by T. R. Harris
Derrick frowned and wrinkled his nose under the white mask. “Man, that’s disgusting. Let’s hope not.”
His men retired to a vacant corner of the room and began to open their heavy black cases. All the equipment was battery-powered and contained within the boxes. Switches were flicked as lights and screens came to life.
A few of the Air Force techs looked over at them and frowned, but soon returned to the tedious work of tracing orphan wires for their source and purpose.
Derrick walked up to a group of them on their hands and knees at what looked like a small crop of thin wires growing out of the floor. “How’s it going? You guys making progress?”
“Fuck it!” said one of the men without looking up. “This is like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
The man next to him looked over his shoulder at Derrick and took in the EPA label on his jacket. His breast tag read D. Grissom. “Don’t mind him, we’re doing fine. We should have a preliminary link up in a few minutes. Should we be wearing masks or something?”
“That wouldn’t be a bad idea, at least until we’re done with our air samples. We brought down a supply of them just in case.”
One of Derrick’s men passed out the masks to all the other people in the room, and then the team huddled together, having pulled up broken equipment supports to use as chairs.
Derrick sat next to Steve Vasquez. “Are we syncing?” he whispered.
“Piece of cake,” Vasquez answered. “Still, this is a lot of data to upload in only forty-five seconds. I think they’re being optimistic. And then the carrying capacity of the connections may not be all that high.”
“What are you trying to tell me?”
“That we may need a lot more time for the upload than forty-five seconds.”
Derrick pursed his lips in frustration. He knew Almasi was waiting halfway around the world for the moment the upload was complete. He would know it at the same time Derrick and his team knew the link between Las Vegas and Karachi was solid and verified.
He carefully watched the techs across the room. Derrick was sure there would be some indication from the workers when connections were established, even though the equipment in the cases would know as well. Originally, the plan had called for the team to access the room after the link had been established. Even if all the RDC drones were accessed at that point, the operation called for the existing codes to be overridden by the ones Almasi would provide. That would have involved a hard tap on the lines, yet without so many people in the room.
But now the crazy terrorist wanted the override to happen sooner, basically in conjunction with contact being initially regained with the bunkers. It was estimated that even if the military were able to reestablish contact, this would only be the first step in changing out the transponder codes to correspond with those linked to new command centers. The old codes would have to be expunged so no conflicts would exist and then new ones loaded.
The codes Derrick carried in his equipment were ghosts of the existing RDC codes already in the flight controllers of the drones. The thousands of UAVs hidden away in hundreds of locations across the country would instantly accept the command authority of these transponder codes, even before they would allow the old ones to be dumped.
Two days from now, Derrick and his team would have had no problem overriding any new codes installed in the drones. But now the job had become trickier. The techs in the room would surely notice the presence of a second signal once the link was established. Derrick had to think of some way to keep them from noticing the ghost signal for what could amount to a minute or more.
He called over two of his men, the two who were classified as muscle on the team and not vital to the upload operation. He briefed them on his plan.
And then they waited.
A full hour later, the tech who had complained about the difficulty of the job lifted off his knees and leaned back against a side wall. “Damn, Sarge, that was a bitch.”
Tech Sergeant Grissom also climbed to his feet, along with his entire eight person team. He and two other men moved to a table that held its own array of sophisticated electronic equipment. He began to type on a keyboard. “Let’s see what we’ve got,” Grissom said. He reached under the white surgical mask and scratched his nose.
They all watched the computer readouts with rapt attention, until one of them pointed at the screen.
“Yeah, looks good, doesn’t it. Check the alignment.”
A moment later he stood back from the table and stretched his back. “Looks like we have it, strong and steady. Let the brass know, Zack.”
Suddenly a soft chirping sound arose from the other side of the room, and all eyes turned toward the source.
The EPA guys seemed agitated, and Derrick and two others rushed up to the tech team holding small readers resembling microphones.
“What’s going on?” the tech sergeant asked.
“High levels of radon have been detected. In fact, off the chart!”
“Seriously? What could cause that?”
“Is it dangerous?” another of the airmen asked.
“Dangerous? Hell yeah!” Derrick exclaimed. He looked to his other two men.
“It’s concentrated on this side of the room,” reported one of them.
“Please, Sergeant, can I get your men to move over by the doorway while we bring in fans and investigate the source?”
“Now? How long will it take?”
“Not more than a minute or two, that’s all.”
“C’mon, Sarge,” said the complainer. “I could use a break anyway.”
“We have to monitor the link.”
“Every second?” Derrick asked.
“Well, no,” relied the tech sergeant. “But we just got it back up.”
“Two minutes and it’ll be clear. Better than killing yourselves just so you can watch a damn computer screen.”
“This shit can kill us?”
“In the right concentration.”
“What about you guys?” the sergeant asked.
“We’re trained for this stuff. Now please, Sergeant, let us do our job.”
“Yeah, sure, just let me know when it’s safe.”
“Roger that.”
********
Fifteen minutes later, Derrick Howard and his team had left the underground comm room, having certified that the air was now safe to breathe.
In fact, they were already in a green EPA van and heading down the hill from the ruins of the Rapid Defense Center by the time Sergeant Grissom noticed something was wrong. Moments before, they’d had a solid link with the bunkers, and now, in rapid succession, the links were being lost. This was unusual, since the original link had been a blanket broadcast to all the RDC bunkers and not singling out any individual location. Now the progression was obvious and the sheer number of the bunkers they were losing was becoming evident.
********
By the time Grissom made contact with his superiors at Nellis, the word had already reached Washington D.C. that something wasn’t right. Contact had been established with the bunkers, and now they were losing it.
Even though a no-name general over at the Pentagon was the official head of the newly-designed Rapid Defense Center East, it was Nathan Hall who was running things on the ground. As such, he saw in real time the spread of broken contacts represented graphically on a huge monitor on the wall of his temporary command center at Andrews Air Force Base. At first he cursed the technicians—the original link wasn’t as solid as they’d reported. But then once all the bunkers were dark again, sporadic reports began to come in saying that some of the bunkers—mainly those in the D.C. area—were opening! Tech crews were inside all of them, and they backed away as dozens of combat drones suddenly sprang to life and lifted out of the silos within five seconds of activation, giving the people inside no time to react.
Nathan grew weak-kneed when he realized what was happening.
He picked up a microphone and set it to broadcast
Center-wide, which in reality consisted of only two converted aircraft hangars on the base, one housing the command center and the other the control pods for the Goliaths.
“Attention, all pilots and techs, man your stations! The RDC bunkers have been activated and the drones inside are mobile, and they are not—I repeat—not under friendly control.”
He set the microphone down on the table and watched on another monitor as thirty or more military personnel in the neighboring hangar, representing every branch of the service, ran to stations and lit up screens. Then his cellphone rang.
“Hall here.”
“This is Xander, what the hell are you talking about, Not under friendly control?”
“It means the transponder codes in the bunker drones have been hijacked. Need I say by whom?”
“How many bunkers have been compromised?”
“All of them, Xander, every last friggin’ one of them.”
There was silence on the phone for several seconds before Xander spoke again. “There are over seventeen-thousand combat-rated drones in those bunkers, and you’re saying Almasi has control of all of them?”
“‘Fraid so. I’m expediting the activation of the cell towers with the killbox neutralizing signal. It’ll have the added benefit of confusing the RDC auto drones as well since it acts on the flight controller itself. But that still leaves the RPAs. How many are in the inventory? I haven’t had time to research everything the RDC had going.”
“Over three thousand.”
Nathan let out a whistle. “Well, I would hazard a guess that Almasi doesn’t have three thousand pilots sitting around somewhere ready to take control of all those units. That’s one way to look at it.”
“Probably not, but he has enough to cluster attacks just about anywhere he pleases, and then transfer his people to other locations once those raids are done. He won’t be able to recharge any of the units, so these are all use-and-discard.”
“But three thousand combat drones, that’s ten times more than what’s been used in any of the attacks taking place to this point. And just when the attacks were beginning to taper off.”
“We should be able to tell which bunkers have been activated, right?”
“That we can, at least visually, or by the techs on-site.”
“That will give us target zones. What do we have so far?”
Nathan scanned the information on the large monitor, while a Navy petty officer handed him a sheet of paper. “You’re not going to like this, but sixteen bunkers have been activated in the D.C., Alexandria, and Arlington region. The auto drones should be dead in the water by now, especially in this area where we have the most assets. But that still leaves over a hundred and twenty-five RPAs from the report I’ve just been handed.”
“What better target than D.C., Nathan? I’ll get the pilots ready, but we only have nine Goliaths in the area. The rest have already been sent out to other locations.”
“If I recall some from the surrounding zones, they could be here in under an hour. That might get another six or so on station.”
“An hour? Hell, Washington could be in ruins in an hour. I’ll get my people up and prowling immediately. Maybe we can delay some of the major damage until reinforcements arrive.”
“Good luck, Xander. I’ll continue to get the killbox signal disseminated, while monitoring things from next door here. We’ll feed your pilots coordinates as they become available.”
Chapter 22
Abdul Almasi surveyed the rows of flight control stations in the large room fifty feet below the surface of his unassuming residential compound in the suburbs of Karachi, Pakistan. He knew eventually he’d acquire the transponder codes from Jonas Lemon, just not so soon. He only had forty-two pilots at the compound, far fewer than he had originally planned for this stage of the operation. They would have to do. Before the desertion of his allies in the drone war against the United States, he had planned on transferring control to another two hundred pilots located across the Middle East, Europe, and even in America herself. Now his former allies would regret their decisions, as they saw the incredible firepower the Arm of Allah had under its control. They could have shared in the ultimate battle against the infidels and been a part of the legend that would be spoken of for centuries.
Now it would be his legend alone.
Yes, his task was now more difficult, and it would take longer to accomplish. In addition, he would have to utilize the same forty-two pilots for countless operations, and they would not be able to maintain the pace for long—which would also slow his progress. But now that couldn’t be avoided.
Eventually the Americans would seal off the remaining bunkers. He would have to act fast, hitting the most high-value targets first. Fortunately, most of America’s symbolic high-value targets where located in or around the Washington, D.C. area.
As a precaution, he sent out commands to activate a hundred additional bunkers across the country, placing the freed drones into standby mode once outside and superficially hidden from detection. Battery charges had to be preserved until the drones were called upon, which hopefully would be soon, before the authorities could track them down.
There was loud murmur permeating the flight control stations.
“What’s wrong?” he called out over the rising din.
A senior pilot, Vladimir Krensky, turned from his station. “The auto drones are not responding, as least the ones in the D.C. area. Some of the others are, the ones you asked to be dispersed into the countryside, but none in Washington.”
The transponder link he had with the bunkers gave him access to the video monitors within. He activated the feeds from two of the bunkers near the White House.
Sure enough, the auto drones—mainly the smaller, sacrificial lambs of the arsenal—had their propellers spinning away in the launch area as they hovered ten feet or more in the air, but they weren’t going anywhere. Frantic technicians and military personnel in the bunkers were desperately knocking the drones out of the air—the soldiers using the hovering UAVs for target practice, while the techs swung metal rods and even folding chairs at the drones.
Almasi fingered the detonate codes for the two bunkers he had on the screen, and was only mildly surprised when nothing happened. Somehow the Americans had figured a way to override the embedded commands in the flight control programs, leaving just the basic take-off-and-hover instructions.
“What about the RPAs? I do not see them.”
“They have launched successfully,” the Russian drone pilot replied.
“How many do we have in the area?”
“One hundred twenty-eight; however, only forty are currently under our control. We’re hiding as many of the others as we can on the ground to preserve battery life.”
“Proceed with your attacks, Krensky. Use the hidden units as backups. I will monitor defense actions, if any.”
********
The Secret Service operated its own fleet of protective drones. These were specifically assigned for duty in and around the White House or when the president was on the move. The pilots of these drones were highly-skilled, if rarely tested; however, with the increasing number of amateurish attempts on the president’s life over the past few years, they were gaining a lot of real-world experience to go along with their constant drills, if not against truly professional combat pilots.
The drone fleet was held in four underground bunkers at each corner of the White House property, with the command and control responsibilities shared between an external building to the right of Lafayette Park and also deep under the residence off the Situation Room.
Fourteen pilots were on duty at all times, along with an equal number of technicians tasked with computer and video monitoring. The bulk of these pilots were tasked with countering external threats to the building, while four manned small defensive drones within the building itself.
Since the recent crisis had begun, there had already been five lone-wolf attacks on the White House, launched pri
marily from single issue groups such as anti-abortion advocates and the resurrected Occupy-Whatever movement. None of these assaults managed to breach the outer perimeter before being taken out through a combination of the responding defensive drones and targeted lasers and drone Tasers now being employed in building security.
When the remote detectors picked up the telltale buzz of approaching drones, the techs at the stations at first thought it was a glitch in their system. There seemed to a whole cloud of contacts that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Fortunately, it was only a matter of seconds before confirmation came in from Andrews that this was indeed a drone attack in the making, and consisting of units from the previous inaccessible RDC inventory. The bunkers housing these units were scattered throughout the monument section of the city, placed there to afford near-instant reaction time to impending threats. No one had ever envisioned that the drones originally placed there for defense could be used as offensive weapons. It was only a matter of seconds before the air above the Washington Mall was swarming with killer robots.
“Mr. President, you must evacuate now!” said the Secret Service agent assigned to Caballero—the code name for Rene Ortega.
Ortega was taken off guard, yet when three more agents rushed into the room and almost carried him out of the Oval Office, he knew this was serious. A bewildered Owen Murphy was left sitting at the president’s desk for only a moment before his own Secret Service detail entered the room. Soon both president and president-elect were shoved into adjoining security elevators and carried far below the White House. The tunnel was long and fortified, and ended at a fallout bunker complete with communications, living quarters, food stocks, and an advanced medical facility.
Ortega entered first, followed moments later by Murphy. All the president’s senior staff were there by now, although Admiral Hagar was at the Pentagon.
Once inside, the massive vault door was closed, and only to be reopened from the inside.
“What’s happening?” Ortega asked as he entered a large, glass-walled conference room lined with video monitors and filled with grave-looking people. Jack Monroe, Ortega’s Chief of Staff, spoke first.
