Rise of the Red Menace
Disclaimer: Same as before.
Dan Rydinger knew what he had to do. He watched as his mother and Kayla lay asleep on the couch adjacent to the ICU. Tony was doing his homework, or trying to concentrate. His father's condition hadn't changed at all in the past day.
He was eighteen, a student of Metroville Community College, he could do it. He knew they would all object to what was on his mind. He composed the hardest letter he would ever write in his life, and left it on the coffee table.
Dan approached his father's bedside and said, "Dad, if you can hear me, I just want you to forgive me for what I'm about to do."
The EKG beeped steadily as the life support machines that breathed for Jim Rydinger hummed to keep him living.
"I know we've butted heads about this before. I know you don't believe in Syndrome's government, and I don't believe in him either. But we just can't stay out of the war. What happened to you is proof of that. It's involving all of Metroville…" Dan began, "I don't want what happened to you to happen to Mom, or Tony, or God forbid Kayla. So I'm joining Syndrome's Army, to protect you all."
Dan squeezed his father's hand as he walked out of the ICU. Tony saw him leave, holding Dan's letter in his right hand.
"So you're just gonna leave us?" Tony asked his older brother.
"Tony, you saw what happened to Dad." Dan replied, "I'll die before I let anything like that happen to any of you."
Tears appeared in the younger boy's eyes, "Dan, I won't stop you, or wake mom, or anything. But please be careful out there."
"I'll do my best." Dan replied, hugging his younger brother and walking down the stairs. As he walked, he couldn't help but imagine that tonight was the last time he would ever see his family.
He headed across the street to a recruiting office. A grim looking sergeant handed him some forms which he filled out. Within six hours he would be on a bus with many other young men like himself to the Oldenborough Training Station, nearly eighty miles north of home.
Lucius Best examined the scene from line of fire level. Lying face down to his right was a security guard, a portly rent-a-cop whose job had been keeping an eye on the power station. He noticed that the back of the man's skull bore an impact, as though an axe of some kind had been used to kill instead of a bullet.
He continued to a wooden guard shack and saw the guard's partner, who was holding a phone handset clutched in dead hands. His torso and head were riddled with bullet holes, probably coming from a silenced AK-47 if the casings underneath Frozone's feet were any indication. The Russians had obviously been here.
He could smell the aroma of smoke, the kind from an electrical fire, mixed with the smell of burned rubber insulation. Frozone continued past the front gate and through a smashed down door. He passed the body of another security guard, who obviously had time to fire a couple rounds from his shotgun before being riddled with several bullets from a few assault rifles firing on full automatic.
It definitely looked like a spetsnaz strike team had hit this place hard and fast, as evidenced by the circuit breakers and control panels that had grenades flung into them. He saw the corpses of two unfortunate technicians that happened to be in the room when the Russians flung the grenades inside.
"Davai!" a command echoed from a catwalk above his head.
Frozone ducked out of site. The Russians were still here and were obviously leaving, as he heard the sound of heavy paratrooper boots against the steel of the catwalk. He followed, running noiselessly up the concrete stairs, past the dead security guard, following the Russians as closely as he dared. There were about a dozen commandoes in ski masks, or wearing black watch caps with darkened faces running, occasionally turning to see if they were being followed.
Helen walked onto the porch, a cup of tea in one hand and a sleepy Jack Jack in the other. The laundry was turning in the machine, she had already done the vacuuming and it really was a beautiful spring day outside.
The woman next door walked out onto her porch to water her plants and waved. Helen waved back and the woman put the watering can and walked towards Helen's porch.
"How did dinner go at Quake?" Piper asked.
"It was OK." Helen replied, diplomatically. Until the psychotic disguise artist, this Zartan character, turned up.
"Are you sure?" Piper asked, "I do read the newspaper you know. And I know that there was a big fight there."
"Lets just say it was a good dinner until the Misfits showed up." Helen replied.
Piper rolled her eyes, "Believe me, I feel your pain. They're…"
At that moment a blond haired fellow built like an ex-football player came running down the street. "HELP!" he shouted.
Chasing after him were five men dressed like 18th Century pirates. "AR HAR HAR HAR!" they shouted as they waved their cutlasses.
"It's time to play pin the tail on the landlubber! AR HA HA HA HAR!" one of them shouted.
"Oh great, they're at it again." Piper groaned.
"Who? You know those maniacs?" Helen asked.
"Yes." Piper replied, "And those maniacs are friends of the Misfits. They're a bunch of lunatic pirate wannabes near as I can tell."
Piper felt bad for not telling Helen the truth. She seemed like a nice enough lady. How is a housewife going to handle the fact that they aren't wannabe pirates, but actual pirates whose world was destroyed by the Heartless and whose leader managed to lead them to our world and safety with the Misfits? I don't think she can handle that does of truth…
Helen thought to herself as well. Pirate wannabes running loose? Crazy mutants? And not to mention someone named Zartan? I'd better ask Marian about all of this. Meanwhile, as soon as Bob gets home we're having a family conference. It looks like we've got some hero work to do in this town…
"How was lunch?" Jan Shimoda asked, as he opened the passenger black side door of the 2006 Dodge Ram 1500 with the markings of a local surveying company on it.
"Delicious." Bluey replied, as he climbed in. He had just walked Marian to a waiting car that would take her back to ACME HQ about five minutes ago.
"I was talking about the company." Shimoda replied.
"Will you knock it off, mate?" Bluey replied, "I doubt you drove over here to give me a slaggering about my love life."
"As much as I would enjoy bugging you about it until the cows came home, there's a slightly more pressing matter at hand." Jan replied.
"What's that?" Bluey replied.
"Word on the street is that this world may have more awareness of other worlds and the Heartless than we realize." Jan replied.
"Marian didn't tell me anything about it." Bluey replied.
"This is only recent news. The bugs we planted at the Parr residence before they moved in picked this up." Jan replied.
"Right. We'd better brief Marian and Aron on this." Bluey replied, "What about Purvis and Papa Louie?"
"Papa Louie sent me to fetch you. Purvis is tracking the Pirates with Sprocket. Aron's acting as backup." Jan replied.
"Something tells me he's not going to be too happy about missing this particular lunchtime meeting." Bluey replied, as Jan backed the truck out of the parking space.
"She'll forgive him." Jan replied, "But on a personal note, what do you think?"
"About what?" Bluey replied.
"You know what I mean. He never even told her the truth about what he really does for a living." Jan replied, "He probably never told her his real name."
"It's not exactly easy to tell loved ones even a tenth of what we really do." Bluey replied.
"Some of us make it work." Jan replied, "Is that why you don't want to follow things through with Marian? You know if you apply a bit of effort, you two could make it work."
"Perhaps. But the odds are slim of affairs working out." Bluey replied, "Paramilitary work on my side, and a case officer's load on her side doesn't make family life all that easy."
"Bollocks, to use your own words." Jan replied, "Look at Bruce and Rebecca back in Edinburgh."
"Look, mate, Bruce is an analyst, and Rebecca's an engineer. Not exactly paramilitary blokes." Bluey replied.
"I'm still saying, that life in ACME doesn't automatically disqualify you from married life. You'll never know if you don't try." Jan replied.
"And if I ruin a friendship I've had since childhood? It's a bad risk." Bluey replied.
"Considering you've had a thing for Marian since puberty, I doubt friendship is what's holding you back." Jan replied, "What happened to you out there? You haven't been the same since Nigeria?"
"You were there, Jan." Bluey replied, "You know damn well what we went through."
"Yeah. Sometimes I wish I could forget everything we saw there too." Jan replied, "Having someone you love help you thorough things like that helps. Even if they can't know exactly what it is that bothers you."
"For fuck's sake, how's Marian going to react to the fact that I shot a surrendering man through the head." Bluey snapped.
"Considering we caught him raping that poor woman, I'm sure she'd understand." Jan replied.
Honey did not sit idly by as Lucius went out to trail the Russians. Her friend Erin had just phoned her with some disturbing news. What looked like several formations of Soviet armor and infantry were hours away from the border with Metroville. They had been within striking distance for months, and Metroville's defense force had been alerted. The Soviets claimed that it was in response to Syndrome's takeover of the government, and then claimed the force remained there on maneuvers.
Now, Erin's latest report was that there were rumors that the Bulgarians, East Germans, Poles, and Czechs were massing along the border as well. All that manpower and equipment was clearly for one reason: invasion. But when?
She thanked God she'd charged her laptop battery, because she was looking through archived articles since Syndrome's takeover. The Union Carbide fire was definitely no accident, now that she looked at it. The Soviets probably sabotaged the facility and rigged the fuel supplies and generator with demolition charges that carried incendiary devices.
Huph being killed was just one in a string of inexplicable deaths of Metroville's higher ranking citizens. Recently, the mayor of Westport's limousine had exploded. From what Erin had said, it looked like the Russians shot it with an anti-tank missile of some kind. The final blow of this covert operation was due to happen, but when?
Her cell phone rang just then and Honey answered, "Hello?"
"Honey, it's me." Lucius said, "I've found a team of them, I'm going to follow."
"Be careful." Honey began, hiding her fear. From what she knew of the spetsnaz units, they invariably left no witnesses to their assaults.
Nikolai Vatunin returned to the abandoned mine with his team, unaware that Frozone was following them. He entered a frenzy of activity. The Naval spetsnaz Detachment 2-F-50 to a man was engaged in preparing weapons, reloading magazines, dozing sailors were being kicked awake by NCOs.
"What's happening, Comrade Major?" Nikolai asked.
The radioman approached the two officers just then and handed a message to Major Ivanovich. "Take your element and attack the Omnidroid launching facility."
"Yes Comrade Major." Nikolai replied. He turned to one of his NCOs and said, "Tell the men to refit, maximize ammunition and grenades and meet me here in five minutes."
"Yes Comrade Lieutenant." The NCO said.
Nikolai watched as a fifteen man detachment left the mine. Junior Lieutenant Yemelyan, a good friend of his from his pre-service days nodded. Nikolai returned the nod. No words were exchanged. What a man did not know he could not spill in capture. Nikolai knew one thing and that the last grenade was for himself, there was no way in hell he was going to be a captive.
As he watched the team depart his own troops began to file in, until all twenty of them were sitting on helmets or stones, or crouched around him.
"Alright. Our objective is the destruction of the Omnidroid launching facility 16km east of us on the coastline." Nikolai began, "Our primary target is the command and control facilities. Secondary targets include the solid fuel depot itself and the base power grid. We will take the command and control bunker first, and hold it."
Nikolai drew a crude map of the facility on the dirt floor of the mine. It was a hexagonal compound, with a launching silo on each corner, containing a single Omnidroid. "The base defenses include roaming watches around the perimeter, assisted by dogs and there is a company of shock troops based in the town of Hovel down Highway 2 along the coast."
Fifteen against one hundred and fifty shock troops that would certainly come screaming down the highway to rescue the facility guards looked like long odds. But Nikolai knew that the guards were likely bored, tired conscripts, walking routine patrols with their hoods drawn tightly. The weather was on the side of the spetsnaz for this operation.
The velocipods relied on for longer range patrol duty were also grounded for this operation, and Nikolai knew that air warning for the defenders of the Omnidroid base was nonexistent.
He could tell the men thought this was a suicide mission, judging by the grim expressions on their faces. He knew they would go, because they were spetsnaz, men who believed in a triple credo, "Don't fear. Don't beg. Don't trust."
Meanwhile, Lucius Best trailed the first detachment he had seen leave the entrance of the abandoned mine. Thanks to following the Soviet detachment he had avoided encountering the worst of the booby traps and perimeter defenses and alarms they had around the area. The Russians clearly had come prepared. Not only were perimeter listening posts manned with alert guards, but mines of varying sorts were in place. Even with his precautions, he nearly avoided tripping a Bouncing Betty mine that would have popped up from the ground before it blasted him in half.
Must be getting old. Lucius thought. He watched the other detachment go, following it as closely as he dared. They were heading towards the coast, he realized, and from what he remembered of maps of the area there was a radar early warning post in that direction.
He quickened his pace; he had to warn the soldiers at the facility that the Soviets were coming. He realized, then, that he could do no such thing. He could easily compromise his position by moving, alerting the Russians to his presence.
Syndrome's no friend of yours. He killed so many Supers, he nearly killed Bob. Why do you care about the fact that one of his radar stations is about to be hit hard by the Russians? Lucius thought, as he raced through the dark woods.
Those young men of Metroville that joined his armed forces might be confused and mixed up, but they don't deserve to be simply gunned down. Lucius rationalized as he raced after the Soviet detachment.
ACME HQ, Edinburgh: Bruce and Thud were working frantically decoding a message from one of their automated listening post, hidden in a buoy off of Metroville's coastline. Things were going to hell in a hand basket quickly over there. The murders of important officials, the destruction of numerous power nodes, attacks on military facilities, and now several radar stations and command and control nodes were being attacked. At least three in the past hour were disabled, all of them near Omnidroid facilities.
Thud was working at decoding Soviet radio transmissions, and sipped his fifth cup of tea in as many hours. Both he and Bruce together with three other ACME cryptographers and intelligence interpreters had shut themselves in the Bubble forty eight hours ago.
Bruce walked over for some more tea. He had slept scarcely three hours in two days, interpreting the messages Thud and his guys were frantically decoding. He stank of dried sweat, he itched between the shoulder blades, he missed Rebecca, whom he'd watched leave the building to go home twice, stopping to wave at him.
He looked through the messages again. Most of them were single words, and strings of numbers, and they coincided with different attacks. For instance, the one that had been sent hours before Gilbert Huph and his driver were gunned down on a highway in Metroville was a string of "3131313131".
He guessed straightaway those were code words to commence operations all over Metroville. There were other messages that looked like routine dispatches.
"Damn Soviet codes aren't the problem. It's Syndrome's codes that take forever to break." Thud grumbled, as he read at another pile of unencrypted documents, "It takes me about an hour to decode Soviet transmissions, but it takes twice as long to decode Syndrome's messages."
"But there's one Soviet transmission I can't figure out just yet." Thud cotinued, "It's a single word 'Decapitation' and that's all."
"Get some sleep, mate." Bruce said.
"I'd say the same of you." Thud replied, "You look like death."
"Look in the bloody mirror." Bruce replied.
"We've got these transmissions to decode." Thud replied.
"And we're also human." Bruce replied, "We've slept a grand total of three hours, in bursts about twenty minutes or so."
"There was that forty minute spurt you got." Thud replied.
"Look, we should get some rest." Bruce replied, "Before we burn out entirely."
"I know. I just know that something bad is going to happen, especially with the Russians involved." Thud replied.
"We just lost two Omnidroid launch sites, several radar early warning sites are also disabled." Mirage began. The man she reported to turned.
He was clearly a red haired man, for what was left of his hair stood in a red shock. One of his eyes was blue, but the other eye was a red electro-optic orb set into a cybernetic half a face. His left arm from the elbow down was entirely mechanical, as were both of his legs. He wore a blue cape, white boots, and a black suit with a large white 'S' on his chest.
"Things are proceeding according to planned then?" Syndrome began.
Mirage replied, "Yes."
"Spread word about possible Soviet germ warfare plans and begin inoculation immediately." Syndrome began.
"That will take some time." Mirage replied.
"We don't need to inoculate everybody." Syndrome replied, "Just those closest to the coastline and the border areas."
"Are you sure you want to release the Heartless right now, my love." Mirage began.
"War is the perfect sowing ground for despair, anger and pain." Syndrome replied, "And the Serum should make the transformations go that much faster, especially in the face of the Soviet offensive. See to it that the 'vaccine' is distributed immediately."
A warning appeared on a screen behind Syndrome. "It appears that one of our television broadcast stations has been compromised." Syndrome began, "No doubt…"
"People of Metroville…." Syndrome's voice could be heard, "As you no doubt heard, there have been attempts to assassinate me and my top officials for months. All military units are to remain in their positions and take no orders from senior officers, because they are traitors who will soon be removed from their posts."
"Soon." Mirage said, "The Soviets and the Warsaw Pact are going to come crashing across the border…"
"All is going according to planned, then." Syndrome replied, "I must say, the Russian imposters who made the tape are definitely top notch. And the actor who played me was flawless."
"I take it you knew that spetsnaz forces took over the Central Broadcasting Channel twenty minutes ago?" Mirage asked.
"No. But certainly the GRU did its homework on me, and they certainly doing a credible job of sowing panic into the population. Time for the virus scare broadcast, get me on the air in ten minutes…" Syndrome replied.
Lucius returned to his home, a distraught man. "Honey…" Lucius began.
"Things have gotten worse." Honey finished.
"How did you know?" Lucius asked, in the hours that he had been gone; electricity had been restored to his quarter of the city.
Honey turned the television on, and Syndrome's broadcasted voice echoed. Almost after the televised appearance, nothing but static could be seen on the television screen.
The phone rang just then and Honey answered, "Erin? What's going on?"
"Did you see the broadcast?" Erin Grant, Honey's old colleague from her days with the Metroville Federal Investigative Organization (FIO), asked.
"Yes, I just saw it." Honey replied, "The one where Syndrome accuses the military commanders of being traitors."
Erin, usually collected and the voice of reason, sounded extremely spooked, "That's why three of Syndrome's soldiers just dragged Director Womack out of his office less than an hour ago."
Honey blanched. Sure she might have had her differences with the misogynistic old toad that ran the FIO but for him to be dragged out of his office for questioning, possibly never to be seen again…
"He just kept yelling he was innocent and that it was all some GRU scheme." Erin replied.
"Framing people and deception operations are things the Soviets excel at, so I think there's some merit to his ranting." Honey replied.
"But what if Womack was a traitor? Like the broadcast implied." Erin asked.
"I don't know." Honey replied, "But honestly, I don't know what to believe anymore right now, regarding the TV and radio."
"The TV in our part of the city just went dead. It seems like all the channels stopped transmitting." Erin replied, "Listen, Honey, I need to get back into the office. Everyone's in an uproar about fifth columnists, Soviet infiltrators and everything else."
"Be careful out there, girl." Honey replied.
Special Agent Erin Grant hung up her cell phone, and stuffed it in the pocket of her jacket. As she walked out of the alley where she'd made the call from, she felt something brush against the side of her head, very lightly. She turned around, thinking some bum had decided to grasp a lock of her hair and froze.
Sticking out of the dumpster was a human forearm. Erin climbed on top of a wooden crate next to the dumpster and peeked inside. There were three corpses, all of them having been dead at most two hours ago. They were the bodies of three men stripped to their underwear, each of them having been executed by being shot in the head at close range.
Three soldiers dragged Womack off. Three dead bodies in the dumpster. Erin thought. There's no coincidence here! The troops that took Womack weren't Syndrome's men, they were probably spetsnaz troopers who captured this patrol, took their uniforms and then executed the patrol members…
Erin ran inside the building, hoping she could save Womack, but she felt an ice cold stab of dread. Her instincts were telling her Womack was very likely already dead shortly after falling into Soviet hands.
"Soyuz nerushimy respublik svobodnykh. Splotila naveki velikaya Rus'! Da zdravstvuyet sozdanny voley narodov. Yediny, moguchy Sovetsky Soyuz!" The Radio Moscow broadcast just before dawn played the Hymn of the Soviet Union.
Captain Anatoly Shumilov, quietly sung the lyrics of the patriotic song of the Rodina while in the background the multi-barreled 9K51 Grad mobile artillery vehicles of his battery launched 122mm rockets into positions occupied by Metroville Defense Forces. The whooshes of flying rockets were complimented by the blasts of the 'God of War', the General Voronov's heavy artillery. Howitzers and field guns located further to the rear added their shells to the barrage and overhead MiG-27 and Sukhoi Su-25 fighter bombers began their assaults on positions further to the rear.
He continued to sing to the long life of the Soviet Motherland as he watched the tanks coming in behind the barrage of the artillery.
"Slavsya, Otechestvo nashe svobodnoye, Druzhby narodov nadyozhny oplot, Partiya Lenina — sila narodnaya. Nas k torzhestvu kommunizma vedyot!" In the back of his mind, Shumilov thought ironically that he was conducting his own orchestra, but an orchestra of destruction to the enemies of the Soviet Union.
The BMP armored personnel carriers followed in close stead, as elements of the 203rd Motorized Infantry Regiment followed behind the tanks as they crossed the border into Metroville. It was a grand display of Soviet military might, for this Second Great Patriotic War.
Shumilov barked a command to the radioman, to inform the battery to advance as well. The barrage had lifted and the vehicles began their inexorable advance across the border. Already things were shaping out to be a success. He watched as two Motorized Infantrymen led a half a dozen prisoners, dazed looking with glassy eyes and blood pouring out of their noses, as if they'd suffered the after effects of major concussive blasts brought about by the heavy artilery.
The battery advanced to its intended position as Shumilov gave his orders to deploy security and make ready for the next call for fire. The town of Bordertown was now a heap of ruins from the artillery barrage only hours before, and the few Motorized Infantry elements still in the area were carrying out 'mop up' operations behind the lines.
Some more soldiers from a Motorized Infantry company were digging graves nearby, and tipping the bodies of fallen comrades inside. The advance couldn't stop, because there were VDV elements holding bridges and airfields ten to twenty kilometers inside enemy territory.
Paratroopers. Crazy sons of bitches the lot of them. Shumilov thought. Jump from perfectly good aircraft behind enemy lines, fighting as light infantry with limited anti-armor defense. And Syndrome's forces are likely to be reinforcing the lines. I wouldn't want to be in the VDV for anything.
Shumilov hadn't lived thirty-six years by being stupid. He knew that this war would be a hard fought campaign for the Soviet Union. He wanted to laugh at the political officers, the commissars, making their exhortations of ultimate victory for the Motherland. Ultimate victory would certainly come at a price for the Soviet Union, a price that could well be the lives of the young gunners readying their rocket artillery pieces for yet another barrage.
From his command vehicle's open hatch, Shumilov could hear the young soldiers jabbering on excitedly about the ease of their advance. The element of surprise was now lost, Shumilov knew, and the war would settle into a relative meat grinder of a conflict. He decided to let them keep their enthusiasm. They would learn in time the rigors of long campaigns.
Shumilov leaned against his PKM machinegun as he looked behind him to the east, as the sun rose blood red in the sky, red for the rise of the Red Menace…
TBC
AN – I'll explain why Mirage is back with Syndrome in future chapters.
Federal Investigative Organization (FIO) – Metroville's equivalent to the American FBI.
GRU – 'Main Intelligence Directorate'. Soviet Military Intelligence organization. Spetsnaz belongs to the GRU.
Rodina – Mother Russia, the Soviet Motherland.
VDV – Soviet Airborne Forces. They're paratroopers who act as light infantry behind the frontlines to capture airfields and bridges.