Drone Wars 1: Day of the Drone (26 page)

********

By the time Grissom made contact with his superiors at Nellis, the word had already reached Washington D.C. that something wasn’t right. Contact
had
been established with the bunkers, and now they were losing it.

Even though a no-name general over at the Pentagon was the official head of the newly-designed Rapid Defense Center East, it was Nathan Hall who was running things on the ground. As such, he saw in real time the spread of broken contacts represented graphically on a huge monitor on the wall of his temporary command center at Andrews Air Force Base. At first he cursed the technicians—the original link wasn’t as solid as they’d reported. But then once all the bunkers were dark again, sporadic reports began to come in saying that some of the bunkers—mainly those in the D.C. area—were opening! Tech crews were inside all of them, and they backed away as dozens of combat drones suddenly sprang to life and lifted out of the silos within five seconds of activation, giving the people inside no time to react.

Nathan grew weak-kneed when he realized what was happening.

He picked up a microphone and set it to broadcast Center-wide, which in reality consisted of only two converted aircraft hangars on the base, one housing the command center and the other the control pods for the Goliaths.

“Attention, all pilots and techs, man your stations! The RDC bunkers have been activated and the drones inside are mobile, and they are not—I repeat—not under friendly control.”

He set the microphone down on the table and watched on another monitor as thirty or more military personnel in the neighboring hangar, representing every branch of the service, ran to stations and lit up screens. Then his cellphone rang.

“Hall here.”

“This is Xander, what the hell are you talking about,
Not under friendly control?
”

“It means the transponder codes in the bunker drones have been hijacked. Need I say by whom?”

“How many bunkers have been compromised?”

“All of them, Xander, every last friggin’ one of them.”

There was silence on the phone for several seconds before Xander spoke again. “There are over seventeen-thousand combat-rated drones in those bunkers, and you’re saying Almasi has control of all of them?”

“‘Fraid so. I’m expediting the activation of the cell towers with the killbox neutralizing signal. It’ll have the added benefit of confusing the RDC auto drones as well since it acts on the flight controller itself. But that still leaves the RPAs. How many are in the inventory? I haven’t had time to research everything the RDC had going.”

“Over three thousand.”

Nathan let out a whistle. “Well, I would hazard a guess that Almasi doesn’t have three thousand pilots sitting around somewhere ready to take control of all those units. That’s one way to look at it.”

“Probably not, but he has enough to cluster attacks just about anywhere he pleases, and then transfer his people to other locations once those raids are done. He won’t be able to recharge any of the units, so these are all use-and-discard.”

“But three thousand combat drones, that’s ten times more than what’s been used in any of the attacks taking place to this point. And just when the attacks were beginning to taper off.”

“We should be able to tell which bunkers have been activated, right?”

“That we can, at least visually, or by the techs on-site.”

“That will give us target zones. What do we have so far?”

Nathan scanned the information on the large monitor, while a Navy petty officer handed him a sheet of paper. “You’re not going to like this, but sixteen bunkers have been activated in the D.C., Alexandria, and Arlington region. The auto drones should be dead in the water by now, especially in this area where we have the most assets. But that still leaves over a hundred and twenty-five RPAs from the report I’ve just been handed.”

“What better target than D.C., Nathan? I’ll get the pilots ready, but we only have nine Goliaths in the area. The rest have already been sent out to other locations.”

“If I recall some from the surrounding zones, they could be here in under an hour. That might get another six or so on station.”

“An hour? Hell, Washington could be in ruins in an hour. I’ll get my people up and prowling immediately. Maybe we can delay some of the major damage until reinforcements arrive.”

“Good luck, Xander. I’ll continue to get the killbox signal disseminated, while monitoring things from next door here. We’ll feed your pilots coordinates as they become available.”

Chapter 22

Abdul Almasi surveyed the rows of flight control stations in the large room fifty feet below the surface of his unassuming residential compound in the suburbs of Karachi, Pakistan. He knew eventually he’d acquire the transponder codes from Jonas Lemon, just not so soon. He only had forty-two pilots at the compound, far fewer than he had originally planned for this stage of the operation. They would have to do. Before the desertion of his allies in the drone war against the United States, he had planned on transferring control to another two hundred pilots located across the Middle East, Europe, and even in America herself. Now his former allies would regret their decisions, as they saw the incredible firepower the Arm of Allah had under its control. They could have shared in the ultimate battle against the infidels and been a part of the legend that would be spoken of for centuries.

Now it would be his legend alone.

Yes, his task was now more difficult, and it would take longer to accomplish. In addition, he would have to utilize the same forty-two pilots for countless operations, and they would not be able to maintain the pace for long—which would also slow his progress. But now that couldn’t be avoided.

Eventually the Americans would seal off the remaining bunkers. He would have to act fast, hitting the most high-value targets first. Fortunately, most of America’s symbolic high-value targets where located in or around the Washington, D.C. area.

As a precaution, he sent out commands to activate a hundred additional bunkers across the country, placing the freed drones into standby mode once outside and superficially hidden from detection. Battery charges had to be preserved until the drones were called upon, which hopefully would be soon, before the authorities could track them down.

There was loud murmur permeating the flight control stations.

“What’s wrong?” he called out over the rising din.

A senior pilot, Vladimir Krensky, turned from his station. “The auto drones are not responding, as least the ones in the D.C. area. Some of the others are, the ones you asked to be dispersed into the countryside, but none in Washington.”

The transponder link he had with the bunkers gave him access to the video monitors within. He activated the feeds from two of the bunkers near the White House.

Sure enough, the auto drones—mainly the smaller, sacrificial lambs of the arsenal—had their propellers spinning away in the launch area as they hovered ten feet or more in the air, but they weren’t going anywhere. Frantic technicians and military personnel in the bunkers were desperately knocking the drones out of the air—the soldiers using the hovering UAVs for target practice, while the techs swung metal rods and even folding chairs at the drones.

Almasi fingered the detonate codes for the two bunkers he had on the screen, and was only mildly surprised when nothing happened. Somehow the Americans had figured a way to override the embedded commands in the flight control programs, leaving just the basic take-off-and-hover instructions.

“What about the RPAs? I do not see them.”

“They have launched successfully,” the Russian drone pilot replied.

“How many do we have in the area?”

“One hundred twenty-eight; however, only forty are currently under our control. We’re hiding as many of the others as we can on the ground to preserve battery life.”

“Proceed with your attacks, Krensky. Use the hidden units as backups. I will monitor defense actions, if any.”

********

The Secret Service operated its own fleet of protective drones. These were specifically assigned for duty in and around the White House or when the president was on the move. The pilots of these drones were highly-skilled, if rarely tested; however, with the increasing number of amateurish attempts on the president’s life over the past few years, they were gaining a lot of real-world experience to go along with their constant drills, if not against truly professional combat pilots.

The drone fleet was held in four underground bunkers at each corner of the White House property, with the command and control responsibilities shared between an external building to the right of Lafayette Park and also deep under the residence off the Situation Room.

Fourteen pilots were on duty at all times, along with an equal number of technicians tasked with computer and video monitoring. The bulk of these pilots were tasked with countering external threats to the building, while four manned small defensive drones within the building itself.

Since the recent crisis had begun, there had already been five lone-wolf attacks on the White House, launched primarily from single issue groups such as anti-abortion advocates and the resurrected Occupy-Whatever movement. None of these assaults managed to breach the outer perimeter before being taken out through a combination of the responding defensive drones and targeted lasers and drone Tasers now being employed in building security.

When the remote detectors picked up the telltale buzz of approaching drones, the techs at the stations at first thought it was a glitch in their system. There seemed to a whole cloud of contacts that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Fortunately, it was only a matter of seconds before confirmation came in from Andrews that this was indeed a drone attack in the making, and consisting of units from the previous inaccessible RDC inventory. The bunkers housing these units were scattered throughout the monument section of the city, placed there to afford near-instant reaction time to impending threats. No one had ever envisioned that the drones originally placed there for defense could be used as offensive weapons. It was only a matter of seconds before the air above the Washington Mall was swarming with killer robots.

“Mr. President, you must evacuate now!” said the Secret Service agent assigned to
Caballero
—the code name for Rene Ortega.

Ortega was taken off guard, yet when three more agents rushed into the room and almost carried him out of the Oval Office, he knew this was serious. A bewildered Owen Murphy was left sitting at the president’s desk for only a moment before his own Secret Service detail entered the room. Soon both president and president-elect were shoved into adjoining security elevators and carried far below the White House. The tunnel was long and fortified, and ended at a fallout bunker complete with communications, living quarters, food stocks, and an advanced medical facility.

Ortega entered first, followed moments later by Murphy. All the president’s senior staff were there by now, although Admiral Hagar was at the Pentagon.

Once inside, the massive vault door was closed, and only to be reopened from the inside.

“What’s happening?” Ortega asked as he entered a large, glass-walled conference room lined with video monitors and filled with grave-looking people. Jack Monroe, Ortega’s Chief of Staff, spoke first.

“Someone’s been able to activate the combat drones in the RDC bunkers in the downtown D.C. area. These units are in the air and preparing to attack.”

“By someone, I suppose you mean Almasi?”

“I would assume, Mr. President.”

“But I thought the attacks had essentially ended. That’s the word we got from Beijing, and by our own count. The volume of attacks is down ninety percent over the last six hours.”

“Obviously the pressure Colleen Hoover suggested the Chinese exert on their puppet states had the desired trickle-down effect. That’s the reason for the sudden drop off in drone strikes. But now it looks like Almasi has found a way to carry on without his coalition.”

“By using our own drones against us.”

“Not all of them, sir. Nathan Hall at DARPA is reporting they can neutralize the autonomous drones with a new jamming signal they’ve developed. But that still leaves the piloted drones to contend with.”

“How many of those does he have access to?”

Monroe looked to Alice Grimes from the answer. “Nationwide, there are over three thousand RPAs—remotely-piloted aircraft—”

“Three thousand!”

“But he doesn’t have access to all of those, not anymore.”

“Why not?” asked Owen Murphy, speaking for the first time.

“We’ve been systematically barricading the exits to hundreds of rapid-response bunkers. Even then, Almasi—we assume its Almasi at the controls—is blowing up the inventory of drones in these bunkers. He can’t use them, and neither can we.”

“So what’s about to hit D.C.?” the president asked.

“These are the RPA units that got out of the local bunkers before we could do anything about it.”

“How many are we talking about?”

“A couple of hundred were activated. We’re not quite sure how many he has under his direct control.”

“Would two hundred RPA drones require two hundred operators?” Jack Monroe asked Alice Grimes.

“Exactly, and we don’t have any idea how many pilots he has at his disposal to know how many are being sent against us.”

“What about other defenses, the White House drone force, for instance?” Ortega asked.

“Already deploying, but we only have fourteen pilots on duty at this time.”

“Countermeasures?”

“Basic. But, sir, the incoming drones are the top-of-the-line RDC drones. They’re every bit the match—if not more—for the UAVs in the Secret Service arsenal.”

Ortega was already seated, otherwise he would have fallen down when the implications of what he was being told suddenly dawned on him. He had trouble collecting his breath, but finally he was able to mutter, “So there’s nothing that can stop them? The drones are going to hit the very heart of the nation’s capital.”

********  

The relatively weak defensive force provided by the Secret Service drones rose up into the cold December air just as the sun was setting on the fourth day of the national crisis. They didn’t last long, overwhelmed by the sheer number of combat drones sent against them. Now the attackers spread out, with over one hundred independently-controlled killer drones hitting at will the seemingly inexhaustible supply of national monuments, symbols, and buildings in this part of the city.

Some saturated with missiles and bullets the large glass facades of the nine museums of the Smithsonian Institution that lined the Mall, while another group sent tiny yet powerful rockets into the base of the Washington Monument. Seconds later, the iconic obelisk toppled over and crashed to the ground in a thunderous cloud of concrete dust. The debris field scattered across the Ellipse, pointing directly at the south lawn of the White House.

With no viable defense protecting the White House, even the lasers and drone Tasers were overwhelmed by the number of attackers. The entire south face of the White House was soon saturated with missiles and gunfire. In the meantime, other drones concentrated on the huge dome of the Capitol Building, with some hovering near the structure while they triggered the ubiquitous explosive charges contained in all RDC drones. The vast dome broke apart in places and crashed inward, leaving ragged cavities in the once majestic structure.