Red Eden: Sons of Mars | Chapter 4: Mutually Assured Destruction
Jack stood alone among rows of empty black pods inside a domed chamber lit by artificial starlight. Only one of these pods was occupied, and it contained the lifeless body of a girl slain in the crossfire between good and evil. The bullet that had struck her came from the side of good, a contradiction which Jack struggled to reconcile.
He heard footsteps echoing behind him. He turned and saw his companions approaching him. Erwin wore his blood-red carbon-plated suit with a matching dragon's head helmet. Derek wore his blue and white form-fitting pressure suit.
“What are you guys doing here?” Jack asked.
Erwin's Dapao shredder and that gargantuan tank-buster he'd named Big Bertha clanked behind him as he walked. “Ellen said she had a job for us. I've yet to be paid for the first one.”
“I thought she gave you first dibs on the loot.”
“She told me I could keep whatever I could carry out with me, so I found myself a giant exo-suit and stacked a pile of loot the size of a minivan. Got called to action before I could make off with it. Better still be where I left it.”
Jack picked up the head-cage that he had removed from the dead girl. The collar had a one-way locking mechanism that he had to break open with a pair of pliers. “Any trouble with the clone girls up there?”
“They really don't like having their heads caged,” Derek said. “Grant had his men chase them around the village, and let's just say the troop's ain't coping so well in Earth gravity.”
“Grant had some bastard beat one of the clone women to get her to control the brood,” Erwin said.
Jack winced. “Jesus.”
Derek sighed. “It's an ugly business, running a concentration camp.”
“Gabriella's gonna use this as propaganda against us,” Jack said.
“So?” Erwin asked.
“So,” Jack began to answer, “We're two hundred men stranded on a hostile planet. The rest of our people are stuck in space. Ellen has burned bridges with Mars, and we have no allies. We can't fight this war alone.”
“Are you suggesting we befriend the locals?” Derek asked.
“We can arm them, train them to fight. We can raid old military bases for weapons. I'm sure they're still out there.”
“Big Mama's promising them eternal life in paradise,” Erwin said. “What can we offer them that's better than that?”
“How about the truth?” Jack said. “But nobody's going to listen to us if we keep using morally dubious tactics that end up killing and maiming innocent bystanders.”
“That's something we'll have to discuss with Ellen and Grant,” Derek said.
“No need.” Ellen strode towards them, head held high. She stopped a few paces from them and nodded her greetings. “Gentlemen.”
“How long have you been listening?” Derek asked.
“Long enough,” Ellen said. “Going forward, I promise we will avoid anymore civilian casualties.”
Jack was sceptical. “What about your spiel about pawns and no such thing as the perfect war?”
“That hasn't changed,” Ellen said, “but I realize now the optics isn't in our favour even if we have the moral high ground. I accept responsibility for all the deaths I've caused. When the time comes, I will face my judgement. Until then, all we can do is move forward and keep fighting.”
Jack tilted his head as he studied her. Her eyes were still a bit red, but the fire in them was back. “What are you going to do with the clone girls?”
“They stay in our custody for as long as necessary,” Ellen answered. “Having them here makes it much less likely that Gabriella would launch her ICBMs at us.”
“What about the Hiigara?” Derek asked.
“I've taken Jack's advice,” Ellen said. “I'm parking her behind the moon.”
“What's the job you called us for?” Erwin asked.
“Walk with me.” Ellen led them to the golden arch at the end of the cavern. Through here, they entered Gabriella's throne room where a terracotta army of robotic warriors once stood. Their footsteps echoed off the walls of the cold, concrete chamber. Ellen ascended the steps of a golden dais and sat down on the throne. “I'm sending you to Britain.”
“You want us to kill Gabriella?” Erwin asked.
“I want you to seize control of her nuclear arsenal.”
Derek whistled. Erwin chuckled.
“Bold,” Jack said. “And Crazy. But mostly crazy.”
“There's a naval base in Scotland where you'll find three nuclear-armed submarines,” Ellen said, “and a bunker in Wales that connects to a missile silo. Gabriella already has the bunker, so you need to seize the subs before she does. Derek, you're the engineer, so you'll have to program the subs to auto-navigate here.”
“I'm no nuclear physicist,” Derek said, “but I'm pretty sure nukes have an expiry date.”
“I asked Sorenson about that. The warheads contain purified plutonium-239, which means little to no degradation caused by its unstable 240 isotope. However, the tritium gas used to boost the primary stage would have decayed into helium-3 long ago as it has a half-life of only twelve years. As they are right now, the warheads would merely fizzle, so to speak.”
“So Gabriella's nukes aren't as scary as we thought?” Jack asked.
“The nukes can be rearmed by replenishing the tritium gas,” Ellen said. “So they're still a threat. There's an underground particle accelerator in the Scotland Highlands. It was used to produce tritium. My guess is she's headed there next. You need to seize that facility before she does.”
“You want us to destroy it?” Jack asked.
“No. We use it to rearm our nukes. Deterrence is our best chance of surviving this war.”
Jack recoiled at the idea. “This was how the world ended the first time.”
“Jack, she has military installations hidden in bunkers all around the world. We don't have the manpower to secure them all. We can only slow her down. If we don't have our own nuclear deterrence, we will be at her mercy.”
“Can't let her have all the toys,” Erwin said.
Jack looked to Derek.
Derek frowned. “It's MAD. Mutually assured destruction.”
Jack grimaced. “So we steal her nukes and rearm them. What then?”
Ellen crossed her legs. “Then we begin truce talks.”
“Right, because MAD works,” Jack said with a heavy dose of sarcasm.
“Jack, you saw how that meeting went. We need more leverage or she'll continue to threaten us.”
Jack ascended the steps of the dais until he was eye to eye with Ellen. “She was willing to let the world burn a hundred years ago. What makes you think she won't do it again?”
“If the archives your father dug up can be believed, it wasn't her who launched the nukes.”
“She's crazy. MAD doesn't work on crazy.”
“Not crazy. Evil. As sick and twisted as she may be, she's not irrational.”
Bargaining with evil almost sounded worse than dealing with crazy, in Jack's mind.
“Ellen's right,” Derek said. “Sooner or later, Gabriella will overwhelm us. We can't beat her militarily, but we can keep her fenced in through nuclear deterrence, giving us wiggle room expand our own influence.”
“Come on, Jack,” Erwin said. “Don't be a bleeding heart pinko. We've got a war to win.”
Jack didn't come all this way only to see Earth burn in the second coming of the apocalypse, but his friends weren't wrong. Seizing Gabriella's nuclear arsenal made tactical sense. He walked back down the dais. “Fine. If it's what you want, I'll do it.”
“I'm not a dictator,” Ellen said. “You don't have to do anything I tell you. But this plan is the only way forward. There can be no truce without nuclear deterrence.”
Jack turned to face her. “How will we get to Britain?”
“There's one VTOL left in the hangar,” she replied.
“So it's just the three of us again? Against her whole army?”
“Right now, she has but a few dozen soldiers with her. That could change very soon, so we must act quickly. I need the rest of our force here to deal with her Iceland army. You three have already proven you are more than capable of handling yourselves out there, and if you move quick enough, you won't have to face her head-on. I have confidence in you.”
Jack didn't share her confidence, but he kept his doubts to himself. “Boys, we have our orders. Let's pay the Queen of England a visit.”
***
Jack and his crew entered a concrete cavern that opened to the outside through a giant sliding door. The hangar was big enough to house a fleet of a dozen VTOLs, but only a single vertical-takeoff/landing aircraft remained. Three all-terrain vehicles were parked behind the VTOL. The rear hatch was open and formed a ramp into the fuselage. To Jack's disdain, Doctor Sorenson walked down the ramp.
“What are you doing here?” Jack asked.
“Re-checking the parachutes I had attached to your equipment while you were out on mission. There's three spares for each of you, just in case.”
“We expecting to be shot down?”
“Gabriella has her VTOLs on patrol. She might even have surface-to-air missiles on the ground. Be prepared for the worst.”
“Where'd you find these parachutes?”
“In the equipment storage. They should still work.”
Jack recognized his midnight black all-terrain vehicle, courtesy of Volta Motors. Doctor Sorenson had strapped a red pack to the back seat of the ATV. Jack also noticed that Erwin's red ATV had been modified with a rifle holster on each side. Derek's blue ATV now had a mini trunk-on-wheels attached to it at the back. “Somebody's been busy,” Jack said.
Erwin walked over to his red ATV and affixed his Dapao and tank-buster to the rifle holster on each side. “While I was lootin' the place, I figured Ellen would send us out on another mission, so I took the liberty of modifying our ATVs.”
“SolarNav should be updated with the coordinates of the naval base and the underground particle accelerator,” Sorenson said.
“Who gave you access to SolarNav?” Jack questioned.
“Ellen.”
Jack frowned. Ellen was far too trusting of this ancient lizard.
“After our last chat, I went to interrogate one of Gabriella's daughters, Sebielle,” Sorenson said. “I was able to extract some information about their history. You might be interested in knowing as it could be relevant when you get to Britain.”
Jack didn't like how the Doctor framed that. “You extracted? You saying you tortured her?”
“More like I read her mind, before they caged her.”
“The hell are you, man?”
“A doctor.”
Jack scowled. Vague answers, as usual.
“She and her siblings had been locked in cold storage until their facility ran out of power fifty years ago. When they woke, they were in their neotenous form. Apparently, only one of their mature brothers woke with them. He was the commander of the clone army garrisoned at that bunker. The rest of the soldiers didn't make it.”
“Why not?”
“He told the clone children that there was a malfunction to explain away the absence of their mature brothers. I think he sabotaged their tanks. Caused them to drown in antifreeze.”
“Why the hell would he do that?”
“Because I'm not the only one who opposed Gabriella. What this means is Gabriella won't find any reserve troops in Britain. The few dozen soldiers she brought with her are all she has.”
“This double agent a friend of yours?”
“I cannot confirm his identity or that he is even on our side because I don't know who the other agents are. What I'm telling you is merely speculation.”
“You don't know? I find that hard to believe.”
“Is it? It's standard protocol to operate on a need-to-know basis.”
Plausible, but Jack remained guarded. “Sure.”
“Anyway, he taught the children basic survival skills, and when they were ready, he injected them with growth hormone to induce sexual maturation. Then he set them loose upon the world.”
“He taught them to survive, yet he killed his own soldiers in cold blood? This doesn't add up.”
“I assume he saw the soldiers as a threat. The children were not, at least not immediately. The children had no access to any of the military installations, and they had limited knowledge of the world. They wouldn't have been able to locate Gabriella's tomb on their own, or have the means to get here.”
“And yet they did,” Jack said.
“Only after fifty years, and only with help from their human worshippers.”
“Is this rogue commander still kicking it in Britain?”
“He disappeared shortly after leading the children out of their bunker. He's never revealed himself to them since.”
“What a swell guy. He kills the only people who can protect them, he leaves them with no means to defend themselves, other than a few cheap tricks he taught them, and then he abandons them.”
“They still had their bunker, a near impenetrable fortress. They crafted primitive weapons and lived off the land. When humans found them... well, you know how it goes.”
“Actually, I don't, but save it. I've heard enough.”
“You mentioned their bunker ran out of power,” Derek said. “I assume this is also the case with the particle accelerator?”
“That facility consumes a stupendous amount of energy,” Sorenson said, “so it has its own fusion reactor, which would have remained dormant.”
“How do we break in?” Derek asked.
“You won't have to break through a blast door, but it's still a strong door. I've left laser cutters in the VTOL.”
Although Jack didn't like the Doctor, Jack had to admit that the Doctor sure was making himself useful.
“The VTOL's set to autopilot,” Sorenson said. “If you have any questions, call. My contact information can be found on your directory. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to resume my chat with Sebielle.” With that, he left the hangar.
Jack mounted his ATV and drove into the fuselage. Erwin and Derek followed on theirs. There was just enough room in here for the three of them, their vehicles and their equipment.
The hatch automatically closed and locked with a click.
Jack picked up one of the spare parachutes Sorenson had left lying on the seats. These parachutes had been lying in storage for God knows how long. Hopefully, he wouldn't need to use them.
Erwin leaned over and picked a backpack off one of the seats. “Somebody packed for us.”
Jack secured his ATV to the straps on the floor and grabbed one of the bags. Looking inside, he saw a bunch of yellow plastic-wrapped nutrient bars but little else in the way of nutrition.
Erwin held up an electric stun-gun. It sparked when he pulled the trigger.
A low humming noise permeated the fuselage. The noise gradually got louder, its pitch rising in frequency. The floor jerked, throwing Jack off balance.
Derek made his way to the cockpit and sat down at the pilot's seat. Jack joined Derek in the co-pilot's seat, and Erwin took one of the backseats. The VTOL rose midway up the hangar then flew out the opening. They flew over a green valley and rose towards the clouds.
A virtual map popped onto the touchscreen display in front of Jack. The display spanned the entire length of the curved dashboard. Aside from the control stick on Derek's side, all the other controls were on the touchscreen display.
“Jack.” Ellen's voice came over the radio in Jack's helmet. “I'm giving you access to the drones we have on the ground in Britain. You can also access our satellite feed anytime you need. I won't be monitoring your progress 24-7 as I'll be needed here to coordinate with Commander Grant. Good luck and godspeed.”
“We're huntin' for nukes to negotiate for peace,” Jack said. “God help us.”
“Don't be so cynical, Jack.”
Before he could make a comeback, the VTOL accelerated, pushing him back into his seat. They punched through a cloud and soared towards the bright blue sky. After a few minutes, Jack's eyelids grew heavy. He had recently suffered a concussion, and he hadn't had much sleep since waking. He decided to rest his eyes just for a bit.
***
A rapid beeping noise woke Jack from his nap. “Derek, what's going on?”
“We're being tailed!” Derek grabbed the control stick. “I'm taking manual control.”
“You know how to fly this thing?”
“Autopilot can't shake them!”
A rapid, ear-piercing popping noise rang from the back.
“They're shootin' holes through the hatch!” Erwin yelled.
Derek made a hard turn to the right. Jack screamed as the VTOL barrel-rolled. It kept rolling until Jack lost all sense of up or down. All he could see out the windshield was blue sky and white clouds. Where was the ground?
A red warning message flashed on the display panel: aircraft stalling. “Derek, what have you done?” Jack cried.
“Hold on!” Derek's finger danced madly across the touchscreen display at the same time that he was yanking the control stick like a madman.
Another red warning message flashed on the display: autopilot overriding. “Thank God,” Jack said. “Leave the flying to the computer, Derek.”
“Hey, at least they're no longer targeting us,” Derek said.
Another round of machine-gun fire tore through the fuselage.
“That almost got me!” Erwin shouted. “Shoot 'em back, Derek!”
“There's gotta be a way to activate the AI's dog-fighting routine,” Derek said as he swiped his fingers across the panel. “There it is. Activate!”
The VTOL swerved to the left. The high-pitched whine of its electric turbines drowned out every other noise. A red warning flashed on the display: critical engine failure.
“Oh, what now?” Jack groaned.
“Engine's shot to hell. We gotta bail!” Derek threw off his seat belt and ran for the fuselage.
Link to table of content:
https://www.minds.com/ME2007Vigil/blog/red-eden-sons-of-mars-table-of-content-967907646284259328
Red Eden: Sons of Mars is the sequel to my first book, Red Eden: Homeworld Bound. To catch up on this series, please click the following link, which will re-direct you to the table of content:
https://www.minds.com/ME2007Vigil/blog/red-eden-homeworld-bound-table-of-content-913570321625583616
You can purchase the full novel on Amazon at this link: