Alone in the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  “That is correct. I did just that. That was after the first threat from the central government. We were not guilty of harming any law-abiding citizen. Not one. What we did was take a mixing bowl full of people of all races, all religions, and make it work. We had some of the toughest laws anywhere in the world and stuck to them. And ninety-nine point nine percent of the people of the Tri-States liked it that way. That one-tenth of one percent who didn’t, left. They went back to a society where, if they stole, they usually got away with it. Hell, if they broke any law, the odds were they would never serve any time for it. We just viewed matters in a different light, that’s all.”

  “So the government sent troops in to destroy the Tri-States.”

  “Yes. And split the country in half by doing so.” Ben looked far into the distance. “We will rebuild. We will rise out of the ashes and rebuild. We’ve got to.”

  She put her hand in his and gently squeezed.

  South of Albuquerque, they turned northwest, bypassing the city. An hour later, after twisting and turning and dodging obstacles in the old road, they rolled onto Interstate 40 and continued westward. They made camp for the night halfway between Albuquerque and Gallup.

  Ben had been driving the nation’s highways for the past few years; he was accustomed to the strain of backtracking, detouring, and winching fallen trees and junked cars out of the way. Rani was not. She was so tired she was trembling from exhaustion.

  Ben pitched camp, made a quick supper over a low fire, and fed Rani. She fell asleep before she was finished eating. Ben led her to the tent and got her into the big, double sleeping bag. They had packed their blankets away, for it was turning colder by the day, and the down-filled sleeping bag was warmer and easier to handle.

  Ben sat by the little fire, sipping hot tea and listening to the night animals prowl the land in search of food. Soon the cold drove him into the tent, to crawl in beside Rani. They reached for each other in the darkness.

  Now there were two alone in the ashes.

  “I would like to take a bath!” Rani said. “I feel grimy.”

  “Well,” Ben said with a smile. “I figure it’s about 30° this morning, and getting colder. There’s a stream back a few miles. Want to bathe there?”

  She flipped him the Rigid Digit.

  With the silence of the Cibola National Forest their companion to the south, Ben and Rani traveled the interstate, stopping at every small town along the way. At Thoreau, they found an old service station whose tanks had not been drained. Using his pump, Ben filled their tanks and topped off their spare cans.

  Both had been monitoring their CB’s, listening to the increasing chatter. Gallup, it appeared, had been taken over by half a dozen gangs of punks, thugs, and various gangs of what appeared to be Hispanics, all fighting each other for control of what was left of the small city. And ambushing and killing anybody else who happened to blunder onto their “turf.”

  Rani could see that Ben was getting angry. She questioned him about it.

  “I’m getting tired of detouring around street gangs who seem to possess shit for brains.”

  She put the needle to Ben. “You don’t like Hispanics, Ben?”

  “Don’t be stupid! Colonel Hector Ramos was one of the best friends I ever had. He was killed fighting the IFP. I don’t like street gangs no matter what nationality they might be.”

  “I’m only kidding, Ben,” she said softly.

  “I know. Sorry I spoke harshly to you. But if I have an overriding hatred of anything in this world, it’s punks. Secondly would be the goddamn liberals who made excuses for the behavior of street gangs—for years.”

  She looked confused.

  “Liberal is probably not a word you’re familiar with, right, Rani?”

  “I’ve heard it. But I’m not sure what it means.”

  “It was going out of vogue about the time you got out of high school. I guess the simplest way to say it would be that a liberal made excuses for the criminal while a conservative punished the criminal. While neither one made any great effort to pursue a middle ground. Now it’s too late.”

  “You are a confusing man, Ben. I can’t peg you.”

  Ben smiled. “You are not the first person to say that to me, Rani.”

  “So what road do we take to bypass Gallup?”

  “We don’t,” Ben said, a hard glint in his eyes. “We go right through.”

  “Why am I not in the least surprised to hear you say that?”

  “You will pay a toll,” the hard-eyed young man said to Ben. “And we will take what we like from your truck.”

  “Oh, my!” Ben said, feigning great shock and fear, keeping his left hand hidden from the young punk. “Do you do this to all visitors to your lovely city?”

  “’At’s right, pops. And if they’re lucky, we let them live.”

  Ben smiled at the street hood. “You know what?”

  “I know I don’ like you.”

  “Oohhh,” Ben said. “You’re hurting my feelings.”

  “I don’ care. I think I keel you.”

  “I don’t think so.” Ben released the spoon of the grenade he held in his left hand and reached out the window, stuffing the live grenade down the front of the punk’s open shirt. The street-slime recoiled in horror, tearing at his shirt in vain. Ben lifted his right hand and emptied his .45 into the knot of garbage gathered around the truck, all of them grinning and scratching themselves.

  They stopped grinning when Ben started shooting.

  Grenades being what they are, the punk’s body absorbed most of the impact. It spread him all over the littered street as Ben and Rani raced through the punk blockade.

  Ben picked up another fully loaded .45 from the seat beside him and shot at anything resembling a punk as the pickups roared through what remained of Gallup. Ben had a pile of loaded pistols on the seat beside him. Driving one-handed, both windows down, Ben cleared the streets of all living things—if they had two legs, greasy hair, fruit boots, rings full of fingers, tight jeans, and jackets with a club name on the back.

  Rani spent most of her time just keeping up with Ben and screaming at him. She called him every uncomplimentary name in her vocabulary. And made up a few new names she felt applied to this particular situation.

  Just outside of Gallup, Ben whipped off the interstate and roared up onto an overpass. Jumping out, Ben grabbed his RPG and quickly inserted a rocket into the tube, and locked it in place. He looked around for Rani.

  “Stand over there,” he told her. “The backblast from this thing is dangerous.”

  “You’re fucking crazy!” she screamed at him.

  “I believe we settled all that the other morning, didn’t we?”

  The street punks came roaring up the interstate in their low-rider cars. Ben felt sure the interiors would be of crushed velvet, red or black. And the drivers would have one hand on the wheel, the other holding a comb. They came in a knot of fancy machines, hubcaps gleaming in the sunlight.

  The rocket welded the first two macho cars to the concrete, those behind slamming, sliding, crashing, and exploding into the mass of burning fancy metal.

  Those who did not become part of the burning interstate did their best imitations of a State Trooper turn-around and carried their asses back to Gallup. Wiser, but not a damn bit smarter.

  Picking up his M-16, Ben shot any survivors who staggered from the inferno.

  He stood up and looked at Rani. “Now we can continue with our journey, dear.”

  “And what the hell do you think you accomplished by doing this?” she demanded.

  “Making the world a little bit safer for innocent travelers, darling,” he told her. “And I got rid of a lot of crud.”

  “You could have been killed!” she squalled at him. “Now I see why your people think you need a keeper!”

  “The world would have been in a hell of a shape if the Rangers on D-Day and the Marines on Wake Island had shared your sentiments.”

  “What
the hell is Wake Island?” she asked.

  29

  Ben managed to calm Rani down and get them once more pointed west, heading toward Flagstaff. They could see the smoke from the burning pyre in their mirrors for miles.

  And Rani didn’t let him forget it, yapping at him over the CB.

  Ben took it good-naturedly, with a lot of “Yes, Dear’s,” and “No, Dear’s,” as they drove along. He also agitated a lot.

  “I bet you thought Hilton Logan was cute,” Ben needled her.6

  “Stop changing the subject! And no, I didn’t think President Logan to be cute. And by the way, what part did you have in the death of that man?”

  “I ordered his death by our Zero Squads. A very brave young man gave his own life to kill that bastard.”

  The CB was silent for a few miles. When Rani again transmitted, she had wisely changed the subject.

  “How far is it to the Tri-States, Ben?”

  “Well, we’re going to see some country first, Rani. We’ll be there in a week or ten days. I’m going to lead those following us on a goose chase for a time.”

  “Those following us?”

  “Sure. Campo and Texas Red. I read those two like a good book. They pulled their people out of Texas and let us rush around like crazy, looking for them. All the time they were probably holed up three or four hundred miles away, getting information on us from scouts. All the time waiting for you and I to pull out. They’re behind us.”

  “And they would know you were heading for the Tri-States?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Ben?”

  “Yes, Rani.”

  “Is the story true? Did you really kill a mutant with your bare hands?”

  “No,” Ben said flatly. “I shot the damned thing seven times with a .45 and then split its skull with a Bowie knife.”

  “I see.”

  I wonder.

  “Ben?”

  “Yes, Rani.”

  “You don’t seem the least bit worried about the outlaws following us.”

  “I’m not in the least worried. Let me put your mind at ease, dear. I know the old Tri-States like the back of my own hand. We left enough bombs, guns, ammo, and materials cached out there to outfit a small army. And I know where it all is. Relax, Rani. They’ll probably find us, but they’ll wish they hadn’t.”

  “I do wish I could share your confidence, Ben,” she said, the dryness coming through the speaker.

  Ben just chuckled and kept on driving.

  It took them the rest of the day to travel between Gallup and Flagstaff. Ben had never seen an interstate so cluttered with junked vehicles.

  “The first thing we have to do,” he said aloud, “is to clear the highways. That will give the people something to do; take their minds off their troubles. Or are you just kidding yourself, Raines?”

  Probably, he concluded.

  He knew people only too well. Ten out of ten would volunteer at first. Two out of ten would end up doing most of the actual work. The others would find some excuse not to work. They would bitch and moan and eventually walk away.

  Not even the most destructive war known to humankind had changed that undesirable aspect of human nature.

  A few miles outside of Flagstaff, Ben began monitoring his CB closely. There was some air traffic coming out of the city, but unlike Gallup, this chatter wasn’t, or at least did not appear to be, hostile.

  Ben slowed and pulled off onto the shoulder, Rani right behind him.

  He got out and walked to her truck. “You been listening to the chatter on your CB?”

  “Yes. It sounds friendly.”

  “Yeah. A Tasmanian Devil is cute, too. But have you ever tried to pet one?”

  “I’ve never even seen one, Ben.”

  Ben nodded absently and reached across her for the mike. “Hello, Flagstaff. Anybody copying this transmission?”

  After a brief quiet pause, a voice replied. “You ’bout blew my doors off with that transmission, friend. You wanna cut it down some? You’re distorting real bad.”

  Ben adjusted his output, flipping the switch, putting his CB on normal power. “That better, Flagstaff?”

  “Much better. Which direction you comin’ from?”

  “East.”

  “How’d you get through Gallup?”

  “Quickly and shooting at anything that looked like a punk,” Ben told the voice.

  The voice laughed. “Well, I hope you got a bunch of them, friend. Come on in, we’re friendly. We’ll meet you on the outskirts of town.”

  “Ben Raines,” Ben said, holding out his hand to the man.

  “The Ben Raines?” the man asked, pumping Ben’s hand.

  Ben could never get used to that reaction from people. “I guess so.”

  “Thank God!” a woman said. “Where is your army?”

  “Most of them are back in Georgia,” Ben told her. “I’ve got one company still in Texas, helping the law-abiding folks in that state hunt down outlaws and warlords.”

  The woman looked horrified. “You mean you and this lady are out traveling alone?”

  Ben smiled at her. “Yes. But doing so carefully.”

  “I heard that,” a man said. “You’re lucky you got through, Mr. Raines. Outlaws working all over the damn place. Good folks up in Utah cleaned up that state, but it seems the scum they didn’t get just moved south. They’ve been giving us fits around here.”

  “Get organized and hunt them down,” Ben said.

  “Easier said than done, Mr. Raines. You ever tried to ... ?” He grinned sheepishly. “Yeah. I guess you have at that. Good Lord, folks! Where did we misplace our manners? Come on, Mr. Raines, ma’am. Please.” He motioned Ben and Rani toward the town. “Spend some time with us. You’ll find Flagstaff a lot different from Gallup.”

  Like between daylight and dark, Ben mentally noted as they followed the local vehicles into the small city. The streets had been cleared and cleaned. Most of the stores had no show windows, but there was no broken glass sparkling on the sidewalks and streets. Ben could not see any rusting, junked cars, which were not only an eyesore, but a hazard.

  As the small caravan wound out of the city proper and into the suburbs, Ben could see what remained of many large gardens. The homes they passed had been properly maintained, the lawns kept up and clean.

  Ben guessed about five to six hundred people were living in the city. The adults were all armed—and well armed, at that.

  At the home of the man and woman who appeared to be the spokespersons for the group, over coffee—real coffee—Ben complimented the gathering.

  “It wasn’t easy, and it wasn’t pleasant,” Jim Blanning told Ben. “I guess there was probably over a thousand of us starting out. About four hundred left when we really started getting tough with the punks and street gangs and criminal element.”

  All those gathered in the large home shook their heads in agreement with that statement.

  Carolyn Blanning said, “We did try the old way, Mr. Raines ...”

  “Ben, please.”

  “Ben. Good. You know what I mean by the old way. We began making excuses for the gangs, not coming down hard on them; mouthing all the old B.S. from before the Great War. Well,” she said with a shrug, “it didn’t work back then, and it wasn’t working for us now. Finally, and this only happened about ... oh, fifteen months ago, we banded together and formed our own police force.” She smiled. “We put your ideas in play. The ones you used up in the Tri-States. We weren’t going to tolerate lazy, sorry, good-for-nothing people; especially the gangs and the thugs and the punks.” She paused, shook her head, and looked at a tall, rangy man sitting across the huge den from her.

  “Evan Reynolds,” the man said. “I guess I’m in charge of the militia here, General Raines. I was the first one to shoot to kill. We had spent months cleaning up the town. Hard, back-breaking work. All the while certain ... types, stood around and jeered at us, refusing to work. After we’d cleared and swept one particula
rly filthy block—where the crud lived, by the way—we came back the next day and they had trashed it. They ...” He struggled with his emotions for a few seconds. “They dared us to do something about it. There was this one ... person. A big, swaggering, dirty-looking type. You know the type.”

  Ben nodded his head. “Only too well.”

  Evan said, “He was called Stud. A gang leader. He told me we couldn’t make him or his people do a goddamn thing. Spat at my feet.” Evan paused and rolled a cigarette. He lit it and smoked in silence for a few seconds. “I looked at him, walked back to my truck, got a shotgun, and blew his goddamn worthless head off.”

  Ben and Rani waited, each of them knowing it was a terrible memory for the man to dredge up.

  “It turned bloody after that,” Evan continued. He looked at another man.

  “What was so ridiculous about it,” the Mexican-American said, “was them accusing us of being bigots and anti this, that, and the other thing.” He laughed bitterly. “As you can see by looking around the room, General Raines, we are a real mixing bowl of people here. Dan,” he said, pointing, “is Apache. Mrs. Yee is Chinese. You have eyes, you can see. We just took all we were going to take of it. Following the initial shooting, it was a bloody week. But we made this community a nice place to live.” He inspected his fingernails for a moment, silently reflecting. “I won’t say that innocents did not die needlessly. That would be a lie. But there comes a time when one must choose a side, a cause, if you will, and stand by it. While it is not safe once one ventures ten miles outside the city, it is quite safe in the city.”

  “And if you were stronger, better armed?” Ben asked.

  “Let us say,” the man who would be later introduced as Mr. Reyes continued, “we would not be adverse to carrying the message outside the city.”

  The group all smiled.

  Ben got the message. He returned the smile. “Well, then,” he said. “I believe we can work something out that would be mutually advantageous.” He told the gathering of his idea of an outpost system.