Parting Gifts

by gerald hall

  “I have to admit that I fear dying, Sir. But I fear living with a yoke around my neck that slowly kills me even more. So let us go out and show these monsters how real men die, proud and free.”

  And so Brigadier General Dalir Rahimi went out and led the remnants of the Persian Army for nine more days of desperate fighting among the ruins of Tehran. Many Persian civilians trapped inside of Tehran picked up weapons from fallen Persian and jihadist soldier alike and fought alongside the General’s regular troops. The civilians had already heard about the atrocities inflicted upon the civilian survivors inside of Jerusalem after it fell.

  Like the Indians that had fought by their side ever since end of the Indo-Pakistani nuclear war, the Persians, professional soldier and desperate civilian alike, made the jihadist warriors of the Arab Brotherhood pay a very dear price before the last Persian warrior fell in battle. The streets and rivers were full of blood by the time that the last shot was fired and the explosion thundered.

  Soon after the guns fell silent in Tehran, the Arab Brotherhood turned its full attention towards the Americas. The Arab Brotherhood mujahedeen, before the final battles for Jerusalem, Tehran and the United Kingdom even began, had already subjugated what was left of Africa’s population. It didn’t take very much effort after the past few years of disease, starvation and intertribal war had done to depopulate the continent anyway.

  Many of the troops that the Arab Brotherhood had sent to the front lines of both the Middle East and Africa were recent converts to Islam from Europe and Western Asia. These Janissaries were forced to bleed to prove their new devotion to Allah and the leaders of the Islamist jihad. In this way, the leaders of the Arab Brotherhood believed that they were literally killing two birds with one stone.

  The Arabs felt that their mujahedeen should be saved until the really important battles. They were born into the faith and had nothing to prove. These new converts needed to prove that they would obey without question. Those who were only pretending to follow Allah would be discovered in the crucible of battle. These pretenders would then be swiftly purged with deadly prejudice.

  With the final defeat of both Israel and the Persian Republic, the western element of the Caliphate now began to focus its forces and turn its eyes westward towards the Americas. Hundreds of thousands of new mujahedeen warriors were being trained. At the same time, every piece of military equipment that could be found or salvaged was being prepared by the Muslim’s military leadership for the new offensive.

  It did not take long before intelligence officials in the Eastern Alliance learned of the preparations being made throughout Europe and Northern Africa. But that only made a difficult situation back home even more critical.

  “Do we not have any other military assets available to meet this new threat, General?” President Harper asked.

  “No, Ma’am. We have formed as many units as possible with the refugees that had come here from England with some military training. We got quite a few with the Royal Navy vessels that had escaped just after the enemy invasion across the English Channel. This included some of their elite forces, though many of those had perished fighting a rear guard action to protect a couple of dozen civilian ships full of refugees.

  But except for the twenty-nine modern warships from the Royal Navy and a few of the other NATO fleets, the refugees arrived with virtually nothing in terms of heavy military equipment. There were virtually no tanks or heavy artillery pieces aboard the ships that made it here. The two British trimarian carriers that made it here all carried a full complement of P-1216 STOVL fighter-bombers aboard. Their third carrier was in drydock under repair and had to be scuttled to avoid capture, I’m afraid.”

  “Did any of their amphibious warfare ships make it?”

  “Yes, Ma’am. Two of them did, along with one Italian and one Spanish light carrier. They brought with them a few aircraft, but emptied their vehicle bays in order to transport more refugees here.”

  “I know that we can make small arms for them. Those can be manufactured by virtually any modern machine shop around here. But can we provide them with anything heavier? I know that we are going to be facing a considerable amount of heavy combat equipment from not only the military bases of the Western Republic but also all of the mothballed equipment from the desert storage facilities.”

  “We are trying to do the same. There are even people attempting to reactivate the old tanks and artillery pieces that were demilitarized to be placed at the VFW halls. Hell, some of those tanks date back to the Second World War. They will almost all have to have completely new engines and gun barrels as a result of the demilitarization process. But that is just how desperate we have become.”

  “We are going to have to give them all of the support that we can if we are going to last longer than the Israelis and Persians. Perhaps, we can come up with an emergency program to design field expedient anti-armor and anti-aircraft weapons that can be used by relatively unskilled soldiers. The Germans managed to do that towards the end of the Second World War.”

  “I’m sure that we could do that. But we also have to remember that the Germans still lost, Ma’am.” The Alliance military chief of staff reminded.

  “Yes, General. I know. But we still have to try. Find out about the local militia groups as well. Not the racist types, of course. But despite the best efforts of the Southern Poverty Law Center and the like to try to paint every conservative, patriotic group of Americans as racist, we know that a lot of the militias are full of very good people who only want to protect our nation. Let’s help them get whatever they need to help us defend our land from the jihadists.”

  “I’ll do that, Ma’am. I understand that a lot of those militia groups are full of combat veterans. They would add a lot of our ability to defend ourselves. They also know the land and the people. It is a powerful motivator to be defending one’s home and family, I know.”

  “Let’s do what we can to get them the tools. It may not seem like much, but we have to try. Otherwise, we won’t last long at all, especially if we are going to be facing a two front war on our own soil.”

  “I agree, Ma’am. There isn’t much left to stop the Pacific Caliphate now. Even Japan is gone. The Caliphate tried to blockade Japan and starve them into submission. But the Japanese simply redoubled their efforts to grow their own food, until the Caliphate sprayed every last field in Japan with defoliants to destroy the crops. Starving, the last of the Japanese took their own lives rather than live with the shame of submitting to the rule of the Caliphate.”

  “We are definitely not going to go that way, I promise you.” President Harper firmly declared.

  Chapter Six:

  Colony Geo-Thermal Power Plant

  Hebes Chasma Habitat, Mars

  September 21, 2041

  “It was really nice of our friends to take the kids off of our hands so that we could spend some time away for a little while.” Peter told Deborah after they had arrived at the power plant via buggy. It was the most distant part of the colony from the main complex and the closest to the new miniature volcano that had appeared in the aftermath of the ‘Third Event’.

  “Yes, we definitely needed a break.”

  “Sweetheart, I was wondering if it were possible for you to use your gift to somehow bring in enough water in just one trip to bring this entire planet back to life?” That would make it possible for us to bring all of the refugees from Earth to live here in peace, I would think. Peter asked as he looked out into the Martian sky from the observation lounge.

  “Technically, I suppose that I could do that. It would require me spending several months in a spacecraft traveling out to Jupiter first. I’m not sure that we have located any pure ice asteroids large enough to provide all of Mars’ needs. Then I would have to harvest enough water to create a ball of ice that is perhaps fifty to one hundred kilometers in diameter. After that, I have to send it on a trajectory that would allow the icy asteroid to perfectly go into Mars orbit to be broken apar
t and sent down to the surface for use.

  But that won’t be enough either, Peter. We will need probably as much nitrogen and complex hydrocarbons as water so that we can get the proper atmospheric mix. What would happen if we go too much or too little of a critical element?”

  “I don’t know, Sweetheart.”

  “The problem is that I don’t know either. I also don’t know if that is how the Lord wanted me to use this gift. Even when my dad was using his gift, God always seemed to create or allow the circumstances for my father to use his gift for the most good.

  But using the gift always seems to come with a price. The first time that my father used his gift, he paid for it with his and my mom’s freedom. My parents had agents from the government pursuing them constantly. That is why they went into hiding before I was born. There was even someone else who had tried to kill my dad. My dad never knew where this female assassin came from either. The second time my dad used his gift, both he and my mom disappeared from this world.

  Now, I am confident that my parents are both now in Heaven. But I’m sure that they missed having the chance to see me grow up.”

  “Maybe, God had a purpose in that too, Sweetheart.” Seems to me that you enriched the lives of your adoptive family too. Didn’t you save your adoptive mother’s life one time?” Peter asked.

  “Yes, I did. She kept my secret from everyone too because I asked her too. That had to be a burden for her.”

  “But it was a burden that she was willing to assume for you because she loved you, I’m sure. Remember, I met Cynthia too. She is a very nice lady.” Peter confidently replied.

  “I guess you are right. But, in the recordings that my parents made for me while they were still in hiding, my dad talked about how scared he was about using his gift again after the ‘First Event’. He was so afraid that he had screwed everything up. I guess that it is a lot easier to use such a gift for little things, even little selfish things, than it is to do something big with this power. It is terrifying for me to think about how events can get so out of control. It is also frightening to think that by using the gift to do good that some other people will be hurt as a result at the same time.”

  “But your dad didn’t use his gift for little selfish things, did he? Like you, he helped as many others as he could with his gift. I also know that you did a tremendous amount of good when you used your power here to save the colony and everyone in it, Deborah.”

  “Yes, it seems that way. God knew long ago that I would be here and that the Sun would send out that mass of energy towards Mars. So he made sure that I had that gift and would be willing to properly use it to save the people here and to make Mars potentially more Earthlike. Now, the second and third-order consequences of what I did still remain to be seen. Mars is changing. We are certainly part of that change. But it has to be managed carefully, just like I have to carefully manage the use of my gift.

  SALI and her robotic minions out there are already doing an incredible job bringing in chunks of ice, carbonates and all of the other mineral building blocks that we need to make this world a welcoming home for more of humanity. But those robotic space probes are sending us those chunks of material in bites that we can currently handle. You and I both know that we can’t afford to bite off more than we can chew. The events on Earth right now make it clear that we will not be able to go back anytime soon, if ever.

  So we have to make sure that things work here for the long run.”

  “I see. I just know that I am not alone in wanting to be able to step outside in the sunshine and not have to wear a pressure suit or some sort of face mask in order to be able to breathe. I long for the ability to walk onto the grass and look out at the forested mountains in the distance just like what I did when I was a kid.”

  “I understand your desires, my dear. I sometimes look out the window from our quarters towards the Martian horizon and think the same thing.

  But, you have to remember. This world is already changing far more rapidly than anyone here dared to imagine. There is just so much that we don’t know about the whole process of terraforming anyway. We need to take our time doing this so that we can more easily correct any mistakes that we make along the way. Otherwise, we are courting a potential catastrophe here, Mark.”

  “I understand. I guess that it was just wishful thinking on my part.” Peter admitted.

  “Yes, I know. There are times where I wish that I could do something with my gifts to help things along here as well. Whenever I begin to think that way, I always pray to the Lord about what He wants me to do. Since the right circumstances haven’t happened where I just know that it is the right time for action, I know that God is telling me to be patient.”

  “I wish that I had your confidence in what God’s will is, Deborah.”

  “You’re doing just fine, Dear. You’ve just had a lot less time to deal with this incredible gift of mine and the responsibility that comes with it.” Deborah said with a smile.

  “I certainly hope so, Sweetheart. Incidentally, in case that you didn’t know already, I accepted a position with the colonial militia. It’s technically part of the Marine detachment here, but I suppose that I still consider myself an airman rather than a Marine.”

  “No, Colonel Walker didn’t say anything about it to me. I guess that he figured that it was a personal matter anyway. Was there any particular reason why you wanted to join?”

  “I guess that I wanted to contribute a bit more to things here than just being Deborah’s husband. I know that I do engineering work here too and help along with the common maintenance tasks in the colony. But I was also a military intelligence officer among all of the other things that I did while in the military. That was a job that I loved very much as well. You know that too because you did some MI work yourself for the Navy before you came here. I may not be carrying a rifle or anything like that, but it was important to me.”

  Deborah walked up to her husband and put her arms around him.

  “I’m sorry about the situation that you feel that you are in. I think that being married to someone that people around here hold in such awe has to be pretty humbling. I have to admit that it’s not exactly easy for me either to deal with it. Plus, I had even less choice in the matter. Of course, you didn’t know anything about my ‘gift’ before we got married either.”

  “Yea, I probably would have been pretty freaked out by the idea of being married to ‘Supergirl’. Peter laughed.

  “Well, we are definitely going to need to keep an eye on what is going on back on Earth. Somehow, I don’t think that the Islamists are going to be stopped this time from their goal of world conquest. I also don’t believe that they will be content with owning just one world either, especially with us being out here now.” A suddenly serious Deborah noted.

  “Unfortunately, I think that you are right. I know that you won’t use your gift to stop them because to do so would be tantamount to committing genocide upon them.”

  Deborah didn’t say anything, but Peter knew what she was thinking. She had no intention of being remembered for doing what a medieval Italian prince once ordered his troops to do to the entire population of a village that he had just captured. That commander told his soldiers, “Kill them all. God will know his own.” Obviously, the Italians had been forced to endure too many attacks by insurgents that had hidden themselves within the civilian population of more than one city or town before.

  There was also the problem of rooting out the violent beliefs from the children who grew up while being indoctrinated with the idea of carrying on the fight. The only apparent solution to the Italian prince for both problems was genocide. But that meant that the innocent would still die along with those would seek to continue the hate and bloodshed for generations to come.

  But Deborah had already seen more than enough death. Only God would truly judge justly as to the guilty and the innocent, not even someone who had been granted the gifts that Deborah possessed. There had to be another pa
th for her and her family, Deborah was convinced.

  Chapter Seven:

  White House Oval Office.

  Washington DC, Eastern Alliance

  March 11, 2042

  “Madam President, we have quite simply outrun our ability to supply our troops out on the Great Plains. It is a lot easier for the Western Republic to resupply their troops because of the shorter distances involved. We just don’t have a lot of logistical capability west of the Mississippi any longer.”

  “What about from Texas?”

  “Texas is a huge state, Ma’am. Most of the population centers, even before the nuclear autumn, were in the eastern part of the state. The situation got a lot worse afterwards with much of West Texas being virtually depopulated before the weather started to warm back up. The Texans currently have their hands full just keeping control within their own state borders, much less supporting troops in offensive operations to the West, I’m afraid.”

  “So we are at a stalemate currently?”

  “Yes, Ma’am. That pretty much sums it up.”

  “I want everything possible done to consolidate our gains out there. Part of that is going to be the resettlement of refugees from Europe and the UK into the reclaimed territories. If we can get new communities established out there where there is plenty of available land, they can serve to be a bulwark in case the Western Republic decides to go on the offensive.

  Those new communities could also potentially be new steppingstones for our people to finally reunite this great nation of ours. Then we may have a chance to take on and defeat the Islamists, once and for all.”

  “A lot of them are going to have to learn to be farmers or adopt other skilled professions then. Otherwise, they will starve within a year of their arrival, Ma’am.”