Cold war 2395, p.1
Cold War 2395, page 1
Cold War 2395
Copyright © 2021 Robert Carnevale
Nef House Publishing
www.nefhousepublishing.com
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved alone, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of the book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products, brands, and/or restaurants referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Cover by Thea Magerand
www.rcarnevale.com
www.nefhousepublishing.com
Table of Contents
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
About the Author
CHAPTER 1
Wesley
Earth-003: District of Columbia, the White House
“A cure for the communist cold,” the Americans had cheered, as though voting for Roseanne Faust and her archaic platform of Cold War fearmongering was something to be proud of. Sitting across from the unmanageable woman in question, my mood as gray as her wiry hair and the cloudy sky peering through the Oval Office’s windows behind her, I think the American people got it wrong.
“There’s no business left to discuss, Madam President.”
“How long do you think you can avoid picking sides, Wesley? Even if the Russians haven’t exhausted your limited usefulness yet, we can all see the end from here.” She rises out of her chair in a fit of barely tempered rage. She’s a touch more aggressive than I’d anticipated.
“Neutrality suits me quite well, thank you very much,” I reply. “And wiping away a transaction that’s all but set in stone would gravely harm my reputation as an unbiased businessman.” I let out a huff and prepare to stand.
“Ha. You know what would gravely harm you even more?” she asks, not giving me time to respond. “A Russian OSV-12 laser rifle. Nice suit, by the way.” She pauses to take a sip of water, then sits down. Her brow furrows as she scowls at me.
“You’ve put me in a very tough position and show no signs of cracking,” she says, scraping her nails against the Resolute desk’s flawless resin finish. “I have one final offer.”
Although I can’t fathom what could possibly make her so interested in the Nebulus sector—a patch of barren, resourceless planets that have long been my least attractive piece of interstellar real estate—I also don’t care. I just need to know how much she wants it, and her desperation is evident.
“I’m listening,” I say, relaxing into my seat again.
“Wesley, in exchange for the entirety of the Nebulus sector, including but not limited to any sections already agreed upon by a Russian party, I am prepared to pay a bill of two hundred trillion dollars. Whatever that converts to in pounds.”
“Pound sterling.”
“Look, I’ll pay it in teatime biscuits if that’s what your prime minister wants. Point is, that’s twice the original offer, a sum I can’t increase any further without robbing our national treasury.”
“Music to my ears. Now, I’m almost prepared to—”
“Madam President,” interrupts one of the two Secret Service agents who’ve been silently stationed at the back of the room. “We’ve detected a security breach.”
Though the room is incredibly quiet, I can make out a distinct hiss. The agents each have a finger pressed firmly against their earpieces. Their eyes narrow as they receive audio feedback until, in unison, they dash toward us.
“Get back!” one yells, his next words muffled by a blast of white noise that drowns out all other sound in the room.
One of the agents loops a massive arm around my upper torso and whisks me out of my chair, as if I’m nothing more than a child under his control. He sidesteps the desk the other agent has just flipped over and tosses me to the ground behind it, scrunching his bulky frame in beside me. I pick myself up off all fours and crouch, my breath quickening. I try to make sense of what’s happening. Within the timespan of a few unhealthily fast heartbeats, Faust and I are hunkered down behind her keeled-over presidential desk, agents peeking out on either side of us with weapons drawn.
The white noise doesn’t let up, meaning I still can’t hear a thing. To compensate, I abandon my self-preservation instincts and rise above the side of the desk, just enough to see what’s going on at the other end of the room.
Puncturing the pristine white paint of the Oval Office’s northern wall, a single bottle-cap-sized scorch mark appears. It begins moving, singeing the wall as it travels, making perfect right angles until it has formed the burnt outline of a door. The agent to my right grabs my neck and slams me down to the floor, yelling at me. The white noise is dissipating, and I can hear the tail end of his sentence.
“. . . your head down!” he shouts, pistol drawn as he braces his recoil shoulder against the desk. It’s quite good advice—a fact I come to realize when a massive detonation deafens the room again and sends burnt plaster hurling across the Oval Office with such force that pieces rocket overhead and smash against the windows behind us, coating us in dust and residue.
In a desperate attempt to bottleneck whatever lies waiting outside, the agents unload suppressive fire through the breach in the wall. As sound returns to the room in the form of nonstop gunfire, I wonder if we might be able to stave off the attack by simply waiting until backup arrives. It’s a very thick desk, after all. But my hope disappears when I turn my head back toward the Oval’s rear windows, where three glowing green eyes stare back at me.
On the other side of the glass, a figure clad in jet-black dragon skin armor and luminescent trifocal goggles finishes planting some sort of charge, then rappels upward as soon as they notice I’m watching. Before I can warn the preoccupied agents, the intruder detonates their explosive, swings through the shattering window panes, and plants bullets in both my protectors’ skulls. Beside me, my last means of safety slump over, dead.
The rappelling assailant lands directly behind the last two of us alive, flanked by a second armored soldier who has followed them through the breached window. With their rifles aimed at us, they tell us not to move. Their English is broken, their accents unmistakably Eastern European, and I find myself regretting that I wasn’t a little more amicable to Faust during our negotiations a few minutes ago.
Faust and I comply with the soldiers’ demands and remain frozen as more intruders filter through the hole in the wall across from us. Seconds later, we’re surrounded by a full squad of troops. They waste no time binding our wrists, gagging us, and mobilizing us.
We pass through the smoking hole in the office wall and are met by a marching party of other captured civilians. The soldiers shove us in line with them. Our hostage parade then begins its trek through the West Wing’s halls.
We make it a few dozen meters before we’re stopped in front of the press briefing room. I see remnants of a scene similar to the one I had witnessed firsthand just a few minutes ago: a smoldering hole in the wall and a lot of dead Secret Service agents and civilians. As far as I can tell, the only living occupant remaining is a downed staffer who looks critically injured. Her body is covered in burn marks, and her legs are crushed and pulpy, riddled with debris from the attack. The soldiers don’t allow me time to vomit. They shove me forward, not happy with my wide-eyed, quivering-lipped dawdling. I get one last glimpse of that poor woman as a bullet is put through her head, shot by our escorts so our parade doesn’t lose its pace.
For every act of horror along our thorough sweep of the White House, one question echoes inside my head: Where is the military, the police, or any other defense? So far, the only people who’ve given these intruders any resistance are a few stray Secret Service agents and a handful of stupid, or perhaps immeasurably brave, civilians. Oddly, the president herself isn’t one of those individuals. It’s not like I’m expecting her to spit the gag out of her mouth through sheer willpower, but still, seeing nothing more than her head hung low enrages me. She’s taking the situation like a coward.
The moment I have that thought, I want to punch myself, as it’s clear I’m no better. People are dying around me, and what am I doing? Watching and trying not to process it. The thought haunts me right up until our party is herded outside through the front doors of the White House. Awaiting us are three small, civilian-class shuttles, stationed right on the front lawn.
Though it’s too little, too late, I finally hear them: the distant sounds of sirens wailing and people shouting. None of it matters, though; the troops are already corralling us aboard the shuttles. The first five of us in line, including myself and the president, are rushed up the boarding ramp of the closest craft, accompanied by four emotionless soldiers. They bark at us in Russian, but my body is on autopilot and I barely hear it. My head is turned, looking back at the civilians still stranded on the lawn. I watch them for as long as I can until the rising boarding ramp blocks out everything but the American flag waving despairingly atop a defiled White House, the last sight I see before I’m trapped in darkness.
Our shuttle’s engines roar to life, and a soldier smashes something against the back of my head. Unable to fight the bells ringing inside my skull, I pass out, certain that death won’t be far behind.
CHAPTER 2
Gourd
“Space,” they used to say. “The final frontier.” They wondered what it would be like to drift lazily through the Milky Way, marveling at its vastness and the wonders it held. They were stupid. There’s nothing out here but floating rocks and wasted time.
I wish I could travel back a few hundred years to tell people how shitty space is, because here I am, sitting in a tiny one-man fighter with a pilot’s seat tighter than a damn toaster slot, waiting for something, anything, to happen. No supernovas, no meteor showers, no sudden appearances by the commies who kidnapped our president, nada. Speaking of which, when are those fellas gonna show up?
“Three civilian shuttles coming in from the northwest sector. Twenty cloaked signatures right behind them,” Bravo Squad’s Sergeant Toufexis announces, right on cue.
“Alpha Squad is good to go,” Sergeant Barton replies as his Marines finalize their ambush formation right above us. Yankee Squad’s Sergeant Marx and Delta Squad’s Sergeant McGregor follow suit, ordering their ships to assemble overhead.
Through the dome of my cockpit, I peer up at the United States Cosmo Marine fleet hovering in tactical formation. Against the backdrop of Earth-003’s sun, our dozens of armored fighters’ scaly silhouettes resemble a dragon—the kind getting ready to snack on some wily Reds.
“Remember, scalpel strike,” Captain Grimm tells his sergeants while drifting his fighter into the middle of the fleet’s formation. “Take out the escort ships, secure the civilian shuttles, and shut down the enemy. Give them no time for whatever contingency plans they have for Madam President.”
While he preps the others for the first phase of attack, I glance at my ship’s biometric scanner, which is tracking the president’s unique exothermic heat signature. Little blips appear across the radar—a damn good sign. Madam President is close by.
“Ready . . .” Grimm says as time slows to a crawl around us.
Overhead, the full force of Romeo Company lies in wait. All fighters’ thrusters are engaged, and every pilot’s trigger finger is ready.
“Now!” Grimm barks as the Russians rocket into our intercept range.
McGregor’s squad swoops in overhead, making it look like they’re beelining for the shuttles. Since fighter-class craft can’t utilize blaster weaponry while cloaking shields are engaged, Delta’s ballsy divebomb scores them a response of twenty instantly uncloaked Russian ships, all clustered tightly around our trio of targets.
With their cloaking shields down, I get a better look at the opposition, and something ain’t right. These Reds are moving faster than any other Russian fighters I’ve ever seen—hell, faster than any fighters I’ve ever seen. They’re hitting parsecs-per-hour counts that shouldn’t be possible.
The sergeants curse up a storm over open comms as they try to keep up with the lightning-fast enemy forces. I wanna jump in and help out, but I can’t; I just have to sit here and wait while everyone else gets all the action. Alpha, Bravo, and Yankee charge after Delta to keep the heat on our foes, and even as our forces start taking hits, I don’t get the word from my captain to intervene. Only once our guys have thoroughly distracted each and every Russkie craft does Captain Grimm finally give my partner and me the signal to begin phase two of the strike.
“Time to save the day and take all the credit,” says First Lieutenant James Beecher, my lone Sierra squadmate and lifelong battle brother. Rescuing the president is a pretty tall order, and I’m glad as hell Beecher’s the guy I get to share that responsibility with.
“Punch it,” I shout, and Sierra Squad finally enters the game. My rear thrusters kick into gear and blast my fighter forward alongside Beecher’s as we dive into the fray. I sink into my chair, absorbing the g-forces of rapid acceleration—it’s the sort of rush that never gets old.
The scene in front of me is dense, at least by space-combat standards. I can just barely make out the three crimson shuttles behind the flurry of laser fire and cluster missile spray, but they’re needles in a space-sized haystack. Around me, fellow Marines whip past at top speed, either tailing or being tailed by the commie bastards I’m proud to call my enemy. The Russian fighters blur across my field of view so quickly I can barely keep track of their silver jet streams as they perform janky zero-g corkscrew spins, high yo-yos, and a whole load of other fancy horseshit I don’t have time for.
“Something’s seriously off about these ships, Gourd. I don’t understand,” Beecher shouts over comms as we get a closer look at the Reds’ incredible speed, an ally below us narrowly avoiding a hostile fighter’s ramming attempt.
“We don’t have to understand ’em, we just have to fry ’em,” I shout back. Now’s not the time to get cold feet—now’s the time to make our mamas proud.
I follow Beecher’s craft as it shoots into the center of the conflict with laser rifles pounding, totaling any Russian ship dumb enough to set off my buddy’s hair-trigger reflexes. Yankee, Bravo, Delta, and Alpha keep the Reds off our flanks, giving us a straight shot at our target. Beecher and I pivot left and right, alternating sides while I stay slightly above him for overhead coverage. Our pattern is good and we’re in sync like two dancing beagles as we zero in on our target; the civilian shuttles get closer and closer with each passing second. Then the monkey wrench hits.
“Sierra Squad, do you read?” It’s Alpha Squad’s Sergeant Barton. He sounds worried.
“We read you. What’s the matter?” Beecher responds.
“They’re gaining on us—we’ve got to split up. Your six is going to be exposed for about fifteen seconds.” Fifteen seconds is about twelve more than the Reds need to mow down a lone pair of unprotected fighters like ours. Not good.
“Jesus Christ. All right, do what you have to do,” Beecher grumbles.
Just as we’re about to dart backward to cover our own tails, my cockpit’s monitor flashes red, displaying the text: “enemy lock in progress.” Shit. I shoot my ship downward, abandoning Beecher as I try to shake off whoever has their sights aimed up my ass.
“Gourd, what’s going on?” he shouts after my break from formation.
“They got a lock on me, man! Watch my six!”
“Our six, your six, my six, everyone’s six! Fuck!” he responds as his fighter flies in the direction of my jet stream.
“Bogey spotted,” Beecher tells me. “Going in for the shot . . .”
Seconds pass as my partner goes to work, but the preliminary lock warning on my display remains active.
“Jesus, Gourd, they’re too fast!” he says, not used to being outmaneuvered by the Reds.
I feel his frustration; they’re giving me a pretty good run for my money too.
I start whipping out the textbook tricks. I flat-scissor the enemy then corkscrew away, hastily changing my orientation in hopes of throwing off the fucker. For a split second, the lock breaks as I’m in a barrel roll, but it comes back immediately when I stop spinning. There goes that plan.
Out of time and ideas, I strain to think up a new trick in the seconds I have left. Thankfully, my thought process is interrupted by my comms light blinking to life. Beecher has a plan of his own in mind.
“Fly toward me and boost up before impact; I’ll take your guy head on,” Beecher says.
It’s risky as hell—even if I don’t accidentally kill him, there’s a good chance the Russian will. But at the rate the enemy’s closing in, it’s the best option I have.
I rip around until I’m on a collision course with Beecher. I burst up, down, and to the sides to make sure the Russian doesn’t get in a cheap shot while Beecher and I set up the maneuver, my buddy now directly aligned with the nose of my ship.
