Talosian Chronicles 6: Armageddon (14 page)

"Yes Sir, Officer Lissa and I were just working out a few details for the base. The holding area will be finished by the time the first prisoners get here, but the base will take most of the day to get built." He shrugged. "It should work out just fine."

"Excellent, then we'll be going. Time to ruin a drug lord's day," Cindy said, grinning.

Cindy's team and the Marines put in a long day. Santiago's organizations spanned most of the province and the team had to do a lot of traveling. The militia did try to fight them, but to Cindy, the effort seemed half hearted, as if the soldiers already knew the outcome of their fight. Hell, most of them probably did; they'd been trying to get into the defense compound for a week and had done nothing but waste a lot of ammunition.

A lot of the men simply dropped their weapons and sat on the ground with their hands behind their heads. They hadn't even needed to be stunned. O'Dell and his Marines treated the men well, and made sure they had everything they needed before leaving them at the holding area.

That situation changed drastically when they approached Santiago's main compound. The guards here were not the normal locals hired as militia for the drug lord, these men were just as bad, and in some cases worse, than Santiago himself. He had murderers, child molesters, kidnappers, and every manner of evil thug imaginable working directly for him. These were the men Santiago used when he needed to hurt another drug lord, or force a politician to work for him.

Cindy told O'Dell that none of these men should be offered the Marine job unless cleared by Officer Shannon. With the first bunch of militia captured, it had been assumed that they were the folks Cindy had mentioned; locals hired by Santiago as additional security. For the most part, that had been true. But it was painfully clear that these men were not the same. More than once Cindy wanted to just kill them all and be done with it.

About half way through the 'battle' for the compound, Lissa reported that Santiago had ordered his men to surrender but they had refused.

"Fuckin' great! That means we need to get in there and protect that asshole from his own men!" Cindy said. "Sergeant O'Dell; continue the assault, but if any of them get hurt I
might
get mad at you. Remember, there are civilians in the compound, which means the dumb fucks will try to take hostages. Sam, we need to be in the mansion; secure and protect Santiago for extraction. Ignore everything else; mission has priority."

"Understood Colonel; last one to slap a shield generator on the drug lord has to buy dinner!" Sam replied.

"You're on! O'Dell, see if you can get someone into the labs and get the civilians to shut down anything that could be dangerous and put the rest to sleep," Cindy ordered.

"We're on it," O'Dell replied.

The mass driver weapons on the rails had been reprogrammed to fire stun pellets. The tiny projectiles could still cause a small amount of damage, weren't considered lethal. The small pellets popped when they hit anything harder than air, and released a small amount of sleep gas and a taser pulse. The gas was also conductive and helped the pulse knock the target out. The two rails shot from the cover of the jungle surrounding the compound and dropped everything in the main courtyard in front of the mansion.

Sam and his gunner jumped out and ran into the big building. Cindy pulled up next to him, but she and Shannon used their jump packs to enter the building on the second floor. They charged through the open patio doors to find a women and a young boy pointing assault rifles at them. Off to one side and behind a crude barracade was Jesus Santiago and another young woman.

"Juanita, Alejandro! Stop, out down your weapons!" Santiago ordered in Spanish. That was when Cindy noticed Santiago had been shot in the leg. The girl with him had been trying to stop the bleeding.

As the women and boy lowered their weapons, Cindy called. "Target secured, but he's been shot. His family appear to be with him. Four prisoners total."

"Damn!" Sam replied. "I was really looking forward to that dinner!"

Shannon quickly took the weapons away from the two defenders and but gave them personal shield generators. Cindy moved over to Jesus and the girl.

"I would guess you know why we're here then, Senior Santiago," Cindy replied in Spanish.

"Si, At first, I thought it was the Americans, but when I saw who it was, I ordered the men to surrender. They wanted to die fighting, so they ignored me," the man replied.

Cindy chuckled. "They are going to be very disappointed in both of us then. We are not killing them only putting them to sleep. When they wake up, they will be in cuffs and waiting for transport to prison." Cindy reached out and put a shield on the girl before doing the same with Santiago. "These are personal shields. They will prevent a bullet from finding you, although it would appear that you already have one."

Cindy had her suit scan the wound on the man's right leg. The wound wasn't life threatening, but would need to be treated soon. Cindy got her first aid supplies out stopped the bleeding and dressed the wound.

"I am Colonel Cindy Williams of the Terran Defense Forces. Sir, you are now under arrest for assaulting our defense installation. We have also been asked by Interpol and other law enforcement agencies to detain you for trial. Under our laws you have the right to be treated fairly and will be protected to the best of our ability while you are in our custody. Everything you say and do from this point forward is being monitored and recorded, and can be used during trial proceedings.

"An advocate will be available to you to ensure these rights are upheld while you are in Terran custody. In light of the circumstances of your situation, your family is also being taken into protective custody. That status can and will change if it is found that they are guilty of any crimes as well. Do you have any questions you would ask regarding these rights as I have described them to you?"

"Not right now, can I ask questions later?" Jesus asked.

Cindy nodded. "You may for the duration of your time with us. Senior Santiago, I do not have a pain killer to give you. When it comes time to move you, I'll stun you and carry you  out of here. Please don't offense; it is simply the quickest and safest way to get you back to the compound for treatment."

"You will treat Papa's wounds then?" The girl asked.

Cindy nodded. "While you are under our care, you have the right to free medical treatment. When we get back to the compound, your Papa will be treated and his wounds healed."

"Thank you for protecting my Family, Colonel," Santiago said and leaned back.

Cindy nodded and stood and pointed to the women. "Your name is Juanita?"

"Si Colonel," the woman replied.

"If you have any family heirlooms or keepsakes that are precious to you, I would recommend getting them. We have orders to destroy the entire compound; this mansion is included in that," Cindy explained.

"Colonel, under the mansion, in the basements, you will find a great many disturbing things. IN order to maintain control of the men I have working for me, I had to allow them certain freedoms. Some of them…" Santiago shook his head. "No, I would say none of them were good. The basements were for my men. I know a lot of bad things went on down there, but I did not want to know the details."

"Colonel, he's telling the truth. He doesn't approve of what went on down there, but felt it was a necessary evil to maintain control of his men," Shannon said. "Once the Marines find that place, we might have trouble keeping the men from here alive long enough to reach trial."

"What a mess. Make sure they have medics with them, and lets get this over with," Cindy replied.

TDF
Star Dancer

Equatorial Orbit

Earth, Sol Sector

The day after sending the Prometheus out to destroy the scouts in Tau Ceti, Admiral H'joles called Ian back with the bad news. Fleets had begun departing the Grimaria system. The real clock was now running.

Ian called the Secretary General and to ask when the meeting was scheduled.

"Currently, it's on the schedule for nine tomorrow morning, eastern time. Has something else happened?" The Secretary General asked. "You look worried."

Ian gave him a sad smile. "Alliance Command just told me that the Imperial fleets have begun leaving their staging point. Based on exit trajectory, fleet size and apparent fleet structure, Alliance Command gives it a ninety-six percent probability they are coming here. In twenty-two days, they will drop out of hyper-space at various points in the sector within twelve light-hours of their targets.  At that point, the fight will be on. This is no longer a possibility, Sir; it's happening."

The man looked like he was going to throw-up. "Ian, you know I worked with you, believed in what you were doing, but I think, deep down, I was hoping that somehow you were wrong."

"I wish I was too, Sir. At least we were able to get more built than I originally believed we would be able to get done. In a fight of this type, victory can never be assured, but everything we are able to get done can only improve our odds of survival. We do still have more to do, but I know what they are planning is going to cost them. It's going to cost them a lot," Ian replied.

"But will it be enough?" The man asked.

"There is no way to know, Sir. The Empire is devoting most of their offensive capability in this galaxy to this single attack. It will be the largest, most destructive battle of this entire war. We are going to take losses, most likely heavy losses. It's going to be very bad, Sir, but we will get through this; we have too. There is no other alternative," Ian said grimly. "I'll go brief my people and get them started on final preparations. Admiral H'joles has already ordered the remaining available forces here.

"I'll send a few techs down tonight and set up a few extra holographic emitters for the briefing in the morning. If time permits, I'll also prepare a press release that the world leaders will be able to use to inform the people of what's coming. Sir, that's not negotiable; they need to be told the truth now."

"I'll make sure the staff knows you'll be here to install more equipment. I think you might want to put your people on alert for action down here as well. If any of the countries are going to do something, this will be the trigger for it," the man replied. "I think there has been a lot of secret planning going on. Some of our more militant members think that if they can take some of their neighbors before this attack, they will be allowed to do it and keep the land since you'll be too busy dealing with the external threat."

"Idiots. They still think they can do whatever they want, even in the face of total destruction. Well, we won't need to do what your thinking, Sir. The one nice thing about all those nice new shiny weapons they have is that they can be turned off. We've told them from the beginning that we won't allow them to do anything like that," Ian said.

"They're all betting that you won;t stop them because of your oath to protect and harm yourself. Basically, they believe the warning about preventing war is a bluff. I'll bet my office at least one of them will try something," the Secretary warned.

Ian just shook his head. "Well, I'm not going remind them. If they dumb enough to try, then I'm dumb enough to educate them. None should get hurt either, but I suppose a few casualties are possible. I hope their aren't any, but it's possible. It will be embarrassing for the national leaders though; I'll make sure of that."

"Well, we'll deal with it when it happens. I'll let you go since I know you have a lot yet to do. Take care of yourself, Admiral."

"And you, Sir. I'll see you in the morning," Ian replied and closed the channel.

"Alex, I need to speak to…" Ian began but she smiled.

"Council Chairman Belden is on comm two, Sir," Alex said.

Ian sighed. "You scare me sometimes, Alex." She giggled as he opened the channel to Luke Belden.

"Ian, Alex said you had some important news. The rest of the Council is also listening in. What's up?" Luke asked.

Ian gave him the information he had, and informed them of the meeting at the UN in the morning. Then he gave them a brief run down on the state of preparations so far and what he expected to be finished before the arrival of the enemy.

"Since the world leaders themselves will be be present via tele-presence, we will also be there, Admiral. This is might be too much for Ambassador Lang to handle on her own. As for the countries trying something, Ambassador Ling did mention something about that; she felt that the most likely culprits would be India or Pakistan, Libya, Syria, China or North Korea," Luke replied. "We would have told you sooner, but none of us thought it was actually possible."

Ian shook his head. "Never underestimate the greed or stupidity of an Earth Politician. If anyone does try something, I planned on going on live TV and ordering the weapons systems shut off. Maybe if we embarrass the first couple bad enough, the others will forget about their own agendas."

"I doubt you will need to go on live TV, Admiral. Just the fact that the weapons shut down will be more than enough to get the point across. Doing more would simply rub their noses in it. While I do admit that does sound entertaining, we need to build unity now more than ever. We don't have the time or the freedom left to us for playing games with those idiots," Laura Johnson said from off screen.