by Ben Winston
Revolution
Book Five of
The Abraxis Complex.
Ben Winston
Copyright © 2015 Ben Winston
All rights reserved.
To my wife, Lori, without whom I would have surely never finished this book
To my brother Michael, without whom this work would never have been published
And to my mother, may she rest in peace, who taught me it’s alright to dream.
This story contains fictional people as well as fictional places. Any resemblance to actual people or places is purely coincidental. It is not my intent to imply that any nation's intelligence service is bad or evil. This work is not a political commentary. I simply needed the fictional versions of those agencies to be bad for the story to work the way I needed it too. In other words, this is a work of fiction, written for the enjoyment of an audience. It is not intended to be taken as truthful in any way.
Ben Winston
Earth
Sol System
In the four weeks since Greg's last surgery, he had put himself through hell to get back into shape and adjust to the cybernetic leg. As promised he kept a daily diary for the doctors of what he went through, how it felt and functioned, and any adjustments he'd had to make to his daily routine in order to compensate for the new device during his therapy. Now, however, he did not have to compensate for it; whether his body was now used to it, or the doctors had gotten it set correctly, he was having no trouble at all in either training or his daily life.
One of the biggest challenges had been martial arts training. The control and precision demanded of the arts were the perfect place for fine tuning the leg and to gather more data on the new technology. Doctor Hasbro was present during Greg's training sessions with all the equipment needed to monitor and adjust the leg on the fly. The Ranger team's instructor, Paul Richards, was very patient and understanding, but still worked Greg as hard as he could.
Doctor Grien had returned him to active duty a week ago, and he had just finished re-certifying as a Ranger. Ten weeks after the incident, Greg returned to duty as the military leader of the new Alliance. Unless you were aware of the incident, you would never know he had a cybernetic leg.
The Alliance Council approved the formation of a new branch of medical technology; Cybernetic Medicine. Doctor Hasbro and his team were all awarded certificates for the new field. He had been very excited about the news and the last Greg saw of him, he was planning on forming a new lab to further develop the new field and help to create a knowledge base for universities as well as other researchers.
The nurse, Cindy, that took care of him most of the time lost the bet she had with the therapist; or won depending on how you looked at it. Since Greg not only met but exceeded the benchmarks the therapists set for him, Cindy accompanied Steve on the date he had arranged for them. Although Greg had not seen nor spoken to either of them, he had heard that they had also gone out on their second date and a third was planned for the coming weekend.
In all the medical procedures and work done to him, there was one failure in Greg's treatment; his genitals. While the equipment functioned as designed physically, he was sterile. He would still be able to father children thanks to the samples taken during his initial training, but he had lost the ability to do it 'the old fashioned way'. While the news had bothered him, it didn't seem to phase either Bella or Jolene, who tried to do their best to make sure he was fully functional in all other aspects.
The Alliance was coming together pretty well, two more races agreed to join and sent ambassadorial missions to Sol. Trade among the members as well as all the known races in the sector was at an all time high and overall approval of the Alliance was growing daily.
The situation on Earth, however, was deteriorating slowly, but steadily. Each election in the free countries brought accusations of tampering and fraud as many of the original corrupt politicians were repeatedly and consistently re-elected. A frustrated public reached out to TDI's computer and cyber-warfare departments to assist in the elections.
Since many of the countries that held elections still used a 'paper' ballot system, there was little raw data from the original elections to use. New elections would have to be held in those countries, using special computers on a dedicated, subspace network that Earth technology could not hack.
In the United States and a few other modern countries, when the raw data was examined, several thousand inconsistencies were found. Several hundred people were found to have voted multiple times in different states. Sometimes under the same name but different social security number. However, camera's posted outside the polls showed the same people entering voting booths multiple times. Some of them in multiple countries.
There were also major inconsistencies between the data sent from the districts when compared to what was received by the 'secure' regional servers. It was discovered that for the last several years, the data had been diverted into a special department within the NSA to 'make sure it hadn't been tampered with'. A policy covertly approved of by the United States Congress without the knowledge or consent of the public. Amazingly enough, the data from the other countries with computerized voting systems ran through the same special department at the NSA.
When the news of this discovery was made public, Mexico closed it's borders and declared martial law. Mexican President Manuel Fernandez ordered his military into Mexico city to protect government offices and to ensure all civil services remained unaffected. In Mexico City, when the civilian cleaning and maintenance workers employed by the government to clean and maintain federal offices refused to come to work, the military arrested them and forced them to work at gunpoint. In most of the rest of the country, federal offices had to be closed because they no longer had utilities and no civilian workforce. The Military was ordered to 'correct' the issue, They refused the order as illegal. For most of the military, the message to their leaders was clear; they would maintain the peace, keep people from hurting themselves, and protect the nation, but that was it.
Similar situations developed in most of the 'free' world. In Great Brittan, the King stepped forward, declared a state of emergency in the Realm, fired the Prime Minister and recessed both houses of Parliament. The House of Lords would remain recessed until the peerage could be verified as trustworthy. The House of Commons would remain recessed until it could be replaced by a clear vote of the people. As for the nation's intelligence services, The King ordered everyone in a leadership capacity to be detained pending an investigation into their involvement in the current crisis. Active agents and field agents were ordered to return to Brittan to answer questions about their duties and involvement in the corruption.
The hidden leaders of the world used the opportunity to begin taking over openly. At their direction, the immense war machine of China was mobilized. North Korea began moving more troops and equipment south. In the Russian Federation, the massive naval assets of the former Soviet Union began to wake up. The world descended further toward madness.
Struve Rim Training Base
Greg's Office
Struve Crater, Selene
Earth's Moon, Sol System
Greg himself was the one to report all these events to the people of Earth.
"Folks, all of the military forces on the planet are made up of people just like you. Unlike the people that give them their orders, they will be the ones that will be dying if they allow the fighting to start. We have seen this in Mexico, Canada, England, Germany, Italy, France… the list goes on. Soldiers standing defense of their nation, of their people, even against the 'leaders' of their countries. That is the true duty of a soldier; to fight if we have to, to
die if we need to, so that others may live. We stand against the darkness in defense of those who can't.
"The soldiers of the countries now making ready for war are no different. We don't know what they've been told, but it's pretty obvious they've been lied to. We will make every effort to show them this deception or to correct it if there was simply a misunderstanding. However, our analysts believe that this is simply the opening move by the former world leaders to finally take over the planet.
"Either way, they need people to do it. Maybe it's just my narrow thinking, but I can't see how they could have those people without lying to them." He paused and swallowed the lump in his throat. " As I said, we will make every effort to talk to these people, to let them know this is not the way.
"I've always said that our duty to you is to protect you not kill you ourselves. My fear is that we will be put in just such a situation very soon. I want to assure you that if it comes to my teams firing their weapons against Earth citizens, we will do everything in our power to minimize the loss of life. We don't want to do this; I don't want to order it."
He shook his head as a tear fell down his cheek. "We have to find another way. Excuse me."
Greg said and ended the transmission. Around him, the command center had gone quiet. Everyone had known the events on Earth had been bothering him, and the people gave him the time he needed to recompose himself.
"Operations," Greg said quietly. "Please call a staff meeting in an hour. Invite all Terran Rangers and Fixers as well as the Governor and Ambassador Jirath with my apologies for the short notice." He paused in thought. "Please see if the UN Secretary General is available to attend as well"
"Where do you want to meet, Sir?" the operations officer asked.
"Command Briefing room, please. This is going to be a fully military meeting," Greg replied.
"I'll handle it personally, Sir," the officer said and handed Greg a hot cup of Cappuccino.
Greg took the cup with a grateful smile and stood. He looked around the room. "Can I have your attention a moment? Folks, I apologize for my emotional outburst there. I more than most of you understand the destruction a hypersled is capable of. When the ladies and I started all of this, I made a promise to myself that I would do everything I could to make sure those weapons would not be used against Earth. I probably should have known better, but at the time…" he shrugged. "Rangers do not kill those we are entrusted to protect. Yet we may be forced to do just that." He looked down at the cup in his hands. "I'd rather kill myself then violate that principle. This is going to be a difficult time for all of us. If you think we are making a mistake, and time allows for it, please ask questions. Now, if you'll all excuse me, I'm gonna go get ready for the meeting."
The operations officer started it by clapping in approval, but the rest of the room quickly joined in. Standing and letting their Commander know they were with him.
Greg smiled his thanks to the staff and nodding to them, left the room.
When Greg arrived at the briefing room with his team, he was surprised to see Prince Edward from England, several Generals from different world militaries, in addition to the people he had asked for. Since the Operations officer would also be attending, Greg cocked his head at him about the extra attendees.
"I tried to think of what you might need for this, Sir. Prince Edward was actually contacting us to see what they could do to assist, so I thought, what the hell? I asked him, and he agreed to attend," the man replied.
Greg nodded. "Good work, I didn't think of asking the Generals."
While Greg's ladies took seats at the table, Greg remained standing and spoke. "Thank you all for waiting. There are still a couple more people to arrive, so please be patient with us for a few more moments. Prince Edward, thank you for joining us. How is your brother?"
"He is well, thank you, Commander. He is very concerned with the general state the world is in and asked me to make contact with you on his behalf to see what could be done to help," the Prince replied.
Greg nodded. "We all appreciate your willingness to help Highness. That can't be an easy thing to offer when you have to be having problems of your own."
"That is true, we are having some difficulties. However, you have done quite a bit to help relieve the tension here; operating the government as an autocracy is actually illegal, but we are trying to correct that as quickly as possible." He snorted. "William even went so far as to release his personal email address to the general public so he could try to communicate with them. He has teams of people going over the messages so he has an idea of what the people want to be done."
"Well, that doesn't sound like a true autocracy then; the people still have a say in what gets decided," Greg replied.
"True, but the system has flaws; it can be hacked and the possibility exists for manipulation by outside influences," Edward replied.
"I think we could help with that, but then again, we could also be considered to be one of those outside influences," Greg said, grinning.
"True, but you have the trust of the people as well as the Crown. It was one of the reasons I was calling you today," the Prince replied.
Greg glanced at the Ops officer and raised his eyebrows. The officer nodded. "I've already sent a message to our computer people asking them to see what they can come up with."
"Great, Highness, if you can stay with us for a time, we would appreciate your advice and suggestions," Greg replied.
"I would be happy to, Commander," Edward replied smiling. Greg nodded to him and greeted the Secretary General and the rest while time permitted.
Carl and Jirath were the last two to arrive, both apologizing for being late. Greg stood and began making introductions. When he finished, He got right to the point. "Ladies and Gentlemen, we are facing a situation unprecedented in the history of our race. The people have lost faith in their elected officials. We now believe that the group responsible for the corruption of so many elected officials is now using the military power remaining to it to incite a global war. Such a war would give the people something to focus their anger on and to distract them while they try to reestablish their dominance over the rest of the planet.
"If that dominance was something the people wanted, we would not be facing the issue in front of us. In my capacity as the Commander of Alliance military forces, I have been directed by the Alliance Council to do everything in my power to return control of the planet into the hands of the citizens.
"We have been attempting to do just that by keeping the people of Earth informed of the secret dealings and moves of this 'shadow' government. To date, widespread violence has been avoided with only a few minor outbreaks that were quickly brought back under control by Earth forces without our direct intervention.
"The situation has changed. The 'shadow' government is trying to start a war on Earth."
He paused to take a drink. "Through our research, we believe we have identified most of the players in this 'shadow' government. We would have already detained them except that they have not broken any laws, and removing them would only allow another to step forward to replace them.
"The more immediate concern is the build up of military force all over the world. China's PLA Navy has already blocked all commercial traffic in the south China Sea. While no one has started shooting yet; we feel it's only a matter of time before they do. The questions facing us right now is what are we going to do about it.
"Our computer teams are working on hacking the systems of the warships and installations involved, Even with advanced AI technology, it still takes time. However, that will only solve part of the problem. We will still have over a million ground troops and their equipment poised to make attacks on other countries. It is the lives of these people and the people in the countries they are going to invade I am most worried about. It is also the reason I have asked all of you here today. I need alternatives to using force against them."
"If I may Commander, the leadership of North Korea is egotistical, sel
f-important and cruel. They are obsessed with taking South Korea. They are also very unimaginative and fully dependent on China. They generally do whatever Beijing tells them. If you can get Beijing to back off, there is every possibility Pyongyang will also, especially if it is made clear to the Central Committee that anything that happens in Korea will be laid at their feet," Prince Edward suggested. "I'll grant that isn't much help, but at least it limits the Asian troublemakers."
The Secretary General nodded agreement with the Prince. "Prince Edward is correct, Commander. However, my concern is the Nuclear, Chemical and Biological weapons arsenals of those two countries. If even one of those weapons is used, it will be a global catastrophe."
"I agree," Greg replied. "However, for the time being there has been no activity that would indicate that those weapons are being made ready. Of course, that doesn't mean they won't use them, just that they don't plan on using then yet."
"Excuse me, I understand what nuclear weapons are, but what are these Chemical and Biological weapons you are speaking of?" Ambassador Jirath asked.
"They are proof of just how barbaric our people are, I'm afraid," Greg replied and explained what each weapon was and how it was used.
Jirath looked horrified and a little sick to her stomach. "That's…" she paused as if searching for the right word. "I cannot even imagine why someone would even want to create such a weapon. Once released, it could not be controlled and would kill everyone!"
"Madam Ambassador, our people are capable of and have done some pretty horrific things. For most, the reason they were created was for fear. Fear of the weapons being used was a deterrent to prevent an enemy from taking hostile action. Some lines should never be crossed, I feel we crossed one of those when those weapons were created," the Secretary General replied. "International Law, as well as other agreement’s, have all but outlawed those weapons, but we know they are still there."
