Out of the Ashes

At the armory, Ben was relieved to find that while the unit had been called out, a lot of their equipment was still in place. A lot of men had either been too sick to report, or had said to hell with it and not reported in. Probably a combination of both, Ben thought.

Ben plugged the small bullet hole at the top of the windshield and then began prowling the armory. He found the weapons room, but the steel vault was locked, and impressive-looking. He told Fran to keep an eye open for people, then went in search of a sledge hammer. He went to work on the outside wall of the concrete block building. When he had hammered a respectable hole in the blocks, Ben pulled a deuce-and-a-half truck up to the wall, hooked a steel cable to the blocks, and pulled the wall apart. He hammered at the steel inner wall until he had worked a hole in it, then hooked a double cable to it and pulled the vault open enough to slip inside.

“You sure you weren't a safe-cracker before becoming a writer?” Fran asked. When he did not reply, she asked, “What in the world are you looking for, Ben?”

“Hah!” Ben yelled. “Found it!” He had discovered the M-16s, but Ben—like many vets—disliked the weapon with an emotion bordering on hatred. He would have loved to have found an old BAR, but those were getting rare. He handed Fran a box, then another box. He stacked several more boxes outside, then climbed out to join her.

“Ben—what is this junk?”

“Grenade launcher, 40-mm high-explosive cartridges, and three boxes of hand grenades, mixed. White phosphorous, HE, and smoke.”

“Thank you,” she said dryly. “I don't ever remember being so impressed with a reply. What in the crap are you going to do with this ... shit!”

“Survive. I wish they had some Claymores in there.”

She sighed. “Ben, I don't even want to know what that is.”

“It's a mine. Hell! They don't even have any det cord. What kind of an outfit was this?”

“I never knew you were like this, Ben. I thought writers were sensitive people.” She looked at him. “Well ... with you, I should have known.”

He tapped the case containing the grenade launcher. “I wish I could find a fact sheet on this thing. Fran? Go rummage through the files and see if you can locate a fact sheet on the M203 grenade launcher.”

“Ben, you're impossible!”

He took her by the shoulders and rudely shook her. It startled her. When he spoke, his words were hard and his voice was rough. “Fran? Let me tell you the way it is, baby.” She gazed up at him, taking in the seriousness in his eyes. “Now, you heard that redneck call you a cunt back there, didn't you?”

She nodded.

“Women, Fran, of any kind or color, young or old, are going to be at a premium, I think. And a good-looking woman is going to be a real prize, worth killing for and more. And you are a good-looking woman. You've got the disposition of a pit viper and you're stubborn as a mule, but you're a beautiful woman. Now, listen to me. There is no law and order. None! You can't call a cop, now, Fran. What has happened is a total, complete, one hundred percent breakdown of law and order and civilization and rules and ethics and decency. We're back to the jungles and the caves, honey. Dog eat dog and the strongest man wins the woman. That's the way it's going to be for a while. Believe it. You're not a stupid woman, Fran, so I don't have to tell you what a gang-bang is, do I?”

She shook her head.

“You ever been pronged up the ass, Fran?”

“Certainly not!”

“Yeah? Well, don't give up hope, baby, ‘cause lots of guys like it that way—good and tight. And without me, and all the firepower I can muster, you're fair game. And you've got a pretty ass, Fran.”

“That's disgusting, Ben Raines. You're ... you're just telling me all this to scare me; make me dependent on you so you'll have someone to sleep with, that's all. Isn't it, Ben?”

“Honey,” Ben said patiently, “if, or when, I find a community or a gathering of decent, civilized people, I'll dump you on them faster than I'd turn loose a polecat. Because I've got things to do, places to go, and events to record. I hope we'll find that in Memphis—I thought perhaps Jackson. I believe there are people here, good people, but they're hiding, afraid, and they have good reason to be. So if not here, then Memphis. If not there, some other place where you'll be safe, and I will find you a safe place. But until then, we're stuck with each other, and I don't know why, but I feel an obligation to take care of you. So you do what I tell you to do, Fran—when I tell you to do it—and I'll keep you alive. But for now, you carry your butt into that office and find me that fact sheet.”

She stared at him for a long half-minute, both of them silent. Her expression a mixture of fear and respect for the man standing in front of her. “All right,” she said. “You're quite a man, Ben Raines.”

“I'm a survivor.”

“I'm ... I'm glad it was you who found me.”

He nodded his head slowly. He felt that was as close as he would get to hearing a thank you or a compliment from her lips.