10-Reaction

Reaction

 

Miramar Naval Weapons Station, San Diego California

The situation room had an array of cameras with feeds from aerial reconnaissance. The mood in the room was pure disbelief. The drones streamed a live feed of tanks, trucks, armored personal carriers and men pouring out of the Port of Los Angeles. It came as no surprise that one by one the signals were lost as either the drones themselves or the satellites that carried the signal were taken out.

The commander looked again to his communications officer who simply shrugged and pointed to the phone. There was no communications at all from Washington. The internet was down. For all he knew D.C. was a smoking crater.

He looked to one of the last screens still with a live feed. It showed a freeway overpass crowed with cheering people waving and holding signs. The fluid coursing through his veins felt like ice water as he had the operator zoom in and he read one of the signs. It was held by an obese man with dreadlocks and said, “Thank you. “

“Gentlemen, “he said grimly, “we are at war. “

There was a few seconds of silence and expectation as this new reality set in. Of all the war plans and games, no communication with Washington whatsoever had ever been practiced. The President had underground and air based command centers. There was no response whatsoever from anybody outside of California. The cell signals were still working but only locally and that didn’t make any sense at all to him.

“Get me the Alert Five Commander on the line and order the ground crews to load special weapons. “

The pimple faced communications officer stammered,” S-s-sir? “

“Nubs, ensign. Nuclear weapons. NBC’s. These commie bastards are nay fod. I guess you don’t know what that means either? It means they are clearly not afraid of dying. Our subs are noncom, as in no fucking communications. Do you see that? Do you understand that, you little pimple?”

He grabbed the frightened teen age communications specialist by the collar and pointed to the other remaining live camera feed showing the Chinese aircraft carrier parked off the shore of Long Beach.

“I am ordering that boat to be nuked.”

The room silenced except for the myriad vibrating cell phones. The second in command gestured to the civilians on the freeway overpass. “Sir? What about them? “

This commander had been a LRRP in Vietnam and had expected to retire at the end of that year. He read again the signs welcoming the invading army by the civilian scumbuckets on the bridge from the aerial drone feed. He had been spat on at the airport when he returned from The Nam, and that was a thing you didn’t forgive, not after having held in the guts of his best friend as he breathed in his last.

He pointed to the screens.

“Fuck those fucking fuckers. Kill the Chinese! You want to learn Mandarin? “