The End of the Beginning

by Eichholz, Zachary

  ...

  “Is this the first test?” William asked.

  “Y-Y-Yes. Phoenix 30 is my favorite.”

  “Phoenix 30,” said William, scratching his eyebrow, “which one is that again? Have we gone over that one yet? What does it do?”

  “Watch, sir.”

  ...

  “Thirty seconds till release,” announced Meyers.

  “Telemetry for each drone reading five by five. Opening bay doors.”

  The copilot flipped a switch on the overhead panel. At the rear underbelly of the monstrous 747-8I aircraft, two white doors slid apart. A holding rack, straddling the top of the plane’s gutted interior compartment, activated. Disaster surveillance drones held in place by extendable grappling arms attached to the bottom of this rack began to move down the rack on two guide tracks towards the open doors, similar in look to automated vehicle assembly lines. As the first folded up drone neared the doors it was lowered to within three feet above the opening and placed vertically in a launch position. The drone had a triangular shaped body, which held its single engine. Its inverted V-shaped wings hugged its body, ready to snap open upon release.

  “Fifteen seconds.”

  “We screw this up,” laughed the copilot nervously, “it’ll put the project back years. And, we’ll be out a job.”

  “She won’t let us down,” Meyers reassured him. “She’s a work of art. Ten seconds.”

  ...

  “Who is Meyers?” asked William.

  “Best pilot in UNIRO,” a woman behind him said adoringly.

  “Why is his call sign Crazy?”

  “You’ll see.”

  ...

  Over the radio, the desert crowd heard the final ten-second countdown. All of them clenched but tried not to show it. The idea of Phoenix 30, the world’s first airborne aircraft carrier essentially, had gone from concept to testing in just over a year, something thought impossible now-a-days.

  ...

  “Five. Four. Three…”

  Meyers looked out the windshield and saw black specs come into view and approach them at almost invisible speeds. Birds.

  “Oh shit…” muttered the copilot.

  An alarm suddenly started going off as the aircraft jolted slightly. The windowpane directly in front of Meyers splintered as fine shards of glass scattered throughout the cockpit. Both pilots covered their faces instantly. When they regained their composure, they saw that engines one and four were on fire and releasing debris.

  “Flight, this is Phoenix 30. We have a fire in our number one and four engines! Fire countermeasures have been activated,” the copilot radioed to the ground. “Suspected bird strike. We are declaring an in air emergenc - ”

  “No!” stopped Meyers.

  “No? What do you mean no?” asked the confused copilot.

  “Countermeasures will put the fire out. Shut down the engines; compensate with the other two. We are completing this mission. We get her through this, we get her through anything. Release the drones on my mark. Count down reset at T-minus ten seconds.”

  “Major are you crazy? We can’t even see out half the windows! Your face is cut and bleeding.”

  “I’m fine,” Meyers laughed. “Now, focus. You’re the one with the good window.”

  “Yes sir,” the copilot wheezed.

  ...

  “Phoenix 30, this is Flight! Meyers, what the hell are you doing up there?” called one of the engineers. “Abort the test. Abort it!”

  ...

  The crowds in the dining hall started cheering Meyers as they heard him through the live stream respond to the ground controllers order to abort the test.

  “Flight, we can’t do that. I never abort a mission, I finish them.”

  Everyone started clapping and roaring as if they were at a concert. Seong shot his fist into the air. William looked around in awe. This was great.

  ...

  Meyers muted the radio as he began the countdown again. “Okay, hold her steady. Here we go. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six…”

  The mighty Phoenix’s wings jostled as two smoke trails now spilled from the planes injured engines. But the sixteen drones inside were untouched and ready. Meyers knew his queen could take it.

  “…Four. Three. Two. One. Mark.”

  The first set of grappling arms released their payload. It fell silently. At a hundred feet below the 747, the drone released its wings and began to level off. Its single jet engine started and the autonomous drone became aware. The grappling arms that once held it folded flat and moved down the rack’s guide tracks, flipping up and over the remaining drones as the rack looped back around, allowing the next drone to be promptly released.

  ...

  “That cocky son of a bitch,” said Meyer’s commanding officer on the ground. His grin only grew larger as he watched each drone appear from the white underbelly of the plane.

  One of the UN officials walked over to him and tapped him on the shoulder. The subgroup general turned around, putting his binoculars down at his waist.

  “Your pilot should be grounded for that, sir,” scolded the official. “He’s insane!”

  The subgroup general nodded. “They call him Crazy for a reason.”

  “Endangering millions of dollars worth of hardware, putting his crew at risk. That’s our only test plane for this project so far. And what has he done with it? We need to deliver in three months; this project can’t risk being delayed any further by irresponsible acts like that!”

  “He’s shown the damn thing works, even when crippled,” the subgroup general said coolly, pointing to the sky. “Now the project can move forward twice as fast.”

  “Oh, so you think we should praise him?” the official asked sarcastically.

  “No,” the subgroup general said seriously, “I think we should promote him.”

  ...

  “Wow,” William exclaimed. “I see the reason behind the name. He was nuts to not abort.”

  Seong looked over his shoulder with furrowed brows. “Are you really so d-different, sir? You never aborted over the bridge. Just like Major Meyers just n-n-now, you never gave up. One day people will be cheering you.”

  William appreciated that. “My days of being crazy are over. It’s not about being crazy on these missions, Lieutenant, it’s about being smart. Crazy is not a good strategy. Over that bridge, I was crazy enough to push something I shouldn’t have. I should have pushed sense, just as that major probably should have in that test.”

  “That may be, Captain,” Seong stated, “but your eyes disagree w-w-with you.”

  “My eyes?”

  “Yes. I saw their gaze while th-they watched the test. They still crave for boldness. They still want to push. They want th-th-the Emerson the w-world remembers.”

  William sighed. “That’s what frightens me,” he said quietly, under his breath.

  CHAPTER 27: Toronto

  Downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada

  Thursday, April 15, 2027

  “Ok,” Constable Steve Sutton started, turning to his partner, Sergeant Walter Perry. “What would you do if Godzilla just appeared out of the lake?”

  “What kind of question is that?” Walter muttered, looking up at the glass façade of the Rogers Centre. Inside was a roaring Toronto Blue Jays game filled with 50,000 screaming drunken fans. The two men were standing on a pedestrian bridge that spanned the ten track Union Station Rail Corridor next to the stadium.

  “Yeah,” Steve said enthusiastically. “Godzilla. What would you do if he just appeared out of the lake and started walking through the city? It’s a valid question.”

  “So, you mean to tell me you think Godzilla is real?” Walter asked. He wasn’t surprised by the question whatsoever. After three years of being partners, he had become quite accustomed to Steve’s many eccentricities.

  Steve shrugged. “Why not?”

  “You are so weird,” Walter said, shaking his head.

  “Oh, come on,” grinned Steve. �
��We both know you live for my random musings. They sure make otherwise boring nights like this more interesting, don’t they?”

  The few people on the bridge were either talking, city watching, or smoking. Below them, a small construction crew was working on one of the corridor’s central tracks. Set amongst a steep glass canyon within the city’s waterfront skyline, the east to west river of rails that flowed through this canyon under the bridge transported GO Transits rail services, Amtrak, Via Rail, and the airport rail link Union Pearson Express all into Union Station, Canada’s busiest transit hub. The station was only a few thousand feet west of the bridge.

  To the immediate south of the corridor stood the buzzing stadium and its massive retractable roof, the 1,815-foot-tall CN Tower, and Ripley’s Aquarium. To the north were tall glass condominiums, stores, the Isabella Valancy Crawford Park, from which the bridge emerged, and the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. All of these beautiful buildings were well lit for the night as the sun began to hide behind Lake Ontario.

  The two men looked up towards the stadium as a sudden swell of noise from the crowd rose up through the open roof.

  “Sounds like a good game,” Walter observed.

  “You still haven’t answered my question,” Steve said, crossing his arms.

  “You still haven’t answered mine,” Walter laughed.

  “Could be real…” Steve said, raising an eyebrow. “Lots of stuff is still out there.”

  Walter shook his head and smiled. He looked up at the CN Tower on the southeast side of the bridge, then at another crowd roar in the stadium to the southwest. In the distance, he noticed a slow-moving train heading eastbound on the rail line closest to the stadium. Behind its two large diesel locomotives, a line of tanker cars stretched far to the west.

  “Hey, Steve,” Walter spoke out slowly.

  Steve was checking something on his phone. “What’s up, Sarge?”

  “There aren’t supposed to be any freight trains in the corridor, right?”

  “Right,” said Steve, still looking at his phone. He was trying to listen to a voicemail his wife had just left him.

  “So, why is there a freight train heading towards the station?”

  “What?!” Steve said, turning to his partner.

  “Look,” Walter said, pointing to the train.

  Both men walked to the handrail of bridge. Steve leaned his head into his radio.

  “Dispatch, can you get in contact with the nearest CN operations facility and - ”

  Steve was interrupted by Walter grabbing his shoulder.

  “What is it?”

  “The engineer,” said Walter, his voice shaky. “Look at him, in the left seat. Look at the glass.”

  Steve squinted past the locomotive’s shining headlamps. The engineer was slumped over the controls. The back wall behind him was covered in red.

  “Dispatch,” Steve intoned, “please be advised. We may have a runaway train passing through the Union Station Rail Corridor. The engineer looks to be incapacitated. Possible gunshot wound. Request…”

  From below the bridge, Steve noticed the crew of construction walking towards the incoming train. He watched as three men removed their hardhats and reflective work jackets to reveal vests lined with wiring and explosives. A hi-rail pickup truck drove out from under the bridge at the controls of a fourth man. The truck slowed and then stopped about 150 feet west of the bridge.

  “Oh, shit,” Walter cried out.

  Steve reached for his radio and began shouting into it as he ran south off the bridge to an elevated walking area adjoined to the base of the stadium. With his other hand he drew his handgun.

  “Dispatch, we have an emergency at the Rogers Centre! Three men wearing bomb vest are on the - ”

  One of the bombers started shooting at Steve. He took cover behind a huge concrete support column. Steve looked back at the bridge and saw Walter clearing civilians off of it. Below his feet Steve began to feel the vibrations from the monstrous freight trains weight thundering over the rails. As he glimpsed over his shoulder he saw the first locomotive cross under the bridge. He lost sight of the bombers behind the black tanker cars.

  “Walter! Ruunnnn!” screamed Steve over the sounds of the train.

  But Walter didn’t turn around. A sudden burst of sound blew out Steve’s eardrums as he was knocked to the ground. The thick concrete column he was behind shielded him from the heat and violence of the explosion.

  Thick oil began spilling out from each ruptured tanker as the cars careened off the river of rails. The glass façade of the Rogers Centre shattered all at once. The high glass canyon walls kept the explosion confined, intensifying the force of the blast. The tanker cars closest to the epicenter were thrown skyward, through the pedestrian bridge, tumbling end over end in twirls of yellow flames. Car after car piled up into each other until they became a mountain of burning oil and steel, wheels and rails.

  People atop the CN Towers observation deck felt an unsettling lurch as shockwaves generated crack after crack at its base. Fans inside the stadium screamed in terror as flames licked over the rim. In a few minutes, the pileup was over. The canyon had been engulfed by fire, leaving the buildings lining it naked, bare, and scorched.

  When Steve awoke amidst the charred debris, sirens, and shrieks of anguish, he could still feel the cauldron burning in the corridor beside him. Dust clouded his view, the air heavy with the smell of red-hot petroleum. Steve turned his head towards the bridge, hoping to see Walter, but the bridge had been completely destroyed, replaced by a mound of smoking tanker cars. He spotted a small child wandering around, covered in soot, the clothing falling off his half-burnt body.

  Steve crawled out from behind the cracked column, bleeding profusely from the head. His radio was dead.

  “Walter,” he whispered in pain. “Walter, where are you…?”

  Steve’s hands suddenly ran into a pair of perfectly clean brown dress shoes. He looked up and saw a man wearing a dark suit standing over him, hands in his pockets. The man looked uninjured, even untouched by the chaos surrounding him, so immaculate he could have been heading to a business meeting. The man knelt down.

  “Who are you?” Steve asked, barely able to move anymore.

  The man smiled. One half of his face was in shadow, the other drenched in flicking orange light.

  “Just one of many…” he said, a sinister smile spreading across his face as he revealed a handgun.

  CHAPTER 28: Be Vigilant

  Training Center, Base Tranquility

  Friday, April 16, 2027

  William entered the classroom and took a seat next to Seong. All around him, students were speaking in hushed tones. A thick blanket of dread and despair had settled over the room.

  “Do you know how many have d-died so far?” Seong whispered.

  “Just over fifty,” William replied, as he slumped down in his seat.

  “To m-many.”

  “It’s always too many.”

  William sat up when he saw Chief of Security Patrick Hernandez walk into the room. Hernandez saw William immediately and gave a wink. Their professor walked in behind him.

  “Oh, boy,” William whispered. “Must be bad if they brought him in here to talk.”

  “Class,” the professor called out, “due to last night’s attack in Toronto, we have a guest. He would like to say a few words. Chief.”

  “Hello, everyone,” Hernandez bellowed. “In light of last night’s events, I am here to calm any fears you may have about security on this base. As chief of security, it is my job to keep you all as safe as possible. ISAF is one of the finest security forces in the world but we can’t do it alone. This is the second major attack in three weeks by this particular group, Terra Nova.”

  Murmurs around the room started.

  “Something is different about this attack,” William whispered to Seong.

  “What d-d-do you mean, sir?”

  “Well, I don’t think Hernandez went around room to
room calming everyone down for every other attack. There must be more to what happened.”

  “We need your help,” Hernandez said, “to seek out and combat terrorists both here and abroad. Be vigilant, be attentive, and be informed. Is that understood?”

  “Yes, sir!” the class chorused.

  “Bueno.”

  Hernandez began to leave the classroom but a rescue officer in the first row spoke up.

  “Excuse me, Chief. With all due respect, what makes you believe we are safe? Two months ago, didn’t Terra Nova attack one of our ships while on sea trials in the Caribbean? Haven’t they stolen from UNIRO convoys in South America?”

  William had never heard that information before.

  “They’ve already hit us. Who’s to say they won’t again?” the rescue officer finished.

  Hernandez took a deep breath and walked over to the alarmed rescue officer.

  “If you have concerns, Rescue Officer…” Hernandez stared down at the man’s badge, “Croft, any specific concerns about our competence, please, voice them. I will surely ease them.”

  “I only ask, Chief, because I lost my cousin last night in Toronto. I’m scared, sir.”

  William rolled his eyes. “Jesus,” he muttered under his breath. Seong glanced over at him.

  “The world is scared of this new group,” the rescue officer continued. “They’ve grown quickly and they’ve attacked UNIRO before. What’s stopping them from doing it again? Especially as they continue to grow.”

  Hernandez nodded his head. “What’s stopping them is me and my team,” he said frankly. “This base is mine, Rescue Officer, as are the people within it. It is my home, my family’s home. You are my mission, just as the people of the world are yours. I will do everything in my power to stop anyone that threatens this facility. Base Tranquility, along with her sisters, has the latest and greatest in security and surveillance technology. If you will allow me to explain… Hm. Professor?”