September 6, 2054
Three weeks after negotiations had begun the US used its remaining space-based assets and secret ground-based weapons to launch an attack on the Japanese-Turkish coalition in space. Within two hours the coalition's space assets were essentially destroyed. The coalition was now blind. Then the US launched its remaining hypersonic airplanes and delivered almost total destruction to the remaining military assets of Japan and Turkey. The peace talks were suspended.
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It was zero six hundred, early dawn when the alarm went off on base. Emily bolted upright in her bunk. That was the launch alarm. She wondered what was going on.
No one had told her anything about a launch. Of course, she was still on report and didn't have any reason to expect to be informed. Still, Emily felt she should have been told. She had to get down to the hangar and check on the hypersonics. She quickly dressed.
The air was still comfortably cool around the hangar. The security guard saluted, apparently not aware of Emily's status. Inside the control room, where Emily should have been, she could see all the top brass. Emily entered the door code and went into the wiring closet down the hall. She took out the alligator clips with the makeshift connector at one end that she had used for troubleshooting many times. She found the terminals marked COMM-BASE23-HYPER1. That was Looker's military designation. She hooked the alligator clips to the terminals and plugged the other end into her Annie.
Emily whispered into her Annie, “Looker this is Sg, over.”
Emily waited.
And waited.
Surely Looker would have responded by now. She heard motion outside the door. She reached for the alligator clips but stopped when she heard, “Looker to Sg, over.”
“Looker glad to hear,” whispered Emily. “How are systems?”
“Systems nominal. How are systems Sg?”
Emily understood then that Looker was aware of her recent absence. Emily replied, “Systems nominal Looker but reassigned.”
“Understood. Mission is a go, I am rolling.”
“Understood,” said Emily. She unplugged the clips and raced outside to see the takeoff.
Emily saw the first four hypersonics takeoff and adopt a finger-four combat formation which was unusual. Looker must be doing that, thought Emily. Then Emily choked as the hypersonic to the right of the point pulled up in what was undoubtedly a missing man salute.
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Donner and his dad heard about the new attacks when they came in from the fields that evening. Jack said, “Well there goes any chance for a quick resolution, we're in for a long struggle.”
________
December 31, 2054
By the end of the year, the Turks had started a ground assault on the Polish bloc using their augmented soldier system. These were soldiers in battle suits whose robotic and computational systems gave them the equivalent fighting capacity of an entire squadron from just a few years before. Networked, they could easily sweep a large area clear of the enemy. Romania capitulated almost immediately and signed a treaty with the coalition. Hungary was overrun within a week. Slovakia put up a stubborn resistance but fell in only three days. Poland now faced the coalition directly and almost alone. The New Year looked bleak for the US and its allies.
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Jacek Bukowski was caught in a no man's land. The Turkish battle suits, what the Poles called kombinezon bitwy or kombinz for short, had passed Jacek and he was now trapped behind enemy lines. The suits in the distance looked like giants threshing the fields.
The speed with which the Turks could move in their kombinz was astounding. The Polish tanks were barely able to keep up or keep out of the way would be more descriptive. The kombinz could not only push the Poles faster than they could retreat but could also clear such a wide area that regrouping for the Poles became impossible.
The networked battle suits, each manned by a Turkish specialist, were almost impossible to take out with small arms fire. They could be disabled with a hit by artillery, drone or tank fire but this was more luck than skill. Each arm held enough firepower to take out a platoon or tank with a single burst. Other Turks in battle suits ranging behind the advancing front could bring up supplies or take the place of a fallen kombinz as needed.
They never stop, thought Jacek. Always a new refreshed kombinz to take the place in the front. “Unstoppable,” he whispered from his hiding place.
Then he saw it. The weakest link in the battle suit's armor. He moved closer.
A kombinz had stopped. It was being serviced by a utility track vehicle. A Turkish soldier climbed the nearest power pole carrying what looked like thick cables. He attached the cables carefully to the power lines, the end claws digging into the sheathing. The soldiers on the ground were attaching more cables to the backpack of the kombinz.
Jacek knew what they were doing. They were recharging the battery pack of the kombinz. He would stop them.
Jacek ran down the power line away from the stalled kombinz. He found the power pole he wanted. Raising his MSBS-9,56 assault rifle he emptied the magazine. Another clip and he had the electrical lines on the ground.
He was pleased; he had been able to do something. He wasn't running anymore.
With all the firing Jacek hadn't noticed the kombinz coming up behind him.
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Donner spent the winter in the snows that came and went and on the frozen stream that crossed the field between the house and the mountains. He didn’t think much of the war anymore. If he took to the internet, it was to research airplanes and piloting.
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