Out of the Ashes

Many of the young troops deserted to join the Rebels; officers publicly shot enlisted people who refused to fight against a group of citizens whom they believed had done no wrong.

The universal soldier syndrome came home to many of the troops: without us, you can't have a war.

And the children of the Tri-states, they fought as well. Some as young as twelve stood and fought it out with the American military ... wondering why, because they thought they were Americans. They hid with sniper rifles and had to be hunted down and killed. No compassion could be shown. A battered and bleeding little girl might just hand a medic a live grenade and die with him.

Rightly or wrongly, Ben's orders to school the young of the Tri-states in the tactics of war had been driven home. They had been taught for nine years to defend their country, and that is what they were doing.

The hospitals finally had to be blown up with artillery; they were unsafe to enter because the patients were armed and ready to die. Everywhere the U.S. fighting men turned, something blew up in their faces. With thousands of tons of explosives to work with, the Rebels had wired everything possible to explode.

Tri-states began to stink like an open cesspool. The troops had to kill every warm-blooded animal they found. There was no way of knowing what animals had been infected—not in the early stages. The government troops became very wary of entering buildings, not only because of the risk of a door being wired to blow, but because the Rebels had begun placing rabid animals in houses, locking them in. A dog or a cat is a terrible thing to see come leaping at a person, snarling and foaming at the jaws.

The troops could not drink any of the water found in the Tri-states. Dr. Chase had infected it with everything from cholera to forms of anthrax.

There were no finely drawn battle lines in this war; no safe sectors. The Rebels didn't retreat in any given direction, leaving that area clean. They would pull back, then go left or right and circle around, coming up behind government troops to harass and confuse them, or to slit a throat or two. For the Rebels knew the territory, and they had, for nine years, been training for this. And they were experts at their jobs.

The bloody climax came when the government troops could not even remotely think of taking prisoners; they could not risk a Rebel of any age or sex getting close to them. Then the directive came down the chain of command: total extermination.

For many, this was the first time for actual combat. The first time to taste the highs and lows of war. And there are highs in combat. The first time to take a human life; and all the training in the world will not prepare a person for that moment.

Sometimes in combat, the mind will click off, and a soldier will do the necessary things to survive without realizing he is doing them, or remembering afterward. Rote training takes over.

Fire until you hear the ping or plop of the firing pin striking nothing. Make an easy, practiced roll to one side; quickly slam home a fresh clip; resume firing position, always aiming for the thickest part of the enemy's body, between neck and waist.

Your weapon is jammed. Clear it. Cuss it. Grab one from a dead buddy. Fire through the tears and the sweat and the dirt.

Sometimes a soldier will fire his weapon until it's empty and will never reload, so caught up in the heat and the horror of combat is he. Pull the trigger over and over; feel the imaginary slam of the butt against the shoulder; kill the enemy with nonbullets.

The yammering, banging metal against metal makes it difficult to think. So you don't. The screaming, the awful howling of the wounded and the yelling of the combatants blend into a solid roaring cacophony in your head. An hour becomes a minute; a minute is eternity. God! will it never end? No! don't let it end; the high is terrific, kind of like a woman moaning beneath you, reaching the climax.

One soon learns the truth: you didn't climax, you shit your pants.

When did it start raining red? Thick red.

Suddenly, you become indestructible. They can't kill you. Laugh in the face of death. Howl at the reaper. A man running for cover is decapitated by a fluttering mortar round that sounds like a bunch of quail taking off as it comes in. The headless, nonhuman-appearing thing runs on for twenty more feet, flapping its arms in hideous silence. How fascinating. Look at it run. Fall down. Lie still.

A man is crawling on his hands and knees, gathering up his guts, trying to stuff them back into the gaping hole in his belly. He falls on his face, shivers, then screams and dies. Good. At least that shut the son of a bitch up. His guts are steaming in the cool air.

There is the enemy. Shoot him. Bring the rifle to your shoulder, sight him in—God! it's a her! Too late, you've pulled the trigger. Good hit. You know it's a good hit, ‘cause the cunt falls funny, kind of limp and boneless.