“Well, what?” Ben knew what was coming at him and he dreaded it. “Stop them, Ben!”
Ben rose from his chair and took her into his arms, holding her, touching her, smoothing her hair. “Gale, I don’t have the manpower to do that.” For once she didn’t attack the statement as being sexist. “Striganov has me outgunned and out-manned, and in many instances, the American people are supporting his actions. I-was
She pulled away from him and glared up at him, about a hundred pounds of mad. “Don’t tell me that, Ben. Just don’t you attempt to hand me that crap! You’re Ben Raines. You pulled-single-handedly-this nation back together in eighty-nine. You formed your own government within a government and made it work. You can do anything, Ben. Everyone who follows you says you can do anything. And I believe it. Yes, now I believe it. You’re forgetting, I spoke with the Prophet, and I’ve talked with people who were in that mutant basement when he singled you out, spoke directly to you. You’ve been chosen, Ben. You-was
Ben looked down at her and laughed, a harsh, sarcastic bark of dark humor. “You, too, Gale? Come on! Of all the people I thought would reject the notion that I am something more than a mortal, I thought you would be that person. Gale, I’m flesh and blood-nothing more than that. I cut myself shaving, I stub my toe sometimes, and cuss when I do. I bang my shin on coffee tables. I don’t sit on the right side of God Almighty; and I don’t receive any special instructions from him. I-was
“I’m pregnant,” she announced.
Ben stood for a moment, looking at her. He blinked a couple of times.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” she asked.
“Well… ah…”
“For a writer, Ben, you sure have a way with the English language.”
“I can do without your smart-ass remarks, Gale.”
“Big deal.”
“Ah, are you certain about this?” he asked.
“I’m certain. I was certain the night it happened. And it happened the same night I spoke with the Prophet. It will be twins.”
“Gale… you can’t be certain about that.”
“I know.”
Ben shook his head. “You mean you know you can’t be certain?”
“No. I know I’m certain.”
“Well …” He hesitated for a moment. “I’m … glad.”
“I can see you leaping up and down from joy,” she commented dryly. “Are you going to move against the IPF?”
“I am moving against them, Gale. In the best way I know how.”
She put her hands on her hips and stood her ground. “It isn’t enough.”
Ben fought to keep his patience, but knew whatever he said was going to be wrong to her ears. And he didn’t want to speak the words. For what was happening in the IPF’-CONTROLLED territory was sickening to him, although, he knew, not to the extent it was to Gale.
“It’s the best I can do, Gale, without launching a full-scale invasion into IPF territory.”
She hung on with the tenacity of a pit bulldog. “Then it appears to me that would be what you would have to do. Now.”
“No, Gale.”
“Why not, Ben?”
Ben took a deep, calming breath. It didn’t work. “Because it would be too costly in terms of human life. My people’s lives.”
A funny-odd look slipped into her dark eyes. She smiled. Ben took a step backward. He had seen that look before. “What are you thinking, Gale?”
“Why don’t you put it before your people, General Raines,” she challenged him. “Or are you afraid they’ll say go in and fight and stop this horror?”
“Gale, that is what I want to do. Believe me. But I have a responsibility to all those who follow me.”
She glared up at him. “You talk about human life, Ben. Human life?” She softened her tone, coming to him, touching his arm. “Oh, Ben, you don’t understand what is happening up there.” She waved toward the west. Ben pointed in the right direction: north. She
made a face at him. “I don’t believe you really understand. Not at all. Not all the terror and horror and suffering. Human beings are being used as lab rats and guinea pigs. They are being tortured. Horrible, terrible, perverted, disgusting acts are being perpetrated upon them. Human life, Ben? How about human suffering? Rape and degradation and God only knows what else. I can’t believe you can just sit back and allow this to continue.”
“Gale, honey, listen to me. I don’t want you to misinterpret this, but my group is, I believe, the last shot civilization has if any type of democratic social order is to prevail. Civilization-was
She spun away from him, her eyes flashing fire and fury. She balled her hands into small fists and hit him on the shoulder. “Fuck civilization!” she screamed the words at him. “Civilization! Goddamn it, Ben. Do you think General Striganov is civilized? Do you think what that monster is doing to men and women and children can be called-by any stretch of the imagination-civilized? You’re living in a dream world. You’re talking about law and order and speaking in terms of productivity and education. But I’m talking about survival! The God-given right of any race of people to exist in peace. That’s what I’m talking about, Mr. President-General Raines.” She jabbed a finger against his chest. “And you, sir, and your people, are the only ones left on the face of this earth-that I know of-who have the might to uphold and maintain and guarantee that right. And that is, I believe, your duty!”
She stood before him, chest heaving from her fast speech. The room was still and silent after her outburst.
Ben looked at her for a moment. Then he looked toward the closed motel room door. “All right, people,” he called. “You can all come in. I know you’re out there listening.”
The door swung open slowly and Ike and Cecil and Doctor Chase stood there, grinning sheepishly.
“Cec,” Ben said. “Get in touch with the tank commanders. Tell them to roll the tanks back up here and get in position to move north. Then get in touch with the heavy artillery, same orders. Contact Tri-States. I want every man and woman and teenager that can handle a weapon up here-pronto! Those that are too old for actual combat can start stripping the area clean, loading it up on trucks, and moving it over to Captain Rayle’s area in Georgia.
“Ike, move one full combat company over to Georgia, just in case the Russian figures out what we’re doing and sends people in there. Roll the convoys day and night, push them hard-I want all the combat troops up here in thirty-six hours.
“I don’t want any of you people to get your hopes up too high about this operation. We’re not going to beat Striganov. We are too few against overwhelming odds. But I think we can hurt him badly enough to make him stop what he’s doing. Or at the very least give us the time to rescue as many people as possible. And I want to hurt him badly enough to give us the time to rebuild over in Georgia, give us the time to fortify our positions so he’ll think a long time before launching any attack against us. I won’t say we’ll never have to move again. We probably will. History proves that for every group of people who attempt to start
some form of orderly society, there is always some other group or groups that want to destroy it. But we have to try and try and keep trying. We must never give up. Never.
“We are going to take heavy losses in this campaign; prepare your people for that. That’s it, gang-move out.”
He looked at Gale. “All right, Gale. We’ll give it our best shot.”
She kissed him on the cheek. “Of course you will, darling. I knew that all along.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Jimmy Linfort and his wife, Helen, along with John Demoss and his wife, Lisa, staggered down the weed- filled, old two-lane highway. They were naked, but it was difficult to tell that because all four of them had been tarred and feathered before the Klansmen had dragged them to the town limits and kicked them out, warning them never to come back. And to spread the word: No niggers or nigger-lovers allowed. Before they had tarred and feathered the four of them, half a dozen Klansmen had raped the white woman and assaulted the black woman
