“And perhaps run into a force three or four times our size, Anna?” Ben said. “That would be very foolhardy on our part, don’t you think?”

  She shrugged her shoulders in silent reply. Anna loved a good fight, regardless of the odds.

  Ben lifted a map and unfolded it. “Exactly where the hell are we?”

  “Right in the middle of the biggest damn mountains I’ve ever seen,” Corrie said.

  “They are impressive,” Ben agreed, looking out at the towering peaks that surrounded them on both sides.

  They rode in silence for a few miles. The highway was in surprisingly good shape and they were making good time as they headed deeper into the vast silent majesty of the Rockies. It was obvious that since the Great War, this highway had not seen heavy traffic.

  “I can’t believe that those bears we saw back a ways were just sitting in the middle of the damn road playing,” Beth said. “I never saw anything like that before.”

  “Man hasn’t made much of an appearance in this area in years, Beth,” Ben told her, without looking up from the map. “This country has reverted back to the kingdom of the animals. And they were grizzlies, by the way.”

  “Dangerous, huh?” Anna asked.

  “Very,” her adopted father said. “And unpredictable, too. I don’t think a grizzly has a natural enemy among the animals.”

  “Mountain lions around here, too, you reckon?” Cooper asked.

  “I imagine they’ve made quite a recovery too, Coop. But they’re very reclusive animals. I doubt we’ll see any of them.”

  “Suits the hell out of me,” Coop muttered. “Grizzlies are bad enough.”

  “I heard wolves talking to each other last night,” Anna spoke. “It was so beautiful and lonely.”

  Ben looked up and smiled. “Yes, it was, Anna. I’m glad to see them back in such force.”

  “Scouts report the bridge is out a few miles up ahead,” Corrie reported.

  “Tell them to rejoin the column,” Ben ordered. “We’ll wait for them right here. Pull over, Coop. Let’s stretch our legs a bit and breathe some of this fine pure air.”

  “We’re liable to scare our lungs to death,” Cooper replied, pulling over and parking, the mobile CP right behind them.

  They all got out of the vehicle and walked around for a moment, getting the kinks out of their legs.

  “Watch out for bears,” Beth said, looking nervously around her.

  Ben smiled at her expression and walked back to the mobile CP, motioning for the driver to get out. “Stretch your legs,” Ben told the young Rebel. “It’ll be a few minutes before the Scouts join us. Besides, we’ve got to figure out just where we’re going to go. There aren’t that many roads to choose from.”

  Ben stood for a moment in the middle of the road, breathing deeply of the cool, clean air.

  I’d like to live up here, the thought sprang into his head. The winters are harsh, but I’d like to give it a try.

  He smiled, thinking: Maybe someday I will.

  Ben looked over the side of the guard railing down below. About a seventy-five-foot drop, he figured, down to the first rocky ledge. Several hundred feet or more to the bottom. He stepped into the mobile CP to get another pouch of tobacco and rolling papers. Cigarettes were still manufactured and sold by the package and carton in the SUSA (despite Dr. Chase’s objections), but Ben had grown to like the hand-rolled variety. Besides, that way, he didn’t smoke as much.

  Ben walked over to his desk and sat down, opening a side drawer. He pulled out a bag of tobacco and papers and stuck them in the right side pocket of his jacket, securing the flap. Then he decided he’d stow some tobacco in the glove box of the big wagon and added another bag and paper to the pocket of his jacket, again securing the flap.

  He pushed the chair back and started to rise when a tremendous explosion lifted the motor home off its left side tires and sent Ben sprawling to the floor as smoke filled the interior. Ben felt the motor home slam against the guard railing, and the guard railing give. At the last possible second, he reached up and jerked the mattress off the single bunk and did his best to wrap up in it as the motor home went over the side.

  “Aww, shit!” Ben shouted.

  Over the grind of metal scraping against rock and the dislodging and crashing sounds of objects falling inside the motor home, Ben heard the sounds of more incoming rockets exploding outside, and the yammer of small-arms fire. Then there was a sickening falling sensation, a hard slam as the motor home struck the side of the deep ravine. More bouncing. Ben was slung from side to side inside the motor home. He would have been killed or badly injured had he not had the foresight to wrap himself in the mattress.

  The motor home struck something with terrific force and Ben’s head smashed against the metal wall. He faded into darkness for a few seconds, then began swimming out of the gray world of unconsciousness. The falling stopped. The sounds of grinding metal ceased. Ben’s pad-wrapped body ceased being flung from side to side. A groan escaped his lips from the many sore spots on his body that were just now sending pain signals to his brain.

  But he was alive.

  The motor home groaned in protest once and teetered sickeningly from side to side. Ben held on to one stationary leg of the bunk until the movement stopped.

  “Whatever I’m hung up on isn’t very permanent,” he muttered.

  Ben carefully and slowly slipped out of the mattress, knowing it had very probably saved his life. He glanced out of what remained of a shattered window and nearly lost the last meal he’d eaten: he could see nothing except space. He inched closer to the window and peered out. It was a very long way to the bottom.

  “Oh, boy,” Ben muttered. He looked up. The door was just above his head. So the motor home was lying on its side, hung up on something. A long deadly fall awaited him if whatever was holding the metal shell gave way.

  For now, he was alive.

  The sounds of a raging battle could be heard above him.

  Ben looked around him, willing his nerves to calm down and start some rational thinking.

  He spotted his CAR lying at his feet and picked it up, slinging the weapon. He picked up the pack he had put together just for something such as this. He carefully made his way, a few inches at a time, toward the cab of the motor home. On the way, he picked up a long canvas gun case, padded inside. He’d put the .270 he’d chosen back at the deserted town inside the case, along with spare ammo in two looped belts. Might need it, he thought.

  The motor home lurched and groaned again and Ben spread his boots to steady himself. He could do nothing, however, to steady his stomach, which seemed to roll over a couple of times in silent protest.

  The groaning and creaking of metal stopped. Ben again moved toward the cab. He could see that the windshield was gone, as was the driver’s side window. If he could make the cab before the battered motor home went over the side? . . .

  If not, he was death-bound toward the bottom of the ravine. He was hung up on an overhang that had prevented him from seeing the full depth of the canyon from the roadside.

  One of his two full canteens pressed against his hip. It hurt, and Ben knew he had suffered deep bruises all over his body.

  But he was alive.

  At least for the time being.

  Ben reached the cab and stuck his head out of the shattered window. His eyes rested on rocky ground a few feet away and below. He could not recall seeing anything that looked so good . . . at least not lately.

  He dropped his pack. It hit the small patch of level ground and stayed put. He lowered the rifle case. The motor home lurched again and Ben grabbed the steering wheel and hung for what seemed like an eternity, but was only a few seconds. The motor home ceased its rocking. Ben heard the low hum of wind picking up; hearing that over the howl of combat some one hundred feet or so above him. If that mountain wind picked up to any sort of intensity, he was a goner, for a small gentle push was all the motor home needed to push it over the side.

  A groan of pain escaped Ben’s lips when he stepped up onto the side of the driver’s seat. His bruised muscles were telling him to take it easy.

  “No time for that,” he muttered.

  He eased one leg out of the window and let it dangle. Then the other leg. He dropped out of the cab, bumping his battered body against the outer shell of the motor home and sliding down the rest of the way. He grabbed for anything and burned his exposed wrist on the hot exhaust pipe. He turned that loose in a hurry.

  Then his boots were on the ground and Ben’s legs could hold him no more. He sank to the rocks and took several deep breaths. His gloved hands pulled his pack and rifle case close to him just as the wind picked up, and he found some small comfort clutching his meager possessions.

  Seconds later, the wrecked motor home went over the side in a shriek of metal. It seemed to fall for a long time before striking the bottom. The motor home caught on fire; smoke drifted up to Ben. The gas tanks did not explode. Ben knew they seldom did. That scene is more often than not reserved for the movies.

  He looked up. He could not see the lip of the roadway. Rock protrusions prevented that. The sounds of combat were fainter now, and Ben had no way of knowing if the battle was winding down or the winds were blowing the sounds away from him.

  But he was alive!

  Far below him, the motor home was burning, sending black smoke in all directions at the whim of the wind.

  Ben rested for a few moments, then began looking around him. There was no way out to his left, no way straight down, and to climb up was out of the question. That left one way. Ben crawled to his aching legs and willed his legs to work. He struggled into the pack and adjusted the straps. He picked up the rifle case and began his trek. The only way open to him wound gently down. Fine. He’d damn sure take it.

  He walked for several dozen yards, then sat down on a large rock to rest. He dug in a side pocket of the pack and took out a small bottle of aspirin. He took two, washing them down with a sip of water. He carefully capped the bottle and returned it to the side pocket of the pack.

  Ben took that time to check his CAR. It was intact and had suffered no damage. He checked his side arm. Undamaged. He returned the 9mm to its flap holster and slung his CAR. Rising to his boots, he resumed his trek downward.

  He reached the bottom of the ravine, or canyon, or whatever the hell it was, much quicker than he anticipated. He looked up. It was a long way to the road. The sounds of shooting were very faint, but the fight was still going on. Well, he thought, I’m sure out of this fight . . . at least for the time being.

  He looked around him, seeking some sort of trail that animals might have cut out over the years, and spotted a dim path. He headed that way.

  As he walked, he thought: the attack had probably been a carefully planned ambush, and he did not believe it had been carried out by Simon’s home guard. That meant it was Bottger’s troops. They had slipped through the lines of Rebels, and as spread out as Ben’s people were, that would not have been difficult to accomplish.

  And if there was one team of Bottger’s troops, there could just as easily be a dozen or more.

  Ben was deliberately keeping all thoughts of his team from his mind, refusing to dwell on what might have happened to them. Right now, his own survival was paramount; time for introspection would come later.

  He prodded carefully on. He came to a small creek and knelt down, shrugging off his pack and laying his weapons aside only after taking a long careful look all around him. He bathed his face and hands several times, the cold water reviving him and chasing away any fog that remained to cloud his senses.

  Ben had no way of knowing how many, or even if any of his team escaped the ambush. So he couldn’t afford to dwell on that. He had to think of his own survival.

  He felt sure that Corrie had gotten off a message, but in these mountains, whether it was received or not was a question. She would not have had time to set up her dish to bounce a signal off a satellite. Not unless she survived the ambush. If that was the case, then this area would be filled with Rebel gunships and search parties in a few hours. If not? . . . Ben was on his own. But he’d been on his own many times before; it was not a new experience.

  A bullet whined off a rock very close to Ben’s head and sent him scrambling for cover. He lay still amid the rocks and new vegetation and waited, only his eyes moving.

  “General Raines!” the shout came from far above him.

  Ben lifted only his eyes and remained silent.

  “Had you not taken that last step, you would be a dead man. As it is, you have only prolonged your life an hour, at best.”

  Ben waited.

  “My name is Hugo Runkel, General. Colonel Hugo Runkel.”

  “Pleased, I’m sure,” Ben muttered. He pushed himself back a few inches, then a few inches more. The movement attracted no gunfire, so Ben slipped back a few feet, until he was in a small grove of trees and brush. He uncased the .270 and cartridge belts and pushed the case away from him. He would not be needing it. He slung one cartridge belt around his waist and looped the other across his chest.

  “Knowing your penchant for striking out on your own, General,” Hugo called, “it was a simple matter to plot your course when you entered the wilderness area. There aren’t that many roads, you know.”

  Ben loaded up the .270 and removed the caps from the powerful scope he had picked up at the old store in the deserted town. He pulled the rifle to his shoulder, adjusted the scope magnification, and began searching the rocky area above him.

  “The ambush went well, General,” Hugo shouted. “We wiped out your entire team.”

  “Doubtful,” Ben muttered. “My people aren’t trained to stick around and die in a hopeless situation.”

  Ben spotted something out of sync with the terrain and settled the crosshairs on the object. For a few seconds it puzzled him; then he figured out what it was. Someone’s knee. He calculated the range at about a hundred and seventy-five yards, uphill, which could be as tricky as shooting downhill.

  Ben had sighted the rifle in at approximately a hundred and fifty yards at the deserted town. He settled into a more comfortable position and snugged the rifle into his shoulder. Just before he pulled the trigger, he thought: Be a miracle if I make this shot on the first try, and I’d better, for one shot will be all I’m going to get with this fellow.

  He gently squeezed the trigger and the rifle cracked. He immediately pulled the rifle back from recoil and sighted in. The knee had turned into a man, and the man was rolling down the incline, screaming in pain. Then, as in a comedy of errors, the wounded man reached out a hand and grabbed at something. The something turned out to be another man and his momentum pulled the second man from cover. The second man held on to the wounded man, bracing against a rock.

  Ben shot him in the belly.

  The first man was released from a suddenly numbed hand and rolled a few more yards before coming to a stop in some scrub brush and rocks.

  Smiling, Ben gathered up his gear and began crawling backward, deeper into the timber and brush. When he was sure he was reasonably safe from the eyes on the mountainside, Ben rose to his feet and began heading east, making as much time as his bruised and hurting legs could carry him.

  “Come on, Colonel Runkel,” he whispered. “You want to make a fight of it . . . well, me too!”

  SIX

  Within two hours, the sky over the ambush site was filled with helicopter gunships and the terrain was crawling with Rebels. Ike had taken command and was standing grim-faced on the side of the road, looking down at the tiny twisted and charred shape of the wrecked motor home that Ben had used for his CP.

  Rebels were rappelling down ropes from hovering ’copters to the canyon floor.

  Ben had lost about a third of his team before the rest scattered, as they had been trained to do. The Rebels oftentimes adhered to the old adage: He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.

  Anna, Jersey, Corrie, Beth, and Cooper were all bruised and scratched, but otherwise unhurt. They were all highly pissed about what had happened.

  They had been checked out and over by medics and released. They were standing by the side of the road, with Ike.

  “But you’re sure you saw Ben get into the motor home?” Ike questioned.

  “Yes, sir,” Beth said. “That’s firm.”

  “And you all heard shots after the initial ambush was over?”

  “Yes, sir. At least four shots,” Jersey said. “From over the side here. The shots came long after the ambush was over.”

  “Motor home is empty,” Ike’s radio tech said. “And no bodies around it.”

  Ike motioned to a half dozen teams of Rebels standing by, ready to go over the side of the ravine. “Check the path of descent,” he ordered. “Carefully.”

  Ropes were slung over the side and the teams of Rebels began scrambling down, maintaining a distance of about twenty-five feet apart. They would go over every inch of the way down to the canyon floor.

  Far below, a dozen Rebels searched the interior of the motor home, pulling out everything that would jerk loose and laying it out on the ground.

  “The general’s CAR is not in the motor home,” the tech reported. “Neither is anything resembling that pack his team told us about, or that rifle he picked up at the deserted town.”

  For the first time since arriving at the ambush site, Ike allowed himself a small smile. The odds of all three items being thrown from the motor home were high against. The odds that Ben had made it out alive were getting better.

  Hurt, probably. But alive, yes.

  “Tell the teams left and right of the wreck site to move out,” Ike ordered. “Slow and easy.”

  “How far out do you want them to range, sir?”

  “Until I tell them to stop,” Ike growled.

  “Pilots report no easy way up the side for several miles in either direction,” the tech said.

  “Thank you,” Ike said gently, softening his gruff order of a few seconds past.

  The tech smiled, having long ago grown accustomed to Ike’s growling.