In keeping with the long-standing tradition of militaries around the world to never actually finish doing anything, the end of the initial invasion of Omen was declared on that day. Not the end of hostilities, nor of combat, nor even of major combat operations. The end of the initial invasion. The backs of their forces on-world had been broken, but they were far from done fighting.
Darren wasn’t too enthused.
The order to scramble came just as he finished unloading crates of supplies from the newest freighter into the system. Sighing, he grabbed his rifle and ran for the hangar deck of the Bunker Hill, donning his armor on the way. The Dark Sparrow sat fueling on the deck, about half of the platoon already aboard. Once on himself, Darren learned the circumstances of what had happened.
A number of servicemen had gone rogue while on duty in Omen’s capital, holing up in a building and detonating a canister of chlorine gas. Dozens of civilians were already dead, and they had warded off all attempts by military police to apprehend them.
“Brainwashed?” Darren turned to Pavlov.
“Yeah, definitely.” Pavlov said, consulting a flash card containing the signs of Poslushi neuroforming. It had been noticed that the brainwashed had an eerie calm about them, but were otherwise hard to detect, being nearly identical to their prior selves. Darren wondered when the government would stop panicking about national security and declassify the whole thing about brainwashing.
The helicopter lifted off the ground and started the somewhat short flight towards the capital, apparently named High Unlerin. It was already visible on the horizon; for a major city, it wasn’t very large. Then, Darren saw that it actually blended into the surrounding forest, concrete and metal fading into lumber and dirt roads. The city center was built in the flowy, vibrant style of the Poslushi; the previous had probably been demolished to make room. However, the Poslushi were far more regular in their construction than the Ovinis, making the Rangers’ jobs easier.
Poslushi cities were built in a honeycomb style, which made them horrendous for automobile traffic but otherwise efficient for saving space. It made sense, considering the Poslushi had no wheeled vehicles, using nimble, legged machines in the place of cars. Each city “block” was its own building, constructed in a rough spire shape, sometimes with a statue or similar art piece to top the towers.
This particular one was bright blue, with a structure composed of multiple parts that stretched upward and melded together like wisps of flame. However, it was partially obscured at the ground level by a cloud of sickly yellow-green gas, and a multitude of dark, limp forms lay strewn about. The whole block had been cordoned off, with barriers and hazard-suited guards abound.
“Jesus. Why would they kill their own citizens?” Pavlov mused, gazing down at the numerous corpses below.
“My best guess is scorched earth or maybe trying to induce some sort of terrorism to make our jobs harder.” Simmons proposed, shrugging.
“Well, it isn’t anything we can’t solve with a little bit of elbow grease and judicious application of firepower. Nothing like 8.5mm to dissuade the bad guys, eh?” Sparrow remarked.
“Nothing indeed.” Darren said. The helicopter hovered over the building, its doors sliding open and the lights on the roof flashing green.
“Go, go, go!” Pavlov barked, donning his gas mask and leaping from the Dark Sparrow. The rest followed shortly after, Darren’s heart leaping into his throat before his jetpack kicked on and sent him gently drifting into the asphalt. The gas mask was hot and not well-ventilated, but it was better than the water in his lungs turning to hydrochloric acid and dissolving him from the inside out. At least it wasn’t VX or some equally-terrible nerve agent.
Darren loaded and primed his rifle, finding the rest of his platoon and regrouping. Once gathered, they split up into their combat teams, spreading out to cover all entrances to the building. Darren, Pavlov, and Simmons went to the south doors, while two six-man teams breached the other, more heavily-trapped entrances. Darren ran his hands over the door, checking for anything that could indicate a trap or mine. Nothing.
Cringing, he mustered his courage and ripped the door open, expecting the entrance to explode. It didn’t, somehow. Darren leaned over, rifle brandished–
Thwip. A bullet whizzed past Darren’s head, the shot sounding a fraction of a second later. Yelping, Darren ducked back behind the doorframe as Pavlov discharged a shot from his grenade launcher. The shell exploded in a burst of light and sound, and Darren entered shortly afterward, setting his sights upon the blinded shooter and firing twice. The soldier staggered back, then collapsed. Darren methodically advanced down the hallway, keeping an eye to each side in case someone emerged from there.
This place was quiet. Too quiet. Their intel showed that there were at least a dozen rogue men in this building, but where were the gunshots as the other two teams encountered their own enemies? Surely they wouldn’t guard one entrance and abandon the others?
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“Hey, there’s a note.” Pavlov said, stooping down to grab a small, lightly-bloodstained piece of paper from the ground next to the corpse. Darren kept an eye out as he started to read.
To the esteemed units of the United States Armed Forces, or whomever else may find this,
My name is Sgt. Philip Halloway, and I am most likely dead. I am alone within this building; it has been arranged for the numbers to be bungled to increase the urgency of your response. I have chosen to hasten my exit from this world by firing a warning shot; if I had intended to hit you, you would not be reading this. Don’t worry about me. I’ve nothing left to lose anyways, and I’ve chosen this task for myself.
The events of the last few years, namely the Contact Wars and the recent outbreak of hostilities with the Poslushi, have left many embittered, including me. You may know us as the Mankind Defense Home Guard, or the MDHG for simplicity’s sake. You will most likely hear more from us in the coming time.
“The hell does that mean?” Pavlov squinted at the text.
“Go on, keep going.” Darren urged him.
First things first, we do not believe that humankind holds any special place in the cosmos, that we are any form of “master race,” or the like. For that, contact any of the dozens of nationalist, jingoist, or downright neo-Nazi groups out there, to which you will find us far preferable. However, that is not to say that we do not believe the alien to be an existential threat to our way of life and/or survival as a species. Like any threat, they are to be neutralized with efficiency and without sentimentality, up to and including the great taboo of genocide, should it become unfortunately necessary.
This unsavory act was an important step in the preparation of mankind for a thousand more crimes like this, done so that no greater atrocity need be committed. Think of this as sowing salt in the fields of war. One day, you’ll thank us for our insight when your children walk the stars freely and without fear, and violence is an evil long forgotten.
Thank you for your time.
P.S.: Check my chest. No secret keeps forever.
Darren inspected the vest of the dead soldier, the blood-drenched graphene augmented with a strange pouch not present on the standard-issue model. Inside was… oh, no.
A tiny webcam, a little red light on its side blinking, probably still broadcasting. And it had heard Halloway’s entire speech. Darren picked it up and clicked a button on its backside twice to switch it off. Then, he activated his radio.
“Platoon, we might want to relay this to command. Looks like we just participated in one hell of a publicity stunt.”
—
“Director Hoover? We’ve got a Colonel Jasper here to talk to you. It seems important.”
“Send him in.” the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency spoke into the phone. The door to his office creaked open and a hulking soldier entered, in his old dress blues, his chest festooned with medals of all kinds. He had an imperious, authoritative air about him, but it was not something the head of the most feared intelligence organization in the world would let sway him.
“Director Hoover.” Colonel Jasper saluted.
“Colonel, you mind telling us precisely what your underling was doing gassing a number of civilians on Omen? You’re lucky we found you before the Hague did.”
“The perpetrator undertook this action on his own and with no intervention from us, even if we were mentioned. We don’t control what people do in their downtime.” Jasper shrugged.
“Well, you should, if they’re going to do this. We’ve been trying to establish good relations with the populace and your little maverick’s just set us back severely. You had better hope he acted alone, or your group’s going on the list we use for terrorists. And you don’t want to be on that list, no matter how tough you think you are.”
“If you’re trying to intimidate me, it won’t work.” Jasper said, narrowing his eyes and leaning over the desk. “I’ve fought in the Anathema Encounter, what makes you think I’ll–”
“You will not mention that incident!” the Director shouted, slamming his palms on the desk and standing up. Supposedly, Director Hoover was one of the foremost “agents of regime correction” in the service before his appointment, and Jasper could see the killer in him as he postured himself almost predatorily. Then, he collected himself and spoke with measured calm.
“It’s bad enough that you know about Anathema. Do what you must, if you believe that you can rally the people to your cause. But the moment we find any evidence that you ordered this, you’re going away for a long time. And if you so much as say a word about Anathema to anyone, you’ll be in a blacksite before the week’s out. Do I make myself perfectly clear?”
Jasper sighed. “Yes, sir.”
“Good. Now leave. Next time, I’m not going to be nice.”
—
Hell on Earth wasn’t a really accurate way to describe war. War was a lot worse. In Hell, things were uniformly terrible, and no one was there without cause. In war, things got better just long enough to leave one complacent when they got worse, and it was filled with people caught inside by plain bad luck.
These notions were unknown to the United States Air Force. From so high up and so far away, war was impersonal. You didn’t have to look the man you shot in the eye. No scream of terror, no keening of anguish could carry twenty kilometers into the air, after all.
The bomber squadron was near-serene as it shot over the landscape of Omen. The only sound was the consistent whine of jet engines and the occasional peal of thunder from storms that appeared on the horizon in a flash and vanished as quickly as they came. The blackness of space was readily visible above.
The remainders of the Poslushi garrison had long since seen the settlements of the planet as a lost cause, retiring to the hamlets of the forests to continue the fight. It was a shame; many of the airmen had been looking forward to a tropical paradise to vacation in.
The pilot of the B-60 in the lead turned to the weapons systems officer. “Get ready to drop the payload.” the WSO nodded, tapping a set of buttons on his control console. In the bomb bay, the electric fuses of the dozen bombs activated simultaneously. All the while, the bomber shrieked towards its target at Mach 6.
Three hundred kilometers out, the squadron dispersed, each bomber flying to its own target. There was no longer any worry of enemy interception to be had; the brave pilots of the Bunker Hill had all but annihilated the already small air forces of the garrison.
A minute later, they were within two hundred kilometers. Hypersonic aircraft were, true to their name, rather fast.
“Drop our speed and pop open the bomb bay.” the navigator ordered. Rapidly, the aircraft descended to Mach 3, the great doors in the plane’s belly sliding open. If they opened the bay doors while at cruising speed, the immense change in air resistance could tear the bomber apart. Still, it was moving fast, far too quick for the manually-aimed Poslushi air defenses to track.
“Three… two… drop.” the pilot counted. Nodding, the WSO pressed a button and the payload began falling from the plane at regular intervals. One bomb every two seconds, a dozen bombs total, leaving a trail of falling bombs twenty-four kilometers long. The payload plummeted towards the ground for a few short seconds, and then the tiny explosive charges in the casings detonated, blowing the bombs apart and leaving in their place a whirlwind of swirling, falling papers. Written in the language of the Ovinis, they were a warning, telling any civilians in the area to vacate immediately before the worst happened.
It was no empty threat. Twenty-four hours later, they would repeat this route with a far different payload. The Poslushi would also do well to heed their words, because this time they would be carrying napalm bombs, and a lot more than twelve of them.
War was not hell. It was far worse. However, mankind knew how to make war seem like hell, more literally than not in some cases.