William W Johnstone - Ashes 33 - Enemy in the Ashes (txt)

ENEMY IN THE ASHES

"Monsieur Chapelle," El Farrar said when the Secretary General of the

U.N. was on the line. "I am sure by now you have heard of the events

which have transpired over the past twelve hours."

"What do you mean?"

"My men have in each of the locations dozens of small packages of

plutonium attached to high-explosive charges. These bombs, which are

arranged so as to do maximal damage to the oil fields, will be set off

if anyone tries to attack or otherwise interfere with my men."

"But ... but that is insane!" Chapelle argued. "That would ruin most of

the world's oil supply for generations."

"I am glad you understand," El Farrar said, all hint of civility gone

from his voice.

"All right, it seems we are at an impasse. What are your demands?"

"Not now, Chapelle. First, I am going to airlift in some more troops to

each location, just to be sure you don't try anything stupid. Would you

be so kind as to instruct all of the nations involved not to attempt any

interference with the planes delivering my troops?"

"You know I cannot tell sovereign nations what to do with their

airspace," Chapelle reasoned.

"Then, just inform them that if they do interfere with any of my

transports, I will explode my bombs and render their oil fields useless

to them."

"But that would mean killing your own men."

"My men are perfectly willing to martyr themselves in a good cause. I

will contact you once again when my men are in place. And Chapelle . . ."

"Yes?"

"I would advise you to keep the General Assembly in close attendance.

You will soon have some momentous decisions to make."

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WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE

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First Printing: September 2002 10 98765432 1

Printed in the United States of America

6 To Angus, a loyal friend and a gentle companion.

7

Claire Osterman drummed her fingers on her desk as her cold eyes roamed

over the men sitting in her office. She'd called a meeting of her

cabinet officers to discuss their current situation, and she wasn't

happy with the news they'd been giving her.

Herb Knoff, her bodyguard and sometime lover, sat on her left, as usual.

He was a large man with broad shoulders, coal-black hair, and a boyish

face that belied his violent and unforgiving nature. The other men

serving under Claire knew he was mean as a snake when riled, so they

tried their best never to make him angry.

Claire glanced at Herb, a scornful expression on her face. "Herb," she

asked in a low, dangerous voice, "can you believe this shit they're

giving me?"

Herb smirked, shaking his head. "No, ma'am," he answered, his eyes

narrow and flat.

Harley Millard, Claire's official second in command in the government,

even though he was a weak, mild-mannered man who was completely under

Claire's thumb, held up his hand. "Now, Claire," he protested in his

usual whining voice, "you asked us how things were. It's not our fault

the situation is so bad."

Wallace W. Cox, Claire's Minister of Finance, cleared his throat and

added, "That's right, Claire. Things could

8

be a lot worse. If Ben Raines and the troops from the SUSA hadn't

intervened and helped us defeat those Middle Eastern terrorists, we

could all be speaking Arabic now."

Claire fixed him with a steely glare. "How could things be worse, Wally?

We may have won the war, but now you assholes sit here and tell me we're

dead broke."

She stared at the other ministers in the room. "Hell, what good is it to

win the war if we aren't left with enough money in the treasury to run

the country?"

Clifford Ainsworth, Minister of Propaganda, nodded his head. "It's true

that the treasury is at very low levels, Claire, but we weren't in good

shape even before the invasion by El Farrar's men. I'm afraid if we

don't do something soon, the people are not going to stand for more

restrictions in governmental services."

"Cliff's right," Gerald Boykin, Minister of Defense, agreed. "My troops

haven't received a paycheck in over a month. I don't know how much

longer we'll be able to keep the soldiers in uniform if we don't come up

with some way to pay them what we owe them."

Claire turned back to Cox. "I thought the United Nations had agreed to a

loan package, Wally. Won't that help to bail us out until we can get the

economy moving again?"

"It'll help some, Claire, but with half the country on welfare, the

money they've promised us won't last six months."

"What the hell's wrong with everybody?" Claire asked, rolling her eyes.

"Doesn't anyone want to work anymore?"

Ainsworth smirked. "Why should they, Claire, when welfare pays them more

for sitting home on their butts than they can make with a job?"

9

Claire stared hard at Ainsworth for a moment, and then she slammed her

hand down on her desk. "Damn it, I'm tired of being told there's no

money in the treasury and the government has to cut back while these

layabouts are living off the government's tit. Cliff, I want you to

announce immediately that due to the current emergency, all welfare

checks will be cut by twenty percent."

Ainsworth's eyes opened wide. "But, Claire, that'll cause riots in the

streets."

She smiled grimly. "Good, then stopping them will give Boykin's troops

something to do to earn their paychecks."

She got to her feet and leaned forward, her hands on her desk. "Now, get

out of here and find me some way to get more money into our

coffers-raise taxes or levy fines or something. The government cannot

function without money!"

Her cabinet members rose from their chairs, casting worried looks at one

another as they filed out of her office.

Claire took a deep breath and stretched her arms out over her head.

"Damn, these meetings always make me tense," she said, glancing at Herb

Knoff, still sitting next to her. She gave him a half smile. "How about

a massage for your boss?" she asked with a lascivious grin.

He returned the look. "Anytime is a good time for a full-body rubdown,

Claire."

She moved from behind the desk, took his hand, and led him into her

living quarters adjacent to the office. As she went through the door,

she began to unbutton her blouse.

Suddenly, a man dressed all in soldier's fatigues stepped from behind

the door and whipped his left arm

10

around Herb's forehead, stretching his head back while he put a long,

curved knife to his neck.

"Holy shit!" Herb grunted, standing still as the razor-sharp blade drew

a few drops of blood from his neck.

Claire whirled around, her hands going to her face. "What the hell's the

meaning of this?" she almost shouted.

"My name is Muhammad Atwa," the man said in a heavy accent. "I have a

proposition for you, but I first need your assurance you will not summon

help."

"How did you get in here?" Claire asked, her eyes flicking toward the

phone on her bedside table.

Atwa moved the knife suggestively. "Please do not attempt to call for

help," he said. "I am not afraid to die, and I most surely will kill you

both before your guards arrive."

"I asked you how you got in here."

He shrugged, his lips curled in a cruel smirk. "Your soldiers are very

lazy. Anyone in a uniform is allowed to pass almost without questions."

Claire sighed and sat on the edge of her bed. "What is it exactly you want?"

Atwa reached around Herb's chest, took the pistol from his shoulder

holster under his coat, and motioned for him to join Claire on the bed.

Once Herb was sitting next to her, Atwa sat on a chair across the room

and leaned back, crossing his legs with the pistol resting on his knee,

the barrel pointed at them.

"I represent an organization called Al Qa'eda, based in Afghanistan."

"Al-Qa'eda?" Claire asked, her brow furrowed. "I thought we got rid of

them back in the early part of the century."

Atwa smiled again, though without the slightest bit of

11

humor in his eyes. "Yes, that is what you thought. You did manage to

kill our leader, Osama bin Laden, but we had others ready to take his

place."

"And what proposition does Al Qa'eda have for the United States?" Claire

asked.

"A friend of our organization, Abdullah El Farrar, has come to us with a

plan to bring the world to its knees."

"El Farrar?" Herb asked. "Wasn't he the crazy bastard who led the

terrorist attack against us this year?"

Atwa shrugged. "A misguided effort, as it turned out. He had neither the

troops nor the materiel to complete his mission, though I think he would

have succeeded had it not been for Ben Raines and the SUSA's intervention."

"I doubt it," Claire said. "We would have beaten him even without Raines

and his troops. It would just have taken a little longer."

Atwa smiled again, showing he didn't believe her. "At any rate, the SUSA

and the UN. have frozen all of El Farrar's family's assets, and he is

angry. He has come up with a very intriguing scheme to make them pay for

what they did to him."

"Yeah? And just what does he have in mind?" Claire asked.

"To take control of the world's oil supply," Atwa answered simply.

"Oh, is that all?" Herb asked scornfully.

"Let me explain," Atwa said, moving the pistol so it no longer pointed

at them. "As you know, almost all of the working oil fields are in Saudi

Arabia and Kuwait since your country destroyed most of the others in

Iran and Iraq during your hunt for Osama bin Laden years ago."

"You're forgetting our fields in Alaska," Claire said.

Atwa waved a dismissive hand. "Yes, you have enor-

12

mous reserves, but your environmentalists have so far blocked you from

exploiting them to any degree."

Claire nodded grimly. The tree-huggers were the bane of her existence.

She'd been trying for years to get the Congress to let her open up the

fields to full production, but so far they'd resisted.

"So, how does El Farrar plan to take control of those oil fields?"

Claire asked. "They are under the protection of the UN."

"My organization is prepared to put fifty thousand of our best troops at

his disposal. He will use them to gain control of the oil fields and

oust the U.N. troops, which are very poorly disciplined."

"So, and then what?" Claire asked. "Ben Raines and his SUSA troops would

take them back in less time than it takes to tell it."

Atwa shook his head. "Not if you agree to help us."

"In what way could we help you?" Claire asked. "As much as I hate to

admit it, our troops have never been a match for the SUSA's."

"We don't need your troops," Atwa said. "We merely need fifty pounds or

so of the plutonium you have in storage."

"Plutonium?" Claire asked, puzzled. "You want to make an atom bomb?"

"No. We intend to place small amounts of the plutonium near all of the

oil wells, rigged to explode if our demands are not met. As you know,

plutonium is one of the dirtiest of all radioactive materials. If we set

the bombs off, it will contaminate the oil reserves for thousands of

years and make them unusable."

"But," Claire said, horrified, "that would throw the world back into the

Dark Ages."

"That is how we have been living in Afghanistan for

13

decades," Atwa said, shrugging. "But I doubt it will come to that. Once

the U.N. sees that we have the means and the will to destroy the world's

oil supply, I think they will accede to our demands."

"And what will the United States get for our help?" Claire asked, a

thoughtful look on her face.

Atwa spread his hands, a wide-toothed grin on his face. "Why, you'd get

to be our partners in ruling the world, of course." He hesitated a

moment, and then he added, "And Ben Raines would have to come crawling

to you to get the oil his country needs to maintain their style of life."

The thought of Ben Raines having to beg her for anything persuaded

Claire. She'd hated him for as long as she could remember, and now was

her chance to get back at him for all he'd done to make her life miserable.

She stood up and stuck out her hand. "We'll do it!"

14 TWO

As Ben Raines ran, his breath came in short, gasping bursts and his

chest felt like a giant hand was squeezing it. Sweat poured from his

brow and ran down into his eyes. Finally, he stopped and bent over, his

hands on his knees as he glanced at his malamute dog, Jody, who'd been

running effortlessly at his side. She wasn't even breathing heavily, and

was looking back at him as if to say, "Come on, let's run some more."

"Jesus, Jody," he managed to gasp between breaths, "give your master a

break." They'd just jogged five miles, a trip he used to make without

even breaking a sweat. He looked at his watch. They'd averaged

six-minute miles, a feat most men would have been proud of. But not

General Ben Raines, leader of the Southern United States of America

Armed Forces.

He bent down, rubbed the back of Jody's neck, and ruffled her ears,

something she loved. "It's hell to get old, Jody old girl," he murmured

to her as she looked up at him with adoring eyes, her lips curled in a

smile of delight.

Maybe it's finally time to step down and give someone younger a chance,

he thought to himself. His adopted son Buddy had been champing at the

bit lately, wanting more responsibility. Perhaps now was the time to

give it to him,

15

Ben thought as he finally managed to slow his breathing down to normal

levels.

He glanced back down the road running along the periphery of his base,

and figured he had about another mile to go to get home. With a deep

sigh, he began to jog toward his quarters, hoping he wouldn't have a

massive coronary before he made it back. Jody barked with happiness as

she ran alongside him, keeping a sharp lookout for a squirrel or rabbit

just in case one happened to show itself alongside the road.

After a shower and a lunch with his troops in the mess hall, Ben met

with his team of advisers in his office. As he sat at his desk, he

looked around at the men and women in the room, his heart swelling with

pride at the excellence of the team he'd formed so many years ago.

Mike Post, his Chief of Intelligence, sat smoking his pipe as usual,

filling the room with the aromatic smell of fine tobacco.

Jersey, his bodyguard, who was half Apache, sat on a chair near his

desk, her hand resting on the hilt of the K-Bar assault knife that was

her favorite weapon. Her long dark hair was tied in a braid at the back

of her neck and hung down almost to her waist.

Cooper, called Coop by most everyone, was his driver and sat next to

Jersey, where he could whisper insults to her as the occasion arose.

Their constant bantering was legendary and a source of constant

amusement to the other members of the team.

Anna, Ben's adopted daughter, sat on the couch next to Harley Reno, also

part Indian, with the characteristic red hair and blue eyes of the band

of aborigines who were his ancestors.

16

Beth, the team statistician, sat next to Carrie, who was in charge of

communications for the team. They were quietly talking to Scott "Hammer"

Hammerick, Harley's closest friend and fellow commando.

On an adjacent couch sat Buddy Raines, Ben's son, who'd led the

special-ops battalion until the previous year, when Ben had asked him to

join the team as second in command

The final member of the group was Dr. Larry Buck, who'd recently taken

over from Dr. Lamar Chase, who'd semiretired to play golf and lie about

his handicap.

It was a fine team, one that had fought together over many campaigns.

Ben took a sip of his coffee and then cleared his throat. "Okay, boys

and girls," he said with a slight grin. "How about a status report on

our current situation?"

Mike Post took his pipe out of his mouth and glanced down at a sheaf of

papers, resting on his ever-present briefcase on his lap. The team often

joked that if they ever wanted to separate Mike from his briefcase, it

would have to be surgically removed.

"Well, to begin with, the good news is it seems all of the terrorists

who invaded the United States have either been killed or captured. Other

than a few stragglers who shouldn't be any problem to round up, the

threat of any overthrow of Claire Osterman's government is over," Mike said.

"What of the leader, Abdullah El Farrar?" Ben asked. "Any news of him?"

Mike's lips curled in a sardonic grin. "The last intel I have says he

returned to the Middle East, either Iran or Iraq, in disgrace for his

failure. I'm also told his family is none too happy with his aborted

attempt to destabilize

17

the U.S. since it resulted in all of the family's assets being frozen."

"Oh, darn," Coop interjected sarcastically, "now they'll have to live

like all the other poor people they've been robbing for the past twenty

years."

Mike laughed. "Well, not really. They still have relatively substantial

funds available from bank accounts the U.N. wasn't able to find, but

their standard of living has definitely gone down."

"How about the governments that supported him in his takeover bid?" Ben

asked. "Are they still behind him?"

Mike shook his head. "Don't know, since our intel is limited over there,

but I would think not. They're not exactly fond of failure in that culture."

"So you think we can forget about El Farrar as a threat?" Buddy asked,

leaning forward, his head cocked to the side in a characteristic mannerism.

"I wouldn't go that far," Mike answered. "But I doubt we'll be hearing

anything from him for quite a while. After all, he lost almost

twenty-five thousand of their best troops. It should take him some time

to reestablish a force we'd need to be concerned with."

"I wouldn't be too sure of that," Harley Reno said.

"Oh?" Buddy asked.

Harley nodded. "Yeah. As you know, I spent some time over there a few

years back. There's no shortage of crazy young Muslims who are willing

to take a short ride to meet Allah by blowing themselves and any

followers of the Great Satan in the West up with them. If El Farrar

survives his return and isn't killed or disavowed by the leaders over

there, he could rearm and have another twenty-five thousand fanatical

followers before you know it."

"That's a good point, Mike," Ben said, his brow fur-

18

rowed in thought. "Tell your sources to keep a sharp lookout for any

news El Farrar is trying to raise another army."

"Roger," Mike said, making a note on his legal pad.

"Now," Ben continued, "what of the U.S.? How are the conditions up there?"

Mike shook his head. "Simply terrible. There are shortages of

everything, from food to gasoline to heating oil. The country is in the

worst depression since Claire took office. I'm told half her army is not

being paid, and the government is so short of funds they've actually cut

their welfare payments by twenty percent."

Ben snorted. "Damn! That means the poor folks up there might actually

have to go to work and do something useful to help their country's economy."

"Hah," Jersey said. Her feelings about people refusing to work and

accepting welfare were well known. "That'll be the day. Expect a revolt

anytime if the layabouts are cut off from the government tit."

"Actually, Jersey's not far wrong," Mike said. "My sources tell me there

have actually been food riots in most of the major cities, and the

university students have been so vocal in opposition to the cutting of

welfare that Claire has actually gone so far as to suspend classes until

the situation clears up."

"That won't hurt the country much," Cooper said with a sneer. "From what

I hear, about all they teach in those colleges are blatant socialism and

other liberal bleeding-heart nonsense."

"How did the schools up there get so bad?" Beth asked.

"You know the old saw? 'Those that can, do; those that can't, teach'?"

Ben asked. "Well, after the initial wars that decimated the world and

caused us to split off

19

from the U.S., men and women with skills found themselves much in

demand. Others, mainly those who spent most of their time on the

sidelines carping about peace and love and sharing the bounty, went into

teaching. Those were the only jobs whose only requirement was a loud

mouth and lots of opinions, none of which had to be realistic."

"That's why in the SUSA, all of our teachers are volunteers who have to

support themselves at an honest job, huh?" Carrie asked.

Ben nodded. "Yeah. We saw right away that teaching should arise out of a

skill, not just an opinion. All of our universities teach skills that

are necessary in the real world to make a living or to be useful to

society. All of the so-called liberal-arts curriculum they love so much

in the U.S. is still taught here, but only to produce well-rounded

people and only as an adjunct to useful subjects. Here, no one takes

philosophy or art appreciation unless they're also enrolled in medicine

or engineering or something they can make a living at."

"You left out the most important job of all," Hammer said, putting his

hand on the butt of his Beretta 9mm pistol. "Soldiering."

Ben laughed. "A prejudiced point of view, but one with which I heartily

agree. Only, soldiering is not taught at universities, but here in the

armed forces," he added.

"And there's nothing like on-the-job training," Coop said, glancing at

Jersey. "Why, just look at Jersey here," he said, smiling. "If she had

to earn her living cooking or taking care of a man, she'd starve to death."

In a flash, Jersey drew her K-Bar and put the point under Coop's jaw. "I

know how to 'take care of a man,' " she said archly. "Want me to show

you how it's done?"

20

Coop gulped and leaned back, moving the knife from his throat. "Umm, I

think I'll pass, dear."

Jersey grinned and put the knife back in its scabbard. "I thought you

might, sweetie," she said.

Ben cleared his throat and hid his smile behind a hand as he said, "Now

that our intel briefing is over, I have some news I want to share with

you all."

The group settled down and gave him their Ml attention, wondering what

was going on.

"I have decided that it is time for this old warhorse to step down," he

continued, his face now serious.

William W Johnstone - Ashes 33 - Enemy in the Ashes (txt)

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