The first ICBM Triton roared into life. The massive death-machine rose from its silo as smoke billowed in a vast, chugging, churning cloud. Flames raged out of the back end as the Triton climbed slowly at first and then with greater speed.
Inside the bunker, Colonel Marks mentally computed the situation. The initial boost phase would last a little over three minutes. The solid fuel booster would put the missile into suborbital space flight. None of the missiles would complete a full orbital revolution around the Earth. Each missile’s flight path used a trajectory that went up and down in a relatively simple curve, well before it had a chance to orbit around the Earth like a satellite.
Despite his worries, a smirk spread across Marks’s face. Conventional ASBMs used regular warheads and Mach 10 plus kinetic energy to destroy ships. Those missiles would need great precision to kilclass="underline" not so his thermonuclear-armed missiles.
The GD fleet was spread across many nautical miles of ocean. It would take more than one nuclear warhead to destroy them. As incredible as it was believe, they had launched ten ICBMs to make sure some got through the GD defenses. In truth, nothing on Earth was going to stop his babies, not the T Mod-5s.
Marks’s smirk grew. The GD ships were spread out, but not nearly far enough apart to save them from the coming destruction. The surprise of a lifetime was about to fall upon the invading armada.
I just hope the German Dominion doesn’t decide to launch their thermonuclear ICBMs at us and ignite the Flash in angry retaliation.
A secret GD sensor-satellite packed in stealth sheathing was in an equatorial stationary orbit high off the coast of French Guiana. The sensor picked up the boost-phase burn of the ten Triton ICBMs leaving Minot, North Dakota.
The satellite’s onboard computer analyzed the data. In a microsecond, it came to the proper conclusion. The enemy launched ICBMs. A second later, the orbiting sensor burned through its sheathing as it aimed a communication laser. The laser speared across space to a relay station in the Mauritanian Desert, which was in western Saharan Africa.
Afterward, with the primary task completed, the sensor continued to track the lifting ICBMs, beaming all the telemetry data to the relay station.
The GD major on station in the Mirror Launch bunker also made a nearly instant decision. He had a single function: to negate an automated system from launching a heavy missile into space.
With hot coffee spilled on his uniform—the cup hit the wall even now, shattering. He’d been leaning back a second ago, drinking the coffee as the alarm rang and surprised him. With hot, soaking coffee beginning to scald his skin, the major nevertheless scanned the simple amount of data on his emergency screen. As he did, he had three thoughts: This is real; it isn’t a test. And those are ICBM boost-phase burns. Holy shit.
The middle thought was the important one. He saw American ICBM boost-phase burns. Therefore, he did not raise his hand and reach for a red button. Because he did not, he did not depress the switch that would shut down the launch sequence. Therefore, the automated system continued to function smoothly as designed.
Fifteen seconds later, the bunker shook, making the light overhead rattle. He thought it might explode. A heavy K-14 rocket sped for space, with massive boosters shooting long flames. The missile did not carry a warhead. This was not a retaliatory strike. The missile’s payload was a mirror, one that possessed fantastic adjusting ability. Even as the rocket roared toward the Heavens, telemetry data poured into its onboard AI, data that originated from the sensor high above French Guiana.
Warrant Officer Gunther Weise stared in shock at the big screen. For a moment, he forgot his duties. Many did in the central situation room aboard the supercarrier.
General Kaltenbrunner and the admiral stared silently at the screen.
“Can we intercept?” Kaltenbrunner finally managed to ask.
The admiral—a small, neat man with a white goatee and white uniform—merely smiled in his restrained way. “Matters are already proceeding for our defense, General.”
That woke up Gunther, as did a nudge in the back from the lieutenant in charge of the warrant officers.
Gunther returned to monitoring his controls. Sweat began to pool under his armpits as he realized the sick truth. The Americans had launched nuclear missiles at the fleet. Those missiles raced here even now. This was horrible. He didn’t want to die.
Once more, the lieutenant poked him in the shoulder “Keep on task, Weise. Don’t freeze. There’s a good fellow.”
Gunther licked his lips. The sweat under his armpits became worse. He swallowed, and with greater concentration, he monitored his station. A pain spiked between his eyes. He found that he stared hard at the controls. Fortunately, his training took hold, helping him to remember his tasks.
Even as he felt himself floating out of his body—it was a terrible sensation, he hated it—he readjusted for static.
“Ah, better,” Gunther heard the admiral say.
Commands soon went out, and klaxons rang with seemingly greater urgency. There was a flurry of activity in the central situation chamber. Gunther badly wanted a cigarette. He craved one, in fact. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Look at that. Death raced toward the fleet. Certainly, the Americans would first try to take out the command ship. That was the GDN Otto von Bismarck, this ship.
“One nuclear warhead could ruin everything,” General Kaltenbrunner said in his gruff voice.
“Certainly, General,” the admiral said. “Ah, look, Strategic Defense is ready, and not a moment too soon.”
“Explain what’s going on,” Kaltenbrunner said.
Gunther sneaked a glance over his shoulder. He saw the admiral point at the big screen. Gunther also looked up at the screen. It showed a strategic map of the US Atlantic seaboard, the Atlantic Ocean and parts of Western Europe and Western Africa. Red lines streaked across the US. Flashing red dots kept moving over the US and toward the fleet. Those were the enemy ICBMs.
Gunther wanted to groan. Maybe his father had been right after all. Excitement was better, and certainly safer, when gained from watching a movie. The real thing could hurt too much. Gunther had never truly believed he himself could get into danger that would maim him for life or kill him.
What was I thinking joining the Navy? In the end, father always knew best.
“What in the world is that?” Gunther whispered to himself. Fortunately, he heard the admiral explaining to General Kaltenbrunner that the blue lines that had just appeared on screen from Iceland and from Brittany were strategic-strength lasers beaming at the rapidly deployed space mirrors.
“Now we shall see how things go,” the admiral said. “Now we shall see if the Americans are any good at this.”
The ICBM boosters had already fallen away and back to Earth. Boost phase had lasted a mere three minutes. The warheads presently sped through suborbital space and would do so for another ten minutes.
They were all presently unpowered and moved in ballistic trajectories like artillery shells. The warheads sat safely in cone-shaped reentry vehicles, grouped together on what was called a “bus.” They were hard to spot, as there was no rocket exhaust to see or other emissions to give them away. As they moved, each reentry vehicle released aluminized balloons to fool any enemy attempting to track them.
Now, however, far away in Iceland and on the continent near Brest, Brittany, strategic lasers shot their high-energy beams at the deployed GD mirrors high in Earth orbit.