The Last Rebel: Survivor (21 page)

“Okay,” Kindhand said, “we’ve got to get someone to sneak up there and see who it is.”

“I’ll do a fade to the other side of the cliff and then work my way back to the hill,” Kevin Shea said.

“Good.”

With that, Shaw drifted away casually. Once he calculated that he was out of the line of sight of anyone hiding behind a hill, he burst into a run, drawing his .45 as he went.

It took him about five minutes to work his way to the hill, and there was no one there. He did a brief search of the edge of the nearby forest, then went back over to the hill and raised his arms in a signal that said: whoever was here is gone.

Kindhand, Langone, and LaDoux immediately left the ambush sight and within minutes they were with Shaw.

“I only saw one thing,” Shaw said when the others joined him, “a pile of animal crap.”

“Where?” Jim said.

“Just inside the woods.”

“Can you show me?”

“Sure.”

LaDoux followed Shaw to the site.

“I have no idea what kind of animal made that. But it’s a large one judging by the size of the turds.”

“It’s a human animal,” LaDoux said. “And fresh. It’s highly likely that the same person who was peering over the hill did this.”

“How are we going to find out?”

“I’m more concerned if it was made by a straggler Reject,” Kindhand said.

“So am I,” Jim said.

They went back to the ambush site.

“Where’s Rosen?” Jim asked one of the Rebels who was busy with another Rebel carrying a body behind the falls.

“He’s behind the hill.”

Jim, accompanied by Kindhand and Shaw, went over to him. He was sitting down, writing something into a narrow notebook. He had listened in on the conversation Jim had with Kindhand, so he was probably making notes on this. But Jim wasn’t sure. The bottom line was that he didn’t know.

Rosen looked up almost in alarm when he saw the three heavy hitters approach.

“No problem,” Jim said. “I just want to double-check the number of soldiers in the escape unit. You said twenty-five?”

“Yes,” Rosen said. “Just a second.”

He took another thin notebook from his breast pocket and flipped through the pages.

“Twenty-five,” he said. “Each unit has twenty-five specialists in it.”

“Could there be any deviation?”

“I seriously doubt it,” Rosen said. “The premier was a stickler for organization and knowing exactly what strength he had.”

There was silence for a moment.

“I counted twenty-four bodies,” Kindhand said.

“So did I,” Jim said.

“Which means that the guy I spotted on the hill was a Reject from this special unit,” Langone said.

“And which also means that he’s probably on his way back to his unit,” Kindhand said.

“We’re pushing on through.”

“But what if they catch up to us?” Rosen asked. “They found you the first time.”

“Well,” Jim said, “we can cover our tracks.”

Rosen looked like he was not convinced that the strategy was a good one. And, in fact, he wasn’t. He had great faith in the Rejects’ tenacity and cleverness.

No one saw it, but abruptly Jim’s eyes had gone cold. Rosen’s attitude was the last straw. He had another idea, and Rosen was not going to like it.

SEVENTEEN

The Rebel convoy had mounted up. Jim, Bev, and Duke Kindhand were standing near Jim’s HumVee. Jim was watching, rolling a cigarette, but mainly looking at Rosen, who had gone off into the woods, for what, Jim didn’t know. Kindhand looked at Jim and saw something in his eyes.

“Do you like reporters?” Jim asked Kindhand.

“Not really,” Kindhand said.

Jim licked the paper closed and stuck the completed cigarette in his lips.

“Why?”

“Well, for one thing,” Kindhand said, “they’re ruthless. In particular I remember how when the priest pedophile scandals hit, reporters went on a rampage, implying that every religious person in town was a pervert. It was vicious and untrue—but their stories sold papers so they kept it up.”

“But without a free press . . .” Bev said.

“I understand that,” Kindhand said. “And I support that.”

“What do you think of Rosen?”

“Something sneaky about him,” Kindhand said.

“Sneaky?” Jim asked.

‘Yes.”

“I think that’s a good word to describe what I sense,” Jim said.

“Me too,” Bev said.

“He told you why he took off, right?” Jim said.

“Yes.”

“What I truly don’t understand,” Jim said, “is why he really left the Rejects’ compound. I know he said that he sensed that the gig was up, but I don’t accept that totally. I mean he’s a reporter for
Rolling Stone
. Those guys are famed for their chutzpah. I don’t know if he would have taken off just because of a feeling.”

Kindhand nodded.

“The bottom line is if he’s not telling the truth about that, what is he telling the truth about? A liar can be a dangerous person.”

Both Kindhand and Bev nodded.

“I have an idea,” Jim said.

“What?” Kindhand asked.

“I—”

Just then, Rosen came out of the trees.

“Okay,” Kindhand said, “ready to roll.”

Rosen was about to get into the HumVee when Jim said, “Wait.”

“Aren’t we going?” Rosen asked.

“First,” Jim said, “I want to see your .45.”

“Why?”

“It’s a secret,” Jim said, smiling.

Rosen hesitated, then drew his gun out of his pocket and handed it to Jim. Jim shoved it into his waistband.

“I wanted your gun, Morty,” he said, “because I don’t want any problems resulting from what I’m about to ask you.”

“What do you mean?”

“I want to know, and Bev and Duke want to know, what’s really going on here. Why did you leave the Rejects’ base camp? It sounded to me like a bunch of baloney. And relatively shortly after you left they came after you. It doesn’t add up to me.”

“You mean that my sensing that I was going to be uncovered is not enough to have me take a powder.”

“Exactly,” Bev said.

“Well, I—” Rosen started to say.

“Okay, Morty,” Jim said, “get ready to start walking.”

“What do you mean?” Rosen asked.

“You’re on your own. Here’s your gun.” Expertly, Jim ejected the clip in the handle and the single shot in the chamber, then handed the gun to Rosen and threw the clip on the ground where it was retrievable, but would take a little time to get to.

“Wait a minute,” Rosen said. “I’ll be on my own out here. I’m a city slicker. I’m not going to last. And they’re going to come again—with more dogs. They’ll track me down.”

“You have a tremendous head start.”

Rosen looked as if he had eaten a goldfish.

“Nothing will do here, Morty, ”
 
Jim said, “except the truth.”

Bev got in the HumVee and fired up the engine. Kindhand said nothing. But he was watching the scene intently.

“Wait,” Rosen said, “wait. I’ll tell you the truth.”

Bev turned the engine off.

“You’re right,” Rosen said, “it was more than my sense that I was going to be uncovered.”

Bev, Kindhand, and Jim were silent.

“Every week,” he said, “the slave women do your laundry, and I did something very stupid. I got mixed up, and allowed one to take away a pair of pants that had my ID card as a reporter for
Rolling Stone
sewed into it. I never wore them. I just left them in a closet. I figured that one day if I got captured by the Believers—who are savages themselves—I would show my ID. It was my insurance policy.”

“Why didn’t you tell us that?” Bev asked.

“Because . . .” Rosen said, hesitating. “I thought maybe you wouldn’t take me with you because you feared them. You would know for sure that they were going to come after to me. They have to.”

Rosen laid it out some more.

“I was undercover for two months. I got enough in my head about them specifically and in general to create big image problems. And if the Believers get a hold of what I have, it will amount to important tactical information.”

“Will you be willing to tell us what you’ve got?” Kindhand asked.

“Sure,” Rosen said.

“Pick up your clip,” Jim said.

Rosen went over and picked it up. Then he came back to Jim, who handed him the .45.

“Okay, Duke?” Jim asked, meaning, did he accept Rosen’s explanation?

Kindhand nodded yes. Then: “Okay,” he said, “let’s go.”

Then, Rosen, Bev, and Jim got into the HumVee and the vehicle started to roll. It was, Jim thought, a situation similar to someone cheating on a spouse. There is a reunion highlighted by people speaking the truth to one another, and the problem is settled and they get back together. But their relationship has changed forever, because what has not changed is the cheater’s capacity to do it again.

And that was exactly the way Jim felt about Morty Rosen.

EIGHTEEN

Otis Williams stopped to relieve himself again about two miles outside Compound W. That was the last thing he needed: to be in the middle of telling the premier all about the slaughter of the unit and then have to ask permission to excuse himself because he had to go to the bathroom.

Thinking about that made him feel like he could go in his pants.

Williams made it back to the camp in under fourteen hours. When he arrived at around midnight, he was very tired, but he knew where his duty lay. The die was cast. He went into the compound and immediately asked to see the premier. Williams was nervous enough because, technically, he was guilty of dereliction of duty—if the premier found out—and there was no telling what he might do. But he was not going to give all the gory details. He was not going to tell him about taking a crap. All he’d say was that he was part of the firefight and was lucky to get away. Period. Keep it simple. Of course, he told himself, he could have just deserted, and it would have been reasonable for the premier to assume that he had been killed like the others, just that his body could not be found. But this way, if he pulled it off, he would be in line for a promotion. In a way, he did not see how he could not get away with it. The premier was more than a little crazy, but there was no way that he could blame Williams for anything.

Five minutes after he arrived, the premier came out of his compound. He was fully dressed but sleepy looking. This surprised Williams. It was a hint of the premier’s being human, and it was hard to imagine him as being that way. Usually he was conferring on some military matter, supervising an execution, or screwing one of the slaves, sometimes two at the same time, and of different ages. Williams had never seen anyone as hungry for sex. He acted more like a fifteen-year-old boy who has just discovered masturbation than a forty-year-old man, which was the age Williams guessed he was.

“What’s up, private?” he said as he approached Williams. “What’s so important that you have to get me out of bed? Where’s the rest of the unit?”

Williams told him, starting with the phrase “we were ambushed,” and as he did, the premier’s face changed from sleepiness to savagery, pure rage.

The premier wanted all the details, such as how far the bodies were from base camp, and how many enemy there were.

“I saw six soldiers—”

“Did you see Rosen?”

“Yes, sir, he was there, and I saw someone else. That religious bitch Harper, the one that got away.”

For a moment, Szabo just looked straight ahead, and then he spoke. His voice was low, but somehow terrifying.

“You’re sure it was her?”

“One hundred percent.”

“What were you doing during all this?”

As nonchalantly as he could, Williams explained that he was on the perimeter of the firefight and was able to kill a few of the enemy before he had to retreat. Here, Williams thought, he had played it very cool. On the way back to the compound he had thrown away all but one clip for the .45 and had fired the gun once. It would not be good to have to explain to the premier why his gun was unfired and full of ammunition!

“Okay,” Szabo said, “good work. I’m glad you got out.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Williams breathed a sigh of relief. He felt he had dodged a bullet. And, indeed, that was probably close to the truth. A bullet or a spike.

Szabo summoned Duyvill to the war room.

“I don’t know who the attackers were,” Szabo said, “but that little bastard was among them—and our friend Beverly. Whoever they are, they are professional soldiers, not beginners.”