William Johnstone - Fire in the Ashes

Gray’s Scouts were formed during the weeks just after the government invasion and consequent crushing of the Rebel’s dream. Their job was to infiltrate government offices; act as saboteurs; perform long-range recon into enemy territory; and anything else Captain Dan Gray might dream up that was dirty, dangerous, and bloody.

Captain Gray had left Special Forces before the invasion, having no taste for civilized man fighting civilized man, when, as was the case, the “enemy” was simply a group of men and women attempting to build a livable society and take care of their own.

Which the Tri-States were doing perfectly well and without so-called “Federal Government advice.”

Gray had spent five years in Britain’s SAS (Special Air Service) and was as wild and randy as those boys are trained to be.

To date they had been involved in only minor hit-and-run operations against the military units loyal to Lowry and Cody. But like Ben’s Rebels in the mountains, they were chomping at the bit for a good fight.

It would not be long in coming… for any of them.

Colonel Hector Ramos headed the first convoy to reach the mountains. He and his personnel set up on the western boundaries of the Great Smokies, patrolling a seventy-mile stretch of terrain, from the Georgia line to just south of Maryville, Tennessee. They had traveled across Texas, Louisiana, then angled northeast through Mississippi and a portion of Alabama.

General Bill Hazen’s convoy rolled in the day after Ramos arrived and took up positions from Maryville to Newport. Major Conger was less than three hours behind him. Conger deployed his personnel—the smallest detachment—as roaming scouts and listening posts along the Virginia line.

General Krigel pulled in last and set up positions on the eastern side of the mountains, from Greenville, Tennessee, well down into North Carolina.

The combined forces were not, as great armies go, terribly impressive. But there were no more great armies of the world. What world remained was still staggering and reeling under the aftereffects of the great war of 1988. So now, ten thousand armed men and women was a very impressive sight to behold.

Especially as they began setting up local militia and kicking out all federal police and arming the people.

“You mean,” a man in Greenville asked a Rebel captain, “it’s as simple as this?”

“Nothing is as simple as it appears,” the Rebel told him, “if you don’t have the balls to use that weapon we just gave you. Don’t think for one second the central government isn’t going to come in here after we leave. Because they damn sure will send agents in. But if those agents see that you people are prepared to fight and die for your beliefs, and are organized and trained to do so, they’ll back off. They don’t have the people to fight an entire nation; they can’t put you all in jail—not an entire nation. It would deplete the workforce and destroy the government. It’s just like General Black said back in the mid-eighties, in one of his books: If the people would organize, by the thousands, and just stop paying taxes—what is the government going to do? Put several million people in jail? How? Where? Fifteen police officers in this town are going to arrest five thousand armed citizens? No way. It’s all been a colossal bluff and we bought it for nearly two hundred years.

“Now General Black is not advocating total anarchy—not at all. All he wants to do is restore power back to the people. And it looks like a gun is the only way to accomplish that.

“All right—you’ve got the guns and the meeting places. The rest is up to you. We’re not going to wet-nurse you. If you don’t want freedom, fine, hang it up and roll over and take it in the ass. But if you love freedom, then learn how to use those weapons—and use them!”

“So you think we have a chance of pulling this off without open warfare?” General Krigel asked.

The COs of Ben’s four brigades sat in a tent in Base Camp One, almost in the dead center of the Great Smokies.

“With Lowry gone I believe the rest would be downhill,” Ben replied.

“What does Levant say about it?” Conger asked.

“He hasn’t replied to our message as yet. Maybe he rejected it right off; maybe he’s quietly sounding people out. I don’t know.”

General Hazen placed his coffee mug carefully on the camp table. He said, “If Levant says it’s no-go, for whatever reason, we still have an option.”

Ben looked at him; waited.

“Gray’s Scouts,” Hazen said. “A suicide mission. One team of handpicked Scouts. It’s something to think about.”

Only Krigel knew of Tina’s joining the Scouts. Ben had discussed it with him just the day before. Krigel looked at Ben for any sign of outwardly shown emotion. He saw none.

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Ben said. “But if it does, that’s the way we’ll go. All right, let’s talk about the troops. How ready are they?”

“My people say if you’ll give them the green light, they can kick Hartline’s bunch right in the ass and be back home in time for lunch,” Hazen said with a grin.

“I gather morale is high,” Ben said dryly.

“I’m having trouble keeping their feet on the ground,” the general replied.

“My people are ready,” Colonel Ramos said. “This rest period is what they needed. They’re hot to mix it up.”

“Same here,” Conger said.

Krigel nodded his head. “We’re all honed fine, Ben. How much longer do we wait?”

“I’ve deliberately let the word out we wouldn’t strike before the first of the year at the earliest. Preferably not until midsummer of 2000. I was afraid many of the civilians would back off from helping themselves; reports coming in say that is true. I keep forgetting that even though many of the people have served in the military, in their hearts, they’re civilians. Hartline’s men crushed a small town up in Ohio; just stood out and shelled it and then shot the survivors.”

“Haven’t any of these goddamned people ever heard of flanking tactics?” Hazen growled. “Damnit, are we going to have to wet-nurse the entire nation?”

“Steady, trooper,” Krigel laughed at his friend. “You seem to forget that for a decade and a half before the war of ‘88, we didn’t have a draft and the country was not what one could call pro-military…”

Ben let his commanders rattle sabers at each other as his mind took him back thirty years, back to the words of one of the greatest guerrilla fighters the world had ever known: Colonel Bull Dean.

They had been waiting to lift off from Rocket City, heading into North Vietnam, to HALO in: high altitude, low opening. They would jump at twenty thousand feet, their chutes opening automatically when they got under radar.

“We’re losing this war, son,” Bull had said. “And there is nothing that guys like you and me can do about it—we can only prolong it. Back home, now, it’s gonna get worse—much worse. Patriotism is gonna take a nose dive, sinking to new depths of dishonor. There is no discipline in the schools; the courts have seen to that. America is going to take a pasting for a decade, maybe longer, losing ground, losing face, losing faith.”

How true his words had been.

A month after Bull had spoken those words, and had supposedly been killed, Ben was wounded and sent home. To a land he could not relate to.

He found he could not tolerate the attitudes in America toward her Vietnam vets. He was restless, and missed the action he had left behind. He had been sent home to a land of hairy, profane young men who sewed the American flag on the seats of their dirty jeans and marched up and down the streets, shouting ugly words, all in the name of freedom—their concept of freedom.