The Rabid Brigadier (25 page)

And somewhere inside him, inside the pain and the disgust at so much death, inside the deep depression that he could feel
threatening to overwhelm him from inside, Stone felt a certain dark joy that he had stopped the madman from turning America
into an endless concentration camp. As bad as things were, men were still free. Free to fight, free to forge their own slovenly
existences in the midst of the wastelands and the human predators. Hardly a chance in hell perhaps, but nonetheless, in some
indefinable but terribly important way, they were free.

Then he saw Elizabeth lying in the snow. And whatever slim slivers of hope had been coursing through his veins vanished like
a gob of spit in the hard ice-coated ground. She was prone, face forward in the white snow, her blonde hair spread out around
her head. She lay right where he had seen her last. Right where she had looked at him with those pitiful doe eyes and said,
“Come back for me, Martin Stone. Come back.” And even from several hundred yards off Stone knew she was dead. He could feel
it in every cell in his body and he felt a wall of tears start to rise up inside him.

Suddenly his face twisted into a grimace of sheer hatred. For as he watched, two black-jacketed bikers came roaring out of
the fortress gates and skidded to a stop just feet from her. He could see by the way they nearly fell from their bikes and
staggered through the snow that the bastards were drunk as skunks. They bee-lined straight for her, bent on having their sick
pleasure. Dead or alive, it didn’t matter to them. Didn’t matter if she was hot or cold, just fuck ‘em all like they were
human garbage.

Stone roared the Harley forward as he heard the bull terrier growling hard on the seat behind him. He shot down the icy road
heedless of going over, his mind filled with a boiling
rage that felt like his skull would explode right into the flake-filled air. He saw one of the bikers drop his pants and start
to lower himself down on her, but he never reached his sick goal. Stone’s fingers found the trigger of the .50 caliber machine
gun mounted on the front of the Harley and he held it down hard. The hail of screaming slugs tore through the air and struck
paydirt, flinging the half crouched biker backward through the air like a rag doll, his bullet-riddled body rolling over and
over in the snow. And as his pal reached for a nickel-plated .45, his eyes wide as saucers, Stone swiveled the bike slightly
and ripped the bastard in two, his guts spewing out over the pristine white ground, soiling it with a stench beyond death.

Stone skidded to a halt just yards from her and jumped off before the Harley had completely stopped, its auto kickstand snapping
out as an internal mechanism sensed the lack of weight on the seat. He rushed over to her and kneeled down by her side. And
slowly, almost unable to bear the feel of her cold flesh, he turned her over. She hardly looked real. More like a china doll,
a princess from some child’s storybook. Her cheeks were so white, white as the snow that surrounded her, her lips like fading
rosebuds that had dropped from the vine before they had ever reached their full beauty. Then he saw the small circle of blood,
starkly red against her blonde hair. Just under the right ear, a hole hardly wider than a pencil, the blood already frozen
over the wound so hardly any had poured out, just a few droplets on the snow beneath her head. It hardly seemed possible that
such a small hole in her flesh could have such terrible results. But Stone had been around it enough now to know that death
could enter through the smallest of doors.

Then he saw the note, a small piece of lined paper, protruding from her half unbuttoned jacket and his hand thrust
down, angrily ripping it from her body as if it were a foul and alien presence near her snow white skin.

Just a little thank-you note, Colonel Stone. You took what mattered most to me—so I take what is yours. But don’t think that
this evens us up. It doesn’t. If it takes the rest of my life, I will destroy you. Will follow you, will find you wherever
you flee. And I will kill you. Of that you can rest assured. And by the way, Stone, just so you fully comprehend the situation,
there are more missiles. The countryside is filled with them. Silos with my men ready to fire whenever I give the word. So
look over your shoulder, and look up at the sky, and look deep into every shadow. And never stop looking, because I’m hunting
you, Martin Stone. Hunting you until I find you, and send you into hell in a blast of atomic fire that will leave not a trace
of the greatest traitor that America has ever known.

General Patton III

Stone crumpled the note with such fury that his nails dug into his palm, leaving little tracks of red. Then he threw it far
into the frigid air so it landed near one of the still oozing bikers. He leaned down over Elizabeth’s motionless body and
mindlessly stroked her blonde hair over and over again.

“Oh baby, baby, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve this.” He moaned the words in a voice so low that even he could hardly
hear them above the wind-driven snow and the explosions that lit up the dark morning all around him. He remembered how warm
her body had been against his, how sweet her whispers of passion in his ear. And now because
of him, she was nothing. He felt as if he were going mad, a wall of hate rising in one part of him and another equally powerful
wall of infinite sadness welling up in another. And with tears dripping slowly from his eyes, falling down onto her pale cold
face and running down her cheeks, as if it were she who were crying, Stone whispered to her.

“I’ll find him, Elizabeth. If I die doing it, I will avenge you. I swear to whatever perverse god rules this sick world.”
But Stone knew the words were for himself and not her. For she could no longer hear a thing. And it took every bit of willpower
in his tired and racked body not to lie down in the snow beside her and go to sleep, forever.

A THIRD WORLD WAR HAS LEFT AMERICA A LAWLESS AND BATTERED LAND. BUT AMID THE PILLAGE AND HEARTLESS KILLING, ONE BRAVE YOUNG
MAN HAS BECOME AMERICA’S LAST HOPE FOR JUSTICE AND FREEDOM…

Deep in the scorched heart of the western plains a sinister new fighting force burns its way across the ruined country. Led
by a brilliant, twisted military genius, the New American Army plans to lead America out of post-nuclear darkness—and build
a fascist new order on the bodies of millions of slaughtered “undesirables.”

Now Martin Stone will face the ultimate test of his skill and nerve. His time is short; his allies few, and his only hope
is an army of his deadliest enemies. With them, he’ll confront one of the most devastating fighting machines the world has
ever seen—and race to stop a nuclear nightmare that could blow America’s future into smoking ash…

Martin Stone is

THE LAST RANGER

America’s Last Hope in America’s Darkest Age