by Evan Currie
*****
Pearl Harbor
Klaxons sounded from one end of the harbor to the other as every military vessel, and many more besides, were a maelstrom of activity in preparation for leaving port. The Two Ticonderoga cruisers currently stationed in Pearl had already left, steaming out into the Pacific at flank speed and damn the port rules, while the CVN 81 Doris Miller and its carrier task group wound up.
Sonic booms filled the air as the Tsunami warning alarm went off, but most people were already moving so the confusion on shore was minimal.
Hawaii was a place well used to military presence, and the people who lived there knew that you ignored alarms at your own risk.
On board the Dory, Rear Admiral Morrow looked out over the flight deck as F35Cs and Bs were rolled into positions for scramble lift if needs be.
Morrow was having a hard time believing the brief he’d received, but orders were orders, and after the news of San Francisco hit the net he knew too well that people would want some kind of action in response. Any action would be preferable to none as far as the politicians were concerned, and that meant that he’d be sending his boys out one way or the other.
I just hope we can figure out who is behind this, He mused darkly as the big carrier practically purred under his feet. Otherwise, we could wind up with another Middle East debacle on our hands. Last thing any of us need.
Morrow was all for military action, mind, he just didn’t like the subterfuge that politics entered into things. Not the subtle maneuvers of the spy game, nor the covert actions of SOCOM, but sneaking and twisting words to fool your own people… that just rankled.
“Admiral, we’re ready to move out.”
“She’s your ship, Captain,” Morrow addressed Captain Stacy Kinney as she approached, “Don’t mind me. I’m just here to make sure the task forces all point in the same direction.”
“Yes sir,” The Captain nodded with a, very, slight smile before turning away. “Clear the lines and take us out. Dead slow!”
“Dead slow, Aye!”
The gentle purr of the Dory’s electric turbines increased to a feeling of barely restrained power as they took up the strain of the big ship and they began to slowly move.
Morrow left the operations to the Captains and Crews of the Task Force. He was more focused on the telemetry data he was receiving from JPL in Houston and NASA’s satellite constellation above them.
Four of seven objects had now been accounted for, two down in Florida, one in San Francisco, and one in the Pacific. Three more were still coming, passing over their position in short order actually.
They had those three on instrumentation, two of them were well out of the range of even the SM3 anti-satellite missiles loaded into the Mk41 launchers available to the task force. For the moment they were heading for coastal China, India, and possibly Israel, though it was difficult to say at this point.
Morrow knew that the Gerald Ford Task Group was currently in the Med and was heading for Israeli waters at full steam. The H.W. Bush was in the South China sea and would be getting as close to the Chinese mainland as the Chinese allowed.
Just how close that would be was going to be fun for the crews of the Bush Task Group, he suspected, but that was someone else’s problem. His problem, for now, was to get every ship to sea just in case the impact of the object in the pacific was enough to raise a significant wave, and then to get to the crash site and begin investigations.
People barely knew what was going on, but they already wanted answers on this one.
Answers, and blood.
*****
Chinese Coast
People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Captain Shyo Tam strode onto the bridge of the Liaoning. The aging aircraft carrier was coming to life with every step he took, and while she was old, he had faith in his crew and his ship.
“Report.” He said simply as he arrived, eyes falling to the RADAR screens that were tracking…
His eyes widened.
“Are those ballistic missiles?” He snapped, jerking around sharply.
“Unknown, Sir.”
He turned to his second in command, “What do you mean unknown? Those are tracking orbital ballistic trajectories, are they not?”
“Yes sir, however they were part of a group detected by the Americans some hours ago, entering Earth orbit from beyond the moon,” Commander Myo Shi said, “Four of the objects have made entry, falling in the United States and causing some damage to at least one city. One is on course to land in our region, the other two are likely to land in India and Israel or somewhere in the Middle East.”
“Meteors?” Tam asked, mind whirling.
Potentially both worse and better than a nuclear strike, depending on the size of the objects. At least he wasn’t dealing with the first strike of a world war.
“Perhaps,” Shi answered, “I spoke with the representative from NASA who was made available to explain the situation…”
Tam nodded, unsurprised. Shi had applied to, and was accepted into, China’s space program. That made him a likely contact point for that sort of exchange.
“She seemed… uncertain,” Shi went on. “I am confident that the Americans are holding something back, but it seems like even they’re not certain what this is.”
“I suppose we shall have to test out air defense missiles for real, then,” Tam said with a shiver of both dread and excitement.
Since the Americans had shown that taking out ballistic targets and satellites was possible, China had of course been pursuing the same level of technology. They had deployed quite a number of weapons that were, in theory, up to the task. How well that theory would play out in the real world, however, was up for much debate.
“The Americans reported that they intercepted one over their west coast with very little effect,” Shi said with a stony face. “Unfortunately, the objects may be too solid to be broken up with kinetic projectiles.”
“That is not good news. Do we have better options?” Tam asked, thinking about his question even as he voiced it.
“Not as such, no.”
“Then we will go with what we have, and hope we have better luck than the Americans.” Tam said firmly. “Put us to sea as soon as possible. I will not have the Liaoning struck down in port if worst comes to worst.”
“Yes Captain, we have been but waiting your orders.”
*****
The PLAN taskforce was moving at full steam, heading up the coast toward Beijing when their tracking systems picked up the target. It was hurtling through the atmosphere, well above their maximum engagement ceiling, but dropping fast.
“The target is on course for a land strike, just outside Beijing, Captain.”
Tam grimaced, knowing that a strike anywhere near Beijing was going to kill possibly hundreds of thousands of people and destroy a substantial piece of China’s infrastructure.
“Calculate interception vectors,” He ordered, “I want multiple calculations, with margins for error. We will stagger our response.”
“Yes Captain.”
Unfortunately, Tam all too aware that the Chinese missiles were not as precise and accurate as the American Standard Missile Three. They did have the advantage of being noticeably more powerful, an attempt by the designers to make up for that particular shortcoming.
He could only hope that the added power would be enough for them to do what the Americans could not.
Stand or fall, He knew that his crew could do no less than give everything for the people they served.
*****
USS Seawolf
The Seawolf was approaching the Chinese shore, just under the surface, running ahead of the HW Bush Task Force to act as both security and scout. With her periscope up, they were moving at better than thirty knots, and making no real attempt to hide the presence.
“We’ve got launch from the Red Task Group, Captain,” Lieutenant Kim called from the Sonar station, where he was standing watch over the work being done by the two
Petty Officers on duty. “They just started flushing what looks like every bird in their boxes.”
Captain Thomas Goad nodded, unsurprised as he twisted slightly to shift the periscope as he stared through the system.
“Got em. Nice fireworks,” He said a moment later, watching the plumes of fire reach up into the dark sky, arcing away. “We have that patch from the AWACS yet?”
“Yes sir,” Commander Jason Bird said instantly, “Just came through.”
“How does their track look?” The Captain asked, curious for both professional and humanitarian reasons.
He certainly didn’t want to see Beijing wiped off the map by some chunk of rock, or whatever it was, from the sky… however the opportunity to see just how accurate the Chinese answer to the SM-3 was not something to be passed up either.
“So far so good.” Bird responded, “Hard to be sure until we have contact, though. Contact in T-minus twenty-three seconds.”
“Understood.” Goad said, “vector to target?”
The commander called out the number automatically, and Goad turned to observe as the countdown continued.
At one, he pulled back slightly from the periscope, just in time to protect his eyes from the flash in the sky.
“Analysis!” Goad ordered, “What’s going on?”
“At least some hit, sir, AWACS is trying to confirm target destruction…. Wait, damn it! It’s still coming.”
Goad hissed, This is a nightmare. What the hell are we supposed to do?
He wasn’t the sort of main who hesitated, however.
“Prime our birds for launch,” Goad ordered.
“Captain, we’re out of position, we’ll never get a hit,” Bird said with a shake of his head.
“Just prime them,” Goad said firmly, entering a formula into his system.
“Aye sir.”
*****
PLAN Ship Liaoning
Captain Tam couldn’t quite keep in the groan as their systems cleared and they were able to see the object still coming, and still on course. They’d hit it with everything they had, and the damn thing just grinned at them and kept coming.
“Stand by the guns,” He ordered, knowing it was useless but unwilling to entirely give up just the same.
“Captain! Missiles!”
“What? Where?” Tam twisted, eyes widening as he spotted flaming tracks in the night sky from the south. “We don’t have anyone down there! Glass!”
He put his hand out, accepting the late generation NVDs that were automatically dropped into his hand, and brought them to his eyes. With the missile tracks to follow back, it wasn’t hard to spot the source.
“An American submarine,” He said as he found the distortion in the water, and wake caused by the elevated periscope. He supposed that he should be grateful to the Americans, they were trying at least, but he knew they were out of position.
Tam lowered the glasses, eyes turning back to the live track as the missiles closed on the target.
“Miss!”
The crew groaned, most of them had probably thought there was a chance, but Tam knew better. Hitting a ballistic target coming straight at you was hard enough, striking one as it moved laterally across your range was all but impossible.
“Second missile… miss!”
Even knowing that, though, Tam couldn’t help but feel his heart sink with his crew with each pronouncement.
“Thir- Hit! Hit! They hit it!”
A flash of light lit up the sky, far enough out that the thunderclap would be seconds before it arrived, but Tam just stared.
Maybe the Americans have better guidance systems than I believed.
“Target still descending! Fourth missile… miss!”
The fifth also missed, and the sixth. The seventh, however, slammed home like the third, and it was then that Tam realized what the Americans were doing… or trying to do, at least.
“Calculate the course of the object,” He ordered. “Give me it’s impact point.”
“Yes Sir…” The RADAR man looked confused but followed orders. A few seconds later he no longer looked quite so confused, but he was certainly surprised. “Captain, impact point is now… North of the city. In the farmlands.”
Tam slumped.
In the farmlands.
It would still kill dozens, perhaps hundreds. That close to Beijing, light population density was a relative term of course, but it was going to miss the city.
Tam felt a deep gratitude to the American submarine Captain, something that came with a flash of irritation.
He did not like owing them anything, after all.
*****
White House Situation Room, Washington DC
“Well that’s the China contact down,” Parsons said tiredly. “Two more to go.”
“That was quick thinking on the part of the sub commander, Admiral,” Strand complimented the man. “Relay my admiration if you will.”
“Yes sir, Mr. President. Two hits out of ten birds, though,” Parsons grimaced, “Bad odds. Especially without getting a kill.”
“Worry about saving lives, not missiles,” Strand ordered. “Congress will love to sign a new spending bill that includes military contracts for their states. It’s getting them to spend on anything else that’s the problem.”
“Yes sir.”
“What’s the news out of Florida?” Strand asked, shifting focus now that there was a little time before the next target would come down, somewhere near India.
“No contact yet from within the blast zone,” Parsons admitted. “Marine helos went down hard, we’re trying to re-task a couple surveillance birds to check on them but so far we’re blind.”
“Damn it, I want to know what the hell happened down there, Admiral. I need to know.”
“Understood, Mr. President. We will make it happen.”
*****
Chapter 7
The world was pain and bruising when Sandra deigned to re-enter it from the black pit she’d been cast into. One brief moment of that sensation made her instantly wish for the oblivion of unconsciousness again. Unfortunately, her body refused to release her back from the world, and so she groaned and tried moving her limbs.
“Easy,” A deep voice said. “You’re pretty banged up. Make sure nothing is broken before you try moving much.”
Sandra opened her eyes, looking up at the face that sort of blurred into focus above her. The Asian man was looking down at her with some concern, framed by blinking lights and whisps of smoke.
She tried to speak, only to have another groan come out, then stopped and took a breath before trying again.
“What happened?” She asked finally, with slow and deliberate pronunciation.
“shockwave hit us,” He said, shrugging. “small tsunami.”
“Tsunami? We’re in the Glades! That’s impossible.”
“Nothing is impossible with the right application of force,” He said with an amused snort, apparently deciding she was fine enough to split his attention as he turned to examine some of the flashing lights. “I’m mostly guessing, cause the instrumentation on this thing is shit, but an emergency pod on full burn can plow into the surface with more than enough force to shift a few million tons of water.”
Sandra gasped, hand flying to her mouth.
“What? What’s wrong?” He looked back at her.
“What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” She babbled, “My entire years’ worth of work was probably destroyed by whatever stupid government project you work for, and you’re asking me what’s wrong? And do you have any idea how much you’ve probably messed up the local ecology!?”
The man snorted, seemingly amused.
“Trust me, that’s the least of our concerns right now. Also, it wasn’t the government, I’m sorry to say. Now let me try and figure out how we’re getting out of this thing, ok?”
“What do you mean, how we’re getting out?” Sandra demanded, “Open the hatch!”
“That hatch?” He asked dryly, po
inting at the floor.
Sandra looked down, then up, and with slowly dawning horror she realized that everything around her was upside down.
She turned to the man she absolutely didn’t know, begging. “Please tell me that our only way out of this oversized hamster ball isn’t buried underwater in the mud of the Glades?”
“Sorry.”
“I’m going to die in a hamster ball,” Sandra moaned, slumping to the floor, “With some guy who’s name I don’t even know.”
“I’m Ben.”
“I wasn’t talking to you.”
Ben shook his head but went back to trying to read all the screens with them upside down. He frowned, reaching up to hit buttons a few times, then finally sighed loudly.
“Well,” He said slowly, “bad news is that I do not think we’re going to flip back over on our own.”
“We were supposed to?” Sandra asked.
Ben rolled his eyes. “They designed these things to self-right in case of water landings, so yeah we were supposed to. I’m guessing that we must have dug in pretty hard when we stuck the landing.”
“Is there any good news?”
Ben grimaced, waggling his hand in the air, “It’s a mix really. We have an option, but it’s not a good one.”
Sandra closed her eyes, “What is it?”
“Blow the hatch.”
“How is opening the hatch, under water, an option?” She demanded, exasperated.
“I didn’t say open the hatch, I said blow the hatch.”
Sandra had another sinking feeling, “And by blow, you mean…?”
“With high explosives,” He said, “The bolts holding it in place are wired with focused explosives, I think they’re called shaped charges here? Anyway, they’ll detonate outward, blowing the hatch off… well, usually what’s what would happen. In this case, I’m hoping they’ll blow us off the hatch.”
She just stared at him, “You’re joking.”
Ben didn’t say anything.
“You have to be joking!”
“Sorry,” He said, nodding to an upside - down bolster seat built into the side of the pod. “You might want to strap in.”