ALL NOVEL Chapter 117 – Fire in the Sky
0010 June 19th, 2020 CE
MacDill Air Force Base, Florida
General Abrams Thompson watched the digital strategic map on the screen. The red that indicated the area that the monsters have taken grew on the eastern portion of the Mach Imperium. His aide looked up from the comms system. “The monsters are swiftly advancing forwards from their landing positions. They are pushing out from the port city and into the surrounding farmland. They will be approaching the outer kill zones within minutes.”
“Inform all artillery units to fire on their pre-designated targets. Accounting for time to impact…” The General looked at his watch. “They should hit them as soon as they arrive.”
0805 Sun 49th, 196 AE
In a field 50 miles from Stelport, Mach Imperium
“We have confirmation to fire at the pre-designated coordinates. Light’em up.”
The missile pods on the M270 MLRS that were already lifted up towards the sky and let off a volley of 12 M30A1 rockets. The rest of the battery of two other M270s let off their rockets towards the sky.”
Monsters advanced lazily through the tight streets of the city that were lined with red and gray brick buildings. A whistling sound caught their attention and they looked up to the sky to see where the noise came from. All hell broke loose as the streets and buildings were peppered by holes as the monsters were torn apart by tungsten fragments falling from the sky. The tungsten fragments sliced and ripped through the monsters.
The M270 gunner leaned back on his chair. “I don’t think the Machians will be happy with all that collateral damage in their city.”
“At least they are just metal pieces and not the explosive DPICM submunitions. Should be much easier to fix.”
“I’m pretty certain the brass brought up M777s to finish up the job so it doesn’t really matter.”
In the distance, they could hear the booms of the M777s as they fired.
0022 June 19th, 2020 CE
Washington D.C.
“Mr. President, we believe we have found where the monsters originated from.”
A haggard looking Ronell set down his coffee. “Go on.”
“We have found an island in the western portions of the Pacific. We are currently confirming whether or not this island existed beforehand.”
“Another island? How big of an island is this for this many demons to appear? Don’t tell me this is something like the elves and there were a bunch of them living underwater.”
“This is not confirmed but there seems to be a structure in the middle of the island that is transporting more of these monsters here.”
Ronell rubbed his eyes. “Great, this could mean they are coming from somewhere else on this planet.”
“I have been informed that it is possible for it to be not from this planet.”
“A gate from another world? What is this? A pro-JSDF Japanese fantasy novel series?”
“Well, we are basically in a fantasy world so why not? Our situation feels like a fantasy web novel written by someone.”
0711 Sun 49th, 196 AE
Bem Republic
Six of the once prominent members of the Bem nobility sat around a table. A heavy silence permeated the air. Finally, one of the members spoke. “Seems like these demons actually exist.”
“That is a problem for our plans.”
“Why? This is an opportunity. These demons are only invading the Americans and the Mach right now. We should take this chance to throw the Americans out.”
“The Americans stopped leaving. That’s the problem.”
“Then we will have to push back the date of what we plan to do. We will let these Americans fight the demons for us.”
“I overheard rumors that they will be establishing a permanent base here.”
Everyone was silent at the table again.
“Even with our original plans, we had no way of preventing them from coming back. We say we had plans but I don’t think any of us have any idea what we are doing.”
The silence continued after that sentence.
“It's not fair at all. These ‘Amercians’ just all of a sudden appear out of nowhere and then mess up the order of the world. I had plans you know? Being a noble and all.”
“You know… maybe we should just give up. We lived under the yoke of the Mach before this and now we live under these Americans. What's the difference?”
“Well under the Mach, we were nobles.”
“And the Americans completely destroyed the Mach. What hope do we have? You know what, screw this. I’m done.”
The person stood up and exited out of the room. A silence hung in the air yet again. One of them interrupted it. “I’m thinking about using what I have left to create a business. Who wants to do that instead? We could make a joint business. The commoner merchants seem to have gotten rich doing this so why can’t we?”
2120 June 18th, 2020 CE
Near the intersection of Foerster Street and Staples Avenue
The gunfire was much much closer now.
“Jesus, how the fuck are we meant to safely get across this?”
Eric poked his head up from the wooden fence they were hiding behind. It was dark and he could make out a row of houses that was basically on an incline across the street. The front yards of each house was terraced. Each house had stairs leading up to the front door. None of them had fences that they could jump over. Ian shrugged. “At least the monsters aren’t filing into the avenue and are just pushing forward on the street.”
Eric sighed in resignation. “We can hide in those bushes and find a house we can get into. Lets just hope that somebody left in a panic and forgot to lock their doors. There has to be at least one house.”
Monsters packed Forester Street. Eric prayed that the darkness of the night hopefully concealed them.
A couple minutes later
“You guys stay down here. I will sneak up the stairs and see if either house has their door open.”
Eric twisted the doorknob on the door and pushed in to no avail. He tried the door in the neighboring house.”
7 minutes later
“Come on… come on. Finally.”
The door swung slightly inwards as Eric gently pushed it in. He crouch-walked down the stairs and whispered to Ian and John. “Let’s go, this house has its door open.”
They had passed through a few more backyards and another street before getting to their supposed position. Ian looked out of the window of the house they were hiding in. “Now what? We are basically at where they told us to be and this place is swarming with them.”
They could hear a massive boom from where they suspected the frontline was. They were on the first floor of a house right next to where they were told to be. It was directly on the front and the monsters infested the streets. They were lucky to have snuck into this house Eric’s comms crackled. <<<”Corporal. You in position?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Get your ass ready to run. You will know when to do it.”>>>
Multiple booms penetrated the air. Suddenly, the swarms of monsters were being mowed down. Explosions after explosions impacted the mob of monsters. Tracers from machine gun fire lit up the night. Ian shook his head in disbelief. “Jesus fuck, they want us to run through that?”
“Ian, John, hug the wall. They are concentrating fire in the middle of the street. Hug the wall! Go! Go! Go!”
They made it out of the house and stuck themselves to the wall outside. They started moving towards the human lines.
Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado
General Ralph Albert, commander of both US Northern Command and NORAD, rushed into the command center. He was immediately greeted by his deputy commander. The General’s face was serious as he asked his deputy. “Give me a rundown. What’s happening?”
“Sir, our satellites are detecting missile launches from the Pacific.”
“Are we certain it's not a glitch in the system? No one in this world are supposed to have missile technology.”
“We are not certain. The PAVE PAWS at the Beale Air Force Base is currently tracking 5 possible missiles. The system is calculating its trajectory and should come up with a solution quite soon.”
Everyone in the room closely looked at the screens on the wall as the trajectory was calculated by the computer. Within a few seconds, lines appeared showing where the missiles were headed. Each line streaked to the same city. Realization dawned on them. “Sir, we need to get Washington on the line right now. They are all heading for San Francisco.”