Out of the Black (Odyssey One, Book 4) (15 page)

“Alright. I’ll link in that way,” he said. “Thanks.”

“No problem, sir,” the reservist said. “Where are you going now, if I can ask?”

“Back to my ship.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Beijing, China

MAJOR GENERAL KONG swore at the display, unable and unwilling to believe what he was seeing. The city crawled with enemy units, literally and figuratively
crawled,
and the reports coming back in made it clear that their normal response teams were utterly ineffective.

“We need to bring in heavy armor and air support. Police units are insufficient!”

“I am well aware of that, Chairman,” the general growled. “We are bringing our forces back from the exterior bases, but it takes time. Our forces have been arrayed outward since the war, so we have few heavy units to deploy.”

“Do not give me excuses! Bring those units back immediately!”

Kong tuned out the ravings of the Chairman, knowing that, for the moment at least, he had little to be concerned about from the man. In the current situation there wasn’t a military officer in the entire Block government who would listen to the Chairman over him. For all intents and purposes, he was the military, and right now the military was in charge.

For all the good it seemed to be doing.

The enemy forces were not particularly tough, as best as he could tell from reports and recordings, but they were more than a match for the police units initially sent against them. Internal military had somewhat more luck, but even those were relatively light in terms of firepower and armor, so at best they were holding the line while heavier forces were brought in.

The only thing that was keeping it from being a rout was the air support provided by the People’s Liberation Army Air Force, and those units were being stretched sorely thin between India and China at the moment.

Kong found himself looking silently over to his computer, remembering just what was located on his personal drives.

He was well aware that, just a hundred nautical miles off the coast, the Confederate carrier group was sitting by. The Clinton Task Group carried as much firepower as an entire division of the PLAAF, and he had the codes and the authority now to call on them.

It is truly amazing how the world can change in just a single rotation
.

Whether he
would
call on them was another matter, and it would depend heavily on just how bad things became. Clearing a Confederate strike group into Block airspace would be akin to political suicide, which was something he had no interest in unless not doing so was
actual
suicide.

He looked up, noting that the Chairman was still raving but was now beginning to wind down.

He stood, silencing the people’s Chairman, and saluted.

“I will immediately enact your orders, Chairman.”

The man across the desk nodded slowly. “See that you do, General.”

Kong picked up his computer and saluted again before he left the office, nodding to the two men he’d handpicked to guard their leader.

NACS
WILLIAM J. CLINTON

THE
CLINTON
WAS a Ford Class aircraft carrier, one of the last of her kind to ever be built, in all probability. She and her sisters ruled the oceans, as had their predecessors for over a hundred years before. Their mastery of the sea and air had only been challenged once in all that time, just under two decades ago.

In that time, seven of the
Clinton
’s sister ships had gone down in under six months with every one of their escorts. It had been a dark time for the Navy, then the United States Navy, a time when the newly formed Block military ruled the skies.

That made their current assignment all the more ironic.

“Latest intel from Beijing, sir.”

Admiral Corner nodded, accepting the delivery and sending it directly to his tactical board. The plate lit up, showing icons across the map of the city. “CRO get their birds online?”

“Yes sir.”

“Well that’s a bright spot in a dark fucking day,” Corner said, lips curling up as he looked over the intel. “Jesus, they landed a lot of those bastards in Beijing.”

“Almost a thousand count, as of last numbers, Admiral.”

Corner shook his head slowly as he looked over the angry red icons listed all across the city view. The Block was in deep shit—he could see that without half trying—but they were being about as prideful about it as could be expected. He wasn’t surprised. Hell, he almost didn’t blame them. Honestly, he doubted that anyone in the Confederation would be any more eager to call in an air strike from a Block task force.

That didn’t mean it wasn’t a stupid ass thing to do, ignoring all your available assets, especially when the brief on the aliens was as bad as it was.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much he could do at the moment, not without tripping off a second Block war that none of them could afford. If he went in without being invited, Block air defense would do its damnedest to chew up his boys and, if he were pressed hard enough, Corner would painfully admit that they’d actually do a pretty damned good job of it too.

That would trigger more fighting along every border, and
that
would just be a distraction no one could afford at the moment.

So he had to sit here, bobbing in the ocean like a toy ship in a bathtub, while the world began to go up in flames around them.

Corner looked away from the map, disgusted. “What’s the news from home?”

“New York is under heavy attack, as is Los Angeles, sir. We’ve got unconfirmed reports of landings in other major cities, but right now it’s all a mess,” the messenger said. “When the
Liberty
went up, it put a hole in our comm network you could drive the
Clinton
through, with room to spare for the
rest of the group. Some stations are still dead. Some are just starting to come back online.”

“Fabulous.” Corner supposed he should have known better than to ask, but he had always been a glutton for punishment. “I don’t suppose you have any good news for me?”

“Not as such, Admiral. Right now there’s nothing but red coming through the pipeline.”

“If Beijing doesn’t get their heads out of their ass soon, there’ll be a lot more red in the pipeline, son,” Corner said heavily, “because we’re going to have to nuke the city if it looks like those things are successfully digging in.”

“Yes sir. We’ve not seen anything that bad come through yet, sir.”

“Small favors, son. Small favors.”