by Rod Porter
“We find the front door and kick it in,” Troy said. “General Tanaka, the juicers and the other evolved forms of alien soldiers are, in fact, life forms, though, correct?”
“Yes, they are.”
“And what about the sentinels?” the Russian interpreter inquired for General Ibrogimov.
“They are machines also, but by no means any kind of conduit for the aliens. They have cockpits that need to be manned by an alien pilot. No different than any airplane or car,” said the Japanese General’s interpreter.
“We are going to use this intelligence as the basis for our first global attack,” Troy said. “I would like to hear everyone’s thoughts on that. I think it would be the perfect first strike to wipe out these drone soldier aliens.”
Arun Alekar, the General of the Indian resistance, decided it was time to offer his two cents. “If the soldier aliens are being controlled from afar, that means they are controlled through some kind of signal. All we have to do is trace it and take out the source. My people and I can get that done.”
“Well, then,” said Troy. “I propose that exterminating the aliens’ ability to use their drones be the primary objective of our first global attack. This will be a huge blow, something they will not see coming. All those in favor of this being the primary objective of Operation Hammer?”
It was unanimous.
“Good. Operation Hammer will commence worldwide two weeks after the source has been identified here in America and abroad.”
THE WAR ROOM
Operation Hammer placed Troy in a whole new role. At this point, the resistance was too large, too influential, and too important for Troy to risk his life in the field. He was the architect of a wondrous surge of hope that now flowed through humanity, a sense of hope that had not been felt since before the nuclear war. The War Room was where Troy would be doing battle. It had been under construction from the time Jackson was General, but it had mostly been a neglected project. The Unconformed had never been large enough to warrant a major command-monitoring center, but now they were.
The hour was late, and the room was dark and empty. Troy had been too infuriated to visit it before tonight. He wanted to be in the field with his troopers, in the heat of the action. This could be the biggest blow ever dealt to the creatures that invaded his planet and took everything he ever loved, and he was not going to get to fire one shot. He found comfort knowing that he had succeeded marvelously in the grand scheme of things, at least for now. Humanity would strike one blow from eight different countries.
The room had plenty of space and was designed in the shape of a large oval. Troy’s eyes wandered in the dim lighting, surveying the layout. In the center of the room was a massive table representing the globe, or more specifically the locations where the respective battles would take place. There were several models scattered about it, organized by group. The models represented the resistance forces and their enemies. They would be positioned on the table according to how the attack progressed. The rest of the room was made up of dozens of different kinds of terminals where technicians and radio operators would perform and monitor various operations. There were loudspeakers set up, so that every broadcast could be heard loud and clear.
Troy moved over to the table. He could not help but admire the models that represented their forces. There were small carvings of model planes, ground troops, tanks, and other vehicles. The enemy pieces were fashioned after soldier aliens, the evolved juicer soldiers, sentinels, and the giant crab-like beings, in case they should return. Other than that, there was no telling what they would be facing.
“Incredible, isn’t it?”
Troy did not think anyone else was in the room at such a late hour. He turned to see Demoskeena sitting in one of the conference chairs. Troy took a seat by the Prime Minister.
“It’s a hell of a room,” Troy responded.
“I’ll be honest with you, General. When I heard that General Anderson was going to be wasting time, money, and resources in the construction of some war center that we would never even need, that was the last straw for me. It was what motivated me to really commit myself to politics.”
Troy looked at Demoskeena with a knowing glance.
“Well, that and a few other things motivated me,” the Prime Minister conceded. “Now…this room will be essential to the way we are going to fight the enemy.” He had to laugh for a moment.
“I can’t believe I’m stuck here,” Troy said. “The fight is out there, not in here. I suppose there is nothing I can do about that. Unless, of course, you’d plead my case with the War Council that I be allowed to fight beside my troops.”
“Months ago, I probably would have. I don’t like you, Troy, and I know you don’t like me, but who knows, maybe that is why we’re so effective. This resistance, this government; Jade itself. It’s all much bigger than the two of us now. And whether I like it or not, you have achieved something remarkable. You might say that you’ve inspired some faith, even in me. So, no, I won’t take your side. The War Council, the Quorum, and Colonel Cartwright himself drafted the proposal that the position of General will orchestrate operations from inside the war room, and I sanctioned it. You are too valuable to be put in harm’s way.”
Troy could not believe the elder priest was speaking to him this way.
“I never would have thought,” Demoskeena continued, “that the level of hope that I see in the people today would ever return to us after the nuclear war and then the invasion. Like I said, you have made a bit of a believer out of me. And I thank you for allowing me to be present here when the attack begins.”
“It’s your right,” Troy said. “You’re the head of the government. You need to be here.”
“I wonder if you would allow me to bless the room tomorrow with a prayer before we attack?”
Troy regarded the man. “Sure,” he said.
With that Demoskeena stood and headed for the door. Troy felt a little uneasy with the whole situation. Never had Demoskeena and Troy ended any kind of consultation on good terms.
“Don’t worry,” Demoskeena said when he got to the door. He could sense Troy’s unease. “We’ll be back at each other’s throats in no time.” He nodded reassuringly and stepped out of the room, leaving Troy with his thoughts.
OPERATION HAMMER
“…On Earth as it is in heaven.” The entire war room was organized in a large circle. They held hands as Demoskeena recited the holy prayer.
“Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. Amen.”
“Amen,” the room responded. Then everyone looked to Troy.
“Take your stations,” he said, stone-faced. No one could tell that under his composed demeanor, he was nervous as hell. He looked meticulously professional. The civilians of Jade had worked hard on the new uniforms for the Global Resistance, and the soldiers were pleased with them overall. The flag of Earth was patched into the right arm of every uniform. As a general Troy had four stars that rested authoritatively over his shoulders. His hair was neatly groomed and his uniform spotless. Shoes shined, clean-shaven, he had wanted to set the example of professionalism for the rest of the troops. There was a massive flag of the Planet Earth tacked on to the back far wall of the war room.
The war room was filled with dozens of operators and a select group of resistance officers that represented not only America but the other affiliated nationalities. The other generals were back in their own countries, seeing to it that things ran smoothly on their end. Everyone checked their positions and terminals before looking to Troy. They were all waiting for him to give the order to commence the attack.
It was a straightforward plan. Several enemy bases had been scouted on each of the involved countries. Because the aliens believed humans to be no credible threat, their above-ground complexes had been easy to survey. Ground forces would launch assaults on their respective enemy str
ongholds. The ground troops, in all involved countries, would be supported by tanks and Armored Personnel Carriers (APCs). This first wave of attacks on the enemy bases would be a decoy for the real objective of the mission: the location and destruction of the soldier aliens’ transmitting source. A handful of covert op teams were scattered about the affiliated countries as well. While the large-scale battles at the enemy bases captured all the attention, these covert teams would raid several locations believed to be operating stations from which the aliens controlled their drone soldiers. Once these teams were inside the stations, they were to trace the source of the signal in their respective regions. Once the source locations were identified, they would be relayed to the appropriate command centers. Upon verification of the coordinates, teams of Falcon and Hawk attack planes would be dispatched to destroy the source locations, nullifying the aliens’ use of the soldier alien robots. The covert teams were under orders to extract any alien prisoners they could and get them safely back to headquarters.
It was assumed that there would be some change in the alien tactics back at the alien bases once they realized their soldier drones were of no more use to them, but there was no way to tell for sure. One bonus about this operation was that it would not directly expose the aliens to the resistance fighter jets. The mission code word was Jackson, and as soon as it fell from Troy’s lips, the attack would get underway.
Troy felt as though his heart would explode through his chest when he uttered the word. Two very specific thoughts went through his head right before he inflected the two-syllable name of his former friend: one, that the mission would succeed, and two, that they would not sustain overly heavy casualties.
“Jackson,” he somehow managed to get up and out over his tongue.
As soon as he said it, the war room buzzed with activity. Operators spoke into their headsets. Officers shuffled the pieces and began to organize them on the massive table that served as the map for the battle. There were voices and transmissions playing over the various speakers in the room.
“Ground forces approaching designated targets,” the lead-relayer for the operation announced to Troy, Demoskeena, Colonel Cartwright, and the several officers who would be monitoring the situation at the board table. An aide advanced the pieces that represented the ground forces around the world and moved them into position on the board that depicted the various enemy compounds.
It was nerve-racking hearing garbled updates over the loudspeakers of the fighting that was going on, but Troy and company would have to wait for a designated period of time before they could launch Phase Two of the operation. Phase One was the initial assault on the compounds, and all teams needed to check in that they were engaging the enemy and having an impact doing so. Only then could Phase Two be implemented. There was no point in progressing unless the first phase of their attack was going to be able to put up a sustained effort that would buy the ops teams the time they needed to accomplish their missions.
The waiting was horrible. Loud broadcasts of troops screaming, explosions, gunfire, commands being yelled, and the like filled the war room for a good twenty minutes, which seemed like twenty hours. The ground troops were raising hell and the support from the tanks and APCs had given them the advantage. Troy and the other Generals knew that their forces were heavily outnumbered; there was no way they could keep up the fight indefinitely. The covert teams would have to be fast, and the Falcons and Hawks even faster.
To no one’s surprise, Delta had been given the lead role as the main covert op squad in the American side of Operation Hammer. Joining them were two members from the British resistance, one from the Russian, one from the Mexican, and another from the Chinese. The ground troops in the operation were kept in the same national groups for the most part, but it had been a point of interest that the covert op teams be represented by a variety of cultures. Perhaps they did not trust one another unconditionally yet, Troy had considered.
Recently promoted Sergeant Michael Mac Roberts was now the commanding officer of Delta squad.
“Any word, Sarge?” Trigger Jenkins asked.
“Nothing yet, Corporal,” Mac responded.
“Shit.” Balls was getting antsy. “Ground forces launched their attack almost a half hour ago. That’s plenty of time to get things started.”
Balls was correct, but Sergeant Mac was not going to let him know it. He had learned a lot from watching Jackson Anderson and Troy Williams operate things. “We sit tight. We’re not going to get a second chance at something like this. If we go in premature, we could blow the entire op. The ground teams will come through. In the meantime, check your weapons and ammo.”
“We checked them a million times already, Sarge,” Nick Eagle Dodds offered.
“Then check them again. And verify your maps and extraction points. Any of us get separated, I want to make sure we all make it back to the LZ. No one gets left behind. We should have prisoners to move, and that might slow us down.”
No one could argue with that. In the meantime, they would have to lay low in the rocks and foliage. The particular operating station that Delta was sitting on was close to a range of low mountains and forest. Jade’s best hacker, Dante, was accompanying Delta to trace the drone signal. Perhaps the location had something to do with having a strong signal, he had pointed out. Security around the station was thin at best. There was nothing standing guard but some kind of four-legged creature. It resembled a large dog with two heads. The beast could definitely have its way with ten men, just not ten men with automatic weapons. L-Man could easily dispatch the alien guard dog with his sniper rifle when the time came to move in.
Back in the war room, the sounds of combat resonated in the air. The aides and officers frantically moved the pieces about the map as updates about the status of the first wave of the attack were reported. Transmissions over the speakers were garbled and chopped-up at times, but the majority of them sounded positive.
“Bravo reports heavy machine gun fire off that ridge…”
“Tanks and APC’s concentrate fire on coordinates alpha, lima, alpha, bravo…”
“Captain Manson! We need your squad over at rally point Echo. We’ve got a hot Landing Zone that needs cooling so we can bolster support for reinforcements by chopper!”
Troy’s uniform was already soaked through with sweat. Having to listen to these exchanges over the speakers and knowing he could do nothing about them was one of the worst experiences of his life. It seemed like an eternity before all ground forces finally reported that they were dug in and holding their own.
“Broken Arrow!” yelled one of the operators.
Troy exhaled when he heard the code word that gave the go-ahead for Phase Two of the operation.
“Relay Broken Arrow. Relay Broken Arrow,” Troy said through deep breaths.
The relay finally came over Delta’s radios.
“Okay, guys,” said Sergeant Mac. “Broken Arrow. Let’s rock and roll. L-Man, you got the target?”
“That’s a roge,” came the static reply over Mac’s radio.
“Take it.”
The alien guard dog was dead before it hit the ground. Taylor Lance was not regarded as the best sniper in the resistance for nothing.
Back in the war room, the aides moved the pieces that represented the covert op squads onto the board. Phase Two of Operation Hammer was now in effect.
Delta converged on the station. It was no more than a regular house, unusually simple and small for the aliens. Half of Delta set up at the back door, the other half at the front. In unison, they breached both entries. Sergeant Roberts led the charge through the front door. Immediately they met a horrifying stench. The inside of the building resembled some kind of slimy, pulsating nest. The floors had their own pulse and appeared to be alive. What looked like large eggs, each the size of a small child, were situated throughout the room coated in films of bile and sludge. The squad headed for the stairs on the far side of the room.
There were noises com
ing from the upper level of the station, but they were totally alien to human ears. Mostly a bunch of guttural sounds and screeches. Delta ascended the stairwell with their weapons drawn. They kicked in a single door and were totally surprised to be standing in one large room, which seemed to house no aliens. Then they saw that the room enclosed a series of pods that were somehow fused into the walls. The pods were shielded in the front by thick layers of glass. On the opposite side of the glass, inside the pods, were-presumably-the invaders in their true form. They appeared to be either dead or asleep.
“God, they’re hideous,” Trigger said. Everyone else silently agreed with her.
They appeared similar to giant insects, rather like a praying mantis. They had several limbs and what appeared to be wings partly folded across their front. The only thing remotely organically familiar about them was their faces. The only parts that could be identified were their multiple eyes and mouth. Two long sharp fangs protruded from their upper rows of filed teeth. Their eyes were closed.
The team hacker Dante spoke up. “This must be how they operate the soldier aliens. These chambers must link them to the soldier drones. Putting them in some kind of suspended animation.”
“With the first wave of attacks across the globe, I bet all of these things are plugged into their roaches,” said Doc Patterson.
“They’re even more disgusting than I’d imagined.”
“Stow the chat, Delta, we’re on the clock.” Sergeant Mac assumed control of the situation. “Dante, you’re the techie. Can this suspended whatever it is be interrupted? Command wants prisoners.”
“Most likely,” the tech responded. “While I’m tracing the source signal, I’ll have to do a diagnostic scan to be sure. Interrupting the state could kill them, or send warning that we’re here.”