Cerberus

by John Filcher

  “Corporal, your men buckled up for this?” asked Lowridge, even though he knew Longman would have already triple-checked how securely the insertion was strapped in.

  “Aye, as ready as we can be,” Longman responded.

  Bulldog 7 jumped the next two billion miles in one jump. While that wasn’t the sort of distance that would cause any commotion with a Bulldog crew, their destination was. Earth. And it wasn’t just some easy jump into orbit. Bulldog 7 reappeared in a jump flare in the dark sky over eastern Russia at a low altitude.

  “Jump 1, complete,” reported Lowridge, unnecessarily because the Bulldog’s violent, fiery arrival in low atmosphere smashed the ship like an angry giant. Lowridge was applying the engines hard to brake themselves before gravity took care of stopping the Bulldog for them. The deceleration briefly pulled nine gravities, and squeezed the breath out of them for the next twenty seconds. Outside the Bulldog, it left a short but impressive flame trail that looked remarkably similar to an incoming meteor except that it began a mere thousand feet above the ground instead of seeming to come down from orbit.

  “Gentlemen, we have arrived at our destination. Thank you for flying Bulldog Airlines, where we take you to all the garden spots you would rather not visit,” quipped Lowridge over the commlink to Drayson and Longman.

  “There! See the landing field?” interrupted Drayson, pointing even though Lowridge had seen it, too. He flew the Bulldog at treetop level over a short distance of the forest to arrive at the landing zone that was marked using a few fires.

  “Here we go, landing in three, two, one,” announced Lowridge as he guided the Bulldog down into the small clearing. Dark figures could be seen rushing towards the Bulldog with some sort of netting. Before he could grow alarmed, they quickly spread it over the Bulldog and they could see it was a camouflage net that had real pine boughs fitted into it for realism.

  “OK, Marines, this is our stop. Debark by the numbers,” Longman announced while Lowridge and Paul shut the vessel down. The rear hatch of the Bulldog lowered and formed a ramp.

  Longman, looking out at the shadowy figures awaiting their presence, muttered to himself, “Here goes nothing.” He led the Marines of Force Omega down the ramp.

  One of the shadows stepped forward to Longman.

  “Password?” the shadow asked.

  “The night is dark and I am far from home,” responded Longman.

  The shadow approached closer, holding out a hand to shake. “Force Omega? Is good see you,” said the man in heavily accented American.

  Longman shook the proffered hand. “Corporal Adrian Longman, Omega 1,” he replied.

  The man motioned for the Marines to follow him. “From here, remain silent until we reach our forward position for briefing,” he said. The Marines and several dozen shadows began following the man single file down a very dark trail. Since it was pitch dark and they didn’t know the forested and uneven terrain, the Marines turned on their night vision in their exosuits to avoid tripping over anything.

  An hour later, the still-silent group arrived at a well-hidden mine tunnel entrance at the base of a large, rolling hill. The leader stepped up to it, popped open a previously unseen retinal scan terminal, and gained entrance after the scan. All of them walked into the lightness tunnel of the old mine and they came to an unremarkable-looking section of wall. Again the leader opened a retinal scan terminal that was hidden in the wall, and scanned. A huge portion of the tunnel swung inwards, revealing a modern-looking tunnel with cement walls and soft lighting. The exosuits compensated for the sudden appearance of light so the Marines weren’t blinded.

  The man walked in, motioning for the Marines to follow as he did so. The wall swung closed behind them, and it was as if the Marines had never been there as they left no trace of their passing. They followed the man to an elevator, and joined him in it. Riding in silence, they dropped far down into the earth before the elevator came to a stop at the bottom of a long shaft.

  When the doors opened, the Marines looked out in surprise at a large cavern that was filled with antiquated looking military equipment. As they walked through the cavern, the man spoke for the first time in quite a while. “Is odd looking equipment, is not?”

  Longman nodded as he gawked while they walked. “Yes, I’ve never seen anything quite like these. What was the purpose of putting the ancient hammer and sickle symbol on them?”

  The man replied with a small smile. “Is ancient Soviet military equipment from before The Fall. We are getting them, how you say, reconditioned for combat?”

  Longman’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “These are from before The Fall? Seriously?”

  As they walked, the man approached a door and opened it with a gesture for the Marines to enter into the well-lit conference room just beyond. “Yes. The Collective knows nothing about this old base. It is forgotten to them long ago. The rebellion has been preparing to use it since we located it a few years ago. We believe the armored vehicles of our ancestors will be useful to overthrow today’s rulers and build a new society.”

  As they sat around the conference table, a mixed contingent of Marines and rebels took up guard positions around the cavern and outside the door.

  “OK, we are ready to begin,” said the man. “You may call me by name of Dimitri Sokolov, I am one of the Rabos.”

  Longman nodded, thinking to himself it’s obviously a fake identity. “The Rabos?” asked Longman. “What’s a Rabos?”

  Sokolov thought for a moment, translating the words for Force Omega. “Rabochiy are workers in our language. The workers in rebellion call themselves the Rabos. Rabos rebel against the Dvoryanstvo.” Sokolov paused, obviously searching for the proper word to translate Dvoryanstvo. “How you say? The nobility? The ruling class? They’re Dvoryanstvo.”

  “You said you have a target for Force Omega?” asked Longman.

  “Yes, although you might not like where it is. We could not risk openly communicating the target to your Confederacy, which is why you are here now. We wish you to infiltrate the Kremlin and put a stop to the Collective’s plan for biological warfare before they create another Fall. This time, it’s an engineered Doomsday virus that will kill most of humanity instead of just enough to bring down civilization by creating economic chaos.”

  Longman had been briefed about the Collective’s plan to unleash a virus-based war on the Confederacy in the misguided belief the Collective would be able to contain the spread of the Doomsday virus since there was no trade or travel between the two civilizations this time.

  “Tell us about the infectious characteristics of the virus,” Longman said, more as a command than a statement.

  Sokolov glanced over at Longman as he replied, “It has an asymptomatic and unusually long incubation period of three to four weeks, and extremely high airborne transmission rates that infect nearly everyone. Once symptoms onset, a victim begins to exhibit what appears to be severe bruising before bleeding from eyes and ears sets in. Survival rate is lower than one percent.”

  “Doomsday virus, indeed,” commented Longman as he leaned further onto the conference table and clasped his hands together. “Has the Collective any plans to stop sick people from crossing over a border in Asia? It doesn’t seem possible to guard thousands of miles of borders that cross through wilderness and mountains.”

  Sokolov nodded and replied, “Is not possible, not by any realistic measure. Someone will get through, the Doomsday virus will inevitably infect the Collective, too. Both civilizations will die along with the vast majority of humanity on Earth, and the ruling families of the Collective will eventually return to recolonize the entire planet. They even have several vaults of stored human genetic material scattered about the Collective to help avoid inbreeding. They want to wipe out the populations of the Confederacy in addition to our own overpopulation. Start over on an empty planet.”

  Longman and Pak
looked at each other. “I knew the Collective was an inhuman and evil government, but this is too much,” Pak said disgustedly. “Now the Confederacy and the Rabos share a common cause. Our right to survive.”

  Longman and Sokolov nodded sadly, as Sokolov continued with the briefing. “We have an infiltration route into the Kremlin from deep underground. Another forgotten tunnel from before The Fall. Because the Collective believes the lack of travel and trade also prevents sending infected carriers into the Confederation as a means of disbursing the airborne virus, the delivery vehicle will be via ballistic missiles. Your mission is to upload a computer virus designed by your scientists into the Collective’s defense grid to sever government control over its missiles and prevent the Collective from launching its attack two days from now.”

  “Two DAYS!” exclaimed Longman loudly.

  “Yes, two days. That is the attack date we have uncovered at great cost to our people. Unless something major occurs in the interim to change that start date, missile launch is in two days after their preparations are complete. We will create a distraction on the surface while you gain entrance to the facility, but we will have to travel immediately if we are to arrive in time.”

  Longman and Pak looked at each other. “All right. I’ll send a report to the fleet, and then we can get going,” said Longman.

  The Underworld

  “It would have been nice if they had provided ground car transportation,” Pak quipped to Longman as the fleet Marines from space paradoxically rode horses through ancient underground tunnels. They had been proceeding at a brisk trot for hours through the old tunnel that ran ruler straight far underground.

  “Any idea how far we’ve traveled, Omega 1?” asked Victor Berger, who was designated Omega 4 for this mission.

  “Negative. Best guess is we’ve covered thirty plus miles based on elapsed time and estimated speed,” responded Longman. “You getting saddle sore back there, Omega 4?” he asked with an evil grin at Berger’s visible discomfort. He received an angry sounding reply in French that Longman was pretty sure included remarks about his parentage and something to do with a goat.

  Force Omega collectively roared with spirited laughter over their team commlink. Although Longman felt it was good for the Marines to blow off some steam with the laughs and banter, he was glad the rebels couldn’t overhear them outside their exosuit helmets, or they’d start wondering what kind of jokers were posing as Marines from space.

  Eventually the horseplay died out as the monotony of underground horseback riding wore on for several more hours. The Rabos had set up several different waypoints with fresh horses to ride and keep the group at speed. Finally, Force Omega and their escorts arrived at an generic-looking underground embarkation platform.

  “This is it,” announced Dimitri as he dismounted his steed and climbed onto the platform.

  Longman looked down the tunnel towards the direction they had traveled. “It is? How can you tell?” he asked, looking around for a sign or some sort of symbol or writing that might identify where they were. There was nothing but white tile for walls, and they had passed multiple such platforms already.

  “Based on signage higher up where the exits were blocked many centuries ago, scout teams previously identified this station platform as the one leading into the Kremlin. Fortunately, there was one scout who was conversant with the ancient Russian alphabet called Cyrillic and he recognized the words written in that dead form of writing,” Dimitri responded. “Come. We have a long climb ahead of us.”

  Longman and his team carried the ropes and climbing gear supplied by the rebels, and walked into the exit tunnel heading upwards.

  “Uh, Omega 1, you know what happens to guys walking into the dark, scary tunnels in the movies, right?” asked Omega 6, Dale Dannon.

  “They always get eaten by the aliens that grab their faces,” responded Longman with a grin. “Well, then, in that case, after you, sunshine!” he added.

  The lower part of the tunnel was in fine shape, perhaps reflecting the protection provided by the earth when the nukes wrecked the surface during The Fall so long ago. Soon they came to breaks in the ramps leading up. “Time for the mountaineering,” muttered Longman as the team began hammering anchor pitons into the walls and climbing past the broken areas. It was slow going.

  Chapter 27

  Wayside Station

  Captain Ronin and Commander Mueller arrived in the same Fleet Intelligence virtual conference room where they originally met with Admiral Rodding and Colonel Hobson. This time, the captains of the Ceres and Cygnus, along with their first officers, join them.

  Colonel Hobson spoke first after they were settled. “Sorry for having to do this via holo instead of in person but time is too short to allow for the traveling. As you all have been kept abreast of the deteriorating situation in the Collective back on Earth, none of this may seem shocking. The economy has collapsed, and the political elite have been evacuating their families because they are losing control over their cities due to the rebellion and other troubles.

  “We’ve received a briefing from Omega 1. Force Omega has made contact with the rebels on the ground near Nizhny Novgorod, and they’ve begun their infiltration of the Collective’s defense grid, which is based there. That is the good news. The bad news is the rebels have advised Omega 1 the Collective will attack the Confederation with its highly engineered Doomsday virus in two days. This virus would pretty much wipe out the entire human population of Earth. Because the Collective is unaware we’ve captured their families out in The Cloud, their government elites still believes all of their families will return from their hideout somewhere in space to repopulate the planet, without the troublesome Confederation to interfere with their scheme to create a new world order and control the overpopulation of their own subjects,” concluded Hobson, looking around at the grave faces around the table.

  Captain Michelle Rodgers of the Ceres responded first, her dark eyes flashing with anger. “Genocide! That’s their Master Plan? It’s The Fall all over again!” Angry shouts from the others in the room drowned out the rest of her comments.

  Hobson attempted to regain control of the briefing. “Quiet!” he roared, stunning the other officers into silence. “We don’t have time to get angry here. We only have time to bring you all up to speed on our next steps. That’s it. Admiral?”

  At this hand-off, Admiral Rodding began his portion of the briefing. “For months, your three ships have played the spaceship version of guerrilla warfare. Striking hard without warning, and disappearing just as quickly. The purposes, as you all know, were to bleed the enemy’s scarce resources, and to force them to expend additional resources to defend everything instead of concentrating their defenses. The strategy has worked brilliantly so far, especially when viewed from the lens of forcing the Collective to divert more of its faltering economy to military spending through higher taxes and redirected government spending. Their people are starving, and revolting because they’ve had enough and the government has grown too weak to keep suppressing them.”

  When the Admiral paused to gather his thoughts, Ronin chanced a question. “Sir, while forcing the Collective to crumble earlier than anticipated is a good thing, and we all recognize that the Treaty of Midway is no longer stopping war on Earth, how do we handle the biological weapons if Force Omega can’t stop all of them and they actually are deployed against our people?”

  Instead of showing anger at the interruption, the Admiral merely nodded. Ronin had framed the very thoughts running through the Admiral’s mind.

  “That’s why you three Captains are here. Welcome to Taskforce 3,” said Rodding.

  The three captains looked at each, somewhat stunned at their inclusion in a Confederate naval taskforce, because the last time such a taskforce was assembled was 75 years ago. They were powerful groups of warships, but required a huge undertaking in terms of commitment, resources, and
war fighting capability. Confederate task forces were also legendary in the lore of the Navy, as Taskforce 1 had wrested control of Mars away from the Collective, and Taskforce 2 had done the same with Mercury.

  As Ronin mulled over the implications of being named a captain in a Navy taskforce, it occurred to him the losses of Mars and Mercury had represented the beginning of the end for the Collective. Losing those planets choked off the Collective’s easy access to massive mineral resources and forced them to rely upon the much smaller scale of asteroid mining. How fitting the third taskforce is here to close that loop and usher in the end of the Collective, he thought.

  As Rodding continued on with his briefing, an image of Earth appeared between their own holo images. “So far in this campaign, your guerrilla warfare style of offensive has featured hit-and-run attacks to simultaneously bleed the Collective and force it to waste dwindling resources by defending everything at the same time instead of massing its forces. Because of the unique firepower and abilities of the Cerberus-class of ships, instead of pinprick guerrilla attacks against minor targets, you’ve repeatedly wiped out major installations and hard targets instead. And you’ve done this without leaving behind a footprint or evidence of the existence of jump drives.

  “But now this mission is totally different. Cygnus is no longer guarding the Argos because the Columbia has joined the fleet and taken over that role, so your three ships will jump to Earth to provide top cover and shoot down any enemy missiles or ships. Detailed orders have been issued to each of you. Questions?”

  Alfred Jurgenson, captain of the Cygnus, had the first question and voiced what was also on the minds of the other two captains. With a concerned look, he asked, “Is the Treaty of Midway’s proscription against orbital bombardment of ground targets on Earth still in effect?”

  Hobson shook his head and responded, “No. We have definite, multiple source confirmations about the enemy’s plans to wipe us out with a biological attack. From that point forward, the Treaty of Midway no longer applies.”