Out of the Ashes

Ben helped her to her feet, gazed at her for a moment, then walked from her to join the group he was taking on diversion. Abruptly, without warning, the silent forest floor erupted into blood and violence. A platoon of paratroopers, quiet and deadly, came at the Rebels; the peaceful wood turned into hand-to-hand combat.

Ben flipped his old Thompson onto full auto and burned a clip into the paratroopers, bringing down half a dozen. Salina screamed behind him. Ben spun in time to see her impaled on a bayonet. Her mouth opened and closed in silent agony; her hands slowly crawled snakelike down her stomach to clutch at the rifle barrel, to try to pull the hot pain from her stomach. She screamed as she began miscarrying the dead child, for the bayonet had driven through the unborn baby.

“Jesus Christ!” the trooper yelled, as he saw what he had done. He tried to pull the blade from her belly. But the blade was stuck. He pulled the trigger—reflex from hard training—and blew the blade free, sending a half-dozen slugs into Salina, throwing her backward from the force.

Ben jerked his .45 from leather and blew half the trooper's head off, just as Salina collapsed to the ground, her hands working at the bloody mess that was once her stomach.

Ben was at her side as his Rebels, offering no mercy, took the fight to the troopers. The troopers were outnumbered and fighting against white-hot rage. They died very quickly; the Rebels took no prisoners.

Ben gathered her into his arms, knowing there was no chance for her to live. She was fading quickly. “I love you, Salina.”

She looked up at him and smiled for the last time. “Sorry ‘bout the baby, honey. But with our luck it would probably have been a koala bear.”

She closed her eyes and died.

Ben tried to rip away the heavy load of grief that saddled his shoulders and clutched at his heart with cold fingers. He shook away dozens of emotions as he knelt beside the only woman he had ever truly loved. He touched her face, closed her eyes, smoothed her hair, kissed her still-warm lips. He fought his way back to reality.

Dr. Chase pulled him away from Salina's body and knelt down for a moment, cutting at her maternity slacks with a knife. He covered her with a shelter half and rose to face Ben. “Boy,” he said. “Perfectly normal. All his fingers and toes. Her complexion, your eyes. Bayonet went right through him.”

Ben nodded. “Let's go!” he shouted. “There is no more we can do here. Help the wounded and let's move it.”

Ike touched his arm. “Ben...”

“We don't have time to grieve, buddy. Later.”

The Rebels drifted silently into the forest, taking their wounded, leaving their dead; Salina and the boy lay among the still and the quiet and the dead. Ants had already begun their march across her face. She lay in a puddle of thickening blood, one hand on the arm of her dead child.

The Rebels split up, the first two squads not making it past the edge of the northern border of the strip. A forward observer spotted them and called in artillery. None escaped the deadly hail. Another group walked into an ambush; only a few escaped. The kids lay like pebbles on a beach, their broken and smashed bodies a grim reminder of the vindictiveness and power of government. A half a dozen Cobra gunships spotted another group and came chopping out of the sky, strafing them with rocket and machine-gun fire.

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.