by Bob Mayer
Inside the PEOC, the detonation sounded distant, an echoing thud.
Riggs laughed. “It’ll take them a year to get in here.”
Then he shot a second officer who was sneaking toward the red lever. The man tumbled to the floor. “Sergeant Major!”
“Yes, sir.”
“Take that lever off and bring it to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Inside the Snake’s cargo bay, Nada was going through another checklist. One he hadn’t used in over twenty years.
Eagle had them flying fast and low, skirting around Groom Mountain, over the dry bed of Papoose Lake, and then banking hard into the Nevada Test Range, also known as Yucca Flats.
The terrain changed from desert to disaster. It looked like the surface of the moon. “Doc,” Kirk asked, “how hot is it going to be?”
Doc had a meter out. “We’re clean at altitude, but that dirt down there is guaranteed to be hot. I’ll keep track.”
A black smudge was the only result of the shaped charge. Neeley cursed and began digging through her pack, searching for more explosives.
The Keep checked her watch: 03:12.
Moms patched through to Ms. Jones. “The Acmes come up with anything? Any way to countermand the authorization?”
“Negative,” Ms. Jones said. “They’re still working on it.”
“They need to work faster.”
Neeley slapped another charge on the wall next to the steel door. “Might be weaker there. Maybe we can hit a power line or something.”
The three ran back around the corner and Neeley fired once more.
“It’s directly ahead,” Eagle said. “A tower, probably one hundred and fifty feet high.”
“Open the ramp,” Nada ordered. He looped his arms through the straps on the package he’d drawn from the Vault. He tried to get to his feet, but it was too heavy. Mac and Kirk gave him a hand, and he staggered upright, every muscle in his body vibrating to remain that way with one hundred and fifty pounds on his back. The back ramp yawned open, revealing the pitted landscape fifty feet below.
Then Nada was promptly tumbled to the metal grating, hard, as Eagle jerked the Snake to the left.
“SAM!” he called out as a surface-to-air missile raced by the Snake, missing by scant feet. Eagle continued evasive maneuvers as the missile looped around and came back toward them, homing in on the Snake’s hot engines.
Eagle hit a button and a spread of flares were fired from the side of Snake.
Now it was a matter of odds. What heat source would the missile take?
There wasn’t time for Mac to even propose a wager as the missile took the bait and exploded 350 feet to the right of the Snake.
“Range?” Nada called out, getting to his knees.
“We’re a klick out and I’m going in fast,” Eagle said. “Who knows what other shit they’re going to throw at us.”
“Eagle, once you drop me, get the hell out of range with the rest of the team as fast as you can.”
A hole in the wall was some progress. Except the hole exposed more steel plating.
“Ms. Jones?” Moms’s voice had an edge to it as the Keep held up the watch: 01:15.
“Negative. We’ve got nothing.”
“The team?” Moms asked.
“They’re assaulting Pinnacle.”
Neeley was rummaging in her pack, at a loss on what else to do. “Not on my watch,” she was muttering. “Not on my watch.”
“Ladies.” The Keep’s voice was calm. She showed them the time. 00:59. “We’re inside a minute. The way the system works, once it gets inside a minute, there’s no turning it off. Even if we were in there.”
Inside the PEOC, everyone’s eyes were riveted on the digital clock.
Except for General Riggs. He was looking at the blinking red triangles on the map of the world. The nuclear arsenals of all the other powers—soon to be vaporized, leaving the United States the sole world power.
Riggs stood. “Destiny, gentlemen. We are making history.”
One of the officers pulled out his pistol and shot himself in the head.
Another opened a drawer and held up a bottle of champagne. “A toast!”
Eagle opened the compartment in the nose of the Snake and the 30mm chain gun extended. As he had feared, there was the muzzle flash of a radar-aimed antiaircraft gun letting loose on top of the tower.
As the first rounds hit the armor plating on the front of the Snake, Eagle let loose with his own gun. The depleted uranium rounds were right at home here in the Nevada Test Site. As his windshield splintered but held, Eagle kept his finger on the trigger and blew the gun off its platform.
“Ten seconds, Nada,” Eagle said.
“Wish me luck,” Nada told the rest of the team. Mac, Kirk, Roland, and Doc were holding him upright, near the edge of the ramp. Mac and Kirk each had one hand on Nada and the other on the steel static line cable that ran along the top of the cargo bay up into the tail. It was a good thing they did, as Eagle had to flare hard to stop the forward momentum of the Snake.
Roland was an anchor by himself without the benefit of the steel wire. He had both arms wrapped around Nada’s waist.
Without their grip, Nada would have fallen out with the package.
As it was, the steel cable tore into skin, and blood flowed freely from both Mac and Kirk, but they held fast.
The Snake came to a shivering halt, wings half vertical, Eagle doing a magical juggling act with the controls to keep the edge of the back ramp less than a foot from the walkway that surrounded the top of the Icecap test tower.
“Got it!” Nada yelled and the other three let go of him.
Nada landed with a solid thud, grunting in pain as ribs cracked when the package slammed him down on the metal walkway. “Go, go, go,” he yelled into his mike to Eagle.
Like that was going to work.
Roland was first, because in combat Roland was always first.
Mac and Kirk jumped in unison right behind him, Doc only a brief hesitation behind them. Doc did have four PhDs after all, and that did call for a momentary consideration about doing something stupid.
Still on his belly, ribs broken, the package pressing him down, Nada looked up and saw his four teammates at his side as the engine blast from the Snake washed over them as Eagle took the craft up to a tight hover in overwatch.
“Fuck me to tears,” Nada said, and for the first time in his life, he really meant it.
00:10
“We tried,” Moms said.
00:09
“We failed,” Neeley replied.
00:08
The Keep said nothing, her book held close to her chest.
00:07
00:06
“Trying counts,” Moms said.
00:05
Neeley slumped down, back against the wall.
00:04
“I’m tired of this shit,” Neeley said.
00:03
“Ain’t we all,” Moms said, putting a hand on her shoulder.
00:02
00:01
00:00
Kirk and Mac helped Nada to his feet as Roland pulled the package off his back. Nada accepted the help, readying his MP5 for action. He went to the edge of the platform and peered down into the tower. An ICBM preparing to launch rested on top.
Looking out, they could see three diesel locomotives moving flatcars with ICBMs on them away, about four hundred yards out and the wheels slowly grinding away.
“Time?” Nada asked over the net.
“Four minutes, forty seconds,” Eagle said.
Nada turned to the other three. “Here is as good as anywhere.”
They put the package down and Nada ripped aside the protective covering on the control pad. He had the Standing Operating Procedures for the SADM out, even though he still remembered exactly how to arm it two decades after his last practice run with one.
Moms slid her back down the wall and sat next to Neeley. “It’s easier whe
n you have a team.”
Neeley nodded. “Yeah. Hannah is a friend, but she’s also my boss. Not that any of it matters now.”
“It always matters,” the Keep said. She still had the watch out.
“How long until the first nuke hits target?” Neeley asked.
The Keep shrugged. “It depends on what targeting protocol General Riggs used.”
Inside the PEOC, everyone was watching the large screen. The tracks of missiles launched, both land-based and from boomer submarines at sea, were marked in red arcs. Clumps of yellow indicated strategic bombers heading toward targets.
It was the world war no one had ever really expected to happen.
That reality, along with the effects of Cherry Tree, had squashed the champagne toast within seconds of it being suggested. The military men stared at the screen as if seeing one of the deepest rings of hell.
Except for Riggs. He was still standing and he reached out and grabbed the unopened bottle. He popped the top and tilted it back, taking a big swig.
Then he slammed it down on the conference table.
“Finally,” he muttered as his eyes tracked the weapons on the screen.
Nada had done everything exactly as laid out in the SOP. The W54 nuclear bomb was ready. All he had to do was push the button to arm it. He’d set the timer for the minimum: three minutes. Like that was going to happen.
“Three to one,” Mac said, standing behind Nada and putting a hand on his right shoulder.
“Which way?” Kirk asked. He put a hand on Nada’s left shoulder.
“Instant detonation,” Mac said.
Doc was a spectator, perhaps regretting his decision to leave the Snake.
Perhaps not. “I think I will go with the one.”
“Me too,” Roland said.
“Kirk?” Mac asked.
“One.”
“Well, shoot,” Mac said. “You guys are ganging up on me and someone has to cover the bettor. I’ll take the three then.”
“It’s been a pleasure, gentlemen,” Nada said, then he pushed the button to arm.
“Two minutes since launch,” the Keep said.
Moms looked up. “And?”
“And time for a reckoning,” the Keep said. “According to my book, this has the possibility of getting ugly, so I could use some, shall we say, team for backup.”
Moms and Neeley looked at each other in confusion, but got to their feet. Neeley readied her HK416 and Moms her MK23 pistol.
The steel doors to the PEOC slid open. As if expecting that, the Keep walked in. Neeley and Moms flanked her, weapons extended.
The occupants of the room broke their mesmerized gaze from the screen tracking the nukes to the intruders.
“General Riggs,” the Keep said. She held up the watch. “You’ve had two minutes to reflect on what you’ve just done. What if you had a do-over? Would you push the button again?”
Riggs blinked, confused. The rush of champagne on top of the Cherry Tree had muddied his brain. But the Cherry Tree prevailed.
“I damn well would.”
“Kill him,” the Keep said.
Neeley and Moms fired, both hitting him right between the eyes with a double-tap times two, which effectively blew his head off.
While General Riggs’s body was still crumpling to the floor, the Keep walked over to the table. She stepped over his body and reached into the briefcase. She pulled the cord out and the screen flickered, then snapped into darkness.
“What the fuck?” someone muttered.
“There have been no launches,” the Keep said. “The system is set up so that the person who has the code can enter it. They can think they launched. Then they get two minutes to reflect on what they’ve done. It’s happened before. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Nixon while drunk one night. Reagan over a Fail-Safe–type scenario. And George Bush, the younger. They all launched. And two minutes later, when they got their chance to do over, they all thanked God on their knees they had that chance. And they never entered this room again.”
The Keep held up the Book of Truths. “So it is written. So it is.”
“Only time I’ve ever been happy to lose a bet,” Mac said.
“Bring it in!” Nada yelled into his transmitter.
“You owe,” Roland said to Mac as the five members of the Nightstalkers gathered near the edge of the steel walkway. The W54 was armed and counting down next to them.
“Two minutes, thirty seconds,” Doc said, staring at the old-fashioned analog clock on the instrument panel.
Eagle brought the Snake in fast, flaring to a hover.
“Hey,” Roland said, looking down into the mine tower. “There’s some guys down there. Running.”
“Can’t run fast enough,” Nada said.
Eagle turned the Snake and the back ramp beckoned. They all jumped and even Doc made it without help.
“Go! Go! Go!” Nada yelled.
Eagle slammed the throttle and the Snake roared up and away from the tower.
Inside the abandoned Pinnacle bunker, the old system slowly counted down to launch.
It never made it as the W54 SADM went off, obliterating the tower and the four missiles as well as the stockpile of weapons.
What was more radiation on top of a landscape scarred with it?
The 740th nuclear explosion in the Nevada Test Site lit up the sky behind the Snake. It was the first one that had not been a test.
“What about the outliers, wherever they are?” Doc asked. “Won’t they go automatically to self-destruct?”
“We assume they will,” Ms. Jones said over the net.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Kirk said.
“And?” Ms. Jones prompted.
“We got the alert for Nebraska from the old SAC headquarters, right?”
“Correct,” Ms. Jones said.
“Well?” Kirk said.
“Very good,” Ms. Jones replied.
“Kiss me. Kiss me as if it were the last time!”
Colonel Horace Egan, USAF Retired, was rounding third and ready to cross the plate with Mrs. Floyd as she cried out a line from Casablanca.
She was leaning against a console in the underground bunker, Egan pressed up against her. Her dress was in disarray and Egan planned on fixing that by taking it off her. She’d come back twice more since their first encounter, both times without her husband, and he’d advanced a base each time. Tonight he planned to bring it home.
She’d put up a good display, but Egan had always known that when he focused on an objective, he could achieve it. He leaned into her, kissing her once more, glad he still had all his teeth even if he were a bit short on the Samson hair.
“We’ll always have—” he began as he parted lips with her, but his line was cut short as a board on the right side of the room lit up like a Christmas tree. Fourteen flashing orange lights.
“Oh crap,” Egan said.
And then a red phone gave a shrill ring. Reluctantly, Egan separated his body from Mrs. Floyd, who pouted and pondered, not for the first time and not for the last time, why she was drawn back to this dark place and this randy old goat.
Men and their missiles.
“Yes?” Egan snapped as he picked up the phone.
“Colonel Egan, my name is Ms. Jones. We have a problem we were hoping you could help us with.”
“All the self-destructs?” Egan asked, glancing up at the board.
“Yes. Is there a way to shut them down? They’re all predigital.”
“Need the arming code to disarm them,” Egan said.
“We’re trying to get it—” Ms. Jones began, but Egan suddenly laughed. His memory wasn’t so bad after all.
“Lady, the last time this joint was active, everyone knew the code. Hold on.” Egan walked over to the one working console in the control room. Eight circular pins were set in it, like a large bike lock. The numbers were set randomly.
Egan quickly dialed each one to zero.
He hit th
e red button above them and all the orange lights blinked out.
Peace once more reigned in the SAC control room.
Egan walked over to the phone. “Taken care of. Now, if you don’t mind,” he glanced over at Mrs. Floyd, “I’ve got an important matter to attend to.”
“Mister Nada.”
Nada and the rest of the team paused in unloading the Snake at the Barn once they heard the omnipotent voice coming out of the cargo bay speaker. “Yes, Ms. Jones?”
“During the ‘Clusterfuck in Nebraska,’ you mentioned being on a SADM team. You were quite cynical about it all.”
Mac couldn’t help himself, bursting out laughing.
“Mister Eagle mentioned being expendable,” Ms. Jones continued. “I want to assure you that you and your teammates are not considered expendable. I have done some research on the matter. The time delay you didn’t think was built into the weapon? Do you still believe that?”
“Of course not,” Nada said. “We got away.”
“How do you know I didn’t have the weapon modified with a delay?” Ms. Jones asked.
That stumped Nada for the moment.
“Aaaahh.” Ms. Jones drew the sigh out so long, that once more, they thought she might just have given her last breath. “Cynicism has its place, Mister Nada. I am reminded constantly of my own.”
Nada wondered who the hell told Ms. Jones she was cynical?
“We enmeshed ourselves deeply into a dark history on this operation. But we prevailed. In your previous time in the army, Mister Nada, you wore the Green Beret, did you not?”
“I did.”
“And you know the history of it, correct?” She did not wait for an answer. “President Kennedy, in October 1961, instructed the Special Forces commander to have his men wear the then outlawed headgear. He later called it a ‘symbol of excellence, a badge of courage, a mark of distinction in the fight for freedom.’ Do you think he meant those words?”