by Ian Maxwell
But all that changed today, as they were back at the proverbial situation room, starting something beyond imaginable. For some reason each of the ten seats at the table had a big swiveling model globe.
Primakov cleared his throat and said, “Let’s go.”
Korlov his lieutenant, activated the massive wall mounted screens. Adjacent to the screens, 10ft high portraits of Catherine the Great, Peter the Great and Ivan the Terrible stared down in revulsion. Lenin’s portrait suggested that, he had never really given a fuck. Stalin however seemed eager.
One by one, the three 100inch screens came alive. The first one showed a harried Mueller. He was conducting his last minute checks in a hassled fashion somewhere deep under Krasnoyarsk in underground Russia. 70 years later they were ready to think beyond the nuke with Project Catie.
The second screen showed the forty three software guys who had developed the new Albatross landing software. Out at the Krasnoyarsk base, they were waiting expectantly for the airshow to begin.
The third 100in screen showed a skinny yet sharp looking aircraft surrounded by an army of support vehicles. The Tupolev Tu-420 was being readied for its maiden flight. The countdown timer beeped at the 10 minute mark.
Primakov turned to Korlov and said, “Fax it.”
“Faxing…it…” replied Korlov as he stuffed the Tu-420’s flight plans into the fax machine. The plan informed the American FAA of the intended route between Komsomolsk-on-Amur and Moscow’s Vnukovo airport.
“Make sure you cc the NTSB as well as that crack house in Brussels.”
The fax machine blared its old tune.
“Boss, you can’t cc someone in fax… at least not in this machine here… you just gotta send it again and again.”
Primakov looked up quizzically from the globe on his lap.
“Never mind Boss, I got it. EU, NTSB…”
“And don’t forget Langley.”
President Anna Petrova stormed into the situation room still arguing with her generals. Other than Foreign Minister Luzkhov, everyone seemed upset. The guy most upset was the head of the Strategic Rocket Forces, Boris Antipin.
“Madam I need to see what this Mueller guy is doing. I just can’t believe you fell for this… American plot.”
“There is no American plot, Boris,” said Anna Petrova as she gestured her generals to be seated, “they are only interested in proxies and sanctions.”
“But Madam President, even if this Catie weapon works as expected, the economic implications are simply unfathomable…” it was the Chairman of Russia’s Central Bank Engalychev, “I mean we have no models to predict the fallout… this is… this is…”
“A once in a lifetime event?”
“More like once in a big bang event…” offered Astrophysicist Yuri.
“Well after 600 years we are still trying to uplift our people... Russian people. And I am freaking tired.”
“But Madam President, you yourself have said that it’s these German spies… thugs who are responsible for Russia’s foibles. You just said that they steal our people and resources depriving Russia…:”
“Boris, yes I know, what I said. These so called German thugs have also built the most sophisticated railway in the world… an underground Trans-Siberian… an underground Baikal Amur Mainline… plus an underground Bone railway to Magadan through Yakutsk… thugs they may be… but they sure as hell have created something terrific… and you know what the best part is? No one died of frostbite.”
“Madam 60 seconds to launch Katie… the one with the K,” announced Primakov.
“Good.”
The Health Secretary cleared his throat, “Madam I am sure this is good for Russia in the long run, but what about the immediate aftermath? The fluctuations in temperature and weather patterns could be too drastic… diseases, water supply…”
“That’s why we got a billion barrels of Beat-It.”
“But Madam, we should have got Himm’s, especially now that we have German spies working for us…”
“For the last time these Germans aren’t spies. When Berlin fell, they came over as guests.”
“Guests?”
“Yes, guests of the great one himself… General Secretary Stalin. By the time Mueller’s team got settled in, the nukes were already passé. Secretary Stalin needed something better… way better… and I think we have it today.”
“Madam, jet Tu-420 is taxiing,” announced Primakov.
“We all set?” asked the President turning to the three 100in monitors.
Mueller nodded while Pulikesi and Ilya gave their thumbs up.
“Still can’t believe you guys let in a bunch of Ukrainians and Indians on something like this,” remarked the Rocket Chief.
The President shrugged, “Well, we got Germans and Russians too.”
No one spoke as the sharp looking Tu-420, the Project Katie, thundered down the 4000m runway. As the jet eventually lifted off, there were hoots from the 3rd screen streaming live from Komsomolsk.
“Primakov, what’s next?” asked the President.
“We wait…”
Langley, Virginia
“Looks like it’s sticking to the waypoints …,” observed Undersecretary Sarah McAllister.
“Yeah it’s no Transaero,” replied Jim Borland.
As it streaked across Siberia, the Tupolev reached the critical speed of Mach 1. If the thing was going to burn up and disintegrate, it had to be now.
“Any second now?” asked Doug from Brussels. He was once again being delivered in bits through GovChat.
“Yep… hey who’s that guy with the pornstache?” asked Sarah.
A post-soviet, pre-yuppie guy with a neat stache was seated next to Doug at his Brussels office.
“Ah… Tomas, he is the Lithuanian rep to NATO. He is cool.”
“Dude what the fuck… you can’t bring in born again type crazies into a live op. Are you insane?”
“Guys, guys Tomas is cool. He is NATO. Lithuania is NATO. We are all NATO. Plus we just sent a bunch of F-35s to Vilnius. We cool.”
“That’s not how things work,” protested Sarah.
“Yeah man, this is so uncool. You are going to have to check his anal cavity now,” said Jim, who had just cleared his psych eval after the Clowning incident.
“Get outta here. No way. I have known him for years.”
“Alright, you dump the guy or we are cutting you out of this.”
“And I just filed an ‘abusing GovChat’ complaint with IT.”
“Whaaat… I thought this was an allied party, the Lithuanians are real concerned about Moscow. We even got doner kebabs…”
“Lose the weirdo, Doug. You got 10 seconds.”
“Seriously dongers…? Be a man and eat a pizza… pepperoni.”
“Fine,” said Doug as he grudgingly showed Tomas out of his office. All they heard back was repeated nyet-s and da-s.
The Tupolev-420 pushed past Mach 2.
Kremlin, Moscow
“Phase II,” said Korlov.
“Madam we need Antipin to guarantee that he will fire. We really need a few MIRVs … like I said decoys will do,” said Primakov.
“Of course Boris is on board. Aren’t you Boris?” asked the President.
“Yes Madam. We have everything ready,” replied Boris grudgingly. Launching MIRV rockets? With or without active warheads? Resistance was futile.
“Komsomolsk control hit the after burners.”
Langley, Virginia
“Holy shit.”
The Tu-420 suddenly lurched forward at an ungodly Mach 10.
“Fuck!!!! It just hit Mach 12.”
“Damn it, someone call NORTHCOM.”
The Tupolev raged past Mach 20… before it hit the magic Mach 24.
“Nooo. Mach 24 is ICBM territory. Anything at that speed they automatically do their thing.”
“Which is?”
“Fire a few anti-ballistic missiles. And if that doesn’t work, launch a few of our own MIR
Vs in retaliation.”
“Shoot the Tu-420 or missile… just veered off course. It’s heading stateside.”
“Fuck, I can’t believe the Russians are this dumb.”
Reindeer Station, Canada
Reindeer Station, located north of the Arctic Circle, was one of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) sites in Canada. After easily detecting the incoming missile, the unmanned ABM site responded with a barrage of Patriot missiles. Adhering to protocol the Reindeer Station then site sent out a coded message to NORTHCOM that read, “Yo, a Russian snitch was tryin’ to like sneak in. So we sent out a bunch of Patriots. Projected destination Portland.”
Langley, Virginia
“Patriots failed. I repeat Patriots failed. NORTHCOM just confirmed. The Patriots failed to intercept the intruder,” announced Sarah.
“Fudge ruckers. Now what,” asked Doug from Brussels.
“Umm… Evacuate.”
“Evacuate? That’s it? We got no other plays?” asked Sarah, furiously pacing the room.
“As humans, no. Machines, yes. Yeah, we will have to let the machines fight this out.”
Something chimed. It was NORTHCOM.
“NORTHCOM just launched a bunch of Minuteman missiles. Moscow, St. Petersburg, Volgograd get the first wave.”
“Machines?” asked Doug, still trying to locate the English section of the ICE instructions at Brussels.
“Yeah, either our ICBMs beat their ABMs or their ICBMs beat our ABMs”
“So there is still a chance?”
“Yeah no.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Coz of the Dead Hand Protocol.”
“What in the fuck is a Dead Hand Protocol?”
“Very simply, total mutual destruction… complete obliteration of whoever is left. I am sure there will be pockets of survivors. But please… I have zero intention of sampling post-apocalyptic hell holes. Werewolves, critters, rationed supplies… no tv, no internet… washing off in streams… scavenging Walmarts… forced breeding with ugly cousins… if they are hot its fine… but… still am not taking chances… fuck no… I had rather face an ICBM head on.”
Kremlin, Moscow
“Three MIRVs coming in fast. Unlike our unarmed Tupolev, these bitches are locked and loaded,” announced Korlov.
“I guess it’s time for the real Project Catie to stand up,” said Mueller with a fake evil laugh.
“Nope. We gotta wait,” said Primakov.
“Madam I got a bad feeling about this,” said someone in the room.
“Why wait?” asked the President. A cold sweat was soaking up her sweet back.
“We need more missiles Madam… more of their missiles. Antipin, your turn dude.”
Chief of Rocket Forces Boris Antipin swore under his breath.
Finally he asked, “How many?” He might have been asinine, but he clearly saw reason here.
“Whatever you got… whatever Russia has got… 100… 1000… 3000…?”
“Well since your request we have dusted up about 10,000. We have 500 in the Ukraine, 400 in Belarus, Kazakhstan has like 1000, and the other republics have 500. Cuba 100.”
“Terrific, let’s start with say… 300.”
Boris Antipin picked up a white phone and said “300”.
Primakov signaled to Mueller, “Mueller, 10 minutes.”
Thirty seconds went by as no one spoke.
Antipin’s white phone rang. “Yes…? Cool. Very cool. Now get into a bunker and sit tight.”
“Well?”
“315 missiles are out… they got excited. They haven’t done this in a while. They are even going after targets like Sioux Falls and Tacoma… ha-ha... small markets… no pro-teams.”
Tim Hortons, Canada
Back in the day, the US forces had buried several hundred Minuteman ICBMs among the corn fields. States in participation included the Dakotas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Missouri, and Iowa to name a few. In typical Soviet style the Comrades had copied and filled up the Steppe with their own missiles. The productivity of their collectivized farms had never recovered.
To match the Russian edge the US forces in turn had stolen something out of the Soviet playbook and ‘invaded’ Canada. In their week long quest to find appropriate farmland, the US army had stumbled upon the Canadian treasure – Tim Horton’s chain of restaurants. Its outlets were strategically placed all over Canada from Yellow Knife to Newfoundland and to the insecure and suffocating settlements all along the 49th parallel. With its large parking lots and constant power supplies, the Tim Hortons were an ideal location for placing nukes.
Langley, Virginia
“Oh baby baby…. la lala… blow me baby… one more time…” Jim Borland was down to his underwear, dancing and voicing Britney songs.
Something beeped and something else chimed.
Sarah McAllister read the thing that had chimed.
“300… Jim, 300 ICBMs launched.”
“Oh baby, baby… whose?”
“Russian.”
“Cool… blow me babe one more time…”
Something pinged and chimed again.
Sarah sat down on the floor and re-read her super secure Blackberry.
“Blow me baby one more time…blow me baby…So what was that?”
“We just unloaded our arsenal… emptied our vaults… the entire allied arsenal… 11,781 ICBMs.”
Chapter 39
Earth, Milky Way
“Hey I am earth. I am like part of the Milky Way… and I lie in a neglected corner… just like Nicaragua. For some reason I haven’t been able to stop my head from spinning. At this point it’s beyond irritating. I read somewhere that high pressure leads to this kind of spinning. Maybe all that molten lava and magnetic shit in my belly is unhealthy. So I like tried to work out… sometimes real hard, but then I used to get bored and slowed a few revolutions… but then I also realized that a good revolution gave me a high… you know what I mean? So I guess I am sort of addicted to the revolutions now. Over the past 4 billion years, there is literally not a method I haven’t tried. I have tried expelling gases, breaking of chunks of myself, sweating out shit, jumping… wobbling… zilch. Nada. Nothing seems to stop the darn spinning. Old Marsy told me I needed more balance in life… like I needed to settle down. So I got myself a moon. A freakin moon… what was I thinking? And guess what? Zilch again. The bloody thing just spins with me and around me now. And then she has the balls to say, ‘ever since the day I met you I haven’t been able to stop spinning.’ I am not even going to start with the trolling and photobombing that the moon does to me. Then I was like ‘fuck it’ for a long, long time... But the spinning just wouldn’t stop… So I get back to working out… you know pulling heavenly objects that sort of thing… so I tried to pull in a bunch of meteors… maybe the momentums would cancel out each other… but sadly, so far no such luck… ahhh… somebody… stop me…”
Chapter 40
Kremlin, Moscow
Missiles fired by all parties were well beyond their half way points. It was time for Mueller to implement Stalin’s dream. The ultimate weapon… Project Catie, was about to go off…
“Mueller. Let’s go,” ordered Primakov.
Mueller turned around and threw an array of ancient circuit breakers.
The Russian Federation plunged into darkness.
And so did Belarus, Crimea, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan and Abkhazia.
Chapter 41
Russia
When Mueller threw his switch, two things occurred. First the entire power generated within the Russian Federation got sidetracked and fed into the Trans-Siberian Railway tracks. The anticipated shortage of 20% was bridged through voluntary contributions of energy rich Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan.
Also a 10 Gigawatt atom splitter, located deep under Yakutsk fed into Mueller’s secret Underground Trans-Siberian rail lines.
All in all, they had about 100,000Km of super-electrified track on
the surface and another 250,000Km of uber-hyper-super-electrified track under the surface.
Fully electrified, the two sets of rail tracks formed a powerful magnetic field.
“Electrification Successful,” announced Otto. This was followed by a round of stuttering applause by his fellow engineers.
Up in the Kremlin, fluorescent light bathed the situation room as the Kremlin power boys struggled to figure out the backup mechanism.
“Are you sure this is fine?” asked President Petrova.
“The monitors and controls have a separate battery powered backup. We are fine Madam,” assured Korlov.
“And the rockets?”
General Antipin was ready, “Absolutely. Same goes for our rocket forces. Never relied on the Russian grid… my rockets are still on target.”
The first Minuteman to Moscow was 7 minutes away. The next wave consisting the bulk of the 11,000 allied missiles were about 13 minutes away.
Mueller turned to an illuminated model of a globe on his desk. “Madam President, I present to you the new globe.”
Chapter 42
Earth, Milky Way
More than 10 Gigawatts of power surged through the railway tracks. The power surge and the associated magnetic fields began their assault on the earthen core made of molten lava. The powerful magnetic fields battered the large quantities of ferrous metals in the core. The sustained assault on the core soon resulted in a realignment of its composition. This manipulation of the core’s composition led to a change in the earth’s gravitational pull.