Luther's Wars

"It's the honor graduate knife for the school."

She smiled. "Honor graduate. Wonder what Mrs. Wilson woulda thought of you bein' an honor graduate of anything?"

"They didn't do a lot of spelling tests." Luther chuckled. "And snakes were just somethin' else to eat there."

Mae nodded just a bit, feeling his fingers brushing through her hair. She shifted back against him. "What's it like out there?"

"Out where?"

"Where you been. I ain't been any past Saint Louis til now."

He shook his head. "You don't want to hear about that. War is ugly. Better off not knowing."

Her mouth twisted curiously. "That's funny, what with all this. Not the war, but you been places. Real places."

"Well... I went through Hawaii. You'd like that. Every day is like a warm spring day, and it seems like you can smell flowers everywhere you go."

Mae smiled wistfully. "I always wanted to be that girl in those magazine ads, you know? The girl in the bikini with big sunglasses drinkin' somethin' outta a pineapple." She tilted her head a bit. "They really do that? They really make them drinks in pineapples?"

"They do."

She sighed in wonder.

"I could do that. It'd be amazing." She closed her eyes for a long moment, imagining the sun on her face. "I really could."

Luther glanced over at the clock. "We have about two hours before we have to go."

"We might make it." Mae turned her head and smiled wickedly. "Might."

*****

Mae tried to casually sort through closely packed racks and bins of used clothing; some ragged uniform pieces, some not-quite-as-worn civilian clothes. Old shopping carts full of baby and children's clothing blocked some of the narrow aisles in the dark store.

A tiny stone-faced Asian woman at the antique cash register watched her like a statue. No movement at all, not even blinking her cold, dark eyes.

Luther paused at a bin of worn jungle boots then turned to the woman at the cash register. "I'm looking for Bugs."

She stared at him for a moment, then tapped the bell on the counter. Once. The sound of the bell hung in the air for a moment, then died away.

The world hung in silence until a display of clothing on the wall slowly slid aside with part of the wall, and a tall, lanky man in a fringed buckskin jacket slunk in, nodding to the beat of some unheard music. It took Mae a moment to realize he had purple beads threaded into his long hair, beard and mustache.

Luther stared at him for a moment. "Are you Bugs?"

"Like, who's askin', man?"

"Luther McCabe."

The hippie frowned for a long moment, then slowly shook his head once, his mouth twisted in concentration. "Nah, I don't know nobody with that name."

"Jerry Shriver says you do."

A wily, almost feral look crossed Bugs' face, but the look was gone in a flash. "Groovy."

He nodded to the girl at the desk. "Sunny, we need a lunch break."

Wordlessly the girl seemed to float with eerie grace to the front door, locked it and put a "Closed for Lunch" sign up in the window.

Bugs picked up a random jacket and studied it for a moment. "You know where Shriver is now?"

"Nobody knows where Shriver is."

When Bugs put the jacket back down, Mae realized he'd been using it to conceal a large handgun. He tucked the gun into the back of his jeans and sighed.

Bugs' smile twisted sideways. "Yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death..."

Luther's mouth tightened in a grim line. "I will fear no Evil for I am the meanest motherfucker in the Valley."

"Far out. You know some names and you got the words, Man. Your girl there righteous?"

Luther glanced over at Mae. "All the way."

Bugs nodded slowly. "Cool. Sunny... Thanh is good too..." He trailed off, lost in thought for a long moment.

Luther looked at Sunny. "Ch� o em."

The girl pressed her hands together and gave a slight bow.

"She doesn't talk much, you know?" Bugs shrugged haplessly. "What are you looking for?"

"Hardware. Some incendiaries, some demo."

"Heavy stuff. You throwin' a party?"

Luther nodded. "Got some pests to deal with, you know how it is."

Softly smiling, Bugs pursed his lips. "Who were you with?

"LRRP, 82nd Airborne... but we were loaned to MACV-SOG OP-35 when they came up short. Nearly a year in Central. SALEM HOUSE."

Bugs stared through the wall for a moment. "I was with the 5th Hunter Killer Detachment. Heavy, major heavy shit, man. Started out with Civilian Irregular Defense Group, CIDG, Mike Force, then we went all the way down the fuckin' rabbit hole. I was supposed to be the unit clerk, but the Old Man had a rule, he said 'everybody fights, nobody sits at home.' He even went out. A for-fuckin'-real Full Bird, walking slack. Crazy shit. You work with the Little People?"

Luther stared at the floor for a long moment. "We did. Had a Kit Carson scout, worked with the Nung, then Khmer Krom mercs...mostly...probably all dead now."

"Far out." Bugs shook his head in wonder and amusement, then looked at Sunny. "You got the door, Babe."

For just the briefest moment, Mae saw a genuine smile light the petite woman's face as she gave a single nod. Somehow, a hideous stamped-metal submachine gun appeared in her hands, wire stock extended, ventilated sleeve-covered barrel questing toward the door like a hungry animal.

Bugs gave an approving smile, then gestured toward a wall covered with secondhand dresses. "This way." He gripped a rack of clothes and slid a part of the wall over.

Luther and Mae followed him through the door into a small room lined with lockers and metal cabinets.

"So, like, I've got some AN-M14 TH3 incendiary hand grenades and some M-183 demo charges -- each one of those has sixteen M112 block demolition charges at one and quarter pounds of C4 each, det cords and boosters."

Luther nodded. "Ten of the incendiaries, four of the satchel charge kits."

Bugs blinked slowly, "That's some serious pest control, man."

"I have a lot of pests."

Tilting his head, Bugs gave a slow blink. "Ka-fucking-boom. Sounds like it might get a little crazy. I got an M2 and a couple.45s I can throw in."

*****

The Chickasaw. Oklahoma

*****

Johnny Williams walked out of the Chickasaw gas station, taking a sip. Coke was a dime a can at Charlie Clearwater's but, for an extra dime, Charlie put a shot of whiskey in it; not great whiskey, but good enough.

He stopped as he bumped into somebody. "Hey..."

A heavyset woman stood stock still, frozen in front of him, staring at...

He felt the heat on his face, and his voice trailed off as he looked past the woman, a loud crackling, hissing sound coming into focus.

The semi-trailer was completely engulfed in flames, long tongues of orange, yellow and blue, reaching thirty or forty feet into the sky as thousands of gallons of hundred-proof corn liquor burned.

He gaped wide-eyed in horror, then took a very long drink. "Fuck, Bill is gonna be really pissed."

Johnny seriously considered running for California, all those stories of sunshine and bikinis secondary to the fact that it was about as far from Bill's reach as he could get.

One look in his wallet killed that idea. Johnny didn't figure he'd get very far on twenty-two dollars and thirty-five cents.

He blew out a long breath and headed back in to see Charlie about using his phone.

As pissed off as Bill sounded on the phone, Johnny didn't really have to worry.

By the time Johnny Williams managed to get a ride to the bus station and take the long bus ride to Jefferson City, Johnny was the least of Bill's problems.

*****

Jefferson City, Missouri

*****

"Four goddamn trucks. Four. Goddamn. Trucks. The Chickasaw...Memphis...Nashville...Chicago." Big Bill Cooper pushed his hands through his hair and looked up at the ceiling. "Who the fuck is it? Who burns that kind of money instead of stealing it?"

He frowned at Tom, his "money man."

"Another outfit. A big one, maybe somebody out of Saint Louis?"

Bill pondered for a moment. "Maybe, but they'd want a cut. They'd talk first, not just hammer us like this."

"Maybe they're making a point first? Then come up later to talk?"

Bill started to respond but stopped when his desk phone buzzed three times in the code he'd given his secretary for absolutely critical calls.

He picked up the phone. "Yeah. No...you have got to be fucking kidding."

Slamming the receiver down, he stood up and strode out to the outer office, Tom trailing behind him.

Through the massive picture window, he could see a column of black smoke growing on the southern horizon.

Tom cocked his head. "Isn't that about where...?"

"Yeah, that's it." Big Bill Cooper's countenance was grim.

"Jesus, that's thirty percent of our production."

*****

Route 22

*****

"Keep yer faces down. Don't try to squirm outta those blindfolds. Hate to have'ta kill y'all fer being curious."

"You know who you're stealing from?" The courier tried to sound angry, but he and his two bodyguards kept their heads down; a single long burst from the M2 carbine had both chewed the car engine to hell and convinced them that they'd best comply with the masked figure.

Not that they had a lot of choice once he'd tied their arms and legs.

The whole incident had happened so quickly the courier couldn't quite get it straight in his head. Just as they'd come to the t-intersection, a dead black car had pulled to a stop right in front while behind them, a pickup truck had stopped bumper to bumper with them.

"Hell, Big Bill will never even miss this." Luther pulled the last canvas bag from the back seat and backed toward his car.

******

McCabe Farm. Devil's Hollow, Missouri

******

Thirty minutes later, Mae stared at the open bags. "What are we gonna do with it."

"Bury it. Hide it."

"This is more money than I've ever seen in my life."

Luther pushed it around a bit. "Maybe...two hundred thousand dollars, more or less?"

"I thought Ryan's notes said the courier carried a couple thousand dollars in pay-off money?"

"Musta been a special kinda day. Big Bill is gonna go off the rails."

"You thinkin' of givin' it back?"

"Hell no. We were gonna have to do this til we got his attention. I think we probably got it now."

Mae gave cocked her head to one side. "Where the hell we gonna hide it?"

"I have a place. Back in the woods behind the cabin, be hard for you to get back through those rocks until you have the baby, but nobody will stumble across it there."

*****

Jefferson City, Missouri

*****

"Goddammit." Bill glared around the room. "Do any of you have any fuckin' idea how much I've lost here?"

None of the men in the room met his eyes. The courier and his two bodyguards couldn't; they sagged unconscious against the ropes holding them in their chairs. Bill had stopped short of killing them, mostly because he didn't want to explain to his wife why he'd had his nephews killed. That didn't excuse the mistakes or prevent the beating, of course.

"Who the fuck is doing this? Does anyone have any fucking idea?"

Kevin Cooper stood up slowly from a chair by the wall. "He said the man had a serious hick accent?"

Bill started to ask the courier then stopped when he saw the man was still out cold. He slowly nodded his head. "That is what he said."

"Black car?"

Duke looked up from where he was washing the blood off his hands. "You thinkin' it's that McCabe fucker from down there in Saint Clair?"

"Black car. Hick accent."

"That fits about half those fucking hillbillies down there, but ain't a lot of 'em crazy enough to do this."

Bill eyed them. "You sure?"

Agent Cooper shook his head. "Can't be certain, but he's got more than enough reason to come after us. He's crazy enough to do it, and he was in the Army, so he might know how to get into our production facilities and make the bombs to blow them up."

"You have a line on him?" Bill frowned.

"Maybe."

Duke snorted. "Fucker is cagey as hell. Probably shoot you with a rifle the second you rolled onto his land."

"One of my guys saw him with one of the Parkers...said one of the girls, the pregnant one, was with him the night we took down Robert Parker."

"Give it a couple weeks or so. Take a couple guys." He gestured at the unconscious men. "Get my damn money back and make him disappear."

******

McCabe Farm. Devil's Hollow, Missouri

******

"Who's 'Estrada?'" Mae looked up from her plate. When they'd finally returned from South Carolina, she'd just dragged her bag of clothes out of the car and tossed her suitcase into his bedroom. It was clear she wasn't planning on leaving.

"Where'd you hear that?"

"You talk in your sleep. Usually, after you been drinkin'. Estrada, Squelch, Two... There's some guy named Charlie you don't seem to like very much."

Luther stared down at his coffee. "Guys I knew back in Vietnam. Staff Sarn't Estrada was our team leader, Squelch Thomas was our radioman and Thiệu...Nguyen Thiệu was a local on our team. Good men."

"You stay in touch with them?"

Shaking his head, Luther fell silent. Mae waited without comment.

Finally, Luther sighed and shifted. "I can't. None of them made it out."

"None of 'em?"

"Just bad luck. I should be dead too. We were in our base, pretty much safe, standing around and talking and a mortar shell hit right next to us. I lived because I had a loose shoelace. I knelt to fix it."

"Good Lord in Heaven, that's...awful." Mae reached over and grabbed his hand before he could pull it back.

"It's the way it is. It's war. Best trained, most experienced men in the world can be killed by bad luck."

Something flared in Mae's eyes. "Still ain't right."

Luther stared down. Her hand gripped his with white knuckle possessive ferocity. After a faltering moment, he slowly squeezed back and watched a light pass over her face.

Mae suddenly flushed red and looked down. She took a deep breath and slowly pulled her hand back. "I have to go an' see the doctor for a checkup tomorrow."

"If you want, we can ride together. I need to go into the courthouse anyways; gotta sign some papers for the farm."

Mae felt herself flush at the normality of Luther's statement, just the kind of thing a couple would do.Then, a moment later, she scowled at herself for being naïve. Just because they were sleeping together didn't mean anything. Flora had warned her that pregnancy hormones could make it hard to think straight.

*****

"I'll need two forms of ID. Please." The woman gave Luther a very bureaucratic smile.

Luther glanced at the "County Recorder Clerk" nameplate then stared back at her. "You serious, Cassie? You've known me since we were kids."

"Rules are rules, Luther." Cassie held his stare with a hint of wicked joy.

"So... I'm guessin' I should apologize for breakin' off datin' with you like I did..."

Cassie gave a wide tight-lipped smile. "That's a start." She held up her left hand, displaying her wedding ring. "But just a little late. Missed your chance."

"I was drafted you know."

"Doesn't explain the little blonde girl you was making out with two days later, does it?"

"I..." Luther shrugged and let his statement trail off.

Cassie straightened up slightly. "All water under the bridge, Luther. That was years ago. And we wasn't really official-like or anything."

"Thank you, Cassie." Luther relaxed.

She gave an understanding nod. "So... I'll need two forms of ID..."

It was nearly a half hour later before Cassie decided she could accept Luther's discharge papers as identification and allowed him to walk wearily out of the courthouse.

A single glance at his truck told him Mae wasn't there; one cup of coffee later at the diner, he decided she must have been held up at the clinic.

As he walked the three blocks to the clinic, Luther sorted through the papers declaring him to be the sole owner of the farm.

Luther shifted warily as a truck rumbled to a slow stop in front of him. A man he didn't know warily leaned out the window, keeping his hands in sight. "You need to get in the truck."

"Why would I do a damn fool thing like that?"

"Look at that four-door over across the road."

One glance at the car was all Luther needed. Mae sat sandwiched between Duke and...Agent Kevin Cooper. Duke grinned at him from the driver's seat.

Luther grimaced. The man nodded sympathetically. "You have a gun?"

Shaking his head, Luther slowly lifted his shirt up and turned around.

"Good enough. Get in."

Luther gave a single nod and walked slowly to the passenger door.

The driver glanced at him as he opened the passenger door. "I don't have a gun. You do anything to me, they just take her, and she and the baby die bad. That'll be your fault."

In the reflection in the car window, Luther saw a redneck looking asshole with long greasy hair walking up behind him, but didn't react. It wouldn't help Mae at all.

He felt the shock of impact, something heavy and metallic cracking across the base of his neck.

*****

Sledgehammer Mission Support Base HEAVY DROP, Republic of Vietnam

Staff Sergeant Estrada shook his head as he studied the odd plum-colored bowie knife. "RECONDO Honor Graduate. The Captain owes me a twenty."

Squelch snorted. "That was a sucker bet. Captain had to know better."

"He might have had a couple drinks." Estrada gave a mock-innocent shrug.

"You bet him I was gonna be the honor graduate?" Luther raised one eyebrow.

"Sort of. I bet him you'd either be the honor graduate or be thrown out for disciplinary problems."

Luther chuckled. "That seems fair."

"Pretty good odds either way."

"Sucker bet." Squelch laughed.

Estrada nodded. "I figured you'd do fine. You always have an ace up your sleeve."

"Always." Luther tucked the knife in his boot."I got myself some great new ideas. Gonna give Charlie pure hell."

*****

McCabe Farm. Devil's Hollow, Missouri

*****

Another kick slammed into Luther's rib cage, making him curl into a tighter ball as he tried to choke in air.

Agent Cooper drew back for one more kick. "Where's the fucking money?"

"Fuck you."

Cooper paused and squatted down by him. "I'm ending your family line right here, right now. I shot your fucking brother. Roy over there held a pillow over your mother's face, then burned that house down with her in it. Figured we needed to make a point. Nobody would know for sure, but everybody would feel it. You're going to die, and she's going to die. All you can do is make it easier on both of you."

An evil chuckle drew McCabe to look across the small room where the long-haired guy with the shotgun was holding Mae by the fireplace

"Hey, Duke, you ever have a knocked-up bitch before?" The long-haired guy gripping Mae's hair gave McCabe a nasty grin before looking at the huge man.

Duke smiled a broad, vicious smile. "Not yet, Roy, but this one looks just about ripe."

Luther looked up from the floor, blinking blood from his eyes. Mae stared listlessly back, a distant, sad look. For a long moment, she looked lost, like she'd just given up. Hopeless.

Duke half-turned toward Mae, a lurid, cruel expression darkening his face.

No. This wasn't fucking happening. The thought crawled over Luther as he bared his teeth and began to coil himself.

A flicker of recognition lit Mae's eyes.

No. This wasn't fucking happening. Mae could feel Luther's rage, just as she felt Roy's grip on her hair loosen, just a bit.