Ben looked at the faces of his team and saw only serious sober eyes looking back at him. “That’s a . . . depressing thought, Coop. What do you think should be done about it? Get rid of those who are opposed to our form of government?”
Cooper shook his head. “No. That’s where we’re different from those who oppose us. We believe that nations-within-a-nation is the best way. They don’t. We want them to have their government, but they won’t want us to have ours. That makes us a cut above them.”
“For a long time now, Chief,” Corrie said, “we’ve been having study groups. In every battalion. We thought you knew and wouldn’t object.”
“I don’t object. I think it’s a good thing.”
“Well, we find boxes of old magazines and books and study them and then discuss what we’ve read. For instance, just before the Great War, the term racist was slung around pretty damn loosely—”
“I’ll certainly agree with that. I was accused of being a racist.”
“But you’re not,” Beth said. “None of us here are racist. You can’t be a Rebel and be a racist. It’s impossible. Thing is, and this just came up a few nights ago, there was this article about this man who bought some land up in the northwest part of America and took his family there. He wanted to be left alone and raise his kids and teach them himself, and he and his wife were qualified to do that. He called himself a separatist, but many of the press called him a racist.”
“And the federal government staked him out,” Ben noted, “set him up, and eventually killed his wife and one of his sons and put him in prison for a time. I know the case.”
“What was he doing wrong to deserve that kind of treatment?” Corrie asked.
“Nothing. But the government was out of control by that time, and getting worse. Soon it was spinning completely out of control. The feds were sticking their noses into everybody’s business. Congress was passing legislation that, in effect, stated we must all love everybody. One racial group could cast aspersions against another group, but the group who could be prosecuted for casting aspersions could not, under the law, cast racial aspersions against the first group.”
“We read about that, too. But none of us could figure it out,” Jersey said.
“Well,” Ben said with a laugh, “don’t feel alone. None of us could either.”
“Boss,” Cooper asked, “what in the hell was sensitivity training?”
“Police officers, for instance, had to take classes in order to better understand the criminals they might have to arrest.”
Jersey’s dark eyes darkened even more. “Would you repeat that, Boss? I mean, that sounds like a bag of shit to me.”
“It was. And is. Which is why we don’t have such nonsense in the SUSA.”
Corrie had turned to her radio and was listening. She spoke a few soft words and then looked at Ben. “That was a report from our scouts. The thugs and gang leaders in Prague have warned that if the Rebels enter the city, they will die there.” She shook her head. “Some things never change, do they?”
“Sure looks that way.” He glanced at Jersey.
She smiled and said, “Should we take sensitivity training before we go into Prague, Chief?”
“I don’t think so, Jersey.”
“Kick-ass time!”
THREE
“It says here,” Beth said, reading from an old tourist guidebook, “that Prague is a city of one-and-a-half-million people. It has warm rainy summers and long dry winters. And if you get in trouble, contact your country’s consulate for assistance.”
“Why don’t we leave Emil Hite in Prague and he can be the ambassador from the US?” Jersey suggested.
“We want to help these people, Jersey,” Ben said. “Not plunge them into depths of depression. What’s the latest from Prague, Corrie?”
“There is a sizable number of punks waiting for us. Exact numbers unavailable, but they appear to be well armed. Scouts report no sign of creepies. The city has been trashed and looted. Residents have fled into the countryside. We should be coming up on the first refugee camps in about an hour. That’ll be just across the border at Teplice. That town is secure.”
“The roads have turned to shit,” Cooper bitched.
“They’re going to get worse,” Corrie warned him.
“Any word from Ike?” Ben asked.
“Not a peep.”
The town of Teplice was overflowing with refugees from in and around Prague. At first they were stunned into silence to see the Rebel army rolling in. Communications had become so bad, most had little or no knowledge of what was going on fifty miles away. It had become a matter of day-to-day survival.
Ben was standing outside his Hummer when Doctor Chase walked up. “I know, Lamar. I know. Don’t start. We’ll be here for a few days.”
“These people haven’t had proper medical attention in years. The children need basic inoculations.” He handed Corrie a list. “I need those medicines. Yesterday. Arrange for a drop, please.” He turned and walked away.
“Well, he’s happy now,” Ben said. “His people are finally getting something to do. Come on. Let’s see the town and talk to some people from Prague.”
The people were shabbily dressed and weary-eyed. They stared in disbelief at the healthy, well-fed Rebels. But there was no sense of defeat about them; they were simply tired and hungry and confused.
The Rebels had begun to realize that the massive resistance they had first faced in every town and village was over for a time. Since landing in France, some months back, the Rebels had killed, wounded, or—in a few cases—taken prisoner thousands of criminals. They had no firm numbers as to how many punks and gangs they had driven eastward, but there is a limit to how many thugs one country can produce. Behind the Rebels, mass graves lay in silent testimony to what happens to those who resist the stabilizing of a country.
“I wonder how many of these people were in gangs just a few weeks ago, or even a few days ago?” Thermopolis asked, felling in step with Ben.
“Quite a few, I would imagine. And there is a good possibility some of them will return to a life of crime once we pull out. But if these citizens adopt the form of government I hope they do, criminals won’t stand much of a chance once we leave.”
“They’ve got to get their economy cranked up.”
“That isn’t our job. There are so-called political experts from the U.N. coming in right behind us to help the people do that.” He grimaced. “The world is getting smaller again, Therm.”
Thermopolis knew what he meant and nodded his head in agreement. “I just hope it’s for the better.”
“It will be for a time. Then it will revert back to the same ol’ have and have-nots it was before the Great War.”
“That’s a dismal thought, Ben.”
“Human nature, Therm. You know that as well as I do. That’s why you and your group dropped out.”
“Then the world learned nothing from all the wars and the following years of suffering and tragedy, did it, Ben?”
“Not much, Therm, I am sorry to say. Not much.”
The Rebels pushed deeper into the Czech Republic. So far, not a shot had been fired since they had crossed the border. They stopped at every town, every village, spending anywhere from a few hours to a few days, treating the people and giving kids childhood shots. The Rebel medical and political people were happy at work, healing and teaching; the Rebel combat teams were bored. They had been primed and cocked for action . . . and none had come for weeks. But all that was about to change.
“We’re about five miles away from combat,” Ben told his team after looking at and then folding and putting away his map. “Order the convoy halted here, Corrie.”
Batts 3, 9, and Therm’s short battalion had cut off from the convoy and would attack the city on the Slany Highway, first taking the airport, while Ben’s 1 Batt and Buddy’s 8 Batt would hit the city from E55.
Scouts who had been roaming around the outskirts of the city for days joined
up with the two columns.
“It’s going to be house to house and block by block,” they reported to Ben.
“How are they outfitted?”
“Small arms and machine guns. Some mortars and rocket launchers. Nothing heavier that we’ve seen.” The young Rebel grinned. “And we’ve been in close enough to hear them fart.”
“They’re a pretty motley bunch, General,” another scout said. “Not much in the way of discipline. But they’re hard-core criminals and they’re not going to give it up without a fight.”
“Then that’s what we’ll give them,” Ben said. “At dawn tomorrow.”
The Rebels had become the world’s leading experts in the taking and clearing of cities, suburbs, airports, and just about anything else one might care to name. As one reporter wrote in his column: Watching the Rebel Army work is something like viewing a very brutal and violent ballet, and, as in ballet, you know who is going to win.
The Rebels, with tanks spearheading, struck the city just after dawn and, by noon, had taken the airport and hammered their way well into the suburbs. Grateful citizens, quickly organized by Rebel political teams, moved in right behind the combat teams—oftentimes working while the fighting raged around them—and immediately began clearing away the debris and putting some order back into neighborhoods.
It really came as no surprise to anyone that at noon the second day of fighting, groups of punks and thugs and street crap started appearing with white flags, their hands in the air. The criminals simply were not prepared for the Rebels’ methods of clearing and cleaning out cities. They were used to dealing with police, who were under strict codes of conduct on how to cope with the lawless. The Rebels went straight for the jugular and didn’t give a damn for the feelings of thugs and punks.
Ben, as usual, was leading the assault very deep in a hot sector and came upon what appeared to be a badly frightened, shocked, and shaken group of men and women. They were sitting in the middle of an old cobblestone street, their hands in the air.
Ben and his team stopped at the corner and quickly scanned the area for a possible ambush. He didn’t like what he saw or what he felt. The street was narrow and lined with old vehicles on both sides.
“It’s no trick!” a woman called out in heavily accented English. “We give up! Don’t shoot us. Please, God, don’t kill us!”
“Stand up and move toward us,” Ben called. “No tricks or you’re dead.”
The group struggled to their feet, which is no easy task with your hands in the air, and stood, their eyes shifting from left to right.
“Move toward us,” Ben called. “Slow and easy.” To his team, he said, “They’re going to pull something. Watch it.”
“There’s something strapped onto that big guy’s back,” Beth observed.
“I saw an old movie during R&R,” Coop whispered. “About the second world war. One Japanese fellow who offered to surrender had a small machine gun strapped to his back. You know what happened next.”
“You may be right,” Jersey said. “Although it pains me to admit it.”
“Now!” the woman screamed, falling forward to land on the cobblestones, her group with her.
Cooper had pegged it: The man had what appeared to be a German MG-3 strapped onto his back. Another of the group jerked it up just as men and women began firing from behind the old cars and trucks parked along the street.
Ben flattened out on the sidewalk and let his old Thompson sing its .45 caliber song, the fat slugs tearing into flesh and whining off the cobblestones.
Coop was carrying his SAW, and he quickly ducked into the building and started firing out of a broken window, letting the .223 rounds from the two hundred round box magazine fly. Jersey, Corrie, and Beth leveled their M-16’s and added to the death songs in the old street.
A Bradley Fighting Vehicle rolled up and cut loose with its 25mm cannon, quickly turning the narrow street into an avenue of death for the gang members.
Automatic weapons’ fire began coming from the second-story windows on both sides of the street. The M3 Bradley began swiveling its two-man power turret and opening up with both cannon and machine gun fire while Ben and his team let the lead fly from ground level. The Bradley turned, and the Rebels inside opened gun ports and added more fire-power to the narrow street fight.
The Rebels poured on the fire for a full sixty seconds until Ben signaled Corrie to call for a cease fire. The six Rebels inside the Bradley exited through the ramp in the rear and took up positions on both sides of the street. But no returning fire from the gang members greeted them.
This brief firefight was over. Or so Ben and the others thought.
“We may have a slight problem, Boss,” Corrie said after listening to her headset for a moment. “We’re cut off from the main group. This area was controlled by a warlord named Viktor Sima. I think I pronounced that right. He had the largest gang and vowed to fight to the death. I just got that word from intel, who got it moments ago from captured punks.” She held up a hand and listened for a couple of seconds. “That’s ten-four. We’ll sit tight.” To Ben she said, “We are most definitely cut off. Some of the street gangs formed up and found some reserve of courage and counter attacked.”
“Screwed their courage to the sticking place, hey?” Ben said with a smile.
“Screwed their what?” Cooper asked.
“That’s Shakespeare, Coop,” Beth said.
“How about ammo?” Ben called.
“Everybody’s all right,” Corrie said after checking with the others. “About six hundred rounds of 25mm for the cannon left.”
“Anybody hit?”
“Nobody got a scratch.”
Ben looked around him and spotted an old garage across and down the street. “Back up to that building,” he ordered. “Now! Go. Go. Go!”
Everyone safe in the garage smelling of old grease and gasoline, Coop unfolded a map and studied it for a moment. “Where the hell are we?” he asked. “All the street signs have been torn down and I can’t get my bearings.”
“That’s why I ordered the Hummer parked,” Ben said. “In these old cities you can get turned around very quickly.” He indicated a location on the map. “I think we’re right there—give or take a block or two.”
“Deserters from Bottger’s MEF are fighting with this Sima guy,” Corrie called from across the room. “Intel underestimated the strength and firepower of the street gangs.”
Ben prowled both floors of the old building and found it well built and in pretty good shape. There were two back doors that led into a very narrow, by American standards, alley. Too narrow for the Bradley, he guessed.
He motioned for two Rebels who had arrived in the Bradley. “Check out that building there,” he said, pointing across the alley, “and keep going to the end of the block. When you reach the end of the block, report by radio.”
They nodded and were gone.
Ben returned to the front of the building and looked up the street. The bodies of the men and women were still sprawled in pools of blood on the cobblestones. The Bradley had been pulled back into the depths of the old garage and was parked in the gloom, impossible to see from the street. Above them, the sky was dark and leaden, the clouds threatening a downpour.
Corrie held up a hand for a few seconds, then said, “That’s a roger.” To Ben she added, “The end of this block opens into a wide park. If we tried to go that way, we’d be exposed to enemy fire.”
“All right,” Ben responded, “get those two back here.” When she had recalled the men, Ben asked, “How hard cut off are we, Corrie?”
“It isn’t good, Boss. The street gangs have rallied and are holding. It’s going to take a couple of hours, at least, to punch through to us. But they’re not real sure of our location.”
Ben nodded his understanding. He pointed to two Rebels. “Get that machine gun the punks were about to use on us and that can of ammo. That’ll give us extra firepower, and we’re going to need it. We’re goin
g to be here for a while.”
When the men had returned, carrying the MG3 and a bi-podded RPK and several boxes of ammo they’d found, Ben assigned positions. “Maintain noise discipline,” he directed. “Leave the garage doors open just as we found them. Get back into the shadows and stay put and I think . . .”
The sounds of mortar rounds exploding cut him off in mid-sentence. “I can’t tell if those are ours or theirs. I suspect theirs. This is going to be a tougher piece of cake than we were led to believe.” As he stood, he sniffed the air. “Who shaved this morning and used after-shave?”
“Me, sir,” a young Rebel said.
“Goddamnit.” Cooper swore at the mistake.
“Smear grease on your face and kill that odor, boy,” Ben told him. “As a matter of fact, all of us will smear grease on our faces to help conceal the paleness. If you can’t find enough grease, use your camo paint. Do it.”
The Rebel on the second floor radioed to Corrie, “We’ve got company. Heads up.”
“Company coming, Boss,” she told Ben.
“Fade back and hold your positions. Do not fire unless we’re spotted. Stand easy.”
The sky darkened further, then opened up and began to rain over the city, turning midday into near-dusk. The Rebels trapped inside the old garage waited, weapons at the ready. They breathed through their mouths to cut down on even that slight noise. They heard the sounds of running boots, then silence as the men flattened against the outside of the building. Muffled voices over the sounds of rain drifted to them. The Rebels saw the fast-moving shapes of men and women dart across the open doors of the garage and slip on past, working their way up the street.
So far, so good, Ben thought.
Betrayal in the Ashes Page 15