Don Pendleton - Terror Descending

Braking to a halt in front of an unmarked bunker, Rexton killed the engine and stepped out of the Jeep to plug an electric cord into an external socket. If the vehicles were not kept constantly warm, the engines would freeze and refuse to start until the motors were disassembled and thoroughly cleaned. He hated to waste electricity, the group tried to be ecologically aware, but such was the price to pay for saving the world. A garage would have served the same purpose, but those were always a prime target for a commando attack. So the bunker marked as the garage was actually just a solid dome of concrete.

Let the fools hit it with all the missiles they wanted, Rexton thought proudly. It would accomplish nothing. Everything had been taken into account. The battle plan was perfect. Perfect! And there was nothing America could do to stop them this time. Greenwich would be avenged!

Heading for the front door of the bunker, Rexton blew into his gloved hands, privately wishing that they could have been heated electrically like his jacket and boots. But the danger of a short-circuit had been too great. Pity, because it was exceptionally cold this day, but slowly getting warmer. Winter was over, and there was a sense of spring in the air. Life was returning to the frozen landscape. A more than fitting analogy. Soon Patagonia, the most remote spot on the globe, would become the center of a new civilization. His civilization. A society of peace and love and tolerance.

After we kill off all of the warmongers, that is, Rexton admitted privately. Back in 1774, Thomas Paine had said it plainly enough in his book Common Sense. Occasionally the tree of liberty had to be watered with the blood of patriots. Sad, but true. Though in the thousands, no doubt, the killings would be kept to an absolute minimum. He was no madman, just the savior of humanity. But if anything went wrong, then St. James would have no choice but to use the Dragon. At which point, he thought grimly, God help us all.

But that was a worst-case scenario, and so far everything had gone off strictly according to schedule. It had taken Genesis more than thirty years to build the base, and almost that long to acquire the three B-52 bombers needed for the operation. And then, buying the bombs had taken almost every last dime Genesis had accumulated. Their fathers had started the Great Project, but they wanted to be the generation that brought it to fruition. To end war, every war, all wars, forever! There was no higher or more noble goal. It was just like performing surgery to remove cancer. He could kill the cancer, to save the patient. True, it was a pity that so many people had to die to achieve worldwide peace, but such was life.

Way back in the 1960s a group of students called Genesis had tried to save America by forcing the government to end the war in Vietnam. They had some limited success, but then the full might of the FBI was turned against the fledging group, and the main leaders were either slain by police bullets or sent to prison. Only a handful of followers escaped, along with most of the cash the freedom fighters had liberated from numerous banks. Once situated safely here in Chile, they took new identities and stayed low, far from public scrutiny, and they invested wisely in oil and steel, then communications and finally advanced computer software.

Now worth millions, the children of Genesis had decided to finish the war for independence started by their parents. They hired mercenaries to teach them how to fight, and they studied the art of war in colleges, and psychology at universities, across the world. Unfortunately, America had grown fat over the decades, and once more was waging political warfare, trading blood for oil, a conflict that was certain to escalate horribly out of control when some terrorist group finally managed to build a hydrogen bomb and started a nuclear world war that nobody could win. Many years sooner than planned, Genesis was facing the end of the human race and had been forced to rush their plans into completion. But now, at last, they were ready to force peace upon the world no matter what. Victory or death.

Tapping an access code into a small keypad, Rexton waited a few seconds as the heavy door slid aside. Then he tapped a second code into the pad, and the door closed, then opened once more, this time with the antipersonnel mines buried inside the jamb deactivated.

Stopping at an alcove, Rexton luxuriated in the waves of heat pouring from a wall vent while he hung up the heavy parka and ski mask, the tattered remains of the glove going into a waste receptacle. Pounds lighter, the man proceeded deeper into the bunker, vainly adjusting his cuffs and collar.

Seeking the approval of the staff and the pilots, Rexton always came to the command center dressed in sneakers, blue jeans and a red flannel shirt. The clothing of a humble working man. It helped him to stay focused on the goals of the group, to free the people.

Smiling at a security camera high in the corner of the ceiling, Rexton nodded in passing to an armed guard sitting in a small alcove.

“Welcome back, brother,” the guard said, smiling, then it vanished. “Were those noises just more ice coming off a glacier or…” He left the sentence hanging.

“Just a penguin,” Rexton replied stoically.

Sagging slightly, the guard sighed. Penguin, that was the code word for civilian. “Then may God guide their spirit into the next world,” he whispered, touching his heart, lips and forehead, in an ancient blessing.

Gripping the man by the shoulder, Rexton squeezed hard, as if the death of some nobody had actually bothered him. After he was satisfied by the amount of guilt demonstrated, Rexton moved onward, eager to get back to work. When would these people ever learn that death was the only act that changed the world?

Impatiently lengthening his stride down the hallway, Rexton placed a palm to a glowing plate set into the wall alongside an armored door. He felt a faint tingling as an electrical current surged through his hand to verify whether he was alive, or merely a disembodied limb stolen by enemy forces to gain entrance. Their chief scientist, Professor Dimitri Oughton, was an electronics wizard who had both Genesis bases prepared for any possible contingency.

A technical genius, “Dizzy” Oughton could have easily run the entire operation himself from Lightning Base, which was why Rexton maintained strict control of the supercomputers down here in Thunder Base. The microsecond delay between the two bases was considered an acceptable danger. The other members of Genesis might think the organization was a democracy, as it had been in the days of their parents, but that was a polite fallacy. Rexton ruthlessly maintained an iron control over absolutely everything. If it became necessary to invoke the final option, there would be a rebellion, and he was ready to kill the rest of the staff to achieve victory. A thousand would die to save six billion. What did the military call that again? Oh yes, a soldier’s burden.

With a soft pneumatic sigh, the heavy door slid aside and Rexton entered the busy control room.

“Morning, brothers,” he called, heading for the master console.

Everybody looked up at the arrival, several of the women smiling widely. He did the same in return. Rexton knew that he was good-looking, although some thought he was almost too handsome. Clearly, his face was the result of delicate plastic surgery performed by experts. His father had dearly wanted Rexton to fly the planes that would awaken America, but after his second crash, that had proved to be impossible. The teenager simply had not possessed the lightning-fast reflexes of a combat pilot. Instead, he studied tactics, and eventually assumed the job of leading Genesis.

Situated in the exact middle of the heavy dome, the control room was wide and spacious, the ceiling arching overhead. Truncating the room was a wall of double-thick Lexan plastic, behind which the massive IBM Blue Gene supercomputer hummed softly, the rows of blade-class servers chilled by liquid nitrogen to temperatures far more deadly to human life than the icy glacier outside.