side. The woman had an odd expression on her face.
Ben got out of his truck. “What’s the matter, Susie?”
She pointed to the side of an old service station. “Look over there, General.”
Ben looked. “Jesus Christ!” he blurted.
Bloated, naked bodies were hanging from a beam that stretched from building to building. Their hands were tied behind their backs, their faces were dark, tongues swollen and protruding.
Before anyone could say anything else, a hard burst of machine gunfire knocked the Rebel still sitting in the front of the Jeep out of his seat, the heavy slugs tearing away part of his face. The Rebel in the rear swung his M- 60 and pulled the trigger back, holding it, spraying the area where the fire had originated. He fought the rise of the weapon on full auto.
Ben located the source of the firing and burned half a clip at the hidden machine gun emplacement by the side of an old house. Rebel rocket launchers cracked their explosive messages. The machine gun nest was blown into bloody bits.
“Teams on both sides of the road!” Ben yelled. “Clear it, house to house. Medics, up front, now!”
It was too late for the Rebel lying in his own blood in the front of the Jeep. The heavy .50-caliber machine gun slugs had torn the life from the young man.
Ben glanced at Susie. The young woman had tears in her eyes. “You all right, Susie?”
“I will be, sir,” she replied. “In a minute.” She turned her back to him and wiped her eyes. Facing him, she said, “General, Bert and I were engaged, sort of. We had talked of getting married.” She looked at the young man named Bert, now being wrapped in a tarp. “I wouldn’t want to leave here until his death had been avenged.”
“We won’t, Susie,” Ben assured her. “I want to find out what in the hell is going on around this place.”
Susie spat very unladylike on the ground. “Personally, I would rather burn the whole fucking town to the ground.”
She walked back to her Jeep. She found a rag and began mopping up Bert’s blood from the seats.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Ike both felt and heard the man’s skull pop under the hickory club. He quickly dragged the robed and hooded man into the room and closed the door, after checking the lock. He damn sure didn’t want to get locked back in with a stiff.
Ike stripped off the robe and put it on, grimacing as he did so. The robe stank of old sweat. Fanning the body, Ike discovered a .38-caliber pistol and a pocket full of cartridges. He found a package of cigarettes-Lord only knew how old they were-and a Zippo lighter. Even though Ike had been trying to quit smoking for years, he made up his mind he’d sure fire one up if he got out of this loony bin in one piece.
He smiled. After he wasted a whole bunch of these kooks, that is.
He slowly opened the door and looked up and down the dimly lit hall. Must be a gasoline generator producing the power, he thought. The hall was quiet and deserted, he slipped out into the hall, stood for a moment, trying to get his bearings, then walked in the opposite direction his guard’s footsteps had always sounded. He passed a room that smelled strongly of kerosene. An idea came to him. He smiled grimly and entered the
room. He found two five-gallon cans of kerosene and a carton of rags. Ike saturated the room with raw kerosene and ran back to the room where he’d been held captive, leaving a trail of kerosene as he ran. He doused the dead man with kerosene, and threw the rest of that can of flammable liquid on the walls and floor. He lit a handful of rags and dropped them to the floor, backing out of the room.
He backed right into a breathing body.
“Brother Jake?” the man said. “Why … you’re not Brother-was
That was as far as he got. Brother Whatever-in-the-hell-his-name-was felt his throat explode in pain as Ike ruptured his larynx with the knife edge of his hand. Brother Yo-yo hit the floor and began flopping around, slowly suffocating, gagging and making horrible choking sounds. Ike hastened death’s touch by kicking the man in the temple with the toe of his boot. The man croaked once and was still. Fanning the body, Ike found another .38 pistol, more cartridges, and a long-bladed hunting knife in a leather sheath.
Ike took the seconds required to check both pistols. Fully loaded. He tossed Brother Yo-yo into the burning room, shut the door, and picked up the second can of kerosene. He ran down the hall, slopping kerosene on the walls and floor, the fire trailing behind him as he ran.
Smoke was rapidly filling the corridored building as Ike came to a dead end. A dirty window faced him. He unlocked the window and climbed out, closing the window behind him.
The outside air was clear and cold. Ike breathed
deeply, gratefully. It felt good to be free. Even better to be armed. Now to get his bearings and find some heavier weapons. Then to do some damage, draw some real blood.
He could hear the sounds of men and women yelling, some of the yelling pain-filled as the fire spread quickly through the old, wooden building. It had been some type of old warehouse, Ike guessed.
A man ran around a corner of the building, carrying an M-16. He ran toward Ike, crouched in the darkness. When the robed man passed the kneeling Ike, Ike jammed one end of the hickory stick hard into the man’s gut. The air left him in a rush. Ike cracked the man’s skull with the club and hit him again for insurance. He grabbed up the M-16 and tore the full ammo pouch from the man. He checked the M-16. It was one of the older models, manufactured long before the M16A2 came to be. This old baby was full auto.
Ike checked the clip. Full. The clips in the ammo pouch were all full, a mixed bag of twenty and thirty round clips.
“Now for a little fun,” Ike muttered. “My kind of fun, kids.”
Using the heavy brush around the burning building, Ike slipped into deep cover, edging into the prone firing position. He found a group of robed men and women standing about two hundred yards from the burning structure. He blew a full clip into them, knocking half of them sprawling, kicking and screaming on the ground.
“Bastards!” Ike growled.
The roaring of the fire completely covered the stutter and crack of the M-16. Ike jammed home a fresh clip and began picking his targets.
He knocked the props out from under a half dozen more hooded and robed persons before deciding it was time for him to haul his ass out of that area.
One man came close to Ike’s position and Ike shot him, one slug hitting the magazine of the M-16, the rounds exploding, mangling the man’s belly and chest. Ike tore the ammo pouch from the man and ripped a pair of field glasses from around the man’s neck. He ran into the woods.
Stopping once to check the stars, Ike got his bearings and headed southeast. He found a stream and followed it until he spotted a bridge looming dark in the early fall evening in the mountains.
Ike carefully reconnoitered the bridge and the grounds around it while remaining motionless in the brush. First chance he got, he was getting out of that stinking robe. It was insulting his nostrils. People of the Ninth Order must not believe much in bathing, he thought.
Cautiously, he made his way to the bridge. He followed the highway south by staying close to the timberline. He came to a highway marker. He was on Highway 60.
Ike searched his memory. The patrol he’d been leading had been ambushed just to the east of Highway 411, very close to the town of Chatsworth. So the members of the Ninth Order had carried him quite a distance to the east. He still couldn’t quite figure out exactly why the Ninth Order had grabbed him. He thought all that questioning about Ben had been to throw him off.
Unless …
Yeah, he reflected sourly, that had to be it. Willette and his bunch were probably playing footsie with that gang of kooks. Christ! Ike had hoped they were all through with people like that when they left Emil Hite and his band of fruitcakes back in Arkansas.*
Ike had to softly chuckle at the memory of Emil Hite. Hite was more harmless hippie than anything else. The man had a scam working for him. But he wasn’t dangerous-at least not like the Ninth Order.
The Ninth Order. Sister Voleta. What the hell did they want? Good Christ, there was surely enough land for everybody.
Ike just couldn’t figure it.
He walked for half an hour before spotting an old house set off the road, almost completely overgrown with
