Doomsday Warrior 02 - Red America (7 page)

“Effective—good. I trust the cameras were mounted before the attack and you filmed the whole thing so we can perform a computer analysis of every shot—any problems—”

“I think we got most of it. One camera about halfway through took a piece of shrapnel from a nearby Red tank shell and got blasted. But we got enough to provide some entertainment for you and your science staff,” Rock said drily. “Hollywood style.”

“Hollywood—what’s—oh, of course. You and your history studies. Hollywood was where the ancients made movies for the masses. Right?”

“Yes. That whole part of the country—California, where the Hollywood studios were all located, was, as you know, hit so heavily with nukes that the San Andreas fault opened up and the whole damn thing sank. A second Atlantis. Why I’ve—”

“We’ll have to discuss it some time, Rock,” Shecter said abruptly, cutting Rockson off. “Did you have the film sent to processing? I’m dying to see the damn weapons in action, after puttering around with them here in the lab for months.”

“McCaughlin was going to take them to the Audio Visual Section immediately. Give them a call.” Shecter made a quick buzz to the film lab and was told the prints were ready and had come out clear as a bell.

“Reserve Screening Room two for me,” Shecter said over the phone. “And chairs for twenty and—let’s see, a big pot of coffee. I and my staff will be going over these films all night, I’m sure.” He hung up with a smile. “It’s looking good, Rock, very good.” Shecter was beaming. He felt personal pride when the machines and labs of Century City were all functioning at one hundred percent. Woe to the lab worker or technician who stripped gears on a valuable piece of machinery or overexposed some important film or let a petri culture accidentally become contaminated with bacteria-ridden air. Then the science staff of Century City quaked in their proverbial boots, as Shecter was notorious for outbursts of temper when everything was not “just so.”

The two most important men of Century City, possibly in all of America, walked side by side back down the slowly curving corridor to the elevators. Though nearly the same height they were contrasts: the man of science, stiff, stooped over with a slow deliberate gait of one always deep in thought; and of the man of action, the warrior, straight as an arrow, every step purposeful, every sense on alert. Rockson felt slightly strange as he walked alongside the great scientist. “Not human!” The words had a strange ring to them. So he and the rest of the “mutants” were an entirely new race. What did that mean? All his life Rock had thought of himself as a member of Homo sapiens, the human race—the sentient life form on the earth for fifty thousand years. Now, in a few sentences from Shecter, he had found out he was not, after all, who he thought he was. It felt strange. As if he were suddenly from another planet. But as he let the words sink into his bones he knew Shecter was right. He hardly ever saw normal wildlife in his treks anymore. Even when he was younger there had been the occasional deer, moose, bear that resembled the pictures of the creatures from before the war. But now. Now, one out of a hundred was a normal. The rest were all mutants: horned, tusked, spiked, multi-headed. It was the normals who were the odd ones now. And somehow that made Rockson closer to those murderous beasts out on the plains and wastelands of America than to Shecter and the other “normal” humans. He was one of the atomic freaks of nature who would inherit the world.

They walked to elevator bank five and took the ride up twelve levels. Shecter at his age didn’t like the gut-wrenching speed the elevators moved at. In case of attack or emergency the closely packed underground city had to be able to react quickly, and instant accessibility to every section of Century City was vital. As they passed the floors, three to a level, in a whiz of motion, Rock thought about the origins of Century City: how the vast underground fortress of fifty thousand had started as two thousand rush-hour commuters, driving through a mountain tunnel of Interstate 70 about four hundred miles southeast of Denver, Colorado, had been sealed inside by atomic explosions that collapsed the entrances at both ends of the two mile structure; how they had organized and survived; how they had dug out after several weeks to see Red troop planes overhead dropping its occupation army; how the commuters had hidden and expanded the tunnel, using the machinery from their cars and their knowledge—and by the grace of God there had been knowledge aplenty in the tunnel: engineers, doctors, scientists, even a hydroponics expert. Nearly half the original inhabitants of the tunnel had died from radiation poisoning, from fear, from unknown causes. But the strong survived and reproduced and even, after a time, prospered. The name Century City was given to the tunnel as it slowly grew and reached out into the mountain above it to create more living and work room for the survivors. Century City—for it would take one hundred years for America to be free again and the inhabitants would make sure that that day came. And after one hundred years it still survived and was the greatest threat to Red hegemony in the world.

They arrived at their level and headed quickly to the screening room where Shecter’s staff was already seated, note pads on laps, sharpened pencils in hand. They stiffened slightly as their mentor arrived and took his seat at the front of the oval-shaped film auditorium. The lights dimmed and Rock began narrating the film, explaining the action that was occurring. Shecter heard Rock’s explanation of each maneuver but was more interested in later shaky hand-held close-ups of the damage to the tanks and trucks.

“Ah, just as I thought, Rock—some metals are more easily cut through. Look, there’s still pieces left of some of the armored vehicles, the most modern of the Red mobile units—magnalloy. It appears to be slightly more resistant to the total destructive force of the particle than the other metals.” His staff were madly scribbling in their lined notebooks every word from Shecter’s mouth. “If the Reds find out that magnalloy is less damaged by the beams, they’ll put every scientist from Red Square to the Crimea on double duty to come up with a defense. We’ll be one step ahead of them and find out how to neutralize their neutralization.” The science staff chuckled appreciatively, though Rock failed to see the humor.

The lights came on. Shecter shook Rockson’s hand. “Good show. Now, it’s up to us to go over these films with a fine-tooth comb.” Rock exited the theater as Shecter’s strong voice demanded “Show them from the beginning, gentlemen . . .”

Five

C
olonel Killov popped another Benzedrine pill into his narrow hawklike mouth. He had been up for days now taking the little yellow pills every three or four hours, sitting alone in his eightieth floor suite of offices at the top of the monolith—the center of all KGB operation in America, located dead center of Denver, Colorado. He was obsessed. Obsessed with one man—Ted Rockson—the so-called Ultimate American, as the peasantry called him. Rockson had dared attack him, had dared to hurt him. But even more, had dared to challenge the power of the man who saw himself as the most powerful and ruthless man in the world. And like Captain Ahab, he could think of only one thing—revenge. He looked even thinner and tenser than usual, his ramrod-straight body nothing now but bone and gristle, his black eyes wide and cold as the vacuum of space. He had been taking more and more of the pills lately, ever since his run-in with Ted Rockson several months earlier. His body trembled with an almost invisible shaking as he stared out the dark windows at the Rocky Mountains off in the distance, their black peaks silhouetted against the purple sky, writhing with pink and orange waves of atmospheric electricity.

Killov slammed his fist down on the black-marbled plastisynth table that curved around in a semicircle facing the ten foot high polarized picture windows, his gaunt face skull-like in the growing dawn.

“No one must know. No one must ever speak of what happened that night out on the Utah Plains,” Colonel Killov, the supreme commander of all KGB forces in America muttered half madly to himself, not even realizing he was speaking. “No one must ever know of this defeat of mine out in the desert by a band of brigands.” His mind couldn’t stop returning to the scene of the battle. It had to be Ted Rockson and his men who had attacked Killov’s squadron of attack helicopters, destroying all the gunships save his alone. He remembered the carnage and the black beams that the small band of freefighters had shot up at the choppers just when it seemed their fate was inevitably sealed by death. Killov had had many nightmares about those few moments.

“If I hadn’t had that last second urge, that slightest caution to hang back as the fleet of black death’s-head helicopters went in for the kill, I’d—” The rest of the thought remained in his mind, unspoken. He would be dead. Burned into a pile of smoldering, glowing metal like the others. The freefighters had come up with a fantastic new weapon, the likes of which Killov had never seen. How could they have made it? Their hidden cities couldn’t be that advanced—could they? Capable of producing technologically advanced weaponry far ahead of the Russians? It didn’t seem possible. And yet he had seen the evidence for himself. Had barely escaped with his life. Vassily and Zhabnov, the fools, believed that the freefighters were just ragtag groups of unshaven mountain men, but Killov knew. Perhaps he was the only one who truly understood that, for the first time in a century, the Red rule was threatened here in America.

It was growing lighter outside, the blood-red rays of the morning sun biting their way through the black purple skies of night. Surrounding his black steel and glass skyscraper were the towering snow-covered Rocky Mountains—and somewhere in those vast peaks of ice and pines lay Ted Rockson’s hidden city. Killov glared out at the mountains angrily as if it were their fault that Rockson managed to escape capture by his elite KGB Death Squads again and again. As the red waves of morning light washed down over the blue slopes like blood dripping from the guts of some immense corpse, Killov popped several more pills. He had been taking so many of the things lately that he had to keep counterbalancing the effects of first one then the other; taking ups for hours and then feeling as if his head might explode through the ceiling, taking tranquilizers to force his enraged body to relax slightly. He had bottles of the drugs on a shelf behind his desk—pink ones, yellow ones, ovals, and squares. He could hardly remember what did what anymore and it hardly mattered anyway. Nothing could take his rage, his hate away from him, and that was what really powered Colonel Killov; the hatred for Ted Rockson—the only man who had ever outfoxed, outmaneuvered and out-willpowered him. Killov was not used to such games. Men had died instantly for much less. Red soldiers through the years had learned not to cross this hawk-faced, power-mad ruler. He was one of the three or four most powerful men in the world. And within months, if things went according to plan, he would become
the
most powerful man in the world.

The sun crept up slowly, inching its way above the pointed peaks that surrounded Denver like spears pointing the way to the stars. They were starkly beautiful now, turning red, purple, and orange as the sky grudgingly lost its panoply of stars. Silently he stared out at them. How could he defeat Rockson? How? And how could he wrest the empire from the dying Grandfather back in Mother Russia before Zhabnov took its reins. He had been pondering this for months and he had been toying with an elusive thought all night—slipping from his grasp as he was groggy from the pills. He’d have to cut back a little. There was a limit to everything, even for those who could get anything they desired. But he had an idea. A glimmer that burned stronger with each moment. What was that archaic American expression—kill two birds with one stone? Yes—that was it. Smash Rockson and use the captured deathray weapons he possessed against Zhabnov and the regular Red Army forces—quickly accomplish this before—

The phone rang with the force of a bomb blast in the quiet solitude of his eightieth floor office, jarring Killov from his murderous musings.

“Yes?” Killov said curtly. “What the hell is it?”

“Colonel, we have a report on the super weapons that were used on the convoy to President Zhabnov’s Pavlov City, wiping the entire fleet out. The damage is the same as the sample wreckage you gave us to analyze. If I might ask where did those samples of burnt helicopter metal com—”

“None of your damn business,” Killov retorted sharply. “What is the nature of the weapon that was used?”

“Sir, that’s what’s puzzling us. It’s definitely not an explosive device. Although some mortar fragments were found, they did not contribute to the complete destruction of the armored vehicles and trucks of the convoy. Frankly sir, we’ve never seen anything like this. I’ve arranged to send some samples to the Central Metallurgic Institute in Moscow for ana—”

“You what? You fool!” Killov exploded into the phone. “What is your name and rank, idiot?”

“Petrin, sir. Lieutenant Petrin,” the voice on the other end replied meekly.

“Listen Petrin,” Killov said with ice in his voice. “Get those samples back or you’re a dead man. You understand?”

“Yes sir,” the voice gulped almost inaudibly. “They haven’t been shipped out yet, sir. I’m sure I—”

“And call me as soon as they’re retrieved. And in the future, idiot, if you have a future, don’t send anything anywhere without asking me first. Is that clear?”

“Clear, sir.”

Killov slammed the phone down so hard that it bounced up in the air several inches before settling back down into its cradle.

Why did he always have to deal with idiots? Here, he had the facilities, the armaments to destroy half the world and he couldn’t capture one stinking American bandit. Meanwhile his own men didn’t seem to know their ass from their elbows. This Petrin would have to be eliminated. The man was too much of a fool to work for him any longer. Besides he knew too much. Killov wrote the lieutenant’s name down in a small notebook and popped another pill.

By now Rockson would have found out about Zhabnov’s new brainchild of Pavlov City. The man always seemed to know what the Reds were up to almost as soon as they did. And since Pavlov City had been going up for nearly three months now and had begun bringing in workers from surrounding Russian fortress cities for brainwashing, Rockson would undoubtedly plan some kind of attack. Rescue the poor downtrodden workers whom Zhabnov wanted to turn into brainwashed soldiers to send out against their own countrymen—the freefighters. But this time Killov was one step ahead of Rockson. The best place to lay a trap for this “Ultimate American” would be Zhabnov’s Pavlov City. Its ten thousand mindbreakers running twenty-four hours a day in attempts at converting vast numbers of workers into fighters would draw the rebel leader.