The War Cloud

51

Marshall’s large, dome-shaped canopy, made from a single layer of triangular cloth gores, blossomed under the clear night. Marshall let the cold wind blow him across the desolate winter fields toward the lonely clapboard farmhouse below.

He looked over at Banks, Harney and Wilson, all doing fine on the descent. His jellyfish chute — the MC1-1C round parachute favored by U.S. paratroopers — had been packed and ready aboard Looking Glass.

Special cuts in sections of the gores gave his chute more speed and greater steering capabilities, enabling him to avoid the grain silo on his right and turn into the wind to minimize horizontal speed as he landed.

He hit and rolled, then quickly detached from his chute. Then, with the others close behind, he pulled out his M9 and headed for the farmhouse.

The MP on the front porch, a grandpa-type in a parka, looked surprised to see visitors and whipped out an M-16. He was talking to somebody through an earpiece but froze when none other than General Brad Marshall walked up the steps. He relaxed and lowered his gun to salute.

“General Marshall,” he said with relief when Harney leveled his own M-16 and spat out a round. Blam! Blam! Blam! And grandpa was blow right through the front door.

Sixty feet beneath the farmhouse in the launch control center, red warning flashes lit up the consoles like the Fourth of July. The two launch officers in blue uniforms and yellow ascots sat tight in their aircraft-style seats, trapped by their shoulder belts designed to keep them from being thrown by the shockwaves if they ever launched ICBMs.

“Shit,” said the first launch officer as elevator cameras showed four armed and unfriendly figures on their way down.

Both launch officers desperately tried to unhook their belts as the vault door opened and Marshall entered with his crew. Wilson and Harney unloaded two shots, and the launch officers slumped in their chairs. Then Banks followed up by relieving them of their launch keys.

The second launch officer was still alive, barely, and Marshall glared at Harney. Too many video games for these younger officers. They shot at faces to save bullets, but the effect was dehumanizing the enemy. And these launch officers were anything but. They w American patriots, and he needed at least one of them alive.

The launch officer groaned in his seat. “General Marshall?”

“It’s OK, son,” Marshall said. “We’ll get you some help. Don’t worry.”

The launch officer relaxed in his chair, blood draining out of him. Marshall knew he had only a minute if that with the kid.

“OK,” Marshall said. “We’ve got ten Minutemen III missiles. Each can be sent to any one of four preset targets. Now where are these warheads targeted?”

“Don’t know,” said the launch officer. “Didn’t want to know. Didn’t want to dream about the impact area.”

Marshall was disappointed. “I understand, son,” he said and then popped the kid in the head with his M9 pistol. The launch officer went limp.

Marshall told the rest, “He was useless anyway. How long will it take you to retarget, Major Tom?”

Banks looked at her console. “Thirty-six minutes using the Command Data Buffer system.”

“You have ten,” Marshall told her. “Harney and Wilson, you’ll need to strip some equipment here. I saw an Explorer parked outside. See if old grandpa has the keys in his pockets.”

As they left, Marshall hovered impatiently as Banks calculated the retargeting information.

“You’re taking too long, Major Tom.”

“More than two hundred attack options have been programmed into this computer, sir,” she replied. “We just need to dial up the right war scenario. Those missiles that are supposed to go, go. Those that aren’t, don’t.”

“You don’t get it. I want them all going.”

“Oh, the than won’t even take a minute then — if you can live with collateral strikes.”

“The Chinese can’t, but I can, Major.”

Marshall pushed the launch officer he had killed off his seat and strapped himself in. Banks did likewise in the other chair and then made the final adjustments.

“Missiles are retargeted,” she announced.

Marshall gave the order, “Insert launch keys.”

Banks inserted her launch key into her console at the same time he did.

“On my mark,” he told her. “Three…two…one…turn.”

They turned their keys simultaneously.

The shaking began, and Marshall tightened his belt with satisfaction. Missiles on screen filled the silo cameras with their exhaust flames.

Finally, thing were going according to plan.