Ashes - Wind In The Ashes Part 19

"Speak!" "Well, like I done tole the other feller I come up on "I am not that other ...

feller"

Khamsin said, his English flawless, without a trace of any accent. "You will tell me exactly what you told him." "Okay," the man said. "Can I sit down?"

"No."

"I'm tared."

"What you are, I believe, is an idiot.

Your life means nothing to me, American. Have you ever seen a human being skinned alive?"

The man swallowed hard. "No, sir."

"Would you like to experience it? Personally?"

"G.o.d, no!"

"Then speak!"

"I know how to get to Ben Raines."

Khamsin leaned back in his chair. He stared hard at the ragged American standing before him.

Fiftyish, he guessed. He sighed. Khamsin really did not have much interest in Ben Raines-not at this time. Ben Raines, from what he had been able to gather, was a malcontent and a troublemaker. A man who had a small force of people, perhaps five or six thousand strong, who ran about like a modern-day Robin Hood, preaching all sorts of strange dogma.

Ben Raines was obviously a fool.

But, Khamsin thought, perhaps he should listen to what this whining wimp standing before him had to say. It might someday be useful.

So he listened as the man droned on and on.

Khamsin finally cut him off with a curt slash of his hand.

"Enough of your prattling. I thank you for your information. Go get something to eat and stay close. I might wish to speak with you again."

As the man left, one of Khamsin's closest aides entered the office. What he had to say caught Khamsin's attention and held it.

"We have underestimated this General Ben Raines, Colonel. Badly underestimated him."

"Elaborate, please."

"Ben Raines was once President of the United States. For a brief period of time. Before the disease-carrying rodents came and very nearly wiped out the population."

Khamsin nodded.

That Ben Raines. His people had been at sea during that time of death. And at that time, Khamsin had not been terribly interested in settling in the Americas. The climate was terrible.

"More, please."

"Right now, Ben Raines is fighting in the west, fighting a General Striganov and some mercenary named Sam Hartline."

"I am familiar with Hartline. We used him about fifteen years ago. In Lebanon. He's a good soldier, but his brains sometimes are located in his c.o.c.k. Put him around a woman and he forgets everything except what is between his legs and what is between her legs. Go on."

"Ben Raines and his Rebels have lost a few battles, Colonel. But they have never lost a war." Khamsin's eyes locked with those of his young aide.

"Never?"

"Never."

"Continue."

"Many people believe the man is a G.o.d."

Ben looked at the blood that stained his hands. He let his eyes drop to the warm body of the dead IPF soldier with the sliced throat. He wiped his blade clean on the IPF man's battle s.h.i.+rt and sheathed it. Lifting his right arm, Ben waved his team forward. They rushed silently past the now-cooling body of a forward sentry.

Soon, the small towns surrounding Lake Almanor would be free of the yoke of the Russian, Striganov.

Ben and his Rebels began with the easternmost town of Westwood. : "About a dozen heavily armed and bunkered-in IPF people there," a recon team reported back.

"Don't risk your a.s.ses with heroics," Ben ordered. "Blow them out of there."

Mortar teams were rushed into position, the tubes checked, the bubbles leveled, and what was to pa.s.s for aiming stakes sighted in. The small complex of the IPF erupted in smoke as the 81mm rounds fluttered true.

Any IPF personnel who escaped the initial attack were shot down as they tried to flee.

Raines's Rebels moved on to Clear Creek and blasted the equally small contingent of IPF people out of their holes.

"The survivors want to surrender, General,"

he was informed.

Ben merely looked at the young man.

He got the message.

No prisoners.

Ben had preached it and thought he had it drilled into the heads of all his people: When in war, whether one is fighting a cause, a faction, a nation ... it must be made clear from the outset, before the hostilities begin, to the common soldier and to the leaders, this is how it will be: I will kill your mother and father, your sister and brother, your dogs and cats and horses and cattle and sheep and pigs. I will poison your water, burn your houses to the ground. I will kill your kids and your wife; I shall show no mercy to anyone or anything aligned with you. I shall inflict so much personal grief and pain and suffering and outrage, that, to a person, you will have but two choices: surrender or die.

"They are trying to surrender, Ben," Sylvia said, standing by his side.

"But they wanted to fight a moment ago, kid. And that is not the way I play the game." He gave the orders. "Destroy them."

He turned to Sylvia and waved the young man away. "Don't ever question an order of mine again, Sylvia. Not ever."

She flushed but said nothing.

The Rebels moved on to Canyon dam and foundthe largest contingent of IPF people thus far.

They were spread out over several acres, in a heavily bunkered and fortified complex.

Ben studied the situation through long lenses.

Lora stood by his side, looking at him, watching every move he made. Sylvia and some of the other Rebels had found the smallest camo uniform around and cut that down even smaller to fit her. But they could not find any combat boots to fit her tiny feet. She wore tennis shoes.

Ben lowered his binoculars. "For some reason, as yet unknown, this complex is very important to the IPF. Judging from the antennas it could be a relay station. Whatever it is, I'm not going to lose people taking it. Bring up a tank. We'll take a break while we're waiting."

While they waited for the tank to rumble its way from the northern part of the lake, the Rebels rested as they ringed the complex and waited.

Two M60A1 main battle tanks rumbled up. The lead tank's commander stuck his head out of the cupola. "Yes, sir?"

"Take it down," Ben ordered, pointing. "Then gun it with white phosphorus."

"Yes, sir!"

The tanks lurched around and pulled back a few hundred meters.

Ben ordered his people down The 105mm guns began belching out their lethal projectiles. They corrected aim and settled down to methodically destroy the complex. Ben ordered a halt to the sh.e.l.ling and ordered in WP rounds.

The complex was soon burning; those who survived the initial sh.e.l.ling were now on fire, and screaming to their burning death.

The Rebels that ringed the complex sat or squatted or stood with impa.s.sive faces. This was nothing new to most of them. They had heard it all before, many times.

The screaming soon died away.

"Mop it up," Ben ordered.

But as he suspected, there was nothing to mop up.

The Rebels moved around the lake to Almanor.

There, they found a hastily deserted IPF complex, the food on the tables still warm.

As before, the Rebels were gathering more weapons and ammo and other equipment than they could stagger with. But looking at the citizens who remained in these small towns, Ben decided not to trust them, and therefore, not to arm them.

"They're pitiful, Ben," Sylvia said.

"They're losers," Ben said harshly. "These people we've found so far are, I suspect, the very types who p.i.s.sed and moaned and sobbed about criminals' rights a decade or so ago. They blubbered and snorted about all the bad ol' guns in the hands of citizens, and were oh-so-happy when the a.s.sholes in Congress finally disarmed Americans. Now look at them.

Slaves to the IPF, and probably, beforeStriganov came, slaves to any warlord who happened along. I would die before I became a slave to any person. You may feel sorry for them if you wish. I feel nothing but contempt and disgust."

He looked at Lora. "How do you feel about them, girl?"

"I don't trust them," she said. "I've been in the hands of men just like them. They are no better than the enemy we are fighting."

"Out of the mouths of babes," Ben said, and walked away, Lora by his side, her carbine shoulder-slung.

Chapter Seventeen.

Ben and his contingent rested and spent the night at the northwestern tip of the lake that night, near the deserted town of Chester. The IPF had been in Chester, but abandoned it quickly as the Rebels began their latest moves. Here, as in the other town, the Rebels found huge amounts of supplies.

And a small band of citizens that Ben didn't like and didn't trust.

Ben called the leader of the surviving group to his command post for that night.

"Name?" Ben said shortly.

"Reed. Harry Reed. I sure am glad to see you and your people, General. You're here to stay; to protect us?"

"No."

Ben's curt reply startled the man. "I beg your pardon, General?"

"Why don't you people protect yourselves?"

"Why ... we don't have the training for that. We Ben tuned the man out, letting him rattle on.

Same old song, different jukebox. Reasons, explanations, rationalizations. Put them all together and they boiled down to the same thing: Excuses.

"Shut up!" Ben told him.

The man ceased his prattling, stopping in mid-sentence, standing before Ben, his mouth hanging open.

The older Ben got, the less patience he had with those who would not help themselves. And it was "would not." Not "could not." Ben had and would continue putting his life on the line for the elderly and the very young and the helpless. Just as he had done back in ...

'88, he thought, with those elderly p.*

But he had nothing but contempt for people like Harry Reed.

"How many people in this area?" Ben asked.

was "Bout a hundred and fifty, or so."

"You mean you don't know how many?"

"Naw, sir."

"How many children?"

"Bunches."