously, or watched John more closely the few times she’d seen him work. She remembered once shortly after they’d married they had met a doctor Rourke had worked with during his internship, before he’d essentially abandoned medicine and gone to work for the Central Intelligence Agency. The man— she tried to remember his name... Feinstein? Feinburg? It was something like that, she’d decided. The man, whatever his name, had told her something while John had stepped away for a few moments. John still smoked cigarettes in those days, and he might have gone to get a fresh pack. It was years ago, she thought. The doctor had told her, though, that John had been the most promising man he’d ever worked with in medicine— with hands skilled enough to make him a top surgeon, had he chosen to become one, and a mind quick enough to make important life-and-death decisions and then act. The latter quality— the doctor’s name had been Feinmann, she finally remembered— was the rare thing, the thing that made greatness in a doctor.
Sarah Rourke looked at the Resistance fighter on the cot beside her. “What’s your name?” she remembered to ask.
“Harmon Kleinschmidt,” he told her, the voice strained.
“Well, Mr. Klein—“ She stopped and started again. “Harmon— my husband, the children’s’ father, is a doctor. I’m not. I had some first-aid courses, rolled bandages as a volunteer, and watched my husband operate a few times in emergencies. I know what to do to get your wounds cleaned up, maybe I can even take out a bullet if it isn’t too close to something vital. But since I’m the best you’ve got right now and since we’ve got Russians all around us, why don’t you just shut up and bite on a towel or something and let me do what I can. Okay?”
Kleinschmidt fell back against the rolled blanket he used as a pillow. “Can I talk?” he rasped. She didn’t look up at him, but it sounded as though he’d spoken through clenched teeth.
“Sure— if it helps,” she whispered. She glanced over her shoulder. Michael and Annie were rubbing down the horses, not watching. She was happy for that because the leg wound wasn’t pretty, and after that there was still the shoulder wound.
“They got all of us— all but me. Most of the women and kids pulled out after the men all got themselves nailed. Me, I tried making it somewhere, anywhere— I wound up here.”
Sarah didn’t think the man was making too much sense, “What happened?” she asked, not really caring, but trying to keep his mind occupied. There was a big, deformed chunk of metal very close to the bone in his upper thigh and she knew that removing it would hurt.
“Well... hmmm,” he groaned. “Well, they— the Reds— we figured to git ‘em. Figured they needed Savannah as a seaport. Rumors seem to be the Ruskies gave Florida over to Castro’s army. If they couldn’t use Florida, Savannah would have to have been mighty important as a seaport. So, we figured we could screw ‘em good— sorry ma’am,” he rasped, “if we made their lives miserable. We were doin’ okay ‘til we started coordinating everythin’ with that U.S. II.”
“What’s U.S. II?” Sarah asked. She was using a small pair of forceps from the first-aid kit John had made up before the Night of the War and she had carried it from the house. “The house,” she groaned under her breath.
“What ma’am?” Kleinschmidt asked.
“Nothing, Harmon. Tell me what U.S. II is? Go on.” She started probing with the forceps for the bullet. Any minute now, he’d scream, she told herself.
“Well, I don’t completely understand it myself. Seems some fella named Sam Chambers was the last man to survive from the President’s cabinet. Makes him the new President. There was a letter goin’ ‘round— some guys had it. My friend Jock Whitman read a copy of it— the President, the real one, he killed himself so the Commies couldn’t make him surrender.”
“I didn’t know that. Are you sure?” she asked him.
“Yeah— well, the letter said that, Jock told me. There was supposed to be copies of it all over what’s left of the country. Story was the Secret Service got it out for him. When we started working with U.S. II, they said the same thing. But there’s gotta be some kind of problem with them. After we started coordinating everythin’ with them, the Russians almost seemed to know what we was up to before we did. Some of us figured they had themselves— in U.S. II, that is— some kind of a— aagh!”
She looked up. His body twitched violently and now his eyes were closed, his mouth contorted in pain. But his chest was still rising and falling. As she started to grasp the bullet— at least she assumed it was that— in the forceps, the body twitched again.
“Michael!” she called. “Come hold Mr. Kleinschmidt so he doesn’t move when I do this. Annie, stay with the horses.”
Michael was beside her in a moment. “Don’t look, son,” she told him.
“It’s all right, Momma,” the boy said quietly. Even the voice, his way of speaking, reminded her more and more of John.
“Traitor,” she said, pulling the bullet from where it was lodged. She thought it had been imbedded in a muscle but wasn’t sure.
“What?”
She looked up at Michael, forcing a smile. “No— not you, never you,” she whispered.
“Mr. Kleinschmidt had been talking before he passed out. He was telling me he thought someone was telling the Russians what he and the rest of the Resistance people were doing. You know— like Mary Mulliner’s husband and son. They were in the Resistance. Well,” she went on, probing the wound to check if the bullet had left any fragments, “he thought there was a traitor.”
There weren’t any fragments, and she studied the bloody chunk of metal in the forceps for a moment. It was obviously deformed, but it looked to be in one piece. “Such a little thing,” she said, turning it so it would better catch the light.
Sarah Rourke looked at Harmon Kleinschmidt’s face. It seemed more peaceful now. She imagined that when he was all cleaned up he probably looked handsome. He’d told her earlier that if she helped him, he knew of a boat they could steal to get them all to safety on one of the
offshore islands. Safety, she thought. Then she looked again at the bullet, almost laughing.
Chapter 9
Rourke looked at the woman, his eyes squinted against the sunlight. “You’ll be safer here, so relax. It should take me about an hour to get into Savannah on foot. Then once I find my contact I might be able to snitch some transportation to get back faster.”
“But why aren’t you taking your guns? What will you do if—“
Rourke cut her off. “If I get spotted with a gun, I’m automatically nailed. Soviet-held cities don’t even allow Americans to carry pocket knives, let alone firearms. You should like it,” Rourke added. “It’s total gun control.”
“Yes,” she began, “but this is different.”
“Tell me about it sometime,” Rourke said, not particularly caring for her ethical two-facedness. He started walking, the cowboy boots from his pack feeling unfamiliar after all the time he’d been spending wearing combat boots. The brim of the grayish-tan Stetson Canyon was pulled low over his face against the sun, despite the dark glasses he wore. He’d unintentionally lied to the woman, he thought as he started down from the low rise where he’d left her. He wasn’t completely weaponless. The heavy trophy buckle on the belt that held up his Levis made a good weapon in a pinch, there were his hands, too, he reasoned. Rourke’s spine shivered slightly— without a gun he felt naked, but perhaps that was the best way.
There was always the disturbing possibility the woman would lose her nerve, steal the bike and the guns, and be gone when he returned. He could always steal a bike himself, he thought, reviewing the possibilities. He’d miss the big customized Harley, though. The other Harley, the one he’d taken from a Brigand he’d killed back in New Mexico after the marauders had slaughtered the survivors of the crashed 747— that Harley was at the Retreat now and he supposed he could work it over to come close to the Low Rider he’d left with Sissy. If he had to.