Warzone: Nemesis: A Novel of Mars

by Morris Graham

  I dismissed the meeting with orders to deploy in one hour. Following the briefing, MAJ Ricochet requested a meeting with me. Since my ready room was cleared, I closed the door to hear him out. As my acting first officer and oldest friend, he had my ear in a way no one else did.

  “Colonel, may I speak freely?”

  “You may.”

  “This plan is madness.”

  “The plan is to feign madness, which is quite sane.” He was not quite sure.

  “You quote often from The Art of War. May I offer you a passage to consider?”

  “Go on.”

  “I quote, ‘If you want to feign weakness to induce haughtiness in opponents, first you must be extremely strong, for only then can you pretend to be weak’. Du Mu, The Art of War. Weakness is both physical and mental, so building on that thought, let me expound further.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Following that line of reasoning, you have to be extremely sane to feign madness. Are you extremely sane?”

  MAJ Ricochet was my closest friend and right-hand man. His job was to view any risky plan with skepticism, and he played that part faithfully. I was mindful of the scripture that said; “faithful are the wounds of a friend.” Proverbs 27:6

  “I’m quite sane, and the plan is good, but I appreciate your concern. Will that be all?”

  Seeing that I would not be swayed from my course, he relented. “No sir, but I want to go on record that I opposed this plan as unnecessarily dangerous. I strenuously disagree with your plan to play “staked goat.”

  “The record will show that you have disagreed, quite strenuously. And Tobias?”

  “Sir?”

  “If you had not voiced your opinion, I would have been disappointed. Is that all?”

  “Sir, yes sir.”

  “Then you’re dismissed.”

  At the appointed time, I met the men at the hangar deck. “You all know what to do, let’s do it.” We all passed through the last transitional airlock of the hangar deck and proceeded north. At a fork in the trail, my wingman CPT Dutchman and I proceeded farther north and the rest of the patrol split and continued north by northeast. We observed radio silence as we traveled northward. We planned to intercept the Soviet patrol where they swung the furthest point from their post and the closest to ours. I was to go forward while the others went to the predetermined destination.

  It was time for my wingman to leave me and go meet the others. He hesitated, and then flew ahead. We had a discussion earlier where he tried to allow me to have him stay with me throughout the next part of the plan, and I told him no. I said it wouldn’t work any other way, and I needed everyone else at this point off enemy radar. I wouldn’t have a wingman that wouldn’t have protested this plan. If there were any slip-ups, I could be killed. Now was the time to find out if I was sane enough to feign madness.

  I proceeded to the intersection point. My radar showed eight ships coming directly at me from due west. I estimated that I would be outside weapons range for about ninety seconds. My heartbeat quickened, and I got my breathing under control and focused on the task ahead. Quickly I hopped out of my tank with the box I’d packed and emptied it on the ground. All five heads of the dead Soviet pilots rolled out. I’d seen bodies on the battlefield and in the morgue, but the sight of the severed heads was obscene and disturbing. I broke off my gaze and remembered that I didn’t have the time to study our handiwork. After hastily jumping back into my tank, I took off at full speed. After firing several quick sprays at the group of ships with my mag cannons, I took off like a scalded dog due east.

  LTC Matulevich couldn’t believe his good fortune. The American dog was alone, and he looked as if he were crazy, drunk or stupid—or maybe even all three. Matulevich was already on a fast track for promotion after personally killing COL Squid, having made the very short list of Soviet officers who had killed an American command officer. At first he had thought it a bad thing that the American first officer survived the assassination attempt, but today he had the opportunity to kill his second American commander. With the war effort going against them since COL SEAL took over, it was easy to play on that fool Kiknadze’s fears and manipulate him to launch an assassination squad against the American commander and his first officer. Kiknadze alone bore the decision for breaking the accord: he faced the backlash of the Americans and the political fallout from the Soviet central command alone. He had moved Kiknadze like a pawn on a chessboard and soon he would be in command. Now he could either kill or capture alive the new American commander. Never before had they taken an American commander prisoner. This would further enhance his reputation but would also be credited to his own commander. As much as he wanted to capture him alive and torture him for intelligence, he would not share the credit with Kiknadze. He would kill the American. For Matulevich was loyal to Matulevich.

  “This is Sub Colonel Matulevich. We will overtake the American. Do not attack him. I want to kill him myself.”

  1LT Daniil Ryzhkov sighed. The honor of killing the American would go to the first officer—again.

  My radar showed the enemy ships stopped where I dropped the heads. They hesitated briefly before resuming course at increased speed, attempting to overcome me. I started flying slightly erratically to give the illusion of being either drunk or insane. My instruments showed that they were flying at maximum speed and were probably mad as hornets. This wouldn’t be a good time for engine failure. I was thankful Chief Wolverine was good and thorough. They followed me about thirty-eight kilometers to a place of my own choosing.

  We neared an opening that was a narrow defile about sixty meters across with shadows heavy against the rock walls. I neared the preplanned location and begin to slow down, turning completely around and engaged my reverse thrusters. Finally arriving at my prearranged spot, I threw out a splinter mortar in front of the lead tank, continuing at full speed in reverse. The mortar caused all of them to stop while it spun in front of the group, throwing fifty caliber projectiles in all directions. The payload of the splinter mortar was constructed of alloy-x shrapnel, propelled outwardly by four small successive mag bomb explosions as the mortar bounced and spun off of the ground like a whirling dervish. Suddenly out of the shadows, all ten of our tanks threw out splinter mortars, surrounding the Soviet tanks’ group with the spinning death wheels. The mortars surrounded the enemy tanks, inflicting damage while effectively cutting off their escape. My men and I were charging up our mag cannons while the Soviets were dealing with the mortars. Just as the splinter mortars stopped throwing projectiles; all ten American ships discharged their deadly purple balls of energy toward their targets. The ground shook as all eight tanks exploded in a deafening roar. The mag charge that hit the tank closest to me ripped off its hull like peeling an orange. It took a minute for the smoke and fire to subside so we could count the enemy survivors.

  The combined force of all the mag charges killed six of the eight pilots as they were trying to eject. As if right on cue, all the tanks started tracking the last two pilots. I was the first one to find LTC Matulevich. He had broken a leg when his retrorocket boots malfunctioned. I drew my colts and made my way to him before my wingman or any of my pilots arrived. He had his service revolver pointed at me, but dropped it when I put a bullet through his right wrist. My enemy’s eyes were as cold and hard as onyx stones, and he offered me one last defiant one-fingered salute. I stood over him for a few seconds, and then shot him through the helmet in the forehead. His helmet had a star in it as if in need of glass repair—his head bearing a neat hole dripping blood. One down, one to go… I accessed my radio link in my suit. “I want that other pilot alive!”

  The one surviving Soviet pilot was 1LT Daniil Ryzhkov. I had a couple of men restrain him while we pulled the tooth with the embedded tracking device. I called the scavenger crew to reclaim the precious alloy-x and called up the satellite.

  Our satellite showed a well-defended Soviet post with nine guntowers and ten turrets, well-plac
ed for maximum defense. The Soviet factory was spitting out tanks and bombers as fast as possible. An attack didn’t look advisable at this time. We’d lose too many ships and men and all the scrap would be recovered by the Soviets. I assigned an escort to deliver the prisoner back to our post for questioning. The loss of LTC Matulevich was going to hurt COL Kiknadze. We sat and waited while the scavengers picked the area clean, then returned to our post.

  I had my chief interrogator, CPT Black Ice, work on our prisoner. To his credit, the young officer didn’t seem to be giving up anything, so I gave the captain the approval to turn up the interview a notch. We didn’t officially exist as far as the Geneva Convention was concerned. After yesterday, we assumed there was no agreement about the handling of prisoners. We’d also had an agreement about using redfield generators. Since both sides had now used them, I assumed that no previous agreement would be honored. Since there were no Rules of Engagement, we’d torture our guest. Had I not been in a state of grief and suffering from guilt, I’d have seen there was no honor in this. CPT Black Ice put the Soviet in a room with a brightly flashing strobe light while playing rock music very loudly. Then he left the room to go to supper. He would leave him there all night and check on him in the morning. We would be celebrating the most successful complete victory in my recollection.

  I ordered the best food and drink served to our men. We all ate and drank together and the story was told and retold. The only thing missing was COL SEAL. I asked CPT Black Ice how our prisoner was doing, and he said he would be most cooperative by morning. When the men had finished eating and drinking and had told the story about a hundred times, I bid them all goodnight.

  We got some very good information out of the young pilot in the morning. We learned some things about the hierarchy there and their routines that we previously didn’t know. Even more valuable was the information about their commander. COL Kiknadze had ordered COL SEAL killed because he feared him. It was an act of a desperate man. We also learned some information about his own personal habits, especially a place he liked to go alone when he wanted to think. He was an avid mountain climber and usually did this alone, with only two wingmen for security. All of this could be misinformation, so I asked CPT Black Ice to give him sodium pentothal to confirm our prisoner was telling the truth. The young pilot wasn’t lying. I submitted the report to GEN Spears, but omitted the details of the pilot’s interrogation. CPT Black Ice had left the details of the interrogation except for the sodium pentothal out of his report at my request.

  GEN Spears called to inform me that he’d read the report. Effective immediately, I was promoted to full colonel and assigned the permanent position of post commander. MAJ Ricochet was promoted to lieutenant colonel. I requested a name change from Cowboy to Kahless, named after the unforgettable warrior icon of the Klingon race from Star Trek. He chuckled a bit and granted my request. He also granted my request to rename the post to Camp SEAL and change our unit’s logo to a pair of crossed Colt forty-fives. I went down to the hangar deck and painted a picture of a Klingon warrior on both sides of my tank.

  That evening we assembled in our dress uniforms for a post christening ceremony. I kept a case of champagne in my office, which was reserved to celebrate the complete removal of the Soviets here. Today I’d use a bottle of that champagne to perform the ceremony of changing the name of the post to Camp SEAL. The entire post was present in front of the main building complex for the ceremony. MAJ Norsemun, the head of the TOC, in his dress uniform and white gloves, carried the bottle to the front as though he were carrying a ceremonial saber. After a stiff walk to the front of the procession, he handed me the bottle and saluted.

  I addressed the men. “I asked GEN Spears if I could rename this post Camp SEAL in honor of our fallen commander and it was granted.” I smashed the bottle on the inside front of the building. “I christen this post Camp SEAL, may her voyage be long.” The men took notice of the references to “her” and “voyage.” I’d always felt this post had the soul of a ship. It made no difference that there was no sea, sails, wind, or quarterdeck under my feet. I felt her soul, and it was the soul of a ship as much as any that sailed the seven seas.

  Normally such an occasion should be followed with celebration, but I dismissed the men; who quietly returned to their duties. I made a mental note to have that bottle of champagne replaced soon. It simply wouldn’t do to be short on champagne if I succeeded in killing every Soviet on Mars.

  A silent war raged within my soul. Any of the chaplains would try to talk me out of what I was planning. My chief surgeon could put a stop to it altogether with an unfit for duty assessment. I avoided making eye contact with any of them whenever possible.

  FORGING A SWORD

  I couldn’t stop thinking about killing Kiknadze; it ate at my soul like corrosive acid. I wanted to do it at close quarters with my hands and look into his eyes as I took his life, knowing who killed him and why. My recent choice of call signs, the fictional Klingon Kahless, would have no doubt just impaled him with the blade of his bat’letH. I had no idea how I’d get him close enough to use a blade, but I decided to make one nonetheless.

  The Star Trek story of Kahless was indeed interesting. The Klingon dipped a lock of his hair into a volcano, pulled it out and hammered forged a bat’letH. He quenched the fantasy blade in a lake. I laughed to myself as I contemplated what winds up in science fiction.

  First I went to the machine shop and requisitioned Chief Wolverine to release about twenty pounds of alloy-x to experiment with making edged weapons. One thing we knew, this stuff was amazing, and I often wondered if it made a good blade. I’d made my Arkansas toothpick out of some scrap tool steel, but never thought to use alloy-x.

  The machine shop had a facility for making and heat-treating tools. Then I went to my locker and pulled out my welding leathers, leather gloves and torch glasses. Growing up on a farm where we did a lot of our own repairs and fabrications, I’d made some knives in our shop back home. We had a bench vice, bench grinder, belt sander, buffer, an anvil and a drill stand close to the forge and heat-treating kiln. I adjusted the anvil’s height to suit me. Since alloy-x had an element in it that was previously not on any elemental chart, I’d have to do some experimenting. Oh, we had data from over twenty years of building ships and weapons with it and the chief had used some to make tool steel. We weren’t completely ignorant of its properties. Alloy-x was dubbed that because of it amazing qualities. Alloy-x was comprised of iron, carbon, a little nickel, and an element we referred to as element x. If it didn’t contain element x, it would only be medium carbon-nickel steel with nothing to brag about. But this element constituted fifteen percent of the alloy-x. Although we’d made tools with it, heat-treating it like steel, I felt this metal had a secret to unlock. There were quite a few different temperatures to quench steel at and different quenching mediums, as well as different tempering temperatures.

  After three months of experimenting, I had a boot knife that passed all my tests beyond my wildest dreams. Heating the alloy-x and hammer forging it into shape, I then reheated it to a dark cherry red and quenched it to a subzero temperature, and repeated the process again. Finally, I reheated it to dark cherry red and quenched it in brine and tempered the blade to a peacock color. What I was looking at was a metal that didn’t follow conventional metalworking rules. The knife bent ninety degrees in both directions without breaking. I hammered it into a barrel. Finally, I hammered the back of it, causing it to shear a cut a foot long through a steel barrel. After all of this abuse, it still shaved hair off of my arm and afterward easily cut through a free hanging one-inch Manila hemp rope. But I’d also seen earthly steels do all this. So I decided to find out if I could break it. Pulling out a half-inch piece of plate steel, I proceeded to hammer the knife into it, point down with a five-pound sledgehammer. To my amazement, it cut right through, but it stuck. Flipping it over, I pounded the point of it back out with the hammer. I was dumbfounded. The knife dropped out without as
much as a chip or crack on the point. Excitedly I called the chief and repeated the test. He was as impressed as I was. After polishing the blade on the muslin wheel of the buffer-grinder, I drilled some rivet holes in the tang and and fixed a red linen Micarta handle to it and gave it to Chief Wolverine

  The next step was to make a fearsome weapon out of this amazing metal. I hammered out a double-handled sword, forty inches long from tip to tip, with four blade edges which would have given even the most discriminating Klingon eyes filled with blood lust and fangs showing an appreciative smile. The two outside blade edges were fifteen inches long apiece, and the two inside blades, twelve inches long in front, acted as blade catchers. It had two handle cutouts in the back of the blade to grip it with both hands.

  I tempered it the same as I did the boot knife. It took two assistants to handle the bellows so I could get all of the blade edges hot enough to hammer out. Using the inside cutouts of the weapon to achieve the balance I wanted, I wrapped the handle cutouts in strips of leather soaked in resin. The end product looked like a cross between a sword and a flying bat.

  We had an old scout that was going to be recycled soon. My attempt to cut through the walls of the craft with my blade and was successful. It was important to me that my new sword to be fearsome in appearance as well. I gave the back of the blade a flat-black anodized finish, but the inside of the cutouts and blade edges I made blood-red. It gave it the look of a bat in flight with bloody wing tips and evil eyes. Its amazing functionality and fearsome look made me smile as I imagined myself impaling or beheading COL Kiknadze.

  I completely quit doing katas in my karate class with any other weapon, save my sword. I wrote six katas for my sword, and when I needed to think, I went to the practice room and practiced katas. Real practice was impossible with the blade as it was too deadly, so I had a pair of hard wood replicas made with a heavy layer of rubber on the outside for practice with a partner. Even so, CPT Dutchman and I had to put on helmets and padded gear after we cracked a couple ribs and busted some knuckles.