INVASION: UPRISING (Invasion Series Book 3)

by Dc Alden

  Ahead of them, runway lights blazed into life. Throttles were pushed to their stops, and Doolittle’s engine exhaust ports glowed blue as it cleared the artificial roof and accelerated towards the mouth of the valley. Ten seconds behind it, Hornet did the same, rocketing along the tarmac. A few moments later, the Raiders were airborne, wheels up, and climbing into the freezing night sky.

  Within seconds, they were lost to the naked eye.

  A moment after that, they were lost to the world.

  The Hilton Newcastle Gateshead Hotel was located on the southern bank of the Tyne River, between the Tyne Bridge to the east and the high-level railway crossing immediately to the west. Before the invasion, it was an establishment popular with shoppers, wedding parties, and professional footballers on a night out, and one of the few hotels to have escaped the violence and destruction as caliphate forces had descended on the city prior to the border war. As they’d returned defeated, still the hotel had remained untouched, commandeered instead as an upmarket accommodation venue for the caliphate’s more senior army officers. Throughout the occupation, it had maintained its status, although now most of its guests were traitors and quislings from the Regional Assembly, including senior local cops who policed the city by consent of the caliphate.

  ‘A den of vipers,’ Roz muttered as she shut off the van’s engine. None of the seven armed and masked men sat behind her said anything. There was no need, because Roz was merely stating the obvious. Newcastle was a divided city, split between those who had embraced the opportunities the fall of Europe had presented, and those who had no choice but to deal with it. The former group comprised local politicians, business people, and civil servants, most of whom had asked how high when told to jump by their new masters. But not all.

  In the weeks after the border war, some had rebelled against the invaders. To the horror of most decent Geordies, those rebels were executed on the pitch inside St. James’ Park football stadium, along with several dozen captured British soldiers. The authorities had removed the goalposts in front of the Gallowgate stand and replaced them with a row of thick wooden stakes. That day, 123 men and women were shot, and those few hundred local citizens forced to watch had never forgotten. Roz had been one of those witnesses and had seen her husband’s torso ripped apart by the firing squad’s bullets. Jed’s mum and dad had been murdered too, a tragedy that had brought them together. Only death would part them now.

  Roz leaned over the wheel of the van, her eyes roaming the night outside. She’d parked beneath an arch of the Tyne railway bridge, unseen in its black shadows. Between the arch and the hotel, a wintry wind drove silver sheets of rain across the service area. The security lights were few, and staff smokers were nowhere to be seen, which didn’t surprise Roz. They were probably too busy servicing the meeting that was being held in the Windows on the Tyne restaurant on the top floor of the hotel.

  The governor of the North-East Territories had gathered his assembly of traitors together, no doubt to address their concerns. Ireland had been liberated and Alliance troops were landing in Scotland. The frontier was only eight kilometres away, just beyond the former Newcastle International Airport, now a sprawling military camp. North of that installation lay the oceans of razor wire, the fields of land mines, the surveillance towers, and the hunter drones. In the dark hill beyond that, the forces of freedom were gathering. The traitors knew it too. And they would be worried.

  ‘They’ll be well pissed by now,’ Roz muttered, looking up at the top floor of the hotel. Rain fell through the roof lights.

  ‘Alright for some,’ grumbled a man behind her. ‘I haven’t had a drink in three years.’

  ‘That’s about to change,’ one of the others told him.

  Roz checked the clock on the instrument panel. Almost 11 pm. It was time to move. She turned in her seat. The seven men in black assault vests, ski masks, and armed with M4 carbines, waited for the resistance leader to give them the nod.

  ‘You know what to do,’ she told them. ‘Jed will give you the signal.’

  She pulled up the collar of her dark raincoat and slipped out of the van. The passenger door opened and Jed climbed out too. Roz held an umbrella aloft, took the ten-year-old’s hand and headed out of the shadows and across the rain-swept service area. Ahead of them were the security doors, handle-less and sealed against the elements. Roz peeled away and Jed ran towards them. She got down on the soaking tarmac, her legs and arms sprawled. Jed’s small fist pounded against the security doors.

  ‘Help!’ he yelled, his voice almost drowned by the rain.

  He kept thumping. After a moment, light flooded the service area. Roz heard a gruff voice. ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘It’s me mam, she fell over! Please help her!’

  She heard the security guard swear, heard his shoes splashing through the puddles towards her, and then he was kneeling by her side. ‘Are you all right, luv?’

  He turned her over. Roz jammed a pistol under the man’s chin. ‘If you want to live, keep your mouth shut and do exactly as I say.’ She got to her feet and forced the guard towards the doors. Jed was flashing a torch towards the bridge, and seconds later, the van pulled up sharply by the service entrance, the armed men piling out and streaming into the hotel. Roz jabbed the gun in the guard’s spine. ‘Move.’

  Her people moved fast, breaking up the security guards’ poker game and disabling the fire alarm and telephone systems. Inside the security suite, the terrified night shift were relieved of their phones and shoved at gunpoint into a store cupboard. A can of petrol was poured across the floor around their feet, soaking their shoes and trousers. Roz warned them to say and do nothing or they’d burn to death inside the locked room. Roz could tell by their faces they believed her.

  With their escape route secured and young Jed watching the CCTV with a radio at the ready, she led the others out into the corridor. They waited silently as she checked her phone. This is it, she realised, the moment we’ve all been waiting for. Her heart thumped as her eyes flicked between the signal bars of her mobile phone and the clock on the wall. The second hand flicked up towards the hour. Roz waited, her chest rising and falling fast.

  The clock struck 11 pm. She looked at her phone.

  No Signal.

  She held it up for the others to see. ‘And so it begins.’

  Roz tugged down her ski mask and moved quickly towards the service lift. They crammed inside, and one man stabbed the button for the Windows on the Tyne restaurant. They cocked their weapons and flipped off their safeties as the lift hissed upwards. Hearts beat fast, including Roz’s. She thought of her husband then, her beloved Brian, his face ashen beneath his blindfold, her name the last word screamed from his lips before he died. She’d loved him dearly and missed him every day. She gripped the pistol in her hand as the lift slowed, the spike of raw emotion now smothered by a cold, vengeful fury.

  Because tonight there would be a reckoning.

  Tonight, the uprising would begin.

  Henri stabbed the starter button and brought the powerful diesel locomotive into life. His crew had spent most of the day checking the train, the air lines, the couplings, then chatting, smoking, and pissing against trees in the surrounding woods where the guards patrolled, watching for dog walkers and ramblers.

  Finally the call had come. The broken-down engine had been cleared from the tunnel, and now that the sun had set, Henri’s train had been given priority by military command. Ahead, through the driver’s window, the distant signal light glowed green.

  ‘About time,’ Jean-Michel said, releasing the brake.

  Henri felt the diesel engine shudder as the forward motion rippled along the 700-metre-long train behind him. Wheels spun on well-worn tracks, then bit. Black smoke belched, and the train started to move. Henri slid open the window and watched as the distant munitions cars rumbled through the darkening forest. All its lights were extinguished, and as the driver’s engine cleared the trees, empty fields stretched away on ei
ther side of the track. On the horizon, a thin band of blood-red sky was all that remained of the day. Nightfall was upon them, and the darkness was their friend. That’s what Henri told himself, though he knew it to be a lie. Instead, he focussed on the task ahead.

  ‘Eight kilometres to the tunnel entrance,’ Jean-Michel reported.

  Henri checked the routing screen. ‘They’ve reduced our transit speed. It’ll take us around 50 minutes to get through.’

  Jean-Michel nodded, then said, ‘You think if this lot blew it would bring down the tunnel roof?’

  Henri felt his stomach lurch. The thought had crossed his own mind, but he was no engineer. Besides, they were safe beneath the sea bed, at least until they cleared the tunnel. ‘Let’s just worry about getting to our destination.’

  ‘Have you ever been to Banbury?’

  ‘I’ve never heard of it.’

  ‘A guard told me it’s the biggest munitions dump in Europe. If you ask me, there’s going to be trouble. I heard a rumour that—’

  ‘I don’t want to hear about rumours,’ Henri snapped. The co-driver gave his boss a Gallic shrug and studied the track ahead. Henri softened his tone. ‘Let’s just deliver our cargo and get back home, okay?’

  ‘You’re the boss, boss.’

  The train clattered toward the unseen tunnel complex somewhere in the distance. Before the invasion, the Eurotunnel terminal could be seen for miles at night, its giant cluster of arc lights visible from space. Now it was a world of shadows and bristled with mobile anti-aircraft guns and SAM batteries. Henri watched one such unit sliding past his window, some sort of tracked vehicle parked behind a nearby farmhouse, its pepper-pot launch pod pointed at the night sky. It wasn’t the only one Henri noticed as the train made slow but steady progress towards the terminal.

  ‘You okay, boss?’

  ‘We’re approaching one of the biggest strategic targets in Europe,’ Henri told him. ‘You should be worried too.’

  ‘It’s not been hit in three years. I guess the English don’t want to cut the cord either.’

  ‘That doesn’t make me feel any better,’ he said, searching the night sky through his window. Then he saw the hillside looming out of the darkness ahead, the gaping circular entrance to the westbound tunnel marked by green lights. Henri slid the window open and leaned out. Maintenance engineers stood in ghostly groups by the tracks, watching them. They wore hard hats and overalls, their faces barely visible. They reminded Henri of mourners, gathered by the graveside as the train descended beneath the earth.

  Another omen. Henri swallowed. He slammed the window shut.

  ‘You worry too much,’ Jean-Michel told him. ‘Besides, you can’t exactly refuse to do the job, right? Not unless you want to be sent east.’

  ‘Don’t talk like that!’ Henri snapped again, but he knew his co-driver was right. Refusal to serve the caliphate often resulted in deportation. Where those people ended up, God alone knew.

  The track ahead sloped towards the tunnel, and then the engine was inside, the roar thundering off the smooth concrete walls. Two hundred metres ahead he saw the tunnel all lit up, and Henri finally relaxed. He knew the tension would build again once they reached Folkestone, but at least there was some respite from the danger. They were on the last leg of the journey, and as far as Henry was concerned, the most dangerous. The British were arrogant and rebellious, and the only force in the whole of Europe who’d stopped the caliphate army cold. Maybe word had reached them that a huge shipment was coming their way. Maybe they planned to attack his train somewhere between Folkestone and Oxfordshire. So many unknowns.

  The track ahead continued its downward angle, and Henri looked out of the window again as the tunnel swallowed the train. He caught a final glimpse of the French night sky.

  He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d never see it again.

  19

  Advance To Contact

  The night sky was clear of enemy eyes. Instead, the troops on the ground were being monitored by their own satellites and orbiting drones, watching over them like the ancient gods of Olympus as they swarmed through the broken streets of Morpeth.

  Mac led Three Section through unlit alleyways and abandoned housing estates, where walls and fences had been dismantled to speed their passage. At crossroads, intersections, and other choke points, military policemen waved glow wands, demanding their silence, urging them forward, wishing them luck. They moved swiftly across the railway tracks and onto the industrial estate at the edge of town, the frigid night air alive with the drum of booted feet, the rustle of clothing, the rattle of equipment and weapons.

  As he jogged behind Steve, Eddie noticed more destruction here, more burned out vans and warehouses, and then the night sky disappeared beneath a ceiling of thermal panel netting suspended between the buildings. Eddie saw it then, the dark entrance ahead, the shadows of Charlie Company vanishing inside its gaping mouth like plankton sucked into a giant whale. Moments later, he was crossing the threshold.

  The interior of the warehouse was unlit, and a road of rubber matting marked with green luminous discs absorbed the rumble of their boots. The air reeked of mud and metal, and Eddie glimpsed giant machinery looming in the shadows of the warehouse, industrial monsters covered in rust and dirt. There were more MPs ahead, waving more glow-wands and guiding them down a wide tunnel that dipped beneath the earth. Harsh whispers ordered them to keep moving, stay in your groups, no talking!

  All Eddie could see were helmets bobbing in the darkness, from wall to curved wall. He could feel himself sinking lower beneath the earth, but the sensation didn’t bother him. In fact, since the mission brief, he’d felt elated. No, wrong word, he cautioned himself. Relieved. That was it. And he wasn’t the only one. That feeling wouldn’t last though, he knew that.

  They kept moving, ever downward, hundreds of soldiers in front and behind, the whole of the Second Mass. After a couple of minutes, he saw a bright white light ahead, and then the ground beneath their feet levelled out. As it did, the rail terminal came into view, a huge cathedral of light and concrete that arched over their heads.

  The pace slowed as the Second Mass filed up onto a wide platform flanked by monorail lines that stretched for 200 metres towards the distant tunnel. They’d been told to expect a marvel of engineering. Those expectations were duly fulfilled.

  They moved along the platform, staying between the bright yellow safety lines. Logistics Corps NCOs wearing orange vests directed the troops towards the far end of the terminal. Eddie saw a huddle of senior battalion officers, decked out in full combat gear and helmets, talking in hushed tones as they consulted data tablets. Colonel Butler was among them, arms folded, head nodding, his eye-patch barely visible beneath the grey and black streaks smeared across his face. On the walls, huge blue arrows pointed towards the far end of the platform, and stencilled words encouraged the soldiers to Keep Moving! Observe Noise Discipline!

  Halfway along the platform they slowed, finally rippling to a halt, and Eddie found himself standing just behind the yellow line. He looked down and saw the raised steel line, the concrete floor beneath spotted with oil and pools of dirty water. Along the crowded platform, he saw Alpha Company to his right, HQ Company to his left, everyone else crammed in between. Beyond the HQ lads, hundreds more soldiers were streaming out of the darkness of the down-ramp and crowding onto the platform. That would be the 216th Pennsylvania British Volunteers, Eddie knew. Somewhere behind them would be three regiments of the US Army’s 2nd Infantry Division, all of whom would roll through this tunnel during the night.

  ‘How far down d’you think we are?’ he heard Digger whisper.

  ‘Couple of hundred metres at least,’ Mac said from the corner of his mouth. ‘This place is something else, ain’t it?’

  ‘It’s a get-out-of-jail card,’ Steve agreed.

  ‘Keep the chatter down,’ a voice said somewhere behind them.

  Eddie looked to his right. There wasn’t much to see other than t
he string of faint blue tunnel lights that seemed to stretch into infinity. After a moment, he felt a gust of warm air on his face, and digital wall displays began flashing: Caution! Train Approaching.

  ‘Here it comes.’ Steve pointed, and Eddie saw the blue lights being swallowed by something dark that filled the tunnel. The breeze picked up then, swirling around the 800 men of the Second Mass, and then the driverless train was whistling into the terminal, towing dozens of open flat-bed cars behind it. The train slowed, then stopped. A low hum filled the station.

  ‘It’s a Maglev,’ Eddie told them, watching the train ripple as it bounced on the magnetised air of the rail beneath it.

  ‘Fast and quiet,’ Mac said. ‘Just what the doctor ordered.’

  The orange vests directed everyone aboard the flat-beds. Eddie scrambled over the side and moved across to the far side of the open carriage before sitting on the thick rubber matting. Digger dropped in front of him, his assault pack between Eddie’s legs, then Steve and Mac, until they were squeezed in tight. The carriages filled quickly, and Eddie saw Butler again, joined by the RSM, walking along the carriages, chatting quietly, slapping a few shoulders, exchanging a few brave smiles. He’d be there, with them, once they were back on the surface.

  On the wall, departing signs flashed.

  ‘Here we go,’ Digger said.

  The orange vests stepped back behind the yellow line. Then the train was moving, almost silently, leaving the station behind as the tunnel crowded in around them. Eddie’s ears popped, and he felt himself sinking as the train accelerated and the tunnel dipped further beneath the earth. The walls flashed by, blue lights flicking past at speed. Twenty-one kilometres long, Eddie recalled the OC telling them, a journey of roughly 25 minutes. It was the sweetest train ride Eddie had ever experienced.

  The wind whipped past them as the train hummed almost silently through the tunnel. The blue wash of light that filled the tunnel suddenly changed to bright yellow, and they all knew what that meant: