Descent into Mayhem (Capicua Chronicles Book 1) (17 page)

Surrounding Leiben like somber sentinels, the Anti-Air Threat Artillery Batteries stood potently, each with three cannon pointed out towards a non-existent enemy on the horizon. Upon receiving orders, only four of the batteries activated; the remaining two were under maintenance, vital hardware components having been removed for repair.

The artillery system, better known as DLCAS, had been the subject of a fifteen year research program before finally being fielded, and centered on an entirely new way to fire cannon. Designed around its munitions, each unit possessed a ludicrous combined reinforced/perforated barrel chamber, which once activated opened to allow a two meter long, 200 millimeter shell to be inserted. The cannon then resealed their breeches and traversed their snubbed barrels up towards the sky. Once there, the cannons’ instrumentation extracted specific data from the shells to assist in calibration, and then paused for further instructions.

Momentarily foiled in its intention to strike down the incoming targets, the master system relied instead on the High Gain Antennas for targeting. By themselves, the HGAs were nearly useless, possessing such a narrow field of vision as to render them incapable of detecting the incoming objects. Combined with the PIRED, however, the HGAs would be able to pinpoint each target’s real-time location precisely enough for it to be engaged. There was a rub to contend with, however.

What allowed the PIRED to detect the objects at all was the infrared signature they produced as they tore through the thermosphere, compressing the already hot gases there to a point where IR emissions could be detected. But with such a steep descending angle, with such a powerful IR signature compared to its size, and at an altitude of over a hundred kilometers, the targets frustrated PIRED’s attempts to supply the artillery system with the precise data necessary for interception.

Added to that was another complication. The high gain antennae were unable to penetrate the ever-intensifying plasma surrounding the objects, meaning these would have to descend until they were low and slow enough for the shroud to dissipate. The system calculated that, at the current rate of the targets’ deceleration, the altitude of engagement would be 35 kilometers. And so it waited another twenty seconds, tasking several HGA components in pairs to each battery in advance.

As the nearest targets punched through the 35 kilometer mark at over three kilometers per second, the ionization dissipated enough for the high gain antennae to precisely map their trajectories and the laser cannon system began to be fed real-time data. Finally receiving the necessary vectors, each individual cannon acquired its respective target and began tracking operations. At 14H50, local time, Unit 2 of the 1
st
Anti-air Threat Battery reached a firing solution and electrically initiated its shell.

The shell cartridge’s rear section consisted of a cylindrical block of high explosives, encased within a copper cylinder surrounded by a carefully spaced solenoid, the casing and solenoid forming an open circuit at their extremities via an instrument package.

At rest that circuit was devoid of current, but upon the shell’s electrical initiation, a capacitor bank, hidden safely within the Battery infrastructure, instantly pumped a powerful electrical charge into the solenoid, generating an intense magnetic field between itself and the casing for the briefest of moments.

At the point of highest magnetic intensity, the electric detonator at the shell’s base fired, sending a detonation wave coursing through the Elastomer-bonded Octogen main charge. Before five microseconds had passed, the expanding shock front reached the metal casing and began to deform it outwards into a funnel shape, distorting the magnetic field between itself and the solenoid until they contacted each other, and in doing so progressively short-circuiting the circuit along the shell’s length as the wave-front advanced. The detonation wave raced along the entirety of the explosive charge, the expanding plasma plasticizing its metal container, torturing it into a magnetic field distorting, electrically inducting tube, and so causing a significant fraction of the explosive charge’s stored chemical energy to be transformed into electrical current.

By the time the explosive shock front had reached the end of its short journey, the inducting effect caused by the distorting magnetic field had intensified the current by two orders of magnitude. In that moment, a load switch placed in the fore instrument package did the first, last, and only thing it had been designed to do: it closed at maximum flux compression, transferring the generated current into the killing component of the shell, an optically pumped diode laser, designed for the sole purpose of producing an exceptionally intense, coherent infrared flash before frying itself.

Over the following seconds all operational cannon fired, sending twelve coherent near-infrared flashes across the distance between the weapons and their targets, some managing to deposit over twenty kilojoules of thermal energy against the objects’ blackened exteriors in a microsecond. The PIRED detected six brief, very intense infrared flashes as half of the targets disintegrated, the remaining six continuing their descent unhampered. By the time the sixth flash had been detected, the first cannon to fire had already reloaded and prepared to fire once more.

Ever more frequent flashes of light illuminated the countryside as the seconds passed by, each accompanied by the tremendous concussion of the DLC cannon as their perforated blast chambers noisily expelled super-heated explosive residue before ejecting the remains of their shells. The incoming targets continued to slow down as they penetrated the lower atmosphere, their numbers dwindling quickly with each passing second until, only a moment before complete interception, the MAGE was abruptly pulled from the task, execution authority automatically transferring to the four stunned Battery commanders who had only just reached their stations. The remaining two inbounds struck their targets and detonated within a second of each another.

The first warhead detonated beside the 3
rd
Anti-air Threat Artillery Battery’s center cannon, releasing a deadly burst of Gamma rays, x-rays and a constellation of charged particles outwards into the immediate area. Twenty meters away from the heart of the blast, the steel-reinforced concrete bunker proved thick enough to absorb most of the radiation. The lieutenant and his three-man crew, having barely begun to take stock of what was happening, nevertheless received more than fifty gray of lethal emissions. Suffering an influx of more than three thousand joules of heat energy each, the four men suddenly felt an intense searing sensation course throughout their bodies.

It was the last feeling they would ever experience.

Thermal radiation emanating from the proto-fireball simultaneously assaulted every surface it came into contact with, ablating steel and concrete away with enough intensity to toss cannon out into the incandescing trees as if they were juggling clubs. The enormous pressure from the bunker’s ablating roof drove it downwards towards the doomed soldiers until, a fraction of a second later, the expanding fireball collided against the concrete. In the briefest of instants, four young lives were snuffed out.

The second warhead came down over the city itself, detonating ten meters above a residential complex in the May 23
rd
neighborhood. In an instant of fire and light, the building was driven into the ground, its solid construction no impediment to the forces acting upon it. Floor after floor collapsed, extinguishing the lives of men, women and children in a layer-cake of tragedy until the collapsing mass broke through its arched foundations and pummeled into the underground transit system beneath. All commuters who had taken shelter there perished immediately, not even those who had been shouldered into the station’s radiating tunnel complex being spared of such a fate; the failing debris acted like a pneumatic hammer, ejecting air from the station’s cathedral-like interior with enough force to propel anything not bolted down towards unyielding concrete and unforgiving steel.

Two nearby buildings came crashing down with the blast, their ruins cutting off all access to the gaping hole in the earth where the center building had stood.

All electronic devices in the immediate area were instantly destroyed and power spikes in the electricity distribution grid damaged all appliances in the city lacking the proper protection. Leiben Varsity was one of the more fortunate establishments, its electricity grid possessing many contingencies meant to protect its sensitive research equipment. In the Varsity’s distinguished Department of Physics, in a room with blackened windows situated on the complex’s third floor, a computer connected to a collection of scientific instruments duly recorded the second warhead’s neutron spike. A nearby physicist, distracted by his calculations, raised his head in irritation at the computer’s warning bleep.

His hackles then rose as an odd crackling sound began to
emanate
from the windows beside him. His stretched his hand out hesitantly and splayed it upon the nearest windowpane´s surface. It was warm to the touch and heating up quickly. Whatever thoughts had been going through his mind in that moment then fled as the windows suddenly shattered with explosive force. Glass fragments and broken window frames flew into the compartment with an earsplitting concussion, carving up the young man’s exposed skin and tossing him mercilessly to the floor.

He lay there for a long moment, his slowly recovering ears picking up the sound of glass shards tinkling off myriad chairs and worktables, listening in astonishment to the resounding rumble that was coming from a large rectangular hole in the wall. Carefully but clumsily, he stood once more, barely noticing the pain from the cut in the palm of his hand. A jagged piece of glass stuck out of the wound, having found its novel refuge the moment he had pushed himself up from the floor.

He approached the opening with awkward steps, the enormous explosion having somehow knocked all grace out of him, and then paused to contemplate the solitary black mushroom cloud that stooped over his city. He felt sick all of a sudden and wondered numbly whether it was from radiation sickness. He found that his right eye could no longer focus correctly, and was about to rub it when he became aware of his shredded hands. He stared down at them, horrified by the vision of carnage. Was that a piece of milky white glass, or was it a protruding tendon? He tried to poke at the outcropping but quickly gave up when the pain intensified. Blood dripped freely into his palms and onto the patterned floor, and his right eye was entirely out of focus now, able to see the world outside only in smudged shades of red.

His untidily scribbled notes lay forgotten on the floor. Only moments ago he had been working on an efficient new way to produce Polonium-208 from natural Bismuth. As much as he tried now, however, all he could focus on was what his only remaining eye could perceive – at the base of the rising mushroom cloud, an enormous billowing cumulous expanding up and outwards, blotting out the still-erect buildings with a deep rumble. In a few moments that cloud would reach him.

Hot tears joined the rivulets of blood streaming down his face.

900 kilometers south-east of Lograin, 09H30, 19
th
of May, 2771

The ScoutEagle MA-17 Reconnaissance Drone persisted at its set altitude of twelve thousand meters, the unmanned craft’s systems retransmitting the acquired data along a string of relay drones that stretched to the north-west like pearls on a necklace. Five such pearl-strings advanced parallel along a south-easterly course, the edges of their 20 kilometer wide target-terrain overlapping so mission analysts could later compile a detailed map of the Mining Quadrant.

The drone constituted the lead element of the center-most pearl-string, its directional tail-antennae pointing back towards the nearest data-relay drone more than a hundred kilometers away. The trailing element’s only answer to the torrent of raw data came in the form of an occasional ping, allowing the lead know its antenna’s aim was true.

Operation Widescan 3 differed from its predecessors in two important ways. The previous operation’s drones had merely made use of passive detection equipment, while the current leading drones were freshly equipped with active ground-mapping radar. It was also the first mission tasked to cross the 45
º
radial line, beyond which several million hectares of exclusively plantation land was to be found.

The Ground-Mapping Radar system possessed one significant advantage and one compromising handicap over earlier sensors. Unlike its predecessors, which could only passively detect the UVB and long infrared components of the electromagnetic spectrum, the GMR produced a high-gain radar beam in the microwave frequency that not only detected all surface structures, including those hidden beneath the more sophisticated camouflage nets, but also most subsurface excavations of military value. The beam streaked across the terrain over fifty times per second in 10 meter wide swaths, the raw return signal being immediately redirected to Lograin Air Base’s operational headquarters for analysis.

The systems’ weak point, however, was that a sufficiently advanced passive radar system could possibly detect operating GMRs, the diffracting effect as its beam passed through certain airborne obstacles acting as a possible source of detection, not to mention the signal-scattering effect ocurring whenever the beam came into contact with rockier soils.

So far the center lead drone had advanced unmolested, and apparently undetected, over the course of more than seven thousand kilometers, and was nearing the end of its outward leg, where it would, along with its flanking companions, execute a carefully choreographed about-face and head for home.

Shortly after it passed the seventy one hundred mark, however, the autonomous aircraft’s fate was abruptly sealed. The drone’s forward ocular, existing only for flight navigation and obstacle avoidance, barely had time to register an abrupt change in the incident luminosity before the entire front portion of the craft disintegrated.

As the leading craft’s flaming remains initiated their plummeting journey back to earth, its two nearest brothers placidly maintained their heading. Had they been piloted aircraft, their pilots would have experienced an “oh shit!” moment and bugged out in time to give warning of the attack, with the additional motivation of preserving their lives and equipment. Instead both continued on their courses until, as if on cue, both were obliterated.

Moments later someone at Lograin Air Base suddenly stopped drinking his coffee and experienced his own personal “oh shit!” moment, and then he ordered the five pearl-string’s trailing elements to update their status and bug out.

The most advanced trailing elements’ CPUs reclassified themselves as the new leading elements, transmitted the video data of their former leaders’ abrupt demise, and initiated a lazy turn for home.

Three of them suddenly burst into flames.

*****

The wall-clock indicated that it was already quite late in the morning. Or at least late for the army, or for the farm, or for any other place where people might be expected to put in solid working hours.

But it happened to be a Sunday, and it also happened to be the first day the SIC’s sole platoon had gotten off in over a month, and all were currently dedicating themselves to lying on their beds in slumber. The violent femmes were nowhere to be seen, and were probably dedicating their morning to similar pursuits in their own casern.

The blackout boards had already been rudely pulled out of their fixtures from the high windows; yet another of Mason’s many fervent contributions to the platoon’s general mood. The bastard was a consummate morning person, and had apparently objected to his charges’ intention of remaining indoors until lunchtime. No one had found the nerve to protest as he yanked the boards out, flooding the darkened compartment with painfully bright sunlight, everyone knowing all too well that the less they argued, the faster he would leave, and the faster some brave cadet might rise to the occasion and blanket the windows.

Toni wasn’t going to play the part. It wasn’t that he was afraid of Mason. His body simply ached too much for the effort it required.

They had gotten a brutal working over in the sims yesterday, their Lieutenant having tweaked the feedback interface so that all quicker movements required an unusual amount of physical exertion to induce the simulator to respond. The exercise objective had been to discover how to moderate one’s movements so as to reduce compressed air consumption. Smooth motion, extended range. That had been the maxim of the day. It had taken a while for them to get used to the change, but in the end it had been unavoidable, since it had been only a matter of time before their sapped limbs finally gave up fighting, slowing down to economize all by themselves.

By the end of the exercise they’d all received a final report displaying the rate of compressed air consumption over elapsed mission time. Toni had performed terribly; he’d been fighting his simul-Suit like a maniac, and by the end of the affair his legs had been shaking like saplings in the great winds.

That was nothing, however, compared to how he felt today.

He had it worst in his abdominal muscles, which seemed to have contracted painfully in the aftermath of yesterday’s training. He was following Gordie’s example, who had decided to lie on his back with a pillowcase underneath his thighs to reduce the muscular tension. At first it hadn’t appeared to help at all, until he had tried removing and felt the pain sharpen as his abdominals tautened once more. Finally giving up, Toni contented himself instead with simply lying there, allowing his troubled mind to wander freely, as it was prone to do.

The days following the April 21
st
attack on Leiben had been pregnant with barely-suppressed panic in the Armed Forces, a state that MEWAC itself had managed to shy away from only due to the professionalism it still managed to retain. On the other hand, there was no euphoria, the primary reason being that, overshadowing their outrage due to the assault on their capital, was the stark realization that they were the ones who were supposed to do something about it.

Baylen had aptly managed to put the mood into words. He reasoned that, had he been a civilian, he would have been outraged enough to join the forces and “get even” but, since he was already there and knew the full extent of what they might be in for, all that remained was to brood over their unknown enemy, and over what lay ahead.

Toni discovered that he was completely unafraid, and wondered whether that pointed towards something very good about his mental state, or towards something very bad. He suspected that he probably had yet to fully understand the full scope of the crisis before them. Adding to that, his mind had recently begun to feel warped out of shape, and he had since found himself overreacting to the ever-more-frequent frictions between the cadets. Perhaps it was the excessive doses of nootropic medication, or perhaps the suffocating pressure, or perhaps there was something fundamentally wrong with him, but Toni was no longer able to get through a day without entertaining the thought of killing someone. Sometimes a person in particular would be a target of the notion, but mostly a part of him felt that killing every single biped in his immediate vicinity would somehow make the pressure go away. He kept the fantasies to himself, despite having briefly toyed with the possibility of telling Ray about it.

The attack on Leiben had led Toni to make the first significant purchase of his life, his miserable current salary having been just enough to acquire a DigiSlab personal computer. Its performance was nothing to write home about, but at least he no longer needed to wait his turn at the Cadets’ Messe, as they called the computer-filled compartment reserved for their platoon. He had also begun to tune into all local broadcast systems, be they video, audio or net. At least until the blanket ban had come into effect, cutting most base personnel off from the outside world. Now the entire planet might be on fire, and he wouldn’t know it until the skyline was aflame.

The ban had also denied him any prospect of reestablishing contact with his family.

He sometimes wondered about the enemy. Local speculation currently ranged from aquatic aliens in fishbowl helmets to the exceptionally rancorous inhabitants from the Terminator hub (All gave Rakaia a wider berth once that theory had become airborne). All that was certain was that Leiben had come under missile attack twice on the same day, each salvo having been launched with enough force to completely annihilate it if not for the city’s defense grid. The few missiles that had managed to punch through devastated entire segments of the city. Not a whisper of enemy action had been picked up afterwards, although elements of the ASC had since begun reconnoitering eastern Thaumantias due to whisperings about lights in the sky and missing miners.

Baylen had been pulled from the SIC last week, a deficit in operational personnel in the FIC having apparently been discovered, and they were once again stuck with Ian as liaison between the instructors and their cadets. Morale had subsequently taken a nosedive. Ray hadn’t been helping things either. His father’s life had been extinguished in the second strike and the cadet’s once-entertaining tantrums had begun to take on a much nastier tone.

His performance in the sims, however, had suffered dramatic improvement.

Despite the brutal increase in the training load, the platoon was still only expected to graduate in the eve of September. The mid-course break had unsurprisingly been cancelled, but there appeared to be no wish from the brass to commit cadets to a fight before full qualification. Toni felt both relieved and annoyed by the decision, although Ray had been furious when the platoon was informed. He had since had a look in his eyes that kept most cadets clear of his path, although Toni still counted him as a friend and therefore listened patiently to the cadet’s vengeful monologues.

“Cadets, time to get up!” Toni suddenly heard someone say.

He turned his throbbing head slowly, feeling every muscle in his neck strain as he did so. An already uniformed Ian stood beside his bed as if expecting his comrades to leap up eagerly from theirs. A few well-deployed blankets ensured that it was still quite dark, but Toni didn’t need the light to know that Ian’s boots were already shining.

Backside-kissing fire-stomper
, he thought tiredly, and he wondered whether he should inform medical of his persistent headaches.

All cadets remained where they were. Ian realized that no one was going to move in the predictable future and finally gave up, exiting the casern quietly without a backward glance. Toni suspected the special one was about to inform on them, but he couldn’t have cared less; a day off was a day off in his book, and he was not alone in the thought.

“You guys thinking what I’m thinking?” Gordie croaked out loud. There were several answering grunts.

“If the Special One gives me grief today, I’m gonna fuck him up.” He declared throatily.

“About time.” Someone groaned.

“Make it count.” Someone else added supportively, and similar remarks made themselves heard over the following minutes.

“Choose the time and place carefully, mate ...” was about all Toni could say. There were several agreeing grunts to the somewhat obvious suggestion.

And just like that, Ian Templeton had once again been promoted to target status. There was no need for deep discussion among them; he had simply pissed off too many people too many times for a cadet to be willing to speak in his defense. Comforted by the prospect of justice, Toni found himself drifting towards sleep again.

The lunch-horn rudely woke him.

He had managed to fall deeply asleep, and time must certainly have flown by over the course of his slumber. Glancing at the wall-clock, he found both hands pointing to the number twelve. Surprisingly, Toni didn’t feel hungry in the least, and even Gordie complained that he could have waited another hour or two before stuffing his face. The shift officer might have something to say to that, however, and so all reluctantly left their beds, some complaining loudly over the assortment of injuries they possessed.

There was little time. Within fifteen minutes the platoon would be expected to form up before the canteen, and so there was a hurried rush to the lavatories at the casern’s opposite end, although not without the customary laughing and pushing that normally accompanied the trip. Thirteen brief minutes later, the platoon’s male elements exited their casern at a swift jog and coursed towards the canteen. Something struck Toni as quite odd as he ran; no other platoons or companies were yet formed up inside the bright yellow rectangle at the canteen’s entrance, where a single blonde cadet awaited their arrival. He also noticed that the few observable soldiers remained at their own caserns’ entrances, some clearly showing surprise as they observed the cadets’ progress.