Samuel’s head was ringing so loud, he could barely think, but he did hear one sound, and it made him smile. The biker he shot over the gate was in agony and crying out for help. It pleased him that they all didn’t get off so lucky as an instant death.
Samuel had said his goodbyes; there was no use in waiting any longer. He placed his family’s photo album in his lap, took one last scathing look at the monolithic evil that loomed over his beloved town, cursed it, and pulled the trigger on the gun now pressed against his head . . .
* * *
The canvas-sided truck approached the gate at the Shamsi Airfield in Pakistan. The driver showed his credentials and proceeded onto the base. As the truck reached the midpoint of the base, all of its heavily armed occupants exited and began an assault on the Headquarters building.
Shamsi Airfield was more than a base set up for protecting the border with Iran; it also housed some very deadly weapons that could reach much further than a close neighbor. Pakistan had been perfecting their mid-range nuclear missile technology when they had a breakthrough. The Shaheen-1 missile was very promising indeed, and was able to strike some six-hundred miles inside of India, but the Shaheen-2 was what they sought to get control of, as it could reach targets inside of Europe.
The leader of their team approached the designated door they were to reach and as scheduled, one of their co-conspirators opened the door and let them in. Within minutes, their team of ruthless Jihadists wiped the entire building clean of any enemy combatants.
Today they would make a strike for all of Islam on the infidels, and then as a double insult to them, they would all go to Hell Fire for their sins and be their slaves in the afterlife.
The leader and three highly trained zealot soldiers entered the elevator and used the key card of a fallen soldier to gain access to B-2, the base’s nuclear-missile control room. Pakistan had built several silos to house their missiles, but in different parts of the country, as potential threats lay in all directions. The West had long suspected this, but with Pakistan’s limited range, they really weren’t so worried about it. That would soon change.
Once the Jihadists got to the control room door, the three soldiers looked to the leader for answers on how to gain entrance to a door that was obviously impenetrable.
Before he could answer, the door opened from inside and the bloodied man it revealed was their second deepest cover man that they had placed on the inside. His knife was clenched in his right hand, the tip still dripping blood from one of the four people he had butchered to gain control of the room.
He led them in and resealed the door before they went to work. Once at the panel, the leader instructed the inside man to target the three missiles they had aimed at the European cities they could reach, but also ones people cared about. They would strike at their heart for the murder of their brethren. Even though the world was being succumbed anyway, Al Qaeda would make sure that those infidels felt the Hand of Mohammed on them as they were pushed to the afterlife.
The passcodes needed to launch the missiles had been obtained by their highest-ranking infiltrator ever. He, of course, was heading to a place where hopefully no one would find him. Once entered, the launch sequence would start, and then, praise Allah, justice would come.
The leader watched with pride as his man entered the first sequence. He hadn’t slept in a day and a half, and suddenly it occurred to him what a blinding headache he had developed. As the inside man was finishing the sequence, he wobbled and passed out without warning, his face smashing into the control panel with striking force.
The leader looked to see what everyone was doing about this when he observed his entire team was on the floor passed out. His final thought before he fell off his chair dead was he should have evacuated as soon as his head began to hurt.
Four hundred miles away at their Command Center, General Khan looked at his counsel of generals and then back to the live video feed they were just watching and asked, “How did they infiltrate us so deeply?”
No one had answers. It was well understood that Pakistan was a country torn by religion, and Al Qaeda was never going away, but this was something that was never supposed to happen. For a country that was holding nuclear weapons, this development was a very troubling thing.
Fortuitously, the generals at the counsel understood this possible reality, and that was why secret audio and video links were installed in every control room they had throughout Pakistan, as were the nerve gas releasers.
General Kahn remembered some of his detractors calling him too over-cautious when he placed these safeguards. He doubted he would hear from those detractors going forward. Of course, Europe would never know just how close they had come to a new reality in this rapidly changing world.
The General and his counsel sat somberly as the team at Shamsi regained control of the nuclear control room. It occurred to everyone at the table that the weight of these weapons was almost too much to bear. Now that the world was coming unglued, fanatics worldwide were willing to risk everything in pursuit of their cause, or in this case, revenge.
General Kahn was none too happy with what happened in Europe, that was for sure, but truthfully, it was happening worldwide, and Muslims were not being singled out. In fact, Germany reacted with a purpose against the responsible parties, even using deadly force to arrest some perpetrators. There were no simple answers anymore, and holding a strike force of nuclear weapons in the heart of the most powerful fundamentalist religious group in the world would now prove to be a challenge no one was truly prepared for.
* * *
Ornery Mel was very much like the tattoo on his arm indicated, ornery. At six foot nine and three hundred and seventy five pounds, he was not someone most people wanted to anger. Add his shaved head and massively abounding muscles, and he was a weapon within himself.
Ornery Mel was not part of any gang, as he alone was a one-man gang. Of all the things that riled up his temper the most was a lack of food. He was doing a “dime” for mayhem and assault with a deadly weapon, the weapon being his fist. He had beaten a man so badly during a bar fight that the man lost sight in one eye as a result of the beating he took. Attica was like any other prison, if you kept your nose clean and didn’t add time to your gig, eventually you would see freedom again.
Up until now, he had been an exemplary inmate, even working in the library. Despite his terrifying appearance, he was quite the prolific reader.
The food line was moving along, but he could tell by the groans up ahead that today’s lunch was not going to be good. When he got to the meat station he saw why. Tofu. Meat had become a once a day occurrence in the beginning, but lately, beans had been replacing them on the regular. They were used to beans, but tofu? There was no way he was eating tofu.
Despite everything he had accomplished in the last two years, once the tofu hit his plate he could not stop himself. He knew Charley Moss, who was serving him up, and it was no offense to Charley personally that he smashed his tray into his face as he stepped around the end of the serving line. Charley screamed as though it was personal, although it wasn’t, even though the mashed potatoes covered his face in a burning film that would cause a second-degree burn.
Ornery Mel had decided life was no longer worth living without proper food and the ensuing riot he instigated resulted in over one hundred deaths, both of prisoners and guards.
His life was snuffed out when a guard fired a beanbag out of a shotgun and hit him square in the temple, causing a brain hemorrhage. But Ornery Mel had started something that was going to spread to nearly every penal institution in the country, so one could easily have called him the first martyr against the war on tofu.
* * *
Jack and Christy watched from the bed with amazement. The TV was a non-stop roller coaster of emotions, from one tragedy to the next. And thanks to video streaming, a lot of it was fresh news.
Dan Whitman, his new supervisor, gave him the day off. When Dan came in it took two full days to
bring him up to speed. But once he got the whole low down and had a feel for the place, he insisted Jack take a day off. His last day off had been the month before, and he had to admit, he needed it.
The first story to come on the news, and the only one of pure interest for the last twenty-four hours worldwide had been Pyongyang. Many people expected this to be the precipitator of a greater worldwide escalation, but Russia’s and the United States’ apparent acceptance of this action had lessened everyone’s apprehension.
Still, over three million people lived in that city and it would be years before the real death toll was known. It was sure to be the largest single loss of life the Earth had yet to know. The United Nations was conducting an emergency meeting where China was to immediately present the evidence that proved without doubt that there was going to be an imminent attack on South Korea. Although the U.S. and Russia were temporarily standing-down, that did not mean half the free world was. Jack could see China was painted into a corner.
Jack looked at Christy, “You still want to live in San Francisco?”
She buried her head in his shoulder and said, “No.”
As they were finishing the UN story, a breaking story cut into the broadcast. Apparently there had been an attack on a Pakistani nuclear installation. Although the Pakistani Government had stated that no attack had occurred, shaky footage Tweeted by a Pakistani soldier did indeed show his base was under attack. Even though the Pakistani Government was denying a breach of their launch facility, this video was now stating that, in fact, there was a breach, a big one.
Jack steered his mind away from the news for a moment. It didn’t take long for him to realize that people had taken their eye off the ball again. Madness was now enveloping everything and Jack knew that the focus should be on which people of the Earth were not suffering right now. If there were any, they would top the suspect list if they had the wherewithal to pull this off.
Jack didn’t even have to ask her twice. He’d suggested they go hiking and clear their minds and her answer was, “Yes.” Dimitri, the negotiator, had made sure they had a loaded backpack full of food. It was shocking how hyperinflation was hitting now. Gouging was a bad term, so price increase was being used. Regardless, when a pound of walnuts was over thirty dollars and climbing, then things were getting out of hand.
Jack needed to be out in nature. He needed to be free and clear of the maddening TV that kept infusing information into him like an IV line inserted into his arm. He got up, shut the TV off, and they got the “hell out of Dodge” for a while—but not before seeing the story of the woman in Los Angeles who had someone rip her back fence down with a chain and stole her five bulldogs. Jack had been hearing more and more of these stories of domestic animals being murdered by the thousands and eaten. A couple of days before, he remembered the story of the empty dog shelters and how a reporter had uncovered the heinous things being done with the animals. People were now eating pets.
Jack could never recall a time in his life when he had such a choice as to stay informed or lose his sanity, but he was truly losing it watching the news.
Before they left, he kissed his mother goodbye, but his brother Dimitri was already out there being Dimitri. He hadn’t noticed his dad was not in the house until he went outside and saw his feet sticking out from under his jeep. Nick had given his son this very nice vehicle when he graduated, but after some time Jack let Christy drive it full time and he bought a Prius. It had been parked in his garage ever since she’d left him.
Christy knelt down and said, “Good morning, Papa.”
Nick had always liked her, well because he was a man, of course, but he also liked her because she was always polite with him. He noticed her manners with others were a little more abrasive, but never with him or his family. Her uppity parents were another story, as they didn’t seem to understand that regardless of their cash, they were not going to be the loudest voices at a Greek wedding. Maybe one day Nick would mend that fence for her sake, as he and Rob had not spoken two words since that day.
He wheeled himself out from under the car on his dolly and squinted up to his lovely daughter-in-law, “Good morning, beautiful, where are you two headed?”
Jack put his hand out to help him up but retracted it when he saw the grease, “We’re going up to a place I discovered and do some hiking away from that damn TV.”
Nick stood up and looked at the two of them, so young and so beautiful. His heart swelled and then it sank as he realized that the two of them had not had any children yet and now if they did, the child would be born into this uncertain world. His face showed his emotion and Jack read his mind.
He looked at his dad and reassured, “The world has always been an uncertain place Dad and we’re not going to stop living in it because of this.” His dad was a bit shorter than he was and his hair was much darker. He had laugh lines as wrinkles because most of his life had been spent smiling. Smiling at his customers, smiling at his family, smiling because although he worked hellish hours to support them all his years, it was a labor of love, as no one loved his family more than Nick Zarifis.
He placed his hand on his fathers worried face and said, “Don’t forget, we have me in this war to figure this out.”
His dad informed him that he had just changed the oil in the Jeep, so they were free to drive it to their hike. They thanked him and went on their way.
* * *
Karen looked across the table, yet was still able to avoid making eye contact with Harshal who was sitting right in front of her. He had grown more and more bitter every moment his research ended without results. Just as Karen had predicted, Madness was winning. She heard him talking to Oleg of all people, “It just makes no sense, how could a pathogen be as clever as this?”
They were working long hours now as the Cosmodrome staff was trying to do the math required for their re-entry of four instead of six. Of course, Anatoly and Karen were threatened with everything under the sun, including imprisonment in Anatoly’s case, but they did not relent. They would ration out the other astronauts remaining supplies and hope that a new crew could make it, but Karen was sure no other crew was coming here ever again as she was sure the Earth was doomed.
Anatoly was amazing as he was acting like he was not committing suicide with her, like the weight of his decision wasn’t on his mind every second. If one were to watch him from the outside, one would think that planning these two re-entries into Earth’s atmosphere was the only thing on his mind, and Karen actually believed that to be true.
She was still in disbelief that anyone could love her that much, which also led to her current state of guilt regarding letting the man she loved die because of her. At first she thought his support to be a ruse, one where he was hoping she would soon see the error of her ways and come home with him. But now they were T-minus forty-six hours and there was no turning back. They had disobeyed direct orders, plus no one on board was going to be subduing Anatoly, so they were literally on their own.
Regardless of his demeanor now, she knew the time was coming when he would turn on her, when he’d realized he gave up the only thing he had in this world, his life. Karen honestly wondered what kind of man gave up his life to be with his woman out in Space alone, watching the world burn like a twisted futuristic version of Nero watching Rome burn.
And burning it was. The fires from Brazil, India, China, and Mexico City were the most prominent from Space, but there were many others. Of course, the one that still played in her mind over and over again was the mushroom shaped fire that erased the entire city of Pyongyang. She had seen many nuclear explosions from multiple multimedia sources growing up, but nothing like this.
As the most bizarre luck would have it, the explosion happened as they were passing that hemisphere. Couple that, she was in Cupola trying to decide if she were mad for not returning with the rest. She was trying to reason out that mankind was the cockroaches of the Earth, and it would be mighty hard to eradicate them; she had a reasonable
chance of survival.
Alas, something else was driving her need to stay, and it was counter to her first thought. Mankind was not going to survive this, and anyone down there was going to suffer great hardship. She had had enough of hardships and was teetering on the precipice of indecision when the bomb exploded. She was literally fence straddling what to do.
It was one thing to watch millions of people die in all the usual forms of multimedia she was subjected to in History class, the news, and just general knowledge, but nothing drove determination like watching a city get vaporized right in front of one’s own eyes in real time. From that moment, Karen subconsciously knew that she was never going to go back. Once they ran out of food, it was time for the first Spacewalk that she would ever perform without fear of dying.
They completed the days flight planning and the two fatal lovers left the group to talk about some crucial decisions they would soon be facing.
* * *
The President looked at his Vice President over the top of the report he was reading, “Looks like we underestimated the extremists ability to organize.”
Sid, never lacking a good retort said, “I’d say we overlooked a hell of a lot more than that, Walter. We have at least forty small towns nationwide that are now under the control of one kind of faction or another. Also, word of the Attica riot spread and now literally every penal institution in the country has had some kind of rebellion. We took our eye off Middle America, Walter, and that is now a big problem.”
Setting the paper down he replied, “Well, when cities start evaporating, it’s kind of hard not to take one’s eye off the ball, Sid. Here’s what we will do. We’ll take the FBI and ATF off of their investigative duties and form them into a large assault division. We will take back those towns one at a time, and maybe by the time we’ve decimated a couple of them, word will spread that we are not messing around.”
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