A Young Girl’s Outer Heaven
08
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Commissioned by Sneaky.
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“Enter,” Lt. Col. Ugar’s voice called from the other side of the door at the sound of my knock. I stepped inside followed by Visha, who closed the door behind us. Ugar looked up from his paperwork and, for a moment, he looked as though he had seen a ghost. Then he stood and hurried over, dropping to one knee and pulling me into a tight hug. “You’re alive! I thought perhaps I had drank too much, or had some sort of fever dream after I spoke with you on the phone.”
He let go and backed away and I gave him a smile. “Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.”
“Haha! Yes, so it would appear!” Ugar laughed, standing up and turning to greet Visha, with another hug. “Welcome home, Lt. Col. von Degurechaff, Maj. Serebryakov.” He looked down at Visha’s rank insignia and raised an eyebrow. “It seems you’ve gone up a few ranks?”
“Ahaha~ no~! I borrowed the colonel’s insignia for this part of the mission,” Visha explained with a laugh. “I’m only just a captain now.”
“Oh?” He looked between the two of us and asked, “And how is that working out?”
“Well. May we sit?”
“Ah, I’m sorry! Pardon my manners. Of course, sit, sit,” he gestured for us to be seated and moved behind his desk. “So you’ve come for Schugel, then?”
“We have,” I confirmed with a nod. “Where is he?”
“At the moment? Being held in ‘protective custody’ at the Imperial Army Air Base here in the city.”
I resisted the urge to curse that we had been so close and missed him, practically walking right past him. But we couldn’t have known, so I let it go. “I see. And the Americans haven’t left with him yet?”
“Not according to my contacts, no. They’re hunting down the last of Professor Schugel’s team.”
“That’s great news!” Visha smiled.
“We’re not too late,” I sighed thankfully. “In that case, we can afford to take a bit of time to prepare and maneuver. Did you manage to contact my men’s families, after Viktoriya gave you their information?”
“I did,” Ugar nodded. “I had the whole department on it and even managed to scrounge up enough funds to be able to put those that couldn’t afford it on a ship. They’re bound for Brasa in three waves—along with some freshly retired soldiers and their families, looking for work.”
“Good. We can always use more experienced men willing to work. Especially with the commies kicking around on the south of the continent,” I nodded.
“So, I wasn’t misreading your message,” he murmured, nodding. “What will you do about them?”
“Whatever I’m paid to do,” I grinned, and he laughed.
“Haha! You’re a real soldier of fortune now, then. How’s the economy down there?”
“Honestly? Ripe for the taking. If I had a corps of engineers, I could take over the country and have it up to Imperial standards inside of a decade.”
Humming, Ugar leaned back in his seat with a grin. “As it so happens, many men from the engineering corps were among those sent your way.”
“Really?” I sat up excitedly. “Ah, the things we could do. The country is fifty years behind the empire, but they have enough of a manufacturing base to jump start things. We could start laying rail and phone lines, get the whole country connected, and set up our own interior lines strategy…” Looking up, I met his eyes and said, “You know… I could use a man of your expertise. We came here on a bomber we bought. The ride won’t exactly be the most comfortable, but there is plenty of room for you, your wife, and daughter.”
Ugar smiled and picked up his phone, already beginning to dial. “I had hoped you would make the offer. I had my wife prepare. They’ve been sitting at home waiting for this call—” He paused and held up his hand. “Yes dear, it’s me. It’s time. I’ll meet you at the gate to the air base. Oh, and bring some pillows to sit on—”
“Blankets, food, and drink too. It’s going to be a long flight, and it was cold,” Visha advised.
Ugar nodded and quickly added, “Blankets, food, and drink as well. Expect a long flight. See you soon.”
With that, he hung up. As soon as he did, Visha asked, “What about the rest of the general staff?”
“Zettour and Lergen won’t leave. There are a few people who might be convinced to. Organizational staff that would help smooth things along. No one who really needs a flight out, though. They could depart on a ship.”
“Let’s spread the word quickly, then depart. I want to get back to the air field as soon as possible.” With that, Visha and I stood, and Ugar gathered up a briefcase that had been waiting beside his desk before joining us. We took a quick tour of the office, where we were greeted with more surprise at being alive and warm welcomes, as we quickly spread the message. Then, we made our way out front and back into the car waiting for us.
“So, what story are we going to tell the Americans?” Ugar asked once we were underway.
“Simple. You’re a defector,” I shrugged. “We’re hiring you to help organize and construct our railway.” Reaching up and tapping the driver on the shoulder, I said, “Take us through the market. I’d like to pick up a few things.”
After a quick detour to get some wine, chocolate, sausage, cheese, and bread—and a selection of things for the officers back in Brasa, as a little taste of home—we eventually pulled into the air field parking lot, where we found Max’s wife waiting. He waved for her to follow and Visha directed the car out to our runway, where we found the MP and lieutenant waiting, the lieutenant sitting at a small folding table playing a game of cards against Edwina and Jorge as we pulled up—though, from the look of things, Jorge was out already and it was down to Edwina and the lieutenant.
“Oh, colonel, welcome back. That was faster than I thought it would be,” the man greeted, but didn’t get up from the table. Instead, he pushed a pack of cigarettes into the pile of money and things in the middle. “All in.”
The game ended quickly after that, with Edwina collecting her winnings as Ugar got his wife and daughter into the plane and settled, while I acted the part of the obedient little sister and helped load up our supplies and goodies. Soon enough, Visha was able to talk the lieutenant and MP into leaving and we settled in to wait, after Ugar told our driver to go check to see if Schugel’s plane had left yet and to inform him when it was getting ready for takeoff.
While we waited, I made my way back into the plane, looking over where Max and his wife and daughter were going to be seated in relation to the back door of the plane. I found some rope and secured our things, then made some extra straps for our passengers.
Eventually, the driver came roaring back up the road from the office just as the sun was beginning to set. He had barely gotten stopped good when he threw open his door. “Lt. Col. Ugar! They’re moving the prisoners!”
“Thank you. Do you know what runway?”
Edwina and Jorge collected the cards and left the table and chairs there, rushing up into Murder Inc and into the cockpit. Visha quickly followed after. I waited long enough to hear the full report from the driver, before Max and I hurried up into the plane as well.
“Hey boss, we’ve got radio chatter. American Spirit and First In are getting ready to take off, but they’re calling in different flight paths. Which one should we follow?”
“What are the destinations?”
“Washington D.C. and Norfolk, Virginia.”
I considered for a moment before nodding. “D.C.. They’re probably going to debrief Schugel there, while they send his team ahead. Wait five minutes, then put in a flight plan to New York. That should be enough time that they’re still in radio range to hear the transmission, but far enough behind that it doesn’t look like were following them. Then put us on a course to overtake them over the Atlantic.”
“Gotcha, boss lady. Alright everyone! Last chance to stretch your legs or take a smoke break. Once we seal her up, no smoking on my bird!”
“Aye, aye, senora,” Jorge grumbled and stood, heading outside. Max joined him a moment later. I didn’t smoke, but I took the opportunity to socialize and headed back outside, where I found that Max and Jorge had apparently traded cigarettes—Jorge finding the German made stuff to his liking, while Max looked a bit ill.
“So, tell me about this railway business,” Max said, tossing away the borrowed cigarette and pulling another of his own from the case in his pocket while Jorge chuckled. Nearby, on another runway, we turned to watch as two American transport aircraft took off. “That will be them, then.”
It had just been a spur of the moment thing, but now that he asked, I took a moment to put some actual thought into it. Thinking over the map of Brasa, I hummed. “I think it would be best to start with a line along the coast, and lines to our nearest neighboring cities—Sao Domingo and Santa Maria. After we kick the commies out. It should be easy enough to hire locals to do most of the work—there’s a large under-class there that we can take advantage of. Much of this should just require simple, unskilled labor. Offer them long term, decently paying jobs, and they become company men overnight. We’ll need to actually build some trains, but those aren’t much good without rails. After that, we look at getting rails to strategic positions within the country for troop deployment and shipping materials. What do you think about laying parallel tracks?”
“Hm?” Max asked, perking up at the idea. “Two tracks side by side?”
“Yes. With regular switching between them so trains can move along wither. Here in the empire, we had to rely on switchbacks and stations to turn trains around or move them out of the way for oncoming trains. A single-lane highway is inefficient. It would be much more efficient to have two lanes and build our stations up around that concept.”
“Mm. Yes, I see how that would speed things along,” he murmured. “The initial cost and time spent setting them up would be greater, but it seems like the payout would be worth it.”
“Not to mention, making it easier to deploy train guns while also retaining the ability to move cargo and people around them as needed.”
Max nodded. “Yes. Yes, I can see it.”
Murder Inc’s engines roared to life and I sighed. “That’s our signal to go.”
The men crushed out their cigarettes and we piled back into the plane. After sealing everything up and getting strapped in, Edwina got us into the air. Once we leveled off, I moved up and consulted with her for a few minutes, checking maps to be sure and running the numbers as she used our radar readings to precisely tell the target planes’ speed.
“We’ll share the same flight path for several hours, before first one, then the other breaks off to head to their destinations. It’s the second plane we’re after. We’ll overtake them before they’re scheduled to break off for D.C.. I’ve got us cruising five hundred feet above their altitude and we’re going just a little faster, so it’ll really just look like we’re passing above them until it’s too late for them to do anything about it. We should make contact in about five hours—”
“Boss lady!” Jorge called out to get our attention, and I looked over. He tapped the radar. “One of the planes has broken off. They’re turning east!”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“East?” I asked, confused. “Heading back?”
“No, senora. It looks like they’re accelerating.”
“Why…”
“First In, return to your previous course and heading,” the American Spirit transmitted. A few moments later, they transmitted again, “First In, what’s happening?”
“Huh. That’s not good for whoever’s on that plane,” I murmured.
“Allied Control Berun, this is American Spirit. We suspect that First In has been hijacked. That plane is carrying assets vital to American national security. Scramble fighters to intercept immediately. If you can’t force them to land, you must bring that plane down before they cross into Federation airspace.”
“Really not good. Any change on American Spirit?”
“None,” Jorge shook his head.
“Alright, stay on course. The operation’s still on.”
I left the cockpit and moved to sit with the others, dropping onto a pillow that Mrs. Ugar had brought. Max leaned forward in his seat and asked, “What’s going on?”
“The commies have decided they weren’t satisfied with the division of spoils. Looks like they’ve hijacked one of the planes and they’re running for Federation territory.”
Max and Visha both winced. “Ma’am, if the Russy get their hands on Professor Schugel’s men…”
“Nothing we can do about it, captain,” I shook my head. With a sigh, I continued. “It’s not our problem.”
But even as I said the words, I had the feeling that they may one day come back to bite me…
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“We’re ready,” Visha called as I finished zipping up my flight suit.
I checked to make sure my sidearm, combat knife, and a single grenade were in place, before moving towards the back of the plane. “Alright. Time on target?”
Visha relayed the question to Edwina before coming back with an answer. “One minute!”
“Seal it up behind me, then drop to five thousand and slow to one-fifty!”
Visha nodded, then held up her hand to indicate thirty seconds. Reaching out, I took hold of the door handle. “BRACE!”
The door popped open under my strength and freezing cold wind whipped into the cabin as it abruptly depressurized. There was a scream from further in the cabin, but I ignored it. Bracing myself in the doorway, I waited as the wind tried to yank me from the plane. Outside, behind and below, I could just make out the red and green lights on American Spirit’s wings. Visha slapped me on the back and I leapt out into the void.
I tucked into a fast dive to clear the plane, before spreading out my arms and legs, angling my body for the other plane as I fell. My heart pounded in my chest and my face hurt from the grin pulling at my lips.
Ah~, it’s been a while since I’ve done something really exciting! An unpowered dive into an enemy aircraft doesn’t top riding a V2 for insane, but it’s pretty far up the list.
American Spirit drew closer and closer as I minutely adjusted my fall. Only seconds away from impact, I flipped around onto my back, feet towards the enemy, and pulled my weapons. I aimed my pistol at the cockpit and the Luger spat four rounds into the wind shield—two where the co-pilot sat, before shifting over to put two into the pilot. Then, the plane was on me. I tucked my arms in and braced, reinforcing my body with internal magic that wouldn’t register on sensors, closing my eyes as I slammed feet-first into the damaged windshield.
Glass shattered around me and filled the cockpit, shredding the pilot and co-pilot, if they weren’t already dead from gunshot. My feet slammed into the cockpit door, leading deeper into the plane. The door slammed off its hinges, breaking the lock, and sending me and it flying back into the rear of the plane—arresting most, but not all, of my momentum. The man who had apparently gotten up to check the door just a second before did the rest as he was crushed under the door.
The world slowed to a crawl around me as magical combat stimulants kicked in and I took in the interior of the plane.
Glass shards glinted like diamonds as they abruptly filled the cabin.
The arm of a black suited man beneath the door as he fell to the floor under the force of a door slamming into him at about a hundred miles an hour.
To my left and right, a pair of similarly suited men whose bearing screamed ‘Fed Boy,’ the one on the left in the motions of standing, the one on the right registering shock as his eyes met mine.
Further back towards the middle of the craft, a squad of six military police armed to the teeth, already beginning to stand.
In the very back, seated beside another suited man, was the all too unfortunately familiar form of Schugel, grinning like a loon as he watched.
I was moving before they could fully muster a response. My right arm came up with my sidearm and put two rounds in the man to my right, while I slammed the combat knife home in the leg of the fed, perhaps proto-CIA agent, on my left. The knife acted as an anchor, allowing me to use my momentum to whip my body around and up, letting go of the pistol to grab the man’s hair in my now free hand as the knife was wrenched from his leg. I slammed the blade into his throat and back out and let go, dropping to the ground as he collapsed into his seat and held his bleeding wound. Spotting the pistol in the holster under his left arm, I reached under his open suit jacket and jerked it out.
The six MPs were up and bringing weapons to bear as I launched myself towards them, low and fast. The one in the lead opened fire, but reflexes ingrained by years of high speed, life or death aerial combat told me he was firing wildly and none of the shots would hit.
I came up inside the reach of his arms, using his body as a springboard, I launched myself up and over, planting the pistol to the side of his skull and pulling the trigger, before sweeping it around and catching the next two on my right with shots to the chest and face, respectively. Landing on the man in the middle left knees first, I brought the combat knife down in the side of his neck as I rode him to the ground and rolled away, jerking my blade out and bringing it down to slam into the booted foot of the last MP. He howled for just a moment before I put him out of his misery with a bullet from under the jaw.
The last fed had stood and drawn his weapon, taking up a shooter’s stance between me and Schugel as he aimed down the sights at me. “Don’t fucking mo—”
I stood and threw the knife in one practiced motion, and he went down with a gurgle as he clutched his throat. Walking the rest of the way up to him, I reclaimed my knife, cleaned it off, and put him out of his misery.
“Wonderful! Well done! I knew you would come for me!” Schugel laughed, clapping his hands from his seat, looking entirely too smug.
“Ah, Herr Doktor,” I sent the man a smile and he only grinned wider. “I’ve waited a very long time for the opportunity to put a bullet in your head. Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t, and leave you to end up on the bottom of the Atlantic.”
“You wound me, frauline!” he held a hand to his check mockingly. “Very well, if it is a reason you want… You inspired me!”
“Eh?”
“I knew what you did, the moment the Americans described their readings on various magical detection arrays to me. All that mana, fixed in place within the Type 95. You released it, all at once. The effect was not dissimilar to a new weapon they’ve been testing, if the information gleaned from my interrogation of them is correct.”
Your interrogation of them, huh? I mused, looking the man over and noting his bruised, disheveled, generally roughed up state.
“A weapon like no other, that harnesses the power of the very atom itself to unleash the nuclear forces held within! An atom bomb! Or a nuclear bomb, if you prefer,” he shrugged, before scoffing. “Completely inferior to my work, of course. A bit of tablecloth math during my confinement showed that such a weapon would leave the land polluted, leaking unbound atoms all over the place for decades to come—like tiny, invisible bullets directly attacking the cells of your body, poisoning you from the outside in, and inside out. Worthless. No, much safer to simply reproduce a mana weapon like the one you set off… and survived.”
The mad genius had already deduced what I had done and devised a super weapon, just from some descriptions of instrument readouts and a few scant details some idiots had let slip while they were interrogating him. I couldn’t honestly say I hadn’t expected it, but to have it confirmed…
Fuck.
There really was no other appropriate response.
Then for the good of the world, I have to—
“I could build you one.”
I blinked up at him. “Come again?”
“I could construct one easily. Now that I’ve had experience building the Type 95, the divine revelations that allowed me to produce a quad-core computation orb, the data gathered over your operational time using it and learning to fix mana, I could easily construct a device that absorbs mana from the atmosphere and artificially fixes it in place. Small, cheap and easy to produce, environmentally friendly, none of the long term effects of a nuclear weapon, fueled by ambient mana, growing stronger the longer they’re stored. You’ve moved to Brasa, yes? I’ve heard they may have rich, untapped Elenium mines…”
Of course he could.
Fuck.
There really was no other appropriate response.
Well, looks like we’re going to become the world’s first magical-nuclear armed power.
I holstered my stolen sidearm and grabbed him by the arm. “Come along.”
Schugel chuckled as I led him back to the rear door of the plane. He kept laughing all the way as I opened the door and threw him out into open air. Taking out the one grenade I’d brought with me, I pulled the pin and tossed it towards the cockpit before jumping out after him. I caught up with Schugel and tackled him in midair as the plane exploded into a fireball. Angling for where I could make out Murder Inc’s lights below, I spun up a flight formula and brought us in ahead of the plane.
Edwina waved through the cockpit window and I pulled alongside the bomber, dropping back to the rear door. A moment later, Visha opened it up and I shoved Schugel in, before climbing in after and slamming the door closed. “Get us out of here! Change course, we can refuel somewhere further south!”
Visha nodded and relayed my orders to the cockpit as I followed Schugel up to where he had joined Max and his family. He eagerly dug into the food and wine as I sat down across from him and began the debrief. Grabbing a couple of headsets, I handed him one as Max pulled one on and Visha handed me hers.
“Alright, I need to know what you’ve told the Americans.”
“Nothing they didn’t already know,” the man answered, shrugging as he made himself a small sandwich of cheese and summer sausage. “They had Imperial records and access to some of my work on the Elenium Type-95 and 97, along with the V2. They were convinced that I had built an atom bomb, or some magical equivalent, and that you, Lt. Col. von Degurechaff, had smuggled it out of the country, sought out an Atlantic carrier group, and detonated it as a test—and a warning.” Schugel grinned as he stuffed his face, then drank directly from the bottle of wine. “I didn’t disabuse them of this notion!”
“So, the Americans really are developing something similar?” Max asked, and Schugel and I both nodded. “How dangerous would one of these weapons be?”
“Mm, that depends. They would have to refine some metal like uranium or plutonium into higher energy isotopes. Perhaps uranium, oh… 235? Or Plutonium 239. At least, that’s what the little dabbling I’ve done in the matter showed would yield good results for a first test. Depending on the purity and size of the material, you’re looking at a blast in the range of several thousand tons of TNT. Kilo-tons, if you will.”
“Can you put that into something I can visualize?” Max asked.
“Hmm. Very well! Imagine, if you will, an American bomber flying over Berun. It releases a bomb that falls right over the center of the city. It detonates at, oh… a thousand feet up. Everything within one mile would be destroyed by the initial blast. Every person, killed by a wave of solid air pressure. Flattened. Splattered. As though hit by a truck. Assuming the initial burst of energy, of heat and light, didn’t simply turn them to little more than vapor and leave nothing but their shadows burned into their surroundings. The blast would super heat the air, creating a fireball, which would then catch everything flammable alight, creating a firestorm that could be lethal up to about two or three miles. Then, there would be a poisonous cloud of ash and smoke, completely contaminated by the loose atoms and energy, which would radiate out more of the same wherever it landed. Depending on which way the wind blew, it could poison the entire countryside for generations to come. As far as Paris, Moskva, or even Londinium. I have no idea of the long term effects of exposure to people an animals, aside from death at higher doses. Painful, lingering death, within days.”
“By all that’s holy,” Max muttered. “And the Americans want to make this?”
“Want to? If they don’t already have one, they’re close,” Schugel shook his head.
“A weapon that destroys cities and blights whatever nation is struck for potentially hundreds or thousands of miles. It’s… a weapon meant to instill terror into the hearts of their enemies.”
“Exactly,” I nodded. “Once the Americans have them, no one would dare attack them, for fear of getting nuclear weapons dropped on their heads. Combine that with the V2, or a launch vehicle even more powerful, and you could launch missiles between continents. Nuclear armed inter-continental ballistic missiles. The Americans could fire one from California and hit Moskva. With enough, they could target every city in Europe. Any serious conflict with them would carry the promise of assured destruction to anyone foolish enough to try. The only way to counter it would be to develop nuclear ICBMs of your own, make sure they knew you had them, and promise to launch on them if they launched on you. This way, destruction would be mutually assured. They won’t fire first, because there would be enough time for you to return fire, and you wind up killing each other.”
Max looked pale as a sheet. “Then whoever controlled such a nuclear arsenal would effectively control the world.”
““Effectively,”” Schugel and I said at the same time, before the scientist turned a grin on me. “Tell me, Lt. Col. von Degurechaff—”
“It’s full colonel now,” I corrected. “I’m one of two people in charge of our little mercenary band.” Turning a look on Max, I said, “If you want the position, I’d gladly have you in charge of rail development and logistics as our third colonel.”
Max chuckled and nodded. “Certainly.”
“Yes, yes,” Schugel waved us off. “Col. von Degurechaff. Tell me. What was it like, being inside a magical explosion of that magnitude? How did you survive?”
Max looked confused and I sighed. “Painful. As though every nerve in my body caught fire all at once. My body was literally burned away to nothing, leaving only my will holding my magic together. The blast was large enough to take out the entire carrier group. Perhaps one or two kilotons, maybe more. I would need to look at my unit’s readings to tell. As for how I survived…” I grinned. “Stubborn spite. I pulled my magic back together and somehow reformed a body.”
“That’s impossible,” Max whispered.
“Improbable,” Schugel corrected.
“The entire 203rd have flight recordings on their computation orbs. You can look over it for yourselves when we get back to base.”
“I’d like to run some tests,” Schugel said, looking at me with that old, crazy look in his eyes. For a moment, I briefly considered just putting a bullet in him and tossing him out the back of the plane. The mission would still be a success, as long as he didn’t fall into enemy hands…
But the temptation of being able to dissuade a direct attack with the threat of our own ICBMs is too good to pass up, I mentally sighed, consigning myself to being poked and prodded. And it wasn’t as though I hadn’t been considering having someone look me over after the incident. The problem was, there was no one qualified, to my knowledge. In fact, Schugel might be the best qualified person. And wasn’t that a terrifying thought?
“Very well. Nothing invasive,” I warned, glaring at the man in threat.
“Of course, of course. A few readings with some equipment, a few samples…”
“What kind of samples?”
“Why, everything!” Schugel grinned. “Hair, tissue, blood, urine, fecal—”
The door is right there. No one could stop me…