“Right,” Joshua agreed, thoughtfully. He might have joined the father of two girls, both of whom were entering their teens and knew it, but it wasn’t as if he had much in the way of money. He’d kept most of what he earned safe in his apartment, where the IRS and other busybodies couldn’t find it. There wasn’t enough to make it worth taking special precautions. “I think you’d better get moving fast…”
Another burst of light, high above, illustrated his point. A moment later, a streak of light appeared from space, racing down towards the planet, striking… somewhere kilometres to the west. He wondered, suddenly, if that was where Fort Hood was located; there was a flash of light in the distance, followed suddenly by a long rumble of thunder. More flashes in the distance caught his eye and he found himself wondering, suddenly, what was under attack. Had the aliens gone after everywhere? Was Austin the last city left on Earth?
It was silly, he knew, but in the air of unreality surrounding the entire war, it was easy to believe that they were alone in the world.
“Yeah,” Mr Adair said. “Do you want to come with me?”
“No, thank you,” Joshua said. Banding together, along with the others in the apartment, probably wasn’t a bad idea; one of the permanent inhabitants had even started a neighbourhood watch and encouraged the other residents to stock up on guns, just in case. At the moment, Joshua wondered if he’d been precognitive, or just paranoid. The media had been full of stories about collapsing gun control programs everywhere as the reality of alien contact sank in. “I’ll stay and watch…”
An hour passed slowly. Shelia, one of the other residents, appeared with a flask of hot soup, which she distributed around to the residents. Joshua hadn’t realised that they’d been joined by five others, including two children, but he was grateful for the soup and for the quiet buzz from the radio one of the others had brought. It was a more powerful model than his own, but despite constant channel sweeps, they heard very little. The static — or, he suspected, the jamming — seemed to be everywhere.
It cleared, suddenly. “All designated emergency personnel are to report for duty at once,” it said. Again, the voice was almost impossible to recognise under the static, but it sounded like the FEMA manager he’d interviewed once in the wake of a building collapse in the city. “All FEMA volunteers are to report to their local emergency centres; all others are advised to stay inside and off the streets…”
There was another burst of static. High overhead, he heard the sound of an aircraft, racing towards… what? A wink of light flared up and a streak of flame fell towards the ground, coming down somewhere to the east. This time, the explosion was smaller and he found himself praying that the pilot had managed to eject before the sudden destruction of his aircraft. He hadn’t been a big fan of the military, but watching the death of the aircraft reminded him that they risked their lives so that people like him didn’t have to risk theirs. The pilot, male or female, had deserved better than to die like that…
“They’ve bombed San Diego,” the radio squawked suddenly. “The death toll is in the millions… the entire harbour has been destroyed!” The voice changed suddenly. “We have an unconfirmed report of an aircraft carrier ablaze and sinking off the Atlantic coast.” It changed again, again and again, each message vague, unconfirmed, and panicky. “The President is dead! My God; they bombed Washington!”
Joshua gasped and heard the others gasp as well. It had been fashionable to bitch about Washington, to complain about the IRS auditing good Americans, about the FBI wasting time playing politics when they should be protecting American citizens, about fat cats outsourcing businesses to places that didn’t have labour laws, or starting wars in far-off countries for their oil… but… but it was Washington! He hoped — he prayed — that it was a lie, or even a mistake; he didn’t want to face the possibility that it might be real. No one did.
Shelia came over to him and sat beside him. “If the President is dead, then who takes over?”
Joshua shuddered. “That would be the Vice President, in theory,” he said. He didn’t think much of the Vice President and knew that others shared that opinion; he’d only been given the role, or so they believed, because he had no embarrassing skeletons in his cupboard. “With all the disruption of communications… God alone knows who’s in charge these days…”
Another piece of flaming wreckage fell towards Earth. He remembered, with a sudden flash of dark humour, the end of Independence Day. The destruction of the alien mothership had produced the same effect, even though the mothership should have sent enough wreckage crashing down onto the planet to make it completely uninhabitable. More and more streaks of fire were burning up in the atmosphere; he found himself praying that they included alien wreckage, spacecraft destroyed from the ground, or even by the secret orbital defence systems that rumour said had existed for years. A brief flare of yellow-white light, like a bad version of a science-fiction laser, flared for a moment in the darkness, and then faded out. Whatever was happening up there was coming to a close.
“Damn it, they should be telling us what’s going on,” someone said, in the darkness. “We’re taxpayers, right? We have the right to know what’s happening!”
“I doubt,” someone else said, “that the government knows what’s happening right now. What are they supposed to tell us?”
The first man had no answer. “We now have confirmed alien attacks on almost every military and civilian airport within the United States,” the radio said, suddenly. “Alien weapons have struck them from orbit and the death toll is…”
The voice broke off, again. Joshua listened to the next two reports — and a bout of terrible elevator music — without fully hearing them. High overhead, the fighting seemed to have stopped, but the man with the telescope was reporting that there were still spacecraft moving high overhead. It was tempting to believe that NASA had launched the shuttles and somehow driven the aliens arrive from Earth, but Joshua had listened to enough NASA-bashing over the past three weeks to doubt that the NASA bureaucracy could organise a whorehouse, let alone a coordinated counterattack against alien spacecraft. The situation called for Will Smith, Arnold Schwarzenegger and a patriotic scriptwriter. All three were rather lacking.
“This is Governor Brogan,” a new voice said. Joshua recognised the man at once. The Republican Governor of Texas might not have been one of his favourite people, but just then he’d have welcomed George Bush, father or son. “The aliens have attacked the planet Earth…”
“Yeah, tell us something we don’t know,” someone jeered, in the semi-darkness. Dawn was coming, slowly. “You useless…”
Someone shushed him as the Governor continued. “I have no communication with the Federal Government,” Governor Brogan continued, “so I am declaring a state of emergency on my own authority.” His voice was growing stronger as he continued to speak. “The aliens have hit at least a hundred targets within Texas and, reports suggest, hundreds more within the Continental United States. I ask all civilians to remain calm and remain in your homes. Rioting and looting will be dealt with severely and perpetrators will be arrested and tried under martial law.”
A voice echoed out in the darkness. “Is that legal?”
“I don’t know,” Joshua answered. It didn’t sound legal, but he’d had enough experience to know that ‘legal’ was often just a matter of interpretation. The Governor probably couldn’t get away with ordering looters gunned down in the streets, but the police, National Guard and State Defence Force would have very liberal rules of engagement. “At the moment, he could probably get away with anything…”
“There is no cause for alarm,” the Governor said. There were some laughs from the small group. “So far, we have received no confirmed reports of any cities destroyed, including Washington. I was able to speak, briefly, to a member of my family in Washington and confirm that the city remains intact, although several nearby military facilities have been bombed from orbit. There is no reason to believe that the
aliens intend to start bombing cities. Normal services and facilities will resume as soon as possible; the power outrages will be brought to an end as quickly as we can. Please remain calm and remain in your homes.”
“There’s someone who isn’t listening,” someone said, nodding towards the outskirts of the city. A massive line of cars, vans and trucks was heading away from the city, heading outwards to an uncertain destination. Some of them would have friends in the countryside, others probably intended to camp out somewhere… and still others would have nowhere to go. “I wonder what the Governor will do about them.”
The radio was silent. Now that it had been brought to his attention, Joshua could hear the sounds of a riot coming from the inner city… and a handful of shots, fired by police or gangsters. It sounded like war had broken out on the streets; a line of police vans drove past the apartment, heading towards the riot. The noise of smashing glass and screams rose up from the distance. He looked over for Mr Adair, hoping to convince him to remain at the apartment and not go to the bank, but he couldn’t see him. His daughters, Sally and Jane, were sitting on one of the chairs, staring up at the sky… but there was no sign of their father. He could only hope that the two girls wouldn’t be orphans by the end of the coming day.
Joshua stood up, nodded to the handful of others who had remained on the roof, and walked slowly back down to his flat. The door had been left ajar when he had left and it a matter of moments to put the kettle on for a cup of coffee. He’d expected the power to fail completely, but instead there was enough for boiling water; he made himself a cup and sat down in front of the television. Unsurprisingly, it was still useless; he flicked through channel after channel, only to be confronted by static or warning messages. The satellite network was completely gone. Televisions still used ground-based systems as well, but those seemed to be gone as well, either through alien action or the system hadn’t adapted to the disaster very well.
On impulse, he checked his laptop. He’d connected it to the internet through a landline, so it should still work. His normal connection service was down, but he linked into a secondary network and was relieved to discover that part of the internet still functioned. It wasn’t what it had been a day ago — the internet seemed to be missing hundreds, probably thousands, of web pages — but he was at least able to log on. No one seemed to know anything; the more reputable forums merely confirmed what Governor Brogan had said, while the less reputable ones were full of horror stories, including the destruction of Austin. Seeing Joshua was still alive, he paused long enough to debunk that rumour, and then started to write up his own notes. It was possible, barely, that someone out there would be interested.
It all seemed so petty now.
Chapter Ten
Never awake me when you have good news to announce, because with good news nothing presses; but when you have bad news, arouse me immediately, for then there is not an instant to be lost.
— Napoleon
The United States National Command Centre (Virginia) had been constructed in absolute secrecy and, unlike some other bunkers with the same purpose, had never been revealed or leaked to the media. It was an open question if the Russians, or the Chinese, knew about its existence, but as far as the public knew, it didn’t exist. They would have thought, if they had bothered to think about it at all, that the President had gone to Cheyenne Mountain and the complex there, not somewhere much closer to Washington DC. If the aliens managed to capture and interrogate humans from the ISS or from the ground, they wouldn’t be led directly to the President.
Colonel Paul James was relieved to see that the President looked much better in the light. He’d been taken quickly, once the fighting had begun, to the complex, but he’d almost been broken by the sheer scale of the attack. He’d had a few hours sleep, a shower and a shave and almost looked human again; Paul wished that he shared that feeling. He’d been up all night trying to collate the data as the United States — and several other nations — fought a war with the aliens, one that they were losing. The aliens were still faceless, their goals and objective still unknown, but they were winning their war. The human capability to fight a war in space, such as it was, had been almost completely destroyed.
The main briefing room was a combination between a control room, manned by operators with the highest level of security clearance in the United States, and a proper briefing room. A table, at the centre of the room, provided seating for the President, his Cabinet and the handful of senior military officers at the complex, while a large map of the world illuminated one wall, overwhelmed by red icons. The aliens had targeted their projectiles with malice aforethought; they’d hit military bases, docks, bridges, ships and even power stations. Parts of the United States were in darkness, their power suddenly cut down by the alien attack, other parts were almost normal and probably wondering if the alien attack was all a dream. It would take time for the truth to sink in, Paul knew, and by then, it would be too late. If they hadn’t stocked up on food in the past weeks, they might be starving pretty soon. Even at a glance, it was obvious that the global economy had been destroyed overnight.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,” Colonel Perkins, the commander of the base, said, “the President of the United States.”
“Please be seated,” the President said. His voice sounded better as well. He waited until Deborah Ivey, Tom Spencer, General Hastings and a couple of unnamed military officers took their seats and then nodded to Paul. “Colonel James, if you would…”
Paul bit down a smile and began. “As you know, Mr President, last night the alien starship — the lead alien starship — arrived in Earth orbit and attacked,” he said. “The principle target of their attack was apparently the International Space Station, but they have also attacked hundreds of targets within the continental United States and the rest of the world. Every country that was obviously developed, as seen from space, was targeted from orbit, with a very high death toll, both civilian and military. Information is still flowing in, so we may have to revise the estimates, but at the moment we are looking at over ten million dead, worldwide.”
A small display lit up as he spoke. As he covered each of the items, a pop-up window opened on the display, providing further information. “The military communications network has been seriously disrupted by the loss of all of our satellites, military and civilian, but the landlines have barely been touched. Readiness data on each of our bases is transmitted hourly to the Pentagon and other secure military communications hubs, providing a multiple level of redundancy in case of nuclear attack. At the moment, we can confirm that almost every USAF base, USN harbour and civilian airport within the United States has been destroyed. Army and National Guard bases were attacked as well, but several survived almost untouched, while others were too large to be completely destroyed. Fort Hood, for example, was hit, but most of the base remains intact and usable. That may change, of course.”
The display changed to show a naval map. “The aliens also hit our ships,” he continued. “Based on incomplete data, we can confirm that every carrier in the world — ours, British, French, Russian, Chinese — was sunk from orbit. We have independent confirmation from an agent in Gibraltar about the Charles de Gaulle and its destruction from orbit; British sources confirm the loss of Invincible and Queen Elizabeth. The other ships were treated on more of a hit-or-miss basis; anything that was clearly capable of launching aircraft was sunk, as was anything that could launch missiles towards targets in Low Earth Orbit, but the remaining fleet was generally ignored. Several hundred civilian ships have been lost as well, but again, the targeting seems almost random.”
“They don’t care about the seas,” General Hastings growled. “Why should they care about the water when they can land anywhere they damn well please?”
“Yes, sir,” Paul said. “The damage to our infrastructure has been very severe. So far, we have confirmed that no cities have been destroyed, although a handful of weapons fell within cities and caused considerabl
e damage, but most of the weapons fell outside the cities. Interstate junctions, dams, harbours and power stations were hit, including a handful of nuclear power stations.”
The President blanched. “Do we now have radioactive clouds drifting over the country?”
“No, Mr President,” Paul reassured him. “The three nuclear power stations that were hit were all over-designed to ensure that an airliner crashed into them wouldn’t release radiation or nuclear waste. FEMA is working on the plants now, but it looks as if the worst effect so far is multiple power outrages. Entire sections of the country have lost all power, while other sections have fallen back on backups and secondary systems…”
The President held up a hand. “We can sort out those details later,” he said. At any other time, damage to even a single nuclear power plant, let alone blackouts over a large part of the country, would have been a major disaster. Now, it was just incidental damage, barely worth mentioning. “What happened in orbit? How badly did we hurt them?”
The display clicked back to the image of the ISS, seconds before the aliens opened fire. “The ISS was apparently hit at least once by an alien weapon and opened to vacuum,” Paul said. “NASA won’t commit itself on the possibility of prisoners being taken, but observers watching from the ground, through the most powerful telescopes we have, report that the smaller alien spacecraft recovered most of the ISS before it fell into the atmosphere. It could be that some of the crew survived and were captured, but we don’t know enough to be sure, one way or the other. There were definitely no survivors from the Discovery; the shuttle was clearly blown into atoms. The final telemetry from the ship confirmed that it went down fighting.”
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