Conquistadors!, page 35
And yet he knew he’d crossed a line.
He hadn’t been particularly worried, when his former assistant had sent him the recordings. His hosts had nothing to gain by crushing him like a bug, not when he was far more use to them in the Senate. He’d even benefited by working for them, indirectly, through a complex web of financial dealings that ended with large amounts of money going into the family coffers. But ... he swallowed hard, trying not to show his fear as he recalled his first meeting with the invader bitch. She knew what he’d done, and she’d told him that if he refused to cooperate the videos would be released ... he’d been so stunned that it had taken him longer than it should to realise who and what she was. Even that brought him no relief. The invaders had demonstrated their computer prowess time and time again. They would have no trouble making sure everyone saw the videos ...
And what had seemed natural and right, back then, was horrific beyond words in the cold light of day.
Sweat beaded on his brow as he listened to the Vice President. It had been sheer dumb luck he’d been invited to the meeting, something that would have offended him under other circumstances. He’d thought himself a mover and shaker within Washington and the VP really should have approached him earlier, but now ... his hand shook as he considered his options. There weren’t many. If the invaders realised he’d kept his mouth shut, they’d expose him; if he went to the FBI and admitted what had happened, they’d arrest him; hell, no matter what happened, there was no way he’d escape punishment. His family would disown him; his friends and allies would desert him so rapidly they’d leave sonic booms behind. His only hope of preserving anything was to collaborate, and even that was risky. The Protectorate might not be willing to let him work for them, after the war was over ...
His mind ran in circles. He’d never really had to face any consequences before. His father hadn’t been much of a disciplinarian and his mother had always spoilt him rotten. His teachers and professors had known his family was important and treated him with kid gloves, no matter what he did. But this ... if he confessed, his life would come to an end. If he kept his mouth shut ... his life would come to an end too, if the invaders won. But if they lost, they might reveal the details of how they’d blackmailed him out of petty spite.
He cringed, inwardly. The first Remington had been a hard-bitten man whose word was his bond. Thaddeus was perfectly aware his ancestor hadn’t been a very kind man – he’d been a slaveowner, for crying out loud – but he’d been a man. Thaddeus, on the other hand ... he considered suicide, just for a moment, yet he knew he could no more end his own life than he could make a full confession. The country itself was at risk and yet ...
I have to warn the Protectorate, Thaddeus thought, grimly. He knew, deep inside, that he was betraying his country, but what choice did he have? He was doomed, unless he sided with the invaders. He couldn’t bear the thought of losing everything, of going to jail no matter how much money he spent on lawyers; he just couldn’t. If I can please them ...
His ancestor would have spat on him. But Thaddeus no longer cared.
Chapter Thirty-Six: Washington DC, North America, Timeline F (OTL)
Martín hadn’t been quite certain what to make of Joint Base Andrews. Some parts of the base were quite understandable, while others were weirdly luxurious, as if the place was more for show than actual fighting. The United States hadn’t had to fight a war on its own territory for years, and Andrews was quite some distance from either land border, but it still struck him as odd. He’d been somewhat amused to note just how many personal possessions had been left behind, enough to suggest that the local airmen lived in comparative luxury. He had a private bet going with himself that they’d never seen a real war.
He told himself to relax as he made his way through the base. The regiment was technically on downtime, but they were so deep in enemy territory that an attack could start at any moment and the first warning they’d have was shells crashing down on their heads. Captain Ruddigore had told his men to keep their light armour on and make sure they knew where to take cover at all times, even when they were sleeping in the commandeered barracks. Martín couldn’t help wondering who’d slept in his bunk, before the evacuation, and quite why he’d had a large collection of books featuring a sorceress in another world. They were the kind of books, he thought, that would be officially banned in the Protectorate. They would also be very popular on the black market.
“And I’m telling you it is probably a trap!”
Martín froze, suddenly very aware he’d accidentally snuck up on his superior officers. The captain wasn’t a bad sort, but he was very stiff-necked and there was no way he’d believe it was an accident. Superior officers weren’t supposed to argue in front of their juniors – he’d been told, more than once, that officers were expected to present a united front even if they disagreed on everything under the sun. And the General was supposed to be even more stiff-necked than Captain Ruddigore.
“They’re planning to unseat their President and attack us,” General Essex snarled. “We just got the warning!”
“And you want to seize the President before he can be removed,” Ruddigore said, in a tone that would have gotten a footman sent to a penal unit. “Do you realise how overextended we already are?”
Martín shivered, inwardly. Standard doctrine stated that capturing and converting primal and degenerate leaders would encourage the rest to submit, if only because primals were too primitive to realise their leaders could no longer be considered anything other than hostages, but he didn’t think that tactic would work here. America was an order of magnitude more politically sophisticated than any other timeline, save perhaps the Protectorate itself, and they’d certainly have procedures for dealing with their leader falling into enemy hands. Hell, the mere fact they had a way to remove their leader that didn’t involve assassination was clear proof they really were advanced.
“Captain-General Montrose left me in command, with orders to keep the situation under control,” Essex said. “Do you believe that letting them remove their President will somehow be good for us?”
His voice hardened. “Are you refusing to carry out my orders in a time of war?”
Shit. Martín felt cold. The captain had the right to question his superiors, but not during open conflict. If Ruddigore was breaking that rule ... Martín doubted it would end well for either of them. Essex would relieve him of command, on the grounds of mutiny, and even if the Captain-General quashed the charges it was unlikely Ruddigore would ever be allowed to resume his post. Mutiny in the face of the enemy was a shooting offense. The merest whiff of attempted mutiny was enough to kill a career stone dead. This could end badly.
“Assemble your troops,” Essex ordered. “I want them on their way in twenty minutes. Do I make myself clear?”
Ruddigore’s tone was hard, cold. “You want me to fly my regiment over the enemy air defences, land in the centre of their government, seize their President before he can be removed from office and get him back here,” he said. “Can I get those orders in writing?”
“You ...” Essex sounded as if he were on the verge of exploding, but – somehow – he managed to calm himself down. “Very well. You’ll get the orders in writing. Now, get to it!”
Martín slipped away, heading back to the barracks. Half the regiment was still on downtime, trying to catch a nap before all hell broke loose ... again. Joyce was flipping through a book, shaking his head in disgust; several others were playing cards, or experimenting with a gaming console that was both surprisingly advanced and completely frivolous. Martín wondered, absently, if they’d be imported back to the homeworld after the fighting came to an end. The console was surprisingly fun, particularly the game with the humanoid hedgehog.
His bleeper sounded a moment later. Martín grabbed the rest of his kit and hurried outside, wondering if Essex really had sent the written orders he’d promised. He’d heard rumours suggesting Essex was a political general first and foremost, climbing the ladder without holding a combat command – or indeed any post with real responsibility – and such a man would rarely, if ever, nail his colours to the mast. If he wasn’t such a good organiser, he’d probably not have risen so high. But being an organiser didn’t mean you could plan an operation or lead troops in combat ...
“Our objective is simple,” Ruddigore said. If Martín hadn’t overheard the argument, he wouldn’t have known the officer was pissed. “We are to take the White House, suppress enemy resistance, capture the President and evacuate the area as quickly as possible.”
Martín felt his heart sink as Ruddigore outlined the operational plan. On paper, it was a pretty good one. Two transports could get much of the regiment – and some armoured vehicles – to their target, particularly when escorted by smaller flyers, before the enemy could react, but ... too many things could go wrong. It reminded him of the plan to take Austin, except they’d had far more manoeuvring room and heavy reinforcements on the way. This time ... if there was an armoured thrust coming to relieve them, it wasn’t shown on the display.
Ruddigore finished the briefing. “Any questions?”
“Yes, sir,” Martín said. “Will the tanks advance north to relieve us?”
“No.” Ruddigore really was worried, Martín noted. He’d have bitten Martín’s head off if he thought it a stupid question. “We are to get in, grab the President and get out again before the enemy has a chance to react.”
He snapped orders, directing the footmen to their transports for departure. Martín fell in with the rest of his team, listening as the regiment hastily distributed the downloaded floor plans for the White House and the surrounding buildings. There was no way to be sure if the floor plans were accurate – if he’d been in charge, he’d have made sure they weren’t – nor was there any way to know if there were tunnels, bunkers, or other surprises under the building. The real surprise would be if there were no bunkers ... any government with any sense would have an underground bunker for senior leaders, particularly if it knew nukes and bunker-buster weapons were a thing. He wondered if the spooks knew something they hadn’t shared, then shrugged. They had thousands of prisoners, but most were relatively low-ranking. They couldn’t be expected to know every last government bolthole.
“They’ll greet us with open arms,” Joyce predicted, cheerfully. “And open legs.”
“More like open muzzles,” Martín said. The truce had been honoured, at least in the area surrounding JB Andrews, but he doubted the enemy would let them fly all the way to the White House without opening fire. Essex’s plan made sense on paper – the transports could cover the distance between the airbase and their target very quickly, faster than any warning could reach the defenders – yet all it would take would be one man with a MANPAD to ruin everything. “They’ll have standing orders to give us a very hot reception indeed.”
He braced himself as the transport lurched into the air. He’d have preferred to make a suborbital insertion, if they really had to strike so deep within enemy territory, but that wasn’t an option. They just didn’t have the facilities to launch such an orbital strike ... if they had, he reflected grimly, they could have dropped KEWs on enemy nations until they surrendered or were smashed beyond repair. He suspected the Captain-General would start working on launch facilities soon, once their early gains were secure. They’d have no choice if they wanted to keep them ...
The datanet updated rapidly. “Missiles will be launched in thirty seconds,” the coordinator said. “I say again, missiles will be launched in thirty seconds.”
Martín braced himself. It was time.
***
Sergeant Günther Rothman had not been having a very good war. His brother had been killed in the early fighting, after he’d been assigned to the exclusion zone, and his sister’s aircraft had vanished somewhere in the Battle of Austin. Günther had put in for a transfer to the war zone, the moment he’d realised that the newcomers were invaders, but his bid to leave the security units assigned to Washington DC hadn’t made its way through the system. He’d joked, sourly, that the invaders would get to Washington before he had a chance to meet them halfway; the joke didn’t seem so funny now, with the invaders sitting on top of JB Andrews, only a few short miles from the capital. Günther had been furious when he’d heard that the President had tamely surrendered the base. How could anyone just give up the most important airbase in the country?
I voted for the other guy, he thought, crossly. The grumbling – amongst soldiers, Marines, Secret Servicemen and just about everyone else – had been intense, despite half-hearted efforts by senior officers to shut it down. How the fuck did we end up with such a pussy in office?
He took a breath, then resumed his pacing around the White House rooftop. The building was no fortress, although it was far tougher than it looked, but the roof was covered with sensors, sniper nests and Marines swaggering around with MANPADs. The only upside of the crisis, from what he’d heard, was that they could make their security precautions a little more overt, in hopes of deterring terrorists – or invaders – from trying their luck. Günther suspected that was wishful thinking. The invaders had blasted their way through a network of entrenchments, backed up by main battle tanks, missile launchers and fighter jets. The White House’s defences were flimsy in comparison ...
The sky lit up, a blinding flash followed by a fireball rising into the air. Günther stared in horror. The Marine barracks were in that direction ... the sound hit him a second later, a dull rumbling that shocked him to the bone. Several more followed in quick succession ... Günther swore under his breath. It looked as though the enemy had aimed at the official military command post, as well as the bridges. Clever of them, part of his mind noted. The river was no barrier to hovertanks. And that meant the city wasn’t just being bombed, it was being stormed.
“Inbound,” someone shouted. Klaxons started to howl, a sound he hadn’t heard in Washington outside drills. “Air assault inbound!”
Günther raised his eyes and saw a pair of heavy aircraft flying straight towards the White House. They were easily the largest aircraft he’d ever seen, so ungainly he couldn’t help wondering how they even got off the ground. He remembered images of 9/11 and stared in horror, then caught himself and started barking orders. A machine gun opened fire, aiming tracer rounds at the incoming aircraft; Günther cursed under his breath, then snapped more orders as the enemy aircraft came to a halt directly over the White House lawn. The hell of it was that shooting down the aircraft would make them crash right on top of the building, possibly putting the President in even more danger. His close-protection team would be hurrying him into the tunnels right now ... would they be in time? The enemy soldiers were already dropping from their transports, hitting the ground and storming the building with practiced ease ...
“Get off the roof,” he snapped. They’d planned for a hasty departure, slinging ropes down the side to allow them to get to the ground in a hurry. “Move ...”
Plasma bolts scythed through the air. Günther saw a Secret Serviceman picked up and thrown off the roof, his body so badly burnt that he’d have no hope of survival; he hurried forward, grabbing a MANPAD from a fallen soldier, and dived down the ropes to the ground. The enemy transports were already landing, shooting bursts of plasma in all directions as they settled on the ground and opened their pods. Günther would have been impressed if they hadn’t been landing in the middle of Washington. It made the Bin Laden raid look puny.
I’ll get you, he thought, unslinging the MANPAD. The first enemy transport was starting to close its hatches, readying itself to take off again. Günther recalled the reports from Austin and New York and shivered. The transports were faster than anything the USMC flew, fast enough to get to Andrews, reload, and bring more troops to Washington DC. He knew he likely would not survive, but he couldn’t force himself to run. I’ll get you, you bastards.
The transport’s countermeasures were good, better than anything he’d ever seen. But the missile was fired from point-blank range. He could not have missed.
And he didn’t.
***
Martín’s unit ran forward, crashing through the White House doors and straight through the corridors, stopping for nothing. They launched janglers and stun grenades ahead of them, abandoning all hope of stealth. The enemy would have to be blind and deaf to miss the transports or the missile strikes, and even then it would be questionable. Two icons flashed in front of him – men dead or wounded – but he ignored them. They’d landed in the midst of the hornet’s nest, and it was just a matter of time before enemy troops responded. He led the charge up the stairs, ignoring a suited – and stunned – man plunging to his death. He wasn't important. In the unlikely event of his survival, his people would take care of him.
The White House’s interior baffled him, a strange mixture of luxury and fine design that bothered him on a very primal level. They ran past a long line of portraits, a handful of names jumping out at him; Washington, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Clinton, Obama, Trump ... none of whom had ever been anyone, if they’d existed at all, in the home timeline. His HUD updated constantly, reporting on smaller units securing the lower floor to block the President’s escape – if he hadn’t already escaped – and locate the entrance to the underground bunkers. A pair of armed men opened fire; a third struggled with his pistol, trying to draw it even as the armoured footmen bore down on him. Martín stunned them all and kicked down the door into the Oval Office, half-expecting the President to have run – or fled – minutes ago. The assault had lasted only a few brief minutes, but any protective team worthy of their name should have gotten the President on his way by now.
