Doomsday Warrior 01 (2 page)

THE RUSSIANS:
The United Socialist States of America is run by the red-faced, heavy-drinking General Zhabnov, headquartered in the White House, Washington, D.C., now called New Lenin. A bureaucrat, careful but not cunning, and a libertine, Zhabnov spends his days eating and his nights in bed with young American girls rounded up by the KGB. Zhabnov has been appointed supreme president of the United States for a ten-year period, largely because he is the nephew of the Russian premier, Vassily. General Zhabnov rules America as his personal fiefdom. The only rules he must obey are (1) no uprisings and (2) seventy-five percent of the crops grown by the enslaved American workers must be sent to Russia. General Zhabnov believes that the situation in the United States is stable, that there are no American resistance forces to speak of other than a few scattered groups that raid convoys from time to time. He sees his stay here as a happy interlude away from the power struggles back in the Kremlin.
Colonel Killov is the head of the KGB in the United States headquartered in Denver, Colorado. He is a ruthlessly ambitious man whose goal it is to someday be premier of the world. Thin, almost skeletal, with a long face, sunken cheekbones and thin lips that spit words, Killov’s operatives are everywhere in the country: in the fortresses, in the Russian officer ranks, and lately he has even managed to infiltrate an American-born agent into the highest levels of the resistance. Colonel Killov believes General Zhabnov to be a fool. Killov knows that the American forces are growing stronger daily and forming a nationwide alliance to fight together. The calm days of the last century are about to end.
From Moscow, Premier Vassily rules the world. Never has one man ruled so much territory. From the bottom of Africa to Siberia, from Paraguay to Canada, Russian armies are everywhere. A constant flow of supplies and medical goods are needed to keep the vast occupying armies alive. Russia herself did not do badly in the war. Only twenty-four American missiles reached the Soviet Union and ten of these were pushed off course or exploded by ground-to-air missiles. The rest of the United States strike was knocked out of the skies by Russian killer satellites that shot down beams of pure energy and picked them off like clay pigeons.
Vassily is besieged on all sides by problems. His great empire is threatening to break up. Everywhere there are rebel attacks on Russian troops. In Europe, in Africa, in India, especially in America. The forces of the resistance troops were growing larger and more sophisticated in their operations. Vassily is a highly intelligent, well-read man. He has devoured history books on other great leaders and the problems they faced. “Great men have problems that no one but another great man could understand,” he lectures his underlings. Advisers tell him to send in more forces and quickly crush the insurgents. But Vassily believes that to be a tremendous waste of manpower. If it goes on like this he may use neutron bombs again. Not a big strike, but perhaps in a single night, yes, in one hour, they could target the fifty main trouble spots in the world. Order must be maintained. For Vassily knew his history. One thing that had been true since the dawn of time: wherever there had been a great empire there had come a time when it began to crumble.

One

“S
hould I blow the charge?” Berger, the explosives man asked, his meaty, weathered hands resting on the detonation plunger. A wire ran from the bottom of the gray metal box, a thousand feet downhill through rocks and trees to a narrow, steel girder bridge way below. The North Colorado River Bridge, as it had once been called, was now wired with two hundred pounds of plastique slapped on in two and three pound mounds to the tops of all the supporting girders. A squad of heavy Russian tanks approached from the other side of the bridge, sending up clouds of dust above the parched, rutted road.

“No, wait!” Ted Rockson, the commander of the twenty-man excursion force of Freefighters said firmly. “We want the bridge filled with their heavy stuff before we blow. Patience, my friend, patience and then . . .” His icy eyes, one violet, one aquamarine, glistened with steel rage. Rockson hoisted his Liberator over his shoulder and walked to a large, flat boulder at the edge of the steep slope that dropped down the mountain to the bridge. With a powerful leap he jumped five feet up to the boulder’s edge and, getting a handgrip, pulled himself quickly up. He stayed low, not breaking the horizon for Russian binoculars, took his own glasses out, then elbowed up to the edge of the oval-shaped, yellow boulder. The Freefighters sat hidden behind him amidst the rocks. They wore gray camouflage outfits, mountain boots with cleats, T-shirts and flak vests already drenched with sweat. The twenty-man attack force rested in the shadows created by the rocks, hiding from the noonday sun which beat down like the searing flames of a blast furnace.

It had been overcast for weeks, but today, when clouds would be a blessing, of course, they had vanished. The sky was clear, with only that strange, purplish tint high in the atmosphere hinting that anything was amiss with the world, that the heavens were radioactive. The Freefighters adjusted their weapons, .9mm Liberator automatic rifles, and made sure no dirt was clogging the barrels. During the four-day journey they had made to get here, anything could have crawled in there. They squirmed uncomfortably in their flak vests, silently blasting the Century City rule that required flaks on all attack missions, and looked up impatiently at Rockson perched on the boulder wondering just when in hell he would signal the attack. The mortarmen stacked rows of shells ten to a pile and calculated the trajectory to the opposite bank. Thirty feet to their left, two machine guns had been mounted, their .50mm muzzles painted brown to avoid any flashes of light that would signal the forward Russian scouts.

Rockson peered motionlessly through his 20x binocs. He watched the tanks moving through a blanket of choking dust onto the ancient girder bridge, built in prewar days. Watched the foot soldiers running alongside the steel killing machines. Watched the entire structure tremble and vibrate in protest as the first of the lumbering K-55s roared on. Rock watched and waited. He was calm, ready for the action that would begin momentarily. He had been doing this for a long time—killing Russians. Since he was a boy. It was nasty work, but not as nasty as the bastards had been to America. The killing would stop when their occupation forces left. It was simple. It was their choice: to stay and die, or leave and live. He focused his binoculars on the command tank which was just approaching the ramp to the bridge, and fine focused the beat-up lenses on the officer who directed the tank from the turret. He was arrogant, with his thin lips, his gold-braided collar, and that look of smug self-confidence that all the Russian officers had. Good, let them think there is no danger, Rock thought, ducking down, as he saw the commander lift his own glasses. So much the easier for us.

The column of twenty Russian K-55 tanks, almost forty feet long, with their huge turrets and .150mm cannons poking forward like dark arms of death, rumbled down the rusty road, the Fifth Sector Highway the Russians called it. The tanks moved slowly, spaced about fifty feet apart. They were surrounded by combat troops in full battle gear and radiation suits. The troops held onto the sides of the battlewagons, letting themselves be pulled along at about ten mph. Their thick anti-rad protective gear and heavy K-200 rifles weighed them down, making movement difficult. But there was no complaining. Not in the Russian Army.

Colonel Antonovich stood in the hatchway of the lead tank peering nervously around at the surrounding hills and mountains. He looked for the slightest trace of metal glinting, of reflection, of a face disappearing behind a rock. This was the perfect spot for an ambush, when they were all bunched together close to move quickly across the narrow bridge. Below the colonel, in the guts of the foot-thick, steel-plated K-55, the six men of the crew were at their battle stations, ready for anything. The tank—equipped with .150mm cannon, twin .55mm machine guns, flame thrower and anti-tank missiles—could take out just about anything . . . if it could see it. That was the rub. If the Americans would fight like men, the colonel thought bitterly, the battle would soon be over. But they wouldn’t. It was always hit and run. Kill one soldier here, take out one tank there. They were like mosquitos, stinging, biting. But mosquitos drew blood. He felt a shiver run down his spine, even as his flesh sweated in the thick, rubberized canvas anti-rad suit.

There! What was that? Antonovich swung his field glasses quickly up. A flash on a peak about eight hundred feet away. He licked his lips nervously, preparing to shout out the command to fire. No, there, it was just a quartz formation reflecting the brilliant yellow-orange sun. Damn, he was getting too nervous. If they had fired up there, it could have caused an avalanche of rock to fall on the other end of the bridge. His superiors would love that. Blocking the only crossing for a hundred miles that would safely hold a tank or a supply truck.

These Americans were a ragged bunch. Why should he feel afraid? The Russian forces were so overwhelming in comparison to the feeble resistance. It was a joke. A pitiful joke on the Americans. Nonetheless, he felt his heart beat faster and couldn’t help but think of his wife and children back in Vladivostok. He tried to create their images in his mind. The pictures quickly faded as a cloud of dust shot up into his face. Damn, it was hard to wear these face masks and be able to use binoculars, Antonovich thought, opting for the mask. He pulled the visor down over his face and began breathing the pure oxygen that filled the mask, from a small pack on his back. I’ve got to use this thing more, he berated himself. The dust out here was still radioactive.
He
wasn’t going to die in this Godforsaken land. Not him! That was for foot soldiers not officers.

Two of their columns had been attacked in this area in the past month. Though the damage had been minimal, the rebels had to be shown who was the power, the strength. This well-equipped force had twenty tanks, nearly five hundred infantry, and a surprise package of three heavily armed helicopters which flew several miles south waiting for any attack, at which they would swoop in for the kill and wipe out whatever ragged forces these Americans had been able to assemble this time. The secondary attack force was Antonovich’s idea. If it succeeded it would be a promotion for him. “We’ll see who will be surprised by who,” the colonel thought to himself, wondering just when and where the attack would occur. His tank ground onto the gravel embankment to the bridge, and then began the three hundred-foot crossing. The steel-webbed roadway groaned beneath the weight of the tank as Antonovich looked at the dark, rushing water some eighty feet below.

From his rocky perch, Ted Rockson watched as the colonel’s tank rumbled onto the girder bridge. “Ready, Berger. Get ready,” he barked down, his eyes glued to the column below. Soon, the entire span was filled with tanks, over half the force. The first K-55 was just feet away from the end. “After I fire, blow it!” Rock yelled, jumping free of the boulder and landing on his feet, next to the explosives man. He swung the .9mm Liberator rapid fire on its web shoulder harness and made first-target acquisition through the scope—the officer, the one with the braiding. Rock squeezed the trigger. The muzzle jerked up as the officer’s head blossomed red and slumped.

Berger smiled, his thick lips curling back into his thick black beard. He leaned forward, putting his full weight on the plunger which slid down into the innards of the generating box, sending out a surge of current. In less than a second, the bridge erupted in fire and smoke. The charges placed at ten-foot intervals along the underside of the metal grid roadway detonated in unison. Instantly Rockson and the twenty Freefighters opened fire from their positions, shooting at the screaming, burning Russian troops some eight hundred feet below.

The explosion literally ripped away the whole central support system for the bridge and as the Freefighters poured down a hail of lead rain, the bridge slowly, as if in a dream, crumbled in pieces and headed for the water below. All the tanks and troops on the North Colorado River Bridge tumbled end over end, a bloody haze of shrapnel and flesh, into the rushing whitecap of the river. Within seconds, every Russian who had been crossing the structure was dead, sucked down into the dark waters, as if the Colorado River were helping its citizens to fight back against the invaders. Pieces of flesh, legs pouring out blood, helmets, leather cushions to pad hard metal tank seats, all bobbed and twisted, a grisly dance of death in the cold, brown water.

“Perfect!” Berger yelled out in glee, looking over at Rockson who had slid between two elephant-sized rock formations and was firing down at the frantic Red troops trying to regroup on the opposite bank. The remaining tanks pulled alongside each other in a small clearing just before the bridge and began opening up with their 50mms though they didn’t have the range yet. The American Freefighters could only stay a few more minutes, inflict what damage they could and leave. They fired down, lining up the scampering Russian troops on the far bank, through crosshair sights on the Liberators and squeezed off three-round bursts at heads and chests that ballooned into red sprays of flesh.

The mortarmen, Hoffman and Jones, began their work, aiming dead center at the line of remaining Russian tanks. The first shell whistled through the air and fell about thirty feet to the left of the end tank. The second shot made contact, blowing the turret right off the K-55. Only two Reds emerged, their clothes on fire. They leaped to the parched ground, screaming, and ran madly in circles, blazing torches of sizzling flesh.

But the Russian tanks were closing in. Their sightmen were finding the Freefighters’ position. A .150mm shell landed just below the ridge on which the Americans were dug in, sending out a cloud of pulverized rock dust. Then another, even closer. The Americans returned the message with their own greetings of red-hot slugs. The two machine gunmen, Pincer and Croy, opened up with their .50mms, spraying the opposite bank with a continuous curtain of fire. The Red soldiers dove off in all directions as the burning slugs bit into the clearing like teeth searching for human flesh to bite. Rock swung his Liberator around madly, working the selector by feel into auto-mode, holding the trigger. Red shells began falling every few seconds—closer, closer—ripping boulders apart as if they were made of sand. Rockson was in charge. It was his decision when to fight and when to leave. They had already decimated the Russian column, destroyed a good sixty percent of its force, and sent nine tanks to the bottom of the Colorado where fish were now doubtless peering through the machine-gun slits at the charred corpses within. Rock hated to leave a battle, but he was the commander of these men and he was more cautious when it came to other men’s lives than he was with his own. He slammed another clip into the Liberator.