Flames from the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  “I hear you’ve been risking your life again, in spite of all the good advice you’ve been given,” the rotund doctor complained in the pitch of a musical saw.

  “Yep, Tubby. Every word is true. I’ve been eating your outrageous imitation food for nearly two weeks,” Ben quipped back. “Today I dined on delicious fresh beef.”

  “Cooked rare enough to moo, no doubt,” snapped the disapproving medico.

  “How else?” Ben was enjoying this. He decided, though, that the time had come to get serious. “Have you received enough supplies to support a major campaign? We’re facing a tough go here at Santa Rosa.”

  “We can handle it,” Dr. Chase said, frowning. “Why do you suppose they picked this place for a major stand?”

  “It’s a crossroads of the Southwest,” Ben told him. “From here you can access Flagstaff and points west, Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and everything south of there.”

  “Well, damn them for being smart enough to know that,” Chase snapped, then launched into another pet worry. “I’m concerned about Cecil Jefferys. He keeps chewing on me to release him early from his recovery program.”

  Ben started to answer when a young corporal appeared in the doorway of the communications van. “General, we have General Payon on a secure channel.”

  “I’ll come at once,” Ben responded. “I’d like you to tag along, Ike, Lamar.”

  Inside the van, the high-altitude advantages to radio communication became clear when the sharp, nearly static-free voice of General Raul Francisco Payon came through the speaker. “Well, my friend, I hear you are in a messy situation up north of us.”

  “Not so’s you’d notice, Raul,” Ben stated calmly. “The usual run of things when dealing with Hoffman and his black-shirts. How are you situated?”

  A sigh, colorless over the scrambler, preceded Payon’s reply. “We were betrayed at Chapultepec by the politicians. They welcomed these Nazi cabrónes like liberators. I sometimes suspect that all politicians are corrupt and seek only to exercise absolute power over everyone else. I also believe that at least half of our crop in Mexico are secret Nazis. But I wander. We were forced to withdraw to the central highland. There we fought a few indecisive battles and again we retreated northward. We are now on a line between Parral and Ciudad Camargo.”

  “Where does that put you in relation to Rasbach’s dispositions?” Ben asked next.

  General Payon chuckled. “We hold the high ground, once they get out of the mountains. I have discovered that the bandidos are at least loyal Mexicans. The outlaws who used to rob our trains are now fighting guerrilla actions against Rasbach, who is bogged down in the steep passes around Torreón.”

  “How are you and they supplied?”

  “We have air cover and supply drops from Ciudad Chihuahua some sixty kilometers north of us.”

  “Can you give me a time frame?”

  “A week. A few days. Hours, if Rausbach’s men can clear the boulders and refuse from the passes. He has some good engineers with his army. They are working in spite of the snipers and bandit raids.”

  “How long can your, ah, guerrillas hold out?”

  “With better supply arrangements, indefinitely. Alas, Ben, our planes are few and small. If only we had the big cargo craft the Rebels use.”

  “I understand, amigo. But considering the distance involved and the refueling problem, it’s out of the question. Hang in there, we’ll be joining you within the week.”

  “I look forward to it, my friend, Ben. Adiós.”

  From outside, the rumble of armor, moving fast and with a purpose, alerted the commanders of a new development. “Let’s take a look,” Ben suggested as he put up the mike.

  Nazi tanks had rolled out of Santa Rosa and lined up for a classic desert tank battle. Rebel MBTs raced to oppose them. The first of the big guns let go with long lances of muzzle flame and pearly smoke rings. Crews with ERIX missiles hurried to get into position to support the Rebel armor. With all attention centered on the developing battle, it came as a surprise to hear the rattle of small arms and yells of alarm from the rear of the Rebel positions.

  Ben Raines directed his attention that way and saw a wave of white-robed people rushing the Rebel rear. In the center, beard and hair waving in the air, came Brother Armageddon, urging on his demented followers.

  SIX

  When Ben Raines received confirmation that Archibald Culp/Brother Armageddon was indeed leading this new assault on the Rebel assembly area, he immediately left the CP to get a first-hand view. Cooper delivered them in somewhat-tumbled condition in a now-vacant tank park. From where the Rebel general had been minutes before came the continued rumble of the armor battle.

  Ben and his team spilled from the Hummer, and Ben put binocs to his eyes. A rapid count of the advancing skirmishers brought a muffled curse from his lips, then he asked in an uncertain tone, “Where in hell did he come up with this many troops?”

  Jersey plucked a stem of grass and chewed on it. “With Hoffman on the loose, I’d say every crack-brain in the country has come out from under his rock.”

  “Brother Armageddon has made that obvious,” Ben replied dryly. “Even so, it’s been less than a week since we cleaned out their snake pit.” Decisiveness replaced his surprise. “We haven’t time to fool with these people. I want Ike’s infantry to turn back this way and roll over the assholes. We can only hope the Nazis aren’t in radio contact with that son of a bitch.”

  “That’s no problem, General,” Corrie offered sweetly. “As you know, there’s jamming equipment in all of the comm vans that hasn’t been used in a while. The black-shirts can be put off the air in no time.”

  “Do it,” Ben commanded, then blinked in surprise as a six-by-six roared up out of a draw directly in front of them.

  It had a snowplow blade fixed on its front and a ring-mounted light machine gun on the extended cab. The driver aimed the jolting monster directly at the Hummer. Everyone scattered. With less than fifty yards to cover, it looked as if the truck would cream Ben’s favorite transportation in seconds.

  A light of zealous madness shone in the eyes of Archibald Culp as he and his six-man bodyguard established a forward observation post and urged the screaming mass of his fighters on past. So agitated had he become that his words spilled out in jumbled confusion.

  “. . . them, gonna we . . . get . . . must . . . moving keep.”

  “Say what?” blurted a former redneck, recently converted to the Assembly.

  “He is speaking in tongues, Brother Cash,” a longtime follower explained inaccurately, a hand on the forearm of Brother Cash.

  “Sound like he be drunk to me,” Brother Cash went on.

  “Don’t say that,” the scandalized convert demanded. “Brother Armageddon hates the demon Rum. Hates all alcohol. He has never allowed a drop of pernicious waters to cross his lips.”

  That wasn’t entirely true. Archibald Culp had been checked into an alcoholic rehab center by despairing parents when he was seventeen. He had been released as clean and sober nine months later. From then until the “Spirit” touched him at age thirty, he was in and out of every detox clinic in Southern California.

  “There — there,” Brother Armageddon shouted, along, trembling finger pointing to the Rebel rear area. “They are gathering to fight us. The Angel of the Lord shall smite them. The Archangel Michael shall descend from Heaven and lay waste all the vanities of Satan.”

  “It’d do better to get them snowplow trucks up here with their machine guns,” Brother Cash muttered. “Them fuckin’ Rebels don’t worry none about angels smitin’ ’em. They just kick ass an’ take names.”

  “You have fought them ere this, Brother?” the faithful disciple asked in awe. “We never did before they came to our valley.”

  “Oh, I done fought Ben Raines before,” the redneck allowed. “Fought him in Loos’ana, fought him in Geo’gia, fought the bastid in Arkansas last summer.”

  “What’s it like?” the fascinated E
nd of Worlder asked.

  “Ben Raines was plumb mean back home. Battled like a madman in Geo’gia. In Arkansas, there was this bull nigger across the river. He talked some bad shit against us white folk. Ben Raines an’ his Rebels kilt damn near ever’ one of them. Then he turned on us. That’s when I knew he was sure enough crazy.”

  “Bring up the fiery swords of the Almighty,” Brother Armageddon interrupted.

  “He means the machine-gun trucks,” the true believer interpreted.

  “I know what he means. ’Bout damn time,” the redneck grumbled as he keyed his radio.

  His was the last message that got out before jamming began. It brought half a dozen huge, powerful trucks with snowplows for armor, and machine guns mounted over the cabs. The beds had been filled with heavily armed members of the Assembly and their new recruits.

  “I’ve seen stuff like this before,” the redneck advised. “But this time, with them Nazis on one side an’ us on the other, I got the feeling Ben Raines is gonna get his.”

  Obersturmbannführer (Lt. Col.) Kurt Nagel had lived through the Rebel vendetta on Field Marshal Hoffman’s army. He had thought he had seen the full gamut of Rebel ferocity. What unfolded now left him gasping.

  “Liebe Gott!” he swore to his executive officer. “Who are those troops attacking the Rebels? They are not any of ours.”

  “No, Hen Obersturmbannführer,” Major Guttmann responded. “Before the Rebels began jamming us, we had radio contact. Their leader claims that they are Aryan brothers, who have come to help us against, ah, against the, ah, ‘Great Satan Ben Raines.’ That’s really what he said. He said they are the Assembly of the End of the World and have a safe conduct pass from the Führer.”

  “Well, well, nothing surprises me in this mad country anymore. Whoever they are, they are being slaughtered by the Rebels.” He pointed to a BC scope. “Take a look. The Rebels take no prisoners. Men who try to surrender are shot down or bayoneted or clubbed to death. It’s — it’s barbaric.”

  Guttmann stepped back from the battery commander’s scope, his face ashen. “Perhaps it is a mistake to defend this area so aggressively. Do you think they would treat our men like that?”

  “Very likely,” Nagel stated coldly. “It is reported that Ben Raines has declared no quarter for any NAL soldier. As to your speculation on our defending this portion of the Eastern Wall with anything less than our utmost, it is a sentiment that Brigadeführer Brodermarm would not approve, to say the least. No, Guttmann,” he went on through a sigh. “We must defend the Santa Rosa complex to the last man, for Führer and fatherland.”

  Unable to react in time to raise the plow blade, the driver of the road maintenance truck died in a shower of safety glass fragments and .45 slugs as Ben Raines’s Thompson chopped a ragged line across the windshield. His body slumped to the left and the vehicle turned that way. Jersey had hacked a crooked stitch up the torso of the machine-gunner, silencing the weapon.

  At the last minute, she had to jump to her left to avoid the deadly edge of the blade, which slammed into the front fender of the Humvee. The loud scream of rending metal came clearly over the yammer of the engine and pop of small-arms fire. The Hummer slewed to the side on loose gravel and the driverless truck careened by.

  Riflemen in the rear opened up as the truck rocked by, and two 5.56mm rounds struck Ben’s body armor, stinging him with the force of impact. Then Cooper fired his M-203. In a bloop-bang zero time frame, the 40mm grenade exploded in the truck bed. Ben Raines hosed down the screaming survivors, and silence accompanied the wobbling vehicle to its encounter with a large boulder.

  Stunned, Jersey looked hard at Ben, noted the holes in his body armor. “If you were a cat, boss, you’d be down to only a couple of lives. This whole campaign has been screwed up from the start.”

  “Complaining, Jersey?”

  “Who, me? No, sir. I wouldn’t dream of complaining, sir. Everything is just hunky-damn-dory, General Raines, sir.” She drew a deep breath and bellowed, “Goddammit, that nut in the truck almost scared me enough to wet my pants.”

  “Me, too,” Ben admitted quietly. Then, “Remember the pucker factor, Jersey.”

  Cooper prudently kept out of the exchange, intent on reloading the blooper under his CAR-15 and taking aim at another truck. An ERIX crew had discovered the mobile machine-gun nests and eliminated one in a huge fireball. More of the holy lunatics poured over the lip of the draw to their front and Ben put his Thompson to good use.

  Three of Brother Armageddon’s followers went off to their brand of heaven when Ben washed them in their own blood. Although firing in tight three- and four-round bursts, a respectable pile of shiny .45 brass accumulated to Ben’s right rear. The faithful old Chicago typewriter ground out deadly copy for the enlightenment of screaming End of Worlders. Ben estimated he had some ten rounds left in the third drum when Ike’s battalions of infantry slammed into the ragged companies of kooks.

  They died screaming, howling, begging for mercy. The biting tang of wet copper filled the air, tinged with burnt powder. It gave Ben a moment to wonder what went on in the armor battle. He sought Corrie and her radio.

  “Bump Ike and ask him how the slug-out is going with the tanks.”

  “Already done, General. Ike says he’d like his infantry back now, if possible. Our gunners are better than theirs. The Nazi armor is pulling back into town.”

  “Good. Tell Ike he can have two battalions as of now. We’ll need the other to mop up on this collection of filth.”

  In common with the executive officer of Brodermann’s regular SS troops in Santa Rosa, Obersturmbannführer Alex Young of the American SS began to have doubts about the wisdom of making so strong a defense in the hilly city area. He had witnessed with growing horror the obliteration of the fanatical group calling themselves the Assembly of something or other. What he saw and learned chilled Lieutenant Colonel Young’s blood.

  Nagel and the others of Brodermann’s officers may have thought they had seen examples of Rebel ferocity. This gave them an entirely new lesson. In the hiatus following the uneven tank battle and slaughter of the religious lunatics, Young drafted his own report for the eyes only of Peter Volmer.

  “The man Brodermann has in charge here,” he wrote, “seems determined to get every last one of us killed. Not necessarily his own men, Peter, but ours. He has a withdrawal plan that places us as the rear guard, with orders to fight to the last man to keep the Rebels from following the main column too closely. Somehow, the Rebels have brought together the strength of an entire brigade. All of that power is leveled at Santa Rosa. Surely a word from you would change our new Führer’s mind about last-ditch stands?”

  Young sighed and looked up from the page. “I’d gladly kill for a bottle of cold beer,” he said absently.

  A youthful aide perked up. “Really, sir? Only, you won’t have to kill anyone for it. Our — our South American friends seem to have plenty of it. I’ll only be a minute.”

  “Sep, you are marvelous. You’ve proven to me that there still are miracles. Even if they are small ones. Yes, get me one, by all means. Get half a dozen if possible and you can share with me.”

  Sep had barely returned when the Rebel bombardment of Santa Rosa began. Artillery rained down in sheets of deadly steel.

  Three burly Rebels brought Brother Armageddon to Ben Raines. The false prophet’s hair and beard were smeared with bloody mud. His robe was in tatters and only the wild light in his eyes revealed any former part of the fanatic in him. He had lost a shoe somewhere and walked with a pronounced limp. He was bent forward with pain and exhaustion so that when Ben stood, they were nearly eye-to-eye.

  “So, Mr. Culp, you’ve played out your string.”

  “It is not over, Satan Raines,” Culp muttered in a ghost of his former voice from the crypt. “And I am Brother Armageddon. You will address me as such under pain of Gawd’s punishment.”

  “I’m afraid God has abandoned you, Mr. Culp,” said Ben with steel-e
dged words. “It is now up to the Rebels to mete out justice to you.”

  “I deny you the right to judge me,” Armageddon snapped back, his old self rallying.

  Ben laughed, loud and long and hearty. “You sorry little shit. Deny all you want. The fact remains, you are in our hands and we will decide your fate according to our laws.”

  Armageddon’s head rose slowly. “You . . . have . . . laws?”

  “Oh, yes. We also have chaplains with the Rebel troops, and a lot of sincere believers in one religion or another. Three of them are holding you right now; a Buddhist, a Catholic, and a Jew. You were so busy preaching ignorance and hate, glorifying plural marriage and, no doubt, incest, that you hadn’t time to learn the least little thing about your self-proclaimed enemy.”

  Renewed anger choked Armageddon. “We do not tolerate incestuous relations,” he bellowed nearly in full form. “Of course, a father must instruct his daughters in the . . . dutiful arts . . . but that’s not the same thing.”

  “Oh, certainly not,” Ben dryly taunted. “Let’s see if we have it all? “You’ve engaged in acts of war against the Rebels, committed polygamy, screwed your daughters, crucified innocent men, and I suppose women — ”

  “Heretics, unbelievers, defilers of our sacred temple, servants of the Antichrist!” Armageddon bellowed.

  “Oh, fuck this!” Ben Raines roared back. “You three, take him out and hang him.”

  “What about my trial?” a suddenly sobered Archibald Culp asked.

  “You’ve had it, you scumbag asshole. I am sick unto death with sanctimonious hypocrites like you. The world is a hard, cruel, unforgiving place, bad enough without your sort coming along with some disgusting absolutist, half-baked theology that panders to the lust and greed of a few, who become your cadre, and feed enough bullshit to the sheep to fertilize every garden in Rebel territory. Mister, if you sincerely want a look at the Antichrist before you die, I suggest you get a mirror.”