William Johnstone - Out of the Ashes

A few moments before dusk Ben’s group came face-to-face with two companies of government troops.

Jimmy Deluce was caught in a murderous crossfire and died on his feet, cursing the enemy.

Jack had regrouped with his father and now left Ben’s side to help a friend. Jack was almost cut apart by M-60 fire. Tina lobbed a grenade into a machine-gun nest and finished it off with a burst from her M-10.

Sam Pyron watched his wife shot dead, and the West Virginia mountain boy rose to his feet, screaming his outrage. He walked toward the soldiers hip-firing an AK-47 and cursing them. He took more than a few with him into that long good-by.

Ben took a slug low in his left side, the slug traveling downward, bouncing off his hipbone, the force of it knocking him against a tree, stunning him. A concussion grenade slammed him into darkness.

Ben was spared the sight of Pal taking a .45 slug through the head. He did not see Valerie torn apart by automatic rifle fire. He would be informed much later that Pal and Valerie’s children had run into the line of fire trying to get to him, and had been cut to bloody ribbons.

Voltan died. Megan was taken alive and raped, then shot. Al, Abby… many, many more died. Lila walked in front of a Claymore and was blown into tiny bits. James Riverson helped carry Ben out of the forest and across the border, the big man walking and weeping. His Belle was dead, and so were their kids.

By the time darkness fell on the now nonexistent government of the Tri-states, not many Rebels had escaped. Less than three thousand had made it out. But Badger and dozens more had escaped weeks before, and headed underground.

The zero squads.

Senators Richards, Goode, Carey, and Williams were having a drink before their usual Thursday-night poker game in Richmond. They would never get around to playing poker, and it would be their last drink before death took them behind her misty curtain of sunless eternity. They all felt safe, knowing that three secret service agents were guarding them. The agents were there, but they were very dead, cut down by silenced .22 automatics.

Williams jerked up his head, the fresh drink in his hand forgotten. “Did any of you hear anything?”

Carey laughed. “Relax, Jimmy. You don’t really believe in those so-called zero squads, do you?”

Sen. Jimmy Williams ran nervous fingers through thinning hair. He did not reply. Outside, a late-summer storm was building; heat lightning danced erratically and thunder rumbled across the sky, almost an ominous warning in cadence.

Senator Goode leaned forward. “Jimmy, it’s been over three months since the Tri-states’ defeat. Ben Raines is dead. Eyewitnesses have reported it. If anything was going to happen, don’t you believe it would have occurred by now?”

“No.” Williams spoke. “I don’t. We allowed the women and kids to be killed—slaughtered like animals. Just like we did the Indians. They’re going to get us. We’re dead men and don’t even know it.”

Senator Richards looked up into the gloom of the darkened hallway. “Oh, no!” he shouted. “Oh, my God!”

The senators looked first at their colleague, then into the faces of hate and revenge and death. Standing in the hallway stood two men and a woman. They held silenced automatics in their hands.

Goode fell forward on his knees and began to pray. A self-professed “good Christian man,” Goode had been the first to vote for war against the Tri-states.

Carey’s face turned shiny from sweat and a trickle of spit oozed from a corner of his mouth. He began to rub his hands together and lick at his lips.

Richards dropped his drink on the carpeted floor. His eyes were wide and he urinated in his shorts.

Only Williams remained calm. “I knew you people would come,” he said. “I told them to leave you alone. I was against fighting you.”

“We know.” The woman spoke. “And because of that, you’ll live. And the Tri-states will live again, too. Remember that.”

“Yes. Yes, I will.” Williams bobbed his head up and down.

The automatics began to hum their dirges. Richards, Goode, and Carey jerked onto the floor and died. The assassination team left as quickly and quietly as they had arrived. They had a lot of work ahead of them.

Williams sat for a long time, looking at the cooling bodies of his friends. His eyes grew wild and he soiled himself. The telephone rang and he ignored it. He began to giggle, childlike. The giggling changed to laughter and he howled his madness as blood vessels burst in his head. He fell to his knees on the floor and cried and prayed. A massive pain grew out of his chest—a huge, heavy, crushing weight. He screamed, his heart stopping its beating. He died.

General Russell called for more coffee. He was working late in his office. A sergeant brought him a fresh pot, poured a cup, and opened a packet of sugar, stirring it in.

“Will that be all, sir?”

“Yes,” Russell said. “You may leave.” He tasted his coffee, added more sugar, and took another sip. He would be found the next morning, dead, his system full of poison.

Dallas Valentine and the first lady, Fran Logan, lay moaning and thrashing on the bed, both of them reaching for the final pinnacle of climax. Neither of them heard the door swing open. They were enjoying mutual climax as the Rebel with the silenced submachine gun sprayed them with .45-caliber slugs, turning the silk sheets red with blood.

The Rev. Palmer Falcreek answered his telephone. A voice said, “Let he that is without sin cast the first stone.”

“What the hell did you say?” Falcreek said.

“I said”—the voice rang in Falcreek’s ear—“open the drawer in the middle right of your desk, you semi-sanctimonious mother-fucker!”

“How dare you speak to me like that!” Falcreek raged. He jerked open the desk drawer and half the house blew apart as the heavy charge was detonated.

Senator Higley worked late in his office. The storm didn’t worry him and neither did the myth of the zero squads. He left his office at nine-thirty. Halfway down the steps of the Senate office building he sat down abruptly, twitched once, then slowly rolled down the steps, the hole between his eyes leaking blood and gray matter.

Senator Pough stepped out of his porch for a breath of cool night air. He heard a thump and looked down. Between his feet, on the porch, lay a hissing white phosphorus grenade. Pough had only a few seconds to feel panic, attempt to run, and scream just once before the grenade exploded and seared him to the house.

Rep. Carol Helger answered the donging of her apartment doorbell and took a twelve-inch bayonet through her chest. The young woman who shoved the heavy blade into her spat on the still-writhing body, left the blade in her, and quietly left the building.

The zero squads were busy that stormy, revengeful night. Very busy. The final tally was thirty-one senators and seventy-four representatives dead. Twelve cabinet heads dead and the entire Joint Chiefs were also wiped out. A few zero squad members made it out of Richmond to rejoin the eastern-based Rebels. Most died in shootouts with the police. Only one zero squad member had not worked that night of terror. He slept soundly in a motel room three hundred miles from Richmond. He had only one person to kill.

Badger Harbin was to kill the president of the United States.

Richmond went into a panic. No one could possibly guess at the number of assassins roaming the streets, killing at random. Innocent men and women were killed by federal agents and police during raids on suspected Rebel sympathizers. Martial law was declared. The police were federalized. It was the beginning of America’s first true police state.

President Logan smiled and leaned back in his leather chair. He was very pleased with the way things were going. Seven weeks since the awful assassinations, and the country was settling down. He had rid himself of a cheating wife and accomplished his life’s dream: he had an iron grip on the country. The previous night he had dreamed of being crowned king of America.