Out of the Ashes

“Oh, for Christ's sake!” Ben punched the mike button. “You wanna know what you can do? I'll tell you: you can order your people to slip onto every military base in this nation and destroy every goddamned plane they find.”

“Yes, sir, very good, sir. That will prevent Logan from getting the jump on us. We have men among us who can fly those planes, sir. Shall we take some for our use?”

“What use!” Ben yelled.

“For the defense of our nation, sir.”

“What fucking nation!” Ben screamed.

“The one the Bull told us you had planned. The one you used to talk about in ‘Nam.”

Ben's sigh was long and frustrated. “By all means ... ah ... to whom am I speaking?”

“Lieutenant Conger, sir.”

“Fine. All right, Conger. If you people have places in ... ah...” He closed the mike switch and thought for a few seconds, then said, “Idaho or Montana, take them there. Pick up anything you feel you might need along the way. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir!”

With the mike closed, Ben said, “Goddamned yo-yo. That ought to keep them busy.”

“General Raines?” The voice popped and snapped.

“What!”

“Where are you, sir? I need your location so I can send some personnel to guard you until you link up with us.”

“Guard me? Goddamn it, I don't need anyone to guard me!”

The voice was silent for a few seconds and Ben was sure he had broken off transmission. “Yes, sir. You said General Ruther, sir? That'd be Shaw AFB. We'll have our South Carolina contingent pick you up as soon as possible. I—”

Ben began shouting into the mike, not knowing whether the man called Conger was off the air listening or still jabbering his nonsense. “Now, you listen to me!” Ben roared. “I am not—repeat—NOT your commander. I hereby appoint you, Conger, as commanding officer of the army of the Rebels, or whatever in the hell you're called. Do you understand that?”

“Affirmative, sir. But you can't make me commander.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because Bull Dean was my uncle. He gave his life for this country, and he said you were to command after his death. And, sir, that is that.”

Ben knew when he was whipped. “Fine, Lieutenant, dandy. You have my orders. Carry them out. I'll be in contact ... sometime.”

He cut off the transmitter before Conger had the time to object. He looked at the radio and said, “I am not your commanding officer, son. Period. Good-by. Good luck.”

Ben prowled the base until he found the ordnance hut. He broke open the building and began picking through the explosives. He was too rusty to trust himself if he used any type of timer, so he chose several crates of incendiary grenades and began the job of filling five-gallon cans full of high-octane jet fuel and pouring some around the line of jets on the tarmac. He then began the job of destroying the aircraft.

When he had finished, he was covered with soot and hard of hearing from the booming explosions. This was one runway that would be a long time getting cleared and repaired.

He then drove around the base, tossing grenades into every other building, and setting the base ablaze. He drove out the main gate, smiling. He said, “Fuck you, Logan.”

Ben took highway 601 down to Orangeburg, then picked up highway 21. He spent the night in a home by the side of Interstate 95, about fifty miles north of Savannah. In the morning he would drive close enough to listen to CB chatter, then decide if he was going into the city.

The next morning, after reviewing the talk on the CB, he decided he most definitely was not going into the city.

He skirted the city, between Savannah and Fort Stewart, on Interstate 95. South of the city, he picked up highway 82 and once more began checking towns along the way, making notes into his recorder, and letting Conger and his band of reactionaries slip from his mind.

Just a few miles outside of Jessup, at a roadside picnic area where he had stopped to eat a can of C-ration, Ben heard a growling. He turned slowly, picking up the M-10 with his right hand.

At first he thought it was a wolf sitting in the bed of the truck, on a tarp-covered crate, and peering over the side at him. Ben took a closer look and could see its upturned tail. This was not a husky, he concluded, but a malamute, the largest of the breed. The dog looked to be about thirty-two inches high, about eighty to ninety pounds. Big. It was wolf-gray with a black mask area around its almond-shaped eyes.

The animal yawned, exposing teeth that could tear a man to painful chunks of meat very quickly. Then the malamute closed his mouth and looked at Ben. It was neither friendly nor hostile, just curious. Ben dumped what was left of his C-ration into a piece of paper and placed it on the ground beside him.

“Come on,” he said.