William Forstchen - One Second After

Ahead, smashed into the side of the gap, was the smoldering wreckage of Don Barber’s recon plane. During the worst moments of the fight John had seen Barber fly over, coming in low, tossing satchel charges, taking out one of their tractor-trailer trucks, and then suddenly wing over and go in.

John had specifically ordered Don not to tangle in the fight, to stay high, to keep doing recon, and in the opening hours he had done just that, flying up, observing, swooping back down over the town hall and dropping a note attached to a streamer with the latest update regarding the enemy moves, then going back out. The info had been crucial, keeping John posted on which direction the Posse was pouring in from and, most important, knowing when their full force had been committed before the closing of the trap.

But as he had feared all along, Don could not stay out of the fight and had decided, at last, to play the role of ground support fighter.

Don Barber was tangled into the wreckage… dead. He was wearing his old uniform from the Korean War. John slowed, saluted him, then pushed on.

A line of prisoners was being led along the westbound side of the road, hands tied behind backs, all roped together, roughly thirty of them, including the last survivors flushed out of the burning house.

A guard leading them looked over at John and he motioned for them to move towards the truck stop at the top of the pass, the place he was heading.

The truck stop was actually a turnoff lane at the very top of the crest, a mandatory pull over for all commercial vehicles, especially 18-wheelers. Trucks that pulled in were not allowed to proceed until the drivers had examined the map of the long descent that marked out “runaway truck lanes” for vehicles that might lose their brakes on the way down. A traffic light was hung across the lane, timed to let trucks through at safe intervals or to stop them completely if there should be an accident farther down the mountain. Of course all that was now in the distant past. To the good fortune of the town, at the start of the crisis one of the trucks stalled there had been loaded with snack crackers, but those were long gone as well.

It had been the command post for the barrier line established what seemed to be an eternity ago and was now where so many were heading, as if by instinct.

John continued on the road, several students falling in around him, all with weapons poised, acting as a guard. There had been a student assigned to him early, but that young man had been killed back by the Exit 65 ramp, taken down by the blast that had knocked John unconscious.

The prisoners were herded over into the truck lane, where a couple dozen more prisoners waited.

As the second group approached, those already there looked over anxiously. Some stood up staring at the short slender man in the lead, white, gray hair cut close, tattooed arms, ugly face twisted up from what looked to be an old knife wound, one of the final group flushed out of the burning house.

Malady, still alive, arm in a blood-soaked sling, came up to John.

John smiled and extended his hand, which Kevin clutched with his left.

“Good job, Kevin, damn good.”

“I lost a lot of kids, though,” he replied sadly. “It got real ugly once these bastards knew they were cornered. Kids were reluctant at first to shoot somebody who was down and looked dead, or badly wounded, but they learned real quick….”

His voice trailed off.

He looked at the young soldiers standing around, gazing cold-eyed at the prisoners.

“You interrogate any of them?”

“Oh yeah, they’re spilling their guts, pointing at each other. Everyone claiming they were forced into it. That piece of shit over there is their leader.”

Kevin looked over at the ugly man.

“Amazingly, that bastard is the leader. Apparently a big drug player in Greensboro, contact guy for major shipments of coke and heroin coming up from Florida. He might look soft, but they’re all scared of him, even the worst of the lot. They say he claimed to have the inside line with Satan himself, that God had abandoned America and Satan now ruled and he was the appointed one sent from hell to pave the way for Satan’s reign over America.”

“The stories about cannibalism?” John asked. Kevin nodded and spat. “They’re all true.”

John walked over to the leader, who gazed at him and then actually smiled.

“So let me guess, you’re the general here?” John did not reply.

“Masterful plan. I bet you’re the professor, aren’t you. I heard about you yesterday from a prisoner we took. A sweet girl she was, captured her yesterday.”

John froze. The girl they had most likely lost in the skirmishing on the dirt road.

“I see a touch of military history in this fight. The la Drang Valley

perhaps, lure in, get close up, and envelop? Saw it in that movie and on the History Channel.”

“And you walked right into it,” John said sarcastically.

“Yes, I did; indeed I did. I guess he decided it thus.”

“He?”

“Satan of course.”

The man turned and looked at the other prisoners.

“Did I not tell you that if you failed to offer your souls to him fully and in all things he would abandon you? Now you are indeed doomed to the fiery pit of hell. For God has cursed this world and because you failed me, Satan shall turn away from thee as well. Your reign by his side will be replaced by eternal punishment for your lack of faith.

“These dogs will show you no mercy. Rather than feasting tonight on their flesh, as Satan wished for you, instead you will be carrion for the dogs and crows… or perhaps…”

He looked over shiftily at John. “…they will feast on your flesh.”

John, his Glock half-raised, was tempted to blow the man’s brains out right there.

The other prisoners looked at him wide-eyed. Some started to cry; others knelt down, heads lowered, resigned to their fate.

It was so damn strange, John thought, how sometimes the most unlikely, an ugly little man like this one, could hold such power. He had a tremendous command presence, his voice sweet, rich, carrying power. So strange how some had that, could spout utter insanity and others would follow blindly.

“Cannibals,” John said coldly.

The man looked up at him, face twisted into a smile that almost seemed warm and friendly.

“My friend. You know enough about what has happened to know that this nation is doomed except for those chosen few with the strength to live. The flesh of the weak is the holy sacrament to us, the living, to survive and to have strength, to allow us our triumph of the will.”

He looked away from John and back to his surviving followers.

“For I have walked up and down and to and fro across the land and have considered this country that once was. Remove thy hand from it, protect it not, and the land that once worshipped thee will curse thee. And thus it was true and the land is now indeed cursed and we are the ones sent forth to cleanse it.”

He then looked back at John.

“That girl we captured yesterday. She was indeed sweet, the best I think I’ve had. Well fed before she became our sacrament.

“You know the natives of New Guinea used to call their foes ‘long pork.’ Well-fed flesh actually tastes like that… pork.”

John raised his Glock, muzzle touching the man’s forehead.

“Go on, you bastard,” he whispered. “Be like me; drink my blood once I am dead as I would have drunk yours. I know you are hungry. You do it, and all who follow you will join in, for they are hungry, too.”

John hesitated, then backhanded the man with the muzzle of his pistol, knocking him down.

John turned and looked at the hundreds who were now gathered round.