Doomsday Warrior 07 - American Defiance (21 page)

“Oh indeed, sir, ah knows,” Rufus said.

“So, just think of us as a few extra tourists—taking in the sights. We’ll be dining and playing cards with our Russian friends here.” Rock smiled at a heavily bemedaled officer who returned the gesture with a thin lip twitch of his own. “So I want all of you to relax and act normal. This is just another trip—and I’m sure we’ll all become fine friends by the end of it.” The crowd of black porters squeezed in the aisle could hardly believe their ears. The things the man was saying—were strange. Still, his calm manner and slow relaxed way of talking seemed to cool them out, and their eyes lost their fear-fired panic.

“Well now, dat soun’s jes fine, Mr. Rockson,” Rufus said, beaming. “An’ I hope we kin make your journey a pleasant one dat you will rememba wit fond memories in de future.”

“Now, I’m sure my men are all starving. Hijacking trains really builds up an appetite. So, why don’t you serve them—and of course any of these Russian gentlemen who would like something.” The Reds, who had been disarmed by the Freefighters and were now strapped into their seats with belts, looked on with insane expressions on their sweaty faces. They had never felt so humiliated in their lives, and burned with both a hatred for Rockson and the realization that they had to act civil, even nice, for the next forty-eight hours or the man might kill them. Their faces seemed to actually jerk, the eyebrows throbbing, noses sniffing rapidly like rabbits, the lips trembling with repressed rage. Yet there was nothing—not a thing—they could do. They were to be mannequins for the rebels—things placed in the windows to make it all look real.

Lieutenant Boyd quickly perused the menu and exclaimed, “Mates, they’ve got beer!” A cheer that shook the walls went up from the twelve Aussies in the car, the rest off guarding other parts of the train. “Course it ain’t no bloody Foster’s . . . but still, good ol’ Yank beer. Let’s give it a try.” The Aussies quickly ordered up a bottle for every one of their men, asked the porters to take the brew to the other cars—and then they scanned the menu, trying to decide just what to have.

“Recommendations, Rock?” Boyd asked. “I can’t make kangaroos or koalas out of this blasted piece of paper here.”

“As the man said,” Rock replied, touching the petals of the roses rising like little suns from the vase on the table, “the veal Prince Orloff is definitely the special of the day.”

The fighters felt wonderful after the meal of some of the best food they had ever eaten—and from the fact that they had survived the assault. Things for the moment were going their way. The entire force changed into spare Russian uniforms so that they too could sit at the large picture windows and look at the world passing outside. But their guns were out, always trained on the Reds around them, though they knew that the Russians in this particular crop were too high up, too powerful, to risk their necks.

Detroit didn’t say a word, but rose after his meal and headed back to the kitchen. He walked through the floor-to-ceiling swinging doors and into pure chaos as the black porters raced around getting their orders together, cleaning dishes, and preparing the next meal even as the last one was being consumed. He found Rufus giving directions to some of the others for taking food on to the other cars. Detroit waited a moment until the old man had finished and then spoke up.

“You and me gotta have a little talk, pal,” the black Freefighter said. “In private.”

“Is de service not to yo’ likin’, sir?” Rufus asked with a deeply worried look on his face.

“De service is jus’ fine,” Detroit snapped back, mimicking the man’s speech. “It’s just you and all these other men here that’s the problem.” Rufus led Detroit through a narrow door and into the kitchen’s refrigerator, which was filled to overflowing with the best produce and meats.

“What the hell are all of you acting like goddamned idiotic slaves for? Don’t you know that slavery died with Abraham Lincoln?”

“Maybe there’s more to all this than meets the eye, Detroit,” Rufus said in perfect unaccented English. “Maybe there are other levels of operation going on that you know nothing about.” The Freefighter stared at the head porter with shock.

“You—you can speak fine.”

“He walks, he talks, he cooks, he shines Russian shoes—and he hears things. Things that he passes onto an underground network in Washington. How the hell do you think all you glory boys out in the sticks are getting the intelligence that you so readily put to use without even asking where it came from?”

“I—I—” Now it was Detroit’s turn to get flustered. He was barely able to speak.

“Hell, man, you think I wouldn’t love the chance to get out there and put my hands around a rifle butt and shoot some of these bastards? Do you have any idea what it takes—what we all go through to act out these ‘nigger’ roles so the Reds have no inkling what’s really going on? I go to my bed some nights, and Detroit—I got tears. Tears that won’t stop flowing because I feel so humiliated. And you know what I do so I don’t end up feeling as if I’m becoming the way these Reds see me? I read, man. Read everything I can get my hands on so that
I
know—if no one else does—that I am an educated, civilized man. Those pigs out there know nothing beyond stuffing their mouths and then heading into the bedrooms with the whores that are stocked for the journey. I—
I
have read Shakespeare, Dickens, Chekhov—all the great minds of literature. No, Detroit, it is I who am the master—the master of my own fate—while those outside will soon crumble into the dustheap of history.” He paused, wiping sweat from his lined brow. Then he looked Detroit squarely in the eyes. “There—I’ve said my piece. Any more questions about niggers?”

“I’m sorry,” Detroit answered, his head bowing slightly, as he couldn’t meet the gaze of the suddenly powerful personality of the man. It was horrible, terrifying, the black Freefighter thought, to submerge every bit of your personality—to grovel beneath the heels of the barbarian—all the while knowing who you really are. That you are a thousand times more evolved than those you must serve.

“There’s nothing I can say, obviously,” Detroit mumbled. “I—I salute you, sir.” He stood at attention and threw up a stiff right hand in salute to the head black man.

“Oh, cut the crap,” Rufus said. “We’re all in this together. I’m not angry at you. If anything, I should be flattered that you care enough to get angry.”

“Are the other porters the same—I mean, all spying, risking their lives?”

“Every blackfaced one of them,” Rufus answered.

“Well, now I know. I’ll tell the others so they don’t think—”

“Don’t tell a soul,” Rufus exclaimed, pushing his old face toward Detroit’s. “If your men know and even one of them lets on—even by accident—then our whole cover is blown here. Every one of us is finished, along with the Freefighters’ most valuable source of intelligence in the entire country. We know what we’re doing. Every man here chose to be here—didn’t have to. What others think about us is of no concern. What we
do
here—that is what matters. No one can know—ever.”

“I could learn a lot from a man like you,” Detroit said, sensing the depths of the head porter.

“You already have, son, you already have.”

They headed out together back into the kitchen, where Rufus immediately took on his role again.

“So’s you like de cut o’ meat I showed you, sir?” he asked, rubbing his hands together. “You want I serve de best to you and Mr. Rockson. Well, dat’s jus’ fine. Dat be our li’l secret.”

“Our little secret,” Detroit mumbled, acting disdainful and walking away. But as he saw the idiot masks all the porters had had to turn their faces into, he felt as if his heart were going to burst. He bolted toward the door so he could get out of there fast.

Rockson sat at the empty end of the dining car as the rest of his men laughed and pulled out cards at the playing tables in the smoking room. They grabbed handfuls of medals from Russian chests to bet with, and went hard and heavy at five-card stud. Good, let them relax, Rock thought. The worst was yet to come—and they all knew it. He sat back in a plush recliner, touching a dial on the side so it slowly lowered him until he was lying almost horizontal. He turned and looked out the window at America speeding by. He was used to being down there in the bushes plodding along, but from here the view was vastly different. The countryside flew by in great patches like a jigsaw puzzle of beauty and death. Fertile fields filled for miles with rainbows of flowers, animals, birds. Then stretches of nothing, just as long. Grayness, flat broken earth that had taken direct hits, and still, a century later, was unable to bring forth life. Occasionally a towering crater rose in the distance, a monument to the madness and stupidity of those who had ruled the world a hundred years before.

It angered Rockson whenever he thought about the old days. How could they have been so insane—all of them—the Russians
and
the Americans? Hadn’t they seen where it was all heading? The legacy they were going to leave for all future generations to come. And now they were all gone—every one of them who had brought on the Great War. And it was Rock and his men who would spend their lives fighting—and dying—to put the pieces back together again.

Eighteen

T
he Silver Bullet sped like an arrow through stop after stop as angry Russian officers shook their fists at the passing train. But the communications officer under the constant guns of at least two Freefighters just kept sending out the same message.

“Priority One, the Silver Bullet has been ordered by President Zhabnov personally to head for Washington without making another stop.” With the foul-up in communications around the country because of Killov’s nationwide attacks, they got away with it. The KGB colonel was aiding Rockson’s passage—without knowing it. The porters served them meal after incredible meal so that every man in the squad put on at least ten pounds within the first thirty-six hours.

At the end of their second day on the train, Rock got a call on the train’s intercom. It was Reston, still driving the damned thing without a break.

“What’s up?” Rockson asked.

“According to this computer thingamajig that’s been feeding out our coordinates and speed, we’re gonna be hitting the outskirts of D.C. in about two and a half hours. Just thought I’d let you know. Better start getting things together back there.”

“Will do,” Rock said. “How’s it going up there?”

“It’s going,” Reston answered with a laugh. “Thanks to this mountainman Archer. He seems to like shoveling the coal into the furnace—watching it glow. I gotta slow ’em down so we don’t take off the tracks.”

“All right,” Rock chuckled. “I’ll let you know just what the plans are.”

He got the rest of the team together and went over their options.

“First of all, we gotta get rid of all these Reds here,” the Doomsday Warrior said. “They’re just going to get in the way, to say the least, when we get to D.C.” The Reds’ ears rose at the words and they began clamoring for mercy.

“Don’t worry, boys,” Rock said coldly, “no one’s getting killed—maybe just a fast ride out the door.”

“I got an idea,” Detroit said, not naming the source. “Why don’t we strip ’em and put ’em in mailbags? There’s pick-up hoists all along the way. Might be a fitting farewell to unwanted baggage.”

“I love it,” Rock said. “You want to run the show?”

“Better believe it,” the black Freefighter grinned. “Ah jes loves to send my Christmas packages home early.” He got some of the other men together and, taking the Russian officers five at a time, they prepared their little special deliveries. First they stripped them down to their underwear, then tied them up and squeezed them into the spacious mail and delivery bags that filled the mail car of the train. They found they could pack three of them in at a time, though the accommodations were a bit on the small side. They got the first bag together and rolled it toward the open sliding door of the car.

“There, I see one coming up now,” McCaughlin yelled with gusto. Detroit took the wide hook attached to the squirming package of human mail and reached far out the door, grabbing onto a handhold on the side. The train shot past the hoist at nearly 60 mph, but Detroit was just able to throw it out and over the even larger hook waiting for it. The reinforced nylon bag shot out of the door like an overstuffed meteor, and the Freefighters poked their heads out the side to see it swinging wildly back and forth, nearly ten feet above the ground.

“What a wonderful thing,” Chen said, watching the proceedings with his arms folded across his chest. “And we don’t even need stamps.”

Over the next hour they loaded up every one of the Reds into bags and sent them flying out the side via the Russian postal service. They spun wildly, legs and arms kicking within their confinement. The thought of what would happen when these top brass were found in such compromised situations made the Freefighters break out into laughter again and again. They had probably just ended more Red Army careers than they had in most of their shooting battles.

Rock had decided against taking the train all the way into Washington. Even with uniforms on, the bluff would be too risky. Detroit had found out from the porters that there was a huge junction of tracks from all over the country about ten miles outside the capital, with miles of track and countless wrecked and abandoned trains among which they could hide. Still not wanting the porters’ true natures to be revealed, Rufus slipped Detroit all the information they needed, making him promise every time not to tell where he got it. Rockson was indeed curious about where all their intelligence was coming from, but he took one look at Detroit’s face when he posed the question and didn’t ask again.

With the hand-drawn maps of the juncture, Reston was able to chart his way among a spiderweb of tracks and slowed down to 25 mph, since many of the side rails were old and rusted and groaned beneath the weight of the passing train. At last they found a nice little niche for the Silver Bullet between two mile-long freight trains, their wheels turned to squares over the years, but their basic frames still intact. Names like Southern Pacific, Union Pacific, Southern Rail, and Great Northwest could still be read on the sides of the long boxcars, their doorless insides empty but for insects and mice. They were like ghost trains of eons ago. Days when America was overflowing with wealth and agriculture, days when thousands upon countless thousands of these landbound cargo ships roamed the nation’s rails, bringing her bounty to every citizen. Days the Freefighters, for all the reading they had done, could hardly imagine.