The Hasten the Day Trilogy

by Billy Roper

  That ain’t workin’, that’s the way you do it, Money for nothin’, and your chicks for free…

  The ‘Azamara Journey’ was filled to double occupancy with former Marines, Airmen, and Infantry who were now all legionnaires. Two of her sister ships docked beside her at the port were rapidly approaching capacity, too, as the train cars pulled right up to the dockside were emptied. Gen. Ferguson looked out over the blue waters of the Black Sea at the Fifth Fleet resting at anchor. They had fought their way in, and might have to fight their back out.

  When the American Foreign Legions had taken Erzurum with heavy Russian support, they had lost another three and a half centuries of good men, men who would never make it home, after coming so close and going so far. The Iranians had taken Batman to the east, caring much less about the cost. The two defeats had caused the Islamic State to withdraw their forces all the way to Elazig, like a trapped rook trying to cover the approach of two knights, cornered. The Iranian Shiites had stopped to consolidate their gains, and as soon as the Turkish Army committed to hitting back at them, Ferguson’s force withdrew in good order. The Russians redeployed with them, but only as far as the old Georgian and Armenian borders. They planned on keeping control over the mountains, as a buffer, from now on.

  He had made the call to the fleet to come pick them up twelve days ago, and the legions had only pulled into Sevastopol the night before last. Vice Admiral Davidson, who really ought to receive a promotion to full Admiral or demigod as far as Gen. Ferguson and his men were concerned, was there waiting for them at the docks, personally. The Eisenhower’s air wing had caught the Turkish defenders asleep at Izmir, and paid them back handsomely for the betrayal nearly five years ago. Most of the base aircraft were destroyed on the ground, and the few which did get airborne, quickly came back down again in flames.

  Lt. Matt Ball had led the third flight over the cratered and bombed field, to see if there was anything left worth strafing. The Eisenhower and her destroyer escorts continued north through the island-strewn Aegean, towards the strait of Gallipoli. So much of the former Turkish Air Force had been committed to their Eastern Front, and subsequently shot down by the Iranian and Russian Mig fighters giving air cover to the American Foreign Legions, that Islamic State Air Defenses were thin. As he turned north, seeing nothing in the air or on his radar, a blip appeared on Matt’s screen, then another. His eyes grew wide as suddenly a dozen missile traces glowed in, all headed in his direction. Excited voices filled his comm frequency as the other birds in his flight saw them on their screens, as well. Before he could panic, he literally saw, with his naked eyes, the streaks go past them, to the north and east. Then another handful darted up in an arc, at a different target. The two Port Royal class guided missile cruisers accompanying the Eisenhower were doing their part.

  Lapseki burned as the first destroyer in the Eisenhower battle group slid past it, and into the wider channel north of Gallipoli, where ship to shore cannon fire from it and the other of its class raked the defenses. Without air cover, the Turks could do little but fire battery shells back blindly. The fleet suffered only minor casualties during the first stage of their entry into the Black Sea. There were a few near misses, and two light strikes that were deflected by armor with only concussions and contusions as a result. In minutes, though, several smaller craft were on them, firing with heavy machine guns and small mounted cannon of their own. The cuttersized ships danced around the Fifth fleet’s lead destroyer, the Porter, but one by one were silenced by the hunter killer Kansas City submarine escort which had entered the waters ahead of the surface fleet. Seemingly out of nowhere one would shudder, then cough fire, and begin to list, or in one case, break into halves and sink with only the smallest of explosions visible from below deck. The three which got past the submarine’s reach were bombed from above by the F-18s. Before they came into range of the Eisenhower’s big guns, they were broken and beaten. The final two, heavily damaged, attempted to disengage, but were run down and sunk by the NAS Taylor frigate. The submarine torpedoes and aerial bombs filled the Sea of Marmara with injured and floundering Turkish sailors in minutes. Many of them were pulled under by the wake of the massive ships continuing their journey undeterred.

  Their carrier air wing passed back over the Eisenhower and her destroyer escorts, Porter and Carney, to overfly Istanbul. The massive city showed no signs of further resistance. Lt. Ball couldn’t believe their luck. No enemy aircraft engaged them. No anti- aircraft fire sprayed up like fireworks. It was a slow and tense hour piloting through, but the open waters spread before them without a further shot being fired.

  Col. Feyderov, General Yurovsky, and even the Russian President, had all radioed Ferguson to thank them for their years of service to the Russian Federation when they had reached Vladikaykaz. The President had called again, personally, just as they began to board the speed rail train, boxcar after boxcar of them, stretching for three miles. Not exactly luxury accommodations, but not a one of them took the Russians up on their offer to stay and become legal citizens. All 8,764 survivors of the U.S. Afghan coalition forces packed in like sardines and hoped for the best. In the final boxcar was loaded pallet after pallet of over 10,000 Russian combat service medals, for them, as a going away present. They warmly shook hands with and hugged the fellow soldiers in Russian gray they had fought for and beside for the last few years, but the Americans were determined to go. All of the doors closed. The engines hummed out in the darkness. Slowly at first, then accelerating, the train took them into the night.

  On board his command ship, the NAS Mount Whitney, Vice Admiral Davidson had been alerted to the fact that fighting seemed to be going on in Ankara, the center of Turkish military power and the former capital. Two factions were struggling for control. He hoped that the string of defeats they had suffered had motivated the semi-autonomous military to attempt a coup against the radical Jihadists of the Islamic State. By the time the Fifth fleet sailed back through Istanbul with a tail of packed cruise ships and thousands of long stranded soldiers, it was obvious that the coup had failed. Half of the Turkish general staff was beheaded, along with their families, live on Al Jazeera. Still, the citizens of the ancient city hung white sheets out their windows and stayed far from the waterfront, and no military presence confronted them, on air or in the water, as they passed.

  With the added muscle, there was no trouble at all getting back through the Suez. It really wasn’t until the fleet stopped off in Durban to trade out the Company of Marine advisors who had been assisting the Orange Free State with their expansion, that the legionnaires began to realize that it was finally, really happening. They didn’t mind at all when their surviving airworthy Cobras and Apaches were donated to the Orangers along with the fresh Company of jarheads from the Eisenhower. There were only eight of them, six Cobras and two Apaches, but they would help, since there wasn’t anything comparable like them on the other side. After so long, it was a miracle that any of them still flew at all, despite regular maintenance and the best parts replacements the Russians could manage. Enroute they had been overhauled and tuned up by the flight crews from the carrier, three of whom would go with the gunships to help out the Boers, along with a half dozen pilots. The Orangers had plans to take Port Shepstone and Margate next, and they would make it much easier.

  Gen. Ferguson would later recount in his memoirs, published at the University of Calgary, that the weeks spent coming back were a blur. Certainly it seemed surreal to his legions at the time. Many of them were too far gone for counseling or re-acculturation, they just simply were hardened beyond return. While they wanted to stick together and get out of Russia, going home was a different thing. The Fifth fleet made two stops in Australia, the first in Perth where another four Companies of Marines were rotated out and refueling and re-provisioning ordered. The most difficult task in keeping the carrier battle group going wasn’t finding fuel for the Eisenhower, which was powered by eight nuclear reactors and made its own fuel. It wasn’t finding
aviation fuel and parts for the air wing, or for the other nine ships which accompanied the carrier. Surprisingly, procuring food for the five thousand personnel on the Eisenhower and the twenty thousand, total, travelling with the group, was the biggest challenge. When the Fifth fleet had left the Red Sea, convoy deliveries of canned and dried foods from as far away as Port Augusta and Adelaide had begun loading up and moving towards Perth. Trucking it in, unloading it, and inventorying the nonperishable food items took several days, and came at a significant expense and sacrifice for the Australians.

  While the necessary business of restocking their ships’ stores was carried out, the nonessential onboard personnel were granted shore leave. There the legions got a chance to be surrounded once again by English speakers, if Aussies counted. Brisbane, Sidney, Melbourne, and Adelaide were still large cities, despite their loss of some population due to the deportation of all Asians, or because of it. In fact, they were thriving. But Perth and Darwin, strategically, were where the New American forces were needed to ‘mind the gap’. It was here that the Indonesians or the Malaysians or the Emperor of Kolkata in what had been southeastern India might strike. Because of the protection the New Americans offered, the Australians were more than willing to refuel and provision the fleet, as well as the garrisons.

  Their week of shore leave was followed for most by a short cruise and another stop at Darwin, where the New American Marine regiment there was rotated out and replaced. In both Perth and Darwin, hundreds of legionary Infantry and Marines whose homes and families had been deep behind what were now enemy lines, or in areas leading them to believe that they were deceased, volunteered for duty in Australia. All of them who wished to stay had not received any letters from family members, or had any answered, during the last couple of years when sporadic mail service back to New America for the legions had been reconnected through their Russian hosts. Those who felt that they couldn’t go home per se, or that their families and loved ones were gone, had little reason to return. In all, about ten percent of Ferguson’s legions stated that they would rather remain legionnaires than go back to a place they hardly knew. As strange as that might sound to someone who hadn’t been through what they had survived, and for as long as they had, Ferguson understood. The fresh regiments left to strengthen the defenses of Perth and Darwin were each four Centuries of the American Foreign Legion. Another Century of volunteers was shipped over via the New Zealand based destroyer for station duty in Auckland.

  A decision was made jointly with the Royal Australian Navy and the New Zealand Prime Minister to maintain them there as permanent New American bases, at all three points, along with the New American naval assets previously left. With limited air power in Australia, the Eisenhower air wing made a show of force over Indonesia to impress the natives. This led to a confrontation in the Timor Sea where two Indonesian frigates were sunk and another badly damaged by the NAS Port Royal cruiser. As they headed up and into the Pacific, Davidson radioed St. Louis of their progress. General Harrison ordered Admiral Woods, who ordered Vice Admiral Bryant on the Ford and the Sixth fleet at Oahu, to start packing. It was time to bring it on home. The Sixth left a regiment of Marines, a destroyer, and three support ships at Oahu, then headed into their new home port at Coos Bay, Oregon.

  Two weeks later, the Eisenhower carrier air wing and the Kansas City hunter killer submarine sunk or disabled every Chinese ship in San Francisco Bay before the Sixth fleet was even in sight. The next wave of fighters scoured the Presidio with fire as a diversion while the fleet offloaded a full 6,000 man legion of Ferguson’s men, including the General himself, at Half Moon Bay. The remaining twenty Centuries under the command of Colonel ‘Fritz’ Gibbons landed at Santa Cruz, and began fighting their way north to link up with Ferguson. The final campaign for California had begun, and it was going to be a four-way fight.

  Chapter Eight

  They (Jews) are our public enemies. They do not stop blaspheming our Lord Christ, calling the Virgin Mary a whore, Christ, a bastard, and us changelings or abortions (Mahlkälber: “meal calves”). If they could kill us all, they would gladly do it. They do it often, especially those who pose as physicians—though sometimes they help—for the devil helps to finish it in the end. They can also practice medicine as in French Switzerland. They administer poison to someone from which he could die in an hour, a month, a year, ten or twenty years. They are able to practice this art. –Martin Luther

  At first flash of Eden, we race down to the sea. Standing there on freedom's shore…

  Josh couldn’t have been happier to hear that the Church of New Dispensation had been driven out of his beloved Republic of Texas. He was like a little boy, Kelly thought, getting a glimpse of what the cowboy must have been like as a carefree kid. He wanted to take her out dancing, but that wasn’t allowed, so they celebrated quietly in his suite. He kept going on about how now Texas oil could go out overseas and manufactured goods could come in, and things would boom in the Lone Star Republic. She was happy for him, especially since it didn’t seem possible that the development would harm Deseret. The two nations were allies against the Nortenos, after all.

  In fact, the biggest fallout she expected from the events on the Gulf Coast would be from the change in governorships of the Mexican province of Arizona. The former governor they had reached an understanding with, after some hard-fought battles. He had become reasonable, even. This new guy would have something to prove. All Deseret armed forces in the southern region were on full alert. Of course, the New Americans landing a whole army in California changed the dynamic there, too. She had better enjoy this weekend, she told herself, because after church Sunday she’d have to get geared up mentally for a very busy week in the Department of Internal Communications.

  Monday morning, when she went into her office, Kelly found Jimmy there waiting for her. She was surprised to see him so early. This time, he was all business. He asked her to sit down. “I’ve got something I want to show you. It’s not very pleasant, but I want you to stay calm and hear me out….” Jimmy sat down on the other side of her desk, placed a smart tablet on her desk, tapped the screen twice, and a video began to play. Kelly froze. It was Josh’s back to the camera, and on the other side of him…Cold and hot anger and nausea coursed through her. “Seen enough?” Jimmy asked, quietly? Kelly nodded. He tapped the screen quiet. She closed her eyes and put her head in her hands, trying to fight back tears of rage and embarrassment.

  “Really, you should have known that it’s standard procedure to monitor the residences of our foreign guests of the Ambassadorial persuasion, as well as our own employees.” He told her, folding his hands carefully in his lap.

  Kelly looked up at him, her face red. “How long have you been watching us?” she asked. Jimmy pocketed the tablet in his suit jacket.

  “Since you started taking your job too personally, Kelly girl.” Jimmy gave her a sympathetic smile. “Hey, it could be worse. You could have turned out to be a lesbian, after all.” It was a joke, but she was in no mood to laugh.

  “So, what happens now? Trial for fornication? Prison? Deportation for Jimmy, what?” Kelly asked, resignedly. Jimmy leaned forward, patting her hand.

  “Wow, so dramatic. No, it doesn’t have to be that way. It doesn’t have to be that way at all.” Jimmy smiled at her, reassuringly.

  “What, then?” Kelly asked, grasping for any hope.

  “Well, no harm, no foul. You haven’t revealed any state secrets they didn’t already know, but his bedside talk has been very informative.” Kelly realized just how much Jimmy must have watched, and seen. She felt like crawling under her chair. “All we need you to do, is just keep seeing him, just like you have been. And maybe, find the opportunity now and then to talk about Texican intentions towards New Mexico. Especially in his suite, or your car, or your apartment…”

  Can you feel it

  Now that Spring has come

  That it's time to live in the scattered sun…

  He had only b
een a Sophomore in High School, trying to pass Geometry so he could stay on the football team, when Cinco Day had changed Andy McDonald’s life. There wasn’t a lot for teenagers to do in Pueblo, even back then. Hang out at the River Walk. Play Call of Duty. Text. Look at the Mountains. Count the Mexicans.

  Colorado had never officially seceded like Arizona and New Mexico had, but Andy and his family had been told to leave, just the same. School had only been ‘temporarily closed’ due to ethnic unrest and ‘bullying’ in light of the national emergency for a week, when the Mexican Army showed up. Just a few of them were seen driving around downtown at first. They were at the Courthouse doing stuff one day, and closing up the gun stores and service stations the next. Everybody was talking about it, but there was nothing on the news. A few of his friends had already left town with their families, going to stay with relatives up north or back east.

  Andy’s dad had worked for Colorado St ate University, as an associate professor of Sociology, so his son’s academic ambivalence was a sore spot around the house. Mrs. McDonald sold scented wickless candles and agonized over her home décor. She had been really upset when they’d had to leave it all behind. First two dark green Humvees parked at the end of each cul-de-sac in their neighborhood. Andy had been trying to get a solid wi-fi connection in the front yard, since the internet had been going up and down for the past few days. Just when he had a bar, he saw a squad of soldiers get out of the vehicles and head in each direction, down the street. His dad was still at work, they hadn’t cancelled classes there, yet. His mom was flipping through the satellite channels trying to find something to watch on a channel that hadn’t gone ‘signal unavailable’. Andy thought about calling his dad, or calling out to his mom, but he didn’t think either one of them would be any help. He watched the soldiers get closer.