America's Galactic Foreign Legion - Book 3: Silent Invasion (2 page)

* * * * *

Sergeant Green got the order to pull back
from KFC. He was about to retreat anyway. The insurgents seemed to
be everywhere, and they were better armed than usual. Mortars were
now falling on his position. Sergeant Green ordered the KFC ovens
booby-trapped. His platoon loaded into the armored car and raced
for the Finisterra Bridge. Sergeant Green used the cannon and
machine gun to cover their retreat. At the top of the bridge, they
rammed a burning tank and knocked it out of the way. He watched
with fascination as it fell off the bridge, splashing into the
water. On the far side of the bridge, they picked up Lieutenant
Lopez. Molten metal from the blast splattered Lopez’s face and
shoulders, and he was moaning in pain. Corporal Tonelli pulled him
up into the armored car.

Medic Ceausescu immediately started an IV,
trying to ease the pain and prevent shock. Corporal Tonelli’s
trained attack monitor dragon Spot tugged at his leash as
Lieutenant Lopez was set down beside him. Smelling blood, the
dragon whipped his tongue out and took a tentative nibble of
Lieutenant Lopez’s shoulder.

“Get your lizard off me!” yelled Lopez as he
drew his pistol and shot at the dragon. “That monster bit me!”

“Bad Spot! No biscuit!” said Corporal
Tonelli, jerking the dragon back. Spot still tugged at Lopez’s
shoulder. Medic Ceausescu grabbed the pistol from Lieutenant Lopez
as another bullet ricocheted off a bulkhead. The round struck
Corporal Washington in the arm. Finally Private Tonelli struck his
dragon on the snout, breaking its grip.

“No harm done,” announced Guido as he pried
Spot loose. “Spot just thought you smelled like a tasty grilled
steak burrito.”

“Burrito this, you spaghetti for brains New
York trash!” yelled Lieutenant Lopez, struggling to get his pistol
back.

“He shot me in the arm!” complained Corporal
Washington, regaining control of his driving. The big spider
legionnaire was usually even tempered, but he was hot now. “I will
get you back for that!”

“Just drive,” ordered Sergeant Green. “Get us
out of here before they fire another missile. Your arm will grow
back.”

* * * * *

At the command center, Corporal Tonelli and
Medic Corporal Ceausescu unloaded Lieutenant Lopez. A medical
helicopter was called to transport Lieutenant Lopez to the hospital
at New Memphis.

“Guido my friend,” I greeted warmly as they
entered. “I heard you have a nuke hidden somewhere that you were
going to sell on the black market. I want it.”

“Who have you been talking to?” asked Guido.
“Just because I’m Italian, you automatically think I’m selling
stuff on the black market? I’m tired of being picked on!”

“Not just stuff. You have a nuke,” I said. “I
want it to fight off the insurgents.”

“General Kalipetsis won’t go for that,”
replied Guido. “You won’t get permission to set off nukes in town
or anywhere else.”

“General Kalipetsis isn’t here.” I smiled.
“It’s not a big nuke is it?”

“It takes two people to lift,” advised Guido,
admitting his guilt. “It’s pretty big.”

“It doesn’t matter. We have to show the
spiders who is the big dog on the block. It’s us!”

“If you blow up East Finisterra, you will
blow up the Singh Mining Corporation’s gold mine and wreck the
whole economy,” warned Guido.

“The insurgents wrecked it all anyway. I
can’t think that far ahead. I just want to survive the day. Where
is your nuke?”

“It’s in a crate in storage at the brothel.
How much are you going to pay me for the nuke? I need a return on
my investment. I have partners to keep happy.”

“I was going to have you shot for treason,
but I will delay that if the nuke still works,” I promised. “Take
the armored car and bring the nuke here. Corporal Williams will
assist you.”

* * * * *

Guido stared at Williams as they left. “I’ll
bet you’re the cheese-eating rat snitch who told Captain Czerinski
about my nuke,” accused Guido. “Do you know how much money you cost
me?”

“What do you care? You’re rich,” said
Corporal Williams dismissively. “That nuke may save all our
lives.”

“That beat up rusted old spider nuke will
probably blow up and kill us when we try to move it,” complained
Guido.

“Quit being a cry-baby,” Corporal Williams
said. “We need the nuke to win this war.”

“We are not officially at war. Anyway, it’s a
matter principle. I trusted you, and you snitched on me. That’s
just not done and cannot be forgiven.”

“Sorry,” said Corporal Williams sheepishly.
“How can I make it up to you?”

“Just make sure you ignore all the other
stuff I have in storage,” said Guido. “Pretend you didn’t see any
of it, and don’t snitch on me again.”

* * * * *

When the medical helicopter landed, Medic
Ceausescu loaded Lieutenant Lopez. Corporal Washington went along
to assist with the stretcher and to have his damaged arm attended
to. The arm was about to fall off, and I was concerned he needed
medical treatment. Spiders usually do grow back missing parts, but
I wasn’t sure. There is only so much the medics can do with duct
tape.

Guido and Williams loaded the nuke. The pilot
complained about all the extra weight, but I told him
tough
.
He complained more when I told him he was taking a detour.

As a precaution, I radioed the insurgent
commander and asked him not to shoot at our medical helicopter
because it was full of wounded. He agreed, saying he was watching
us closely from KFC. The insurgent commander complained about
Sergeant Green blowing up the ovens at KFC, saying it showed a lack
of good faith on our part. But he was above such pettiness and
would let the medical helicopter pass. I could see hundreds of
insurgents across the river waving and dancing. They were
celebrating their victory. I was determined to put an end to that!
The rest of the city seemed deserted. The local population of
spiders and humans had either evacuated East Finisterra or gone
underground into the mines.

The helicopter lifted off, taking a sharp
turn toward East Finisterra. Guido set the timer on the nuke and
dropped it out the side door over KFC. Then the helicopter darted
southwest toward New Memphis. A ground-to-air missile arced up from
East Finisterra, took a severe turn towards the helicopter, and hit
with the force of a hammer. The helicopter dropped quickly,
spinning out of control as it went down.

Lieutenant Lopez braced himself as he looked
up at Medic Ceausescu. “Elena, I am sorry for anything mean I may
have said to you.”

“Screw you!” replied Corporal Ceausescu.

“We’re about to die, and the last words on
your lips are
screw you?
” asked Lieutenant Lopez
frantically.

“Screw you and fasten your seat belt!” added
Corporal Ceausescu.

“Puta,” responded Lieutenant Lopez as he
clicked his restraining harness into place just before impact.

The helicopter bounced off trees before
twisting to the ground. Medic Ceausescu pulled Lieutenant Lopez
from the wreckage. The pilot died. Guido and Williams stumbled out
of the helicopter unhurt. Spot tagged along. With Corporal
Ceausescu’s assistance, Lieutenant Lopez led them away from the
crash. It started raining as darkness set in.

“Some days just aren’t worth getting up for,”
commented Lieutenant Lopez, still leaning on Ceausescu.
“Thanks.”

“Drop dead,” replied Corporal Ceausescu.

“I probably will.” Lieutenant Lopez let go of
the medic. “I can walk just fine.”

Suddenly the dark sky turned to bright light.
They all shielded their eyes and dove for cover as they heard the
sonic boom from the nuke they’d dropped on East Finisterra. The
rain turned to mud from the fallout. Everything was coated with wet
clay that came down like snow.

“Take your radiation tablets,” advised Medic
Ceausescu as they walked through the muddy forest. “I think that
nuke was larger than the Captain expected.”

“We just turned East Finisterra into glass!”
shouted Corporal Williams, giving a rebel yell and shaking his fist
to the east. “Awesome, baby! That’s what happens when you mess with
the Legion!”

“Where are we going?” asked Guido as they
trudged along.

“If we keep going west, we will reach the
highway,” answered Lieutenant Lopez. “We can hitch a ride from
there.”

“This place creeps me out,” complained Guido.
He could hear wolves howling up on a nearby ridge. “They’re
stalking us.”

“I heard that the wolves seeded on New
Colorado are smarter and larger than normal wolves,” said Corporal
Williams. “They plan their attacks. It’s genetic engineering gone
wild. I heard the wolves even wiped out a whole company of spider
special forces.”

“Nonsense,” said Lieutenant Lopez. “El lobo
only seeks out the weak. Maybe they smell my blood.”

“You have nothing to fear,” said Corporal
Washington. “Fear of man is a survival instinct bred into all wild
animals of Old Earth. It is me the wolves are stalking. They hope I
will lag behind.”

“I told you they liked to eat spiders,” said
Corporal Williams. “Don’t worry, Washington. We won’t let them eat
you. I say we blast them.”

“Don’t waste your ammunition,” ordered
Lieutenant Lopez. He thought he glimpsed a wolf off to the side.
Then it was gone, hidden by the underbrush. “If there are
insurgents out here, we don’t want to give away our position.”

“I just saw the biggest damn wolf there ever
was!” shouted Corporal Williams as he fired full automatic into the
forest. “I think I got him!”

Corporal Williams charged off into the
forest. The others followed. They found nothing, not even a blood
trail.

Finally losing interest in wolves, the
legionnaires walked for miles until they reached the North Highway.
The wolves followed.

* * * * *

I looked out the slit windows of the command
center bunker. The mushroom cloud still drifted over East
Finisterra. I had seen nuclear explosions before, but this one
close up seemed larger than usual. The devastation across the river
was complete. West Finisterra was flattened, too. I expected the
course of the New Mississippi River to change. The paperwork from
the environmental impact statement would be extensive.
Damned
paperwork!

Miraculously, the Finisterra Bridge was still
standing. Civilians were popping out of their spider holes and
wandering about the rubble. The mines and the tunnel system
remained intact. Radiation levels were high, and dust was settling
everywhere. The spiders weren’t much affected by radiation, but it
was something to be avoided by humans. Refugees needed to take
radiation tablets before fleeing south to New Disneyland or north
to Camp Alaska.

“General Kalipetsis is on the radio,”
announced Corporal Kool. “And he doesn’t sound happy.”

“He never is,” I replied, taking the radio.
“What?”

“Lose that attitude real fast, mister,” said
General Kalipetsis. “Did you explode a nuke?”

“No, sir,” I said. “It must have been the
insurgents.”

“Don’t lie to me,” shouted General
Kalipetsis. “I need to rely on my commanders to tell me the
truth.”

“Is this a secure frequency?” I asked. “Never
mind! You took all my nukes. Remember? Besides, our tactical nukes
aren’t that big. It must have been a spider nuke.”

“I will not tolerate your deception,” advised
General Kalipetsis. “Give me a reason not to relieve you of
command.”

“Because my sector is the only place in the
North that no longer has an operational insurgency,” I replied. “We
killed them all.”

“Insurgents are attacking all the county
seats,” said General Kalipetsis. “Be ready to move out toward
either New Disneyland or Camp Alaska. And don’t set off any more
nukes!”

“I did not explode that nuke,” I argued. “It
must have been the insurgents who accidentally blew themselves
up.”

“A man is never more truthful than when he
acknowledges himself to be a liar,” said General Kalipetsis.

“Spare me,” I replied.

“I’m warning you,” continued General
Kalipetsis. “No more surprises. No more nukes. No more lies.”

“That’s my story, and I’m sticking to
it.”

“You lie so easily. I need reliable
information. Don’t you know a lie can travel halfway around the
world while the truth is still putting on its boots?”

“All I know is we are facing more than just
insurgents,” I answered. “There were thousands of heavily armed
Arthropodan marines in Finisterra. We need air support. We have one
medical helicopter carrying wounded missing south of here, shot
down by a SAM. I expect more casualties from the radiation. We have
a lot of digging out and rebuilding to do. Fortunately the miners
up here are good at digging.”

“Did you blow up the Singh Gold Mine?” asked
General Kalipetsis. “The biggest mother load on the planet, and you
nuke it. How am I going to explain that to Congress?”

“I have not been across the river yet, so I
don’t know about the Singh Mine,” I said. “Are you going to do
something about the spiders landing marines down here?”

“I’ll be talking to the Commander of the
Arthropodan Fleet later today,” said General Kalipetsis. “They deny
landing any troops. He says they are only in orbit to protect the
local spider population and to prevent more genocide. Quite
frankly, you setting off a nuke on the spider side of Finisterra is
not going to help negotiations.”

“Threaten to blow their Fleet out of orbit,”
I suggested. “Threaten war. That will get their attention.”

“No one wants war,” said General Kalipetsis.
“I can’t make threats like that. We need to contain the
fighting.”

“War is a horrible thing,” I said. “Let’s
keep it that way so you don’t grow too fond of it. War can’t be
contained. It needs to be unleashed.”