“Leave some water,” Karl instructed. “And a sponge, right next to that bucket there.”
The soldiers looked confused, but did as they were told.
“Why … what are you going to do to me?” the man asked.
Karl walked to the ladder.
“Me? I’m not going to do anything. If it weren’t for the pressing need of my men’s satisfaction, I would simply toss a beam of wood over the door and nail it shut. See if being caged alone in the dark for eternity makes you become something of a man and muster the strength to break free of your confinement.”
“No. My God … please.”
“Relax,” Karl said, and went up the ladder followed by the rest of the soldiers. Liam turned to close the door, but Karl shook his head. “Leave it open. Let the stink ventilate out a bit. He likes it as fresh as possible.”
Karl gave a command to a nearby soldier, and ordered everyone to clear the area. He puffed at another cigar as he waited, enjoying the burn in his throat. Across the field, by the mass of his army, a single man walked toward him. When he was in earshot, Karl said, “Right here, ol’ sport.”
“Sir?” Doctor Freeman walked up, clutching his satchel.
“As part of our continued pact, I present you with an offering.” He motioned toward the bunker door. “Bob is down there, awaiting your arrival.”
“His name’s Bob?”
Karl shrugged. “Sure, why not.”
“Is he clean?”
“I left a bucket, sponge, and water at the base of the landing. There’s a lantern, and his propane stove still has some fuel.”
The doctor moved his satchel to his other hand.
“You have one hour until we move out,” Karl said. “Make the most of it. He’s all bone anyway.”
Doctor Freeman nodded and swung his feet onto the ladder. He proceeded down the entryway, and Karl watched the glow of the lantern illuminate from within. A moment later, a quiet trail of violins and cellos rang out from the doctor’s portable stereo.
Karl turned and left, joining his officers beside the field. He was passed a bottle of dark liquor, and took a hearty swallow. For a moment, he thought he heard screaming in the distance, but it might have been a flight of birds.
***
The exhilaration was palpable in the increased conversation and quickened pace as the army entered the lush, green terrain of the mountains.
They slept that night in the deep thicket of woods, and Karl ordered no fires to be made, as they were within a mile of Odyssey. In the morning, a blanket of fog hugged the earth, rolling through the trees on the mountain like something alive.
The officers proceeded on foot into the wilderness. The earth swept up and down over hills both shallow and tall, and it wasn’t long until Laurence whispered, “Quiet now,” and they climbed up an embankment to an overlook at the top.
They crawled on their bellies, each man holding binoculars. The thick canopy of pine trees worked as cover.
“That’s it,” Laurence said. “Odyssey.”
Chapter Eleven
Hellfire
The town of Odyssey was nestled in a valley, surrounded by tall mountain peaks as if it were inside the basin of a bowl. From their vantage point, Karl and the officers could see a good portion of the layout.
Whispers of smoke rose and dissipated in the air from a dozen campfires hidden from view behind buildings, and men carrying rifles were visible on rooftops beside the main road and bordering the vicinity in a ring. Makeshift bunkers were constructed on the taller buildings, with many additional lookouts extending from the tops. From what Laurence reported, there were a total of six towers, complete with snipers and machine-gun turrets. An assault from over the mountain could be effective, but they would be exposed on the sheer mountainside, and it would be slow to climb down.
“Liam,” Karl said to his captain. “What do you make of this?”
Liam cleared his throat, peering out from the binoculars. “There’s no easy way in. It’s best to stick with the plan that we got.”
They reversed down the embankment and made their way back to camp.
That evening, as Karl held counsel with his officers, a hunter returned holding the back legs of a plump raccoon. He proceeded to skin and butcher the animal, and the meat was roasted in chunks over a small flame, producing dark swells of greasy smoke. The officers ate with appetite, tossing the little bones into the brush.
After their meal, the campfire was smothered, and soon Karl fell into a fast and deep sleep. At dawn, a young private named Ryan Pechman came into his room, saying, “It’s time, sir.”
The man was shooed away, and Karl stood and stretched. He dressed in clean, dark-green army fatigues and polished his boots before stepping out into the damp morning air.
Laurence waited outside along with the Priest, and when Karl arrived, they nodded.
“Sir,” they said. “The men are ready.”
Karl yawned. “Let’s get on with it then. Are you prepared, Laurence? If you feel this plan is at all in folly, this is our last chance to reconsider.”
Laurence shook his head. “It’ll work. Like I’ve said, President Clark and the counsel are a soft bunch. They know nothin’ of fighting. Hell, they dress themselves in button-down shirts and running sneakers, like it’s just another fuckin’ day at the office. Never venture outside the gates themselves. He’ll send the army out, practically delivering them to us, if I tell ’im it’s worth it.”
“And he’ll be willing do that, sight unseen?”
“It’ll be seen, ’cause I’ll tell ’im it’s seen. That’s my job, to scout out anything worth lootin’ and send the army to go forage.”
“Very well then.”
Laurence turned and began his trek alone toward Odyssey. The officers turned the opposite direction to lead the army back out the way they’d arrived, to the pre-determined clearing right outside of the entrance to the woods. Laurence had a lot to accomplish in a short period of time. First, he had to convince the leadership that he’d been lost out west, to justify his absence. Then he was to persuade President Clark that he’d seen a group of vile men camped beside a broken-down convoy, which appeared to have been transporting fuel. Laurence was to explain that he’d seen from afar that the group of men, about thirty or so, had prisoners, women and children tied with ropes, disheveled and downtrodden. Appealing to President Clark’s good-natured disposition, Laurence would convince him to send out his loyalist army to eradicate the miscreants, free the prisoners, and take the fuel. Out in the open, Karl’s army could deal with the more experienced soldiers away from the town’s defenses before storming the gates.
As President Clark’s army was being mustered, Laurence would then have to find and organize the citizens he knew would rebel against the current authority. Their numbers would be low, not enough to take the town on their own; but that was not their objective. They were to wait until Karl and the Red Hand army were near the gates, and then help eliminate or subdue the soldiers standing guard in the lookout towers, machine-gun posts, and atop the walls. To aid them were the dozens of snipers who had left in the night to scale the surrounding mountains, and were sitting high atop rocky perches.
Before sundown, Odyssey would fall.
***
The horses snorted plumes of steam that evaporated in the damp morning air. Karl Metzger sat atop his pale stallion on the crest of a hill that overlooked the advancing army, just a twinkle in the far distance emerging from the woods. Beside him, Mark Rothstein stroked his long red beard.
“They’re coming right at us,” he said.
Karl turned to Liam. “Ready the men.”
“Yes, sir.” Liam tugged at the reins. “Come on now,” he told the stallion, and trotted down the embankment.
Karl raised his binoculars and watched the kicked-up dust on the horizon, trying to estimate their numbers and machinery. There were vehicles, but he assessed by their slow advance that most were on foot.
“All is not lost until pale death lays its shadowy fingers over my eyes,” he mumbled to himself, surprised at hearing this strange verse come up from the depths of his memories. He chuckled and turned to the officers waiting behind him. “Keep watch,” he said, and led his steed down from the crest until he came to a ridge of land overlooking his army in the gull of the rocky terrain. They were a scramble of activity: dusty glooms going this way and that, preparing trenches on either side to stop the enemy from flanking their position. Taking up the rear was Doctor Freeman with the rest of the medical brigade, double-checking their pouches of gauze and painkillers.
Karl guided his horse through the throng, some of the men stopping to say, “Sir,” as he passed. When he reached the doctor, he strode up beside him.
“Arthur,” he said. “We’ll be seeing a fair share of bloodshed. Are your men ready?”
“Yes,” the doctor replied.
“Good.” Karl sighed and let out a low laugh. “It’s funny,” he continued, “just a moment ago I remembered something my grandfather used to say.”
“What’s that?”
“All is not lost until pale death lays its shadowy fingers over my eyes.”
The doctor stopped checking his gauze pouch and looked at Karl. “Your grandfather told you that?”
“The man was a religious fanatic. If it’s from the Good Book, the verse is unknown to me. By all accounts, he enjoyed making up his own spiritual acknowledgments and played them off as something wholly divine.”
“Hmm,” the doctor said.
“You know, that’s why I always liked you—you’re a hell of a listener.”
Doctor Freeman pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose and looked at Karl through his dark eyes. “You got any family left?”
“No, Arthur. No family.”
“No one has any family left.”
“Not true, sir. Not true. Here in this valley are our brethren. Better than the family we were given at birth. Am I wrong in saying so?”
Doctor Freeman shrugged.
Through the cluster of men, Liam appeared, trotting his horse up to meet them.
“We got less than twenty minutes. Let’s get in position. What the hell are you guys talking about?”
“Aye aye, Mister Briggs,” Karl said, pulling the reins of his horse.
A command was shouted from the front and repeated down the lines.
“Position check! Position check!”
The men stopped digging their foxholes and jumped into the shallow depressions, feeding their assortment of large caliber machine guns, and pulling back the bolts to arm their weapons.
Karl heeled his horse and hurried back up to the crest of the rocky hill to check the advancing party, with Liam in tow.
A shot fired out from the valley, and Sergeant Novell, standing two over from Karl on the vantage point, dropped. More shots rang out and the men recoiled. “They’re breaking off their approach,” Karl announced. “The main attack will be from the north, but they will flank both sides of the hill. Fall back into position. Everyone.” He turned to face his army, hiding behind the massive rock formation, waiting for the enemy brigade to come around the bend and find themselves at odds with the force of the Red Hands.
Karl took up position on the front, and looked to his rear to see Mark and his army holding the opposite flank. They were a rough assortment of outcasts, most of which belonged to various biker gangs that had squashed their rivalries in the face of mass-extinction, and came together under Mark’s leadership and authority. They lacked the finesse of military order, but took to violence with a particular revelry that made Karl know their virtues.
“Hold,” Karl said, hearing the roar of the coming army. Bullet shots echoed from the snipers scattered atop the mountainous rock and from the invading men shooting back at them.
The soldiers at Karl’s side and all around him squatted low, pressed to the walls of their shallow dugouts, their teeth clenched, the air thick with impending war. Somewhere in the rear a voice was heard in happy song, and Karl knew the Priest was conducting his symphony of the damned, psalms for the wicked, to his waiting cavalry.
Two jeeps rumbled around the bend, machine guns mounted to the beds, and the enemy issued a howling war cry that echoed loud against the hulking rock formation. Two more jeeps came into view, and as they opened fire, Karl yelled, “Artillery!”
Bullet fire erupted from the line, peppering the automobiles in plunks, with splinters and twisted metal spiraling through the air. Mortars rained down as the bulk of the enemy came around the bend. Then their front line saw the mass they were up against and stopped short, trying to turn, but pressed on by the unaware mob in their rear.
If presented the opportunity, Karl and his men did quite well with this tactic of baiting the enemy out of their encampments to charge what they presumed to be a small brigade.
The crackling of bullet fire from behind Karl suggested that the enemy had also emerged from around the other side of bluff, and Mark’s men were unleashing their fury.
Some among the line fell as bullets whizzed by, and plumes of dirt shot into the air from the land before them. Shouts yelled out for the medics, and Doctor Freeman and his men arrived, dragging away the injured to makeshift tents in the rear.
The battle itself lasted mere minutes before what was left of the adversaries turned back and beat upon the valley in hastened retreat. The jeeps that preceded their advance sat in ruin. Two caught fire, and as the mob ran, one exploded in a great ball of fire. Dark, almost black, greasy smoke consumed the vehicle. Several fleeing men were rocked to their sides and burned. Some attempted to stand again, while others lay unmoving.
A sniper above shouted, “They’re pulling back!”
Karl yelled above the roar of warfare to Liam, who had stationed himself halfway up the hill to relay messages, “Numbers! What are their numbers?”
A moment later Liam yelled back, “No more than fifty!”
Karl got to his feet and turned to the reserve line behind him. He grabbed the reins of his stallion from a rotten-toothed boy. “Advance!” he yelled. “Advance!” Whistles blew and the army stood. Karl thrashed at the bridle, leading the procession with the Priest’s mounted brigade, and the men shouted loud into the air at their impending victory, anticipating that fighting would soon be hand-to-hand.
The hooves of the horses beat against the soil, trailing a cloud of dust as the cavalry turned the bend and were quickly at the trailing deserters. A few fleeing enemies looked over their shoulders in horror, their expressions aghast. Some dropped to their knees with trembling arms covering their heads, or hands clasped before their chests in pleading prayer. Some fought on, turning to fire their weapons as the storm of returned munitions shredded their bodies to mists of red.
The cavalry overtook the small retreating numbers and the men on foot were fast to catch up, hundreds upon hundreds, all the reserves running forward to claw their way at the few enemy fighters left alive. Karl rode against a man standing tall, his rifle out before him. The man turned and swung his gun to fire, but Karl struck a heavy boot against the man’s skull.
The army was held up in the valley as the enemy soldiers were tied up, stripped of clothing, beaten, and spit on.
“Back in line!” Karl commanded, high atop his stallion. “Back in line!”
The officers repeated his command, shoving and kicking the men into submission, snapping them out of their hypnotic bloodlust. “To the town!” they declared.
The army fanned out in two columns, marching forward into the mountain pass. The cavalry, led by the Priest and Karl, took up the rear, their horses trotting to maintain the speed of the marching men. Mark Rothstein took up the far flank, separate so as to make their procession toward the encampment advance from two angles.
The gates of Odyssey came into view through the towering pines. Shots rang out from behind the walls, and a few dropped from the advancing line, or stopped to hold bleeding limbs. The army
quickened its advance, and as bullets continued to pepper the ground and smack at tree limbs, the first explosion was heard inside the town. A plume of smoke erupted into the air like a geyser. A second explosion followed, and a tall guard tower combusted into fiery splinters. The enemy gunfire lessened.
Karl gave the command, “Open fire!” The outer wall of the colony was fractured to shreds of wood and the guards atop the platform evaporated. Karl heeled his mount and the men ran to lay siege, flooding over the villagers like hellfire come alive.
Chapter Twelve
Butchers
Tables and chairs were taken from Odyssey’s Masonic lodge and brought outside into the clearing of an adjacent park. A commemorative bronze statue of a World War I soldier stood in the middle. A bonfire was constructed, and the men fed the flames using anything that would burn.
Bushels of produce and pallets of canned goods were brought out from the storeroom and dumped on the tables. A small farm was discovered on the outskirt of town, and before it could be put under guard, three chickens and two lambs were slaughtered, roasted over small flames, and devoured on the spot, half-raw. The guards shooed the men away from the remaining livestock, and Karl sent for the army’s butchers to prepare a proper meal.
Alcohol was produced in quantity, and in the early evening the revelry grew to a height. At the center of it all sat Karl Metzger, Liam Briggs, the Priest, Mark Rothstein, and Sultan. The Priest had sustained an injury from the fighting, a burst of shrapnel that came close to taking his eye out. Doctor Freeman set up an emergency triage in a little church, whose decrepit wood and uniquely carved architecture, with peels of white paint, gave evidence to its age. A wooden, handwritten sign outside the structure read:
Butcher Rising Page 8