The End of the Beginning

No one could communicate anything to the front. Near the DMZ, AWACS were falling out of the sky. Vehicles were stopping dead in their tracks. Computers were turning off for good. Incheon was thankfully too far south to be affected by this rolling blackout. This distance, however, was also the city’s misfortune. Due to the incoming missile’s high ballistic arc and velocity, it was calculated that Incheon would be first of the six-targeted cities to be hit. They had just under a half hour to respond before annihilation.

“General, the Zumwalt is online and ready to target the missiles for interception. We now have three more tracking. Two seem to be headed to Japan, Tokyo and Osaka. The other is headed for Beijing. Chinese and Japanese air defenses are going up. Twenty-six minutes ’til impact.” General Rose rubbed his eyes. “Shit.”

The bustle of the room had heightened. A gelid fear swept over the command center. No one wanted to believe it. General Rose leaned over a computer console, puffing his cigar. William stood still, staring out at the command center. The soldiers were like ants, running around frantically, trying to reestablish communications. It was no use. Their calls went unanswered. The general puffed his cigar one last time and then put it out, looking at the rising smoke trail as though disappointed he would not be able to finish it.

“They know it’s over… It’s mutually assured destruction,” he whispered under his shocked, tobacco laden breath. He sprang into action.

“Get the Zumwalt back,” he barked at an unsuspecting soldier. “They need to know the severity of the situation. Per my orders, give them authorization to seek and destroy all nine targets over any airspace necessary. The Chinese will just have to suck it up. And you!” he exclaimed, pointing at another, “Get POTUS on the line!” Laying in wait, in the southern Sea of Japan, was the USS Zumwalt, the first naval vessel of its class. Stealthy and narrow, the Zumwalt cut through water like a blade. Silent as can be, one could hear a pin drop on the ocean floor with her passive sonar.

Missile silo doors opened atop either side of her forward deck, concealed to lurking enemy radar. Nine RIM - 161 Standard Missile 3s, otherwise called SM - 3s, were armed and readied inside the silos. They were anti-ballistic missiles designed for just this situation. Men and women on board the ship prepared. A voice over the vessels intercom system made intentions clear.

“Thirty seconds to firing.”

“We need to evacuate our people out of Incheon and Seoul immediately,” Rose said to a group of senior staff. Rose then pointed to William and motioned for him to come over.

“Emerson, take your team and go to the Songdo District. The secretary of state is there.”

“What’s he doing there?” asked William, surprised.

“Secret diplomatic mission. He’ll need help getting out. The air raid sirens have already started sounding. The roads will be a mess. Find him, pick his ass up, and then fly as fast as you can out to sea and don’t come back. No one else,” Rose said sternly. “Do you understand, soldier?” A voice rang out over the conversation. “General, the Zumwalt is thirty seconds away from firing. Twenty-five minutes till detonation.”

“Go, Emerson, go! Make sure you’re out with at least four minutes ’til impact, no matter what.”

William nodded firmly and said, “Yes, sir. See you in the North.”

A final countdown had begun on board the Zumwalt. Once each SM - 3 left its silo with its lightweight exo-atmospheric projectile kinetic warhead, it would be traveling at Mach fifteen. It would take only minutes for them to intercept the missiles. Twelve seconds. The crew stood by, waiting anxiously.

A Striker almost ran William over as he sprinted out of the command center. Stumbling away from it, he shoved past scrambling soldiers and darted to his team’s staging area to get suited up. William looked down at his watch. Twenty-four minutes remained.

“Sir,” said someone grabbing his shoulder. It was Darrow.

“Sergeant!” William said with surprise. “Get to a shelter now! There are nukes inbound.”

“I know,” said Darrow. “I just heard. I wanted to see if you needed any help, sir.”

“Me?!” exclaimed William. “You’re the one in crunches Sergeant. Get your ass to a shelter, now!”

“Yes, sir. What about you? Where are you going?”

“Just for a little joyride across the harbor to do a quick rescue. Great way to start the weekend, huh? I’ll see you soon enough, okay?”

“Yes, sir,” Darrow said doubtfully. “Good luck.”

Deep within the ship’s maze of corridors, the command information center was busy processing data. It would be within the confines of this room that the fates of human lives would be determined. Data from each of the Zumwalt’s SM - 3s was reviewed and cleared. An operator made the announcement.

“This is CIC, clear to engage targets. Fire!”

Nine missiles were launched from the deck in rapid succession in a Medusa hair-like scurry of smoke trails and flames. In seconds, the missiles went supersonic, the percussions of each sonic boom resonating across the water. The kinetic energy warheads contained no explosives, using only the physics, their name implied to eliminate targets upon impact. Within two minutes the missiles were over land.

Calls for help were already coming in from across the city. William’s Valor lifted off from the scrambling FOB under the overture of air raid sirens. It headed out across the mouth of the harbor down to the south of the Incheon Bridge. Other aircraft were doing the same. William began to brief his team on the situation.

“Alright, here’s what we’ve got. Approximately nine minutes ago, our satellites detected nine nuclear birds headed towards South Korean, Japanese, and Chinese air space. Incheon is one of the targeted cities.” The airmen’s eyes grew wide with concern. They waited for William to continue.

“We are to rescue the secretary of state from the Songdo District. We have eighteen minutes to do so. Four minutes before detonation, we are to drop what we are doing and haul ass to the southwest, out of the blast zone. That gives us fourteen minutes of useful time. Is that understood?” A resounding, “Yes sir,” called from every corner of the cabin.

“We will not fail,” William said sternly, emphasizing each word. “I won’t allow it.”

“We have confirmation from the Zumwalt of all nine intercept missiles firing, General,” said a soldier, looking slightly relieved. “Interception in 126 seconds. Also, both the president and the UN Security Council have been notified.” “Good. Okay, people, start heading down to the bunkers. Take only what you can carry. I will stay here with a few volunteers to monitor the missiles until interception has either occurred or failed.” The general looked around the command center and was met with raised hands all around. He wanted it made clear that no one had to stay.

“Ladies and gentleman, this is a nuke we are talking about,” he said seriously. “I wouldn’t blame anyone for wanting to leave.”

The raised hands remained up and high.

“Very well,” he said proudly, “stations, people, stations.”

The Valor leveled off at twenty-four feet above the harbor waters, kicking spray aloft as it flew by. With the two cabin doors open, the team was quickly drenched inside. A frantic call for help shot into their ears through their radios.

A small explosion made everyone look towards the Incheon Bridge’s central span. A massive six-lane highway cable-stayed design, it was twenty miles long and 755 feet high at the top of its two central towers. It welcomed all to the harbor entrance with its impressive size and futuristic elegance. Bordering the entire southeastern side of the city center, the bridge was so large it could be seen from space as a narrow white ribbon across the blue of the harbor.

“US aircraft in vicinity of Incheon Bridge,” called a voice through the radio, “we require immediate assistance. A tanker truck has exploded in an accident and a bus of school children is trapped amongst traffic. Please help them!” “Great,” Grace joked, “more buses.”

William swung half his body outside the cabin door looking at the slender bridge. A smoke plume was rising slowly. He could see the accident blocking all three lanes of east-bound traffic. Thousands had abandoned their vehicles and started running back towards shore along the bridge deck but William knew they would never make it to a shelter in time. William rushed to the cockpit and tapped one of the pilots on the shoulder.

“Get us over to that smoke plume!” he ordered.

The airmen looked at each other. Jones and a pilot both spoke out simultaneously.

“Sir,” Jones said, “we don’t have time respond to that. We have orders - ”

“Lieutenant,” the pilot interrupted, “I have orders to get to Songdo, not the bridge.”

“Pilot, there are school children on that bridge about to be vaporized. Get us to the bridge, now!”

“Those are not my orders Lieutenant Emerson. Now, get back - ”

“Fuck the orders!” William screamed. “Get me over to that bridge or I swear I will jump out of this plane and swim there myself! The secretary has a fucking bunker, they do not!” The pilot grumbled and shifted the joystick hard to the left. William crawled back into the cabin. “New plan,” he said into his headset radio, “We’re rescuing these kids first, then the secretary.” “We don’t have time for that,” Harden shouted.

“I’m all for bad ideas,” said Grace, “but I think Harden is right, sir. We can’t do both.”

William didn’t answer them. His team nervously eyed each other.

“This is Lieutenant William Emerson with the United States Air Force,” William radioed down to the sole police officer on the scene. “We are here to assist you. Please clear the area so we can drop our rescue baskets. We will only take the children in the bus.” The police officer cleared the bridge deck the best he could and signaled the Valor to lower its two baskets. Bridge cables attaching to each side of the road deck were no more than fifty feet away and the day was getting windy, making the Valor hard to control.

“Jones, Connell, we have room for seven survivors at most,” William cautioned. “That’s it. Make sure there isn’t a panic down there. One at a time and only the worst off!” “Yes, sir,” they replied in unison.

Connell was visibly nervous as he looked over the edge of the cabin door, readying to start the rescue. A huge crowd had gathered below.

“You’ll be fine,” William reassured him, crouching down to talk to him. “You’ve done this dozens of times in training. Now go!” he said. “I’ll be up here directing the action.” With a thumbs up, William lowered his men down on a winch at each door to the road deck below.

“Lieutenant, we’re down on the deck,” called Jones. “The first survivors are being put in the baskets. It’s a shit show down here. People are panicking. This police officer is having a hard time holding the crowd back.” By this point in the war, the sound of the air raid sirens going off was usually taken as an everyday false alarm but today was different. Updates and news flashes across social media and the government’s early warning text alerts made the public aware of the incoming nuclear strike. No one knew how big the missiles were or how they would hit. Would they be an airburst or a surface attack? This would make a difference. The lack of knowledge frustrated William.

He looked through his digital smart glasses down at the bridge deck. The Valor’s current height, wind speed, and even a heat sensor displaying temperature flaunted directly in front of his eyes. They were now forty-five feet directly above the deck near the western most tower almost straddled amongst the V-shaped cable system. The water was nearly 300 feet below them and the wind was gusting to thirty-five miles per hour. With a wave of his hand, Jones signaled to raise the baskets up.

“First survivors are in the air,” William said.

Every time he did this, raising a rescue basket with someone in it...

The basket I sat in felt so exposed to the elements, I thought I was going to fall out. On the inside, I kind of wanted to, just to make the nightmare end. In the light of the first post-apocalyptic day, I saw the world had changed. I had changed. There was no such thing as innocence anymore. There was only cold reality… “Baskets are below the cabin... Baskets are in the cabin door... Survivors are in the cabin.”

Grace and Harden got to work on the two children, securing them into seats and making them comfortable. They repeated this two more times until six had been saved. By now, several more cars had caught fire and the crowd was growing increasingly restless.

One of the pilots called out to William, “Lieutenant, message for you from General Rose.”

“Switch it over to my helmet,” William instructed. A soft static filled his helmet.

“This is Emerson,” he said. “Go ahead, General.”

“Emerson, the Zumwalt failed. All nine targets were missed.”

“What?! How?”

“We don’t know. The Zumwalt should have easily taken those missiles down. Each one changed trajectory as our intercepts approached them.”

“That’s impossible! I thought they didn’t have evasion technology. How did they get it?”

“It doesn’t matter anymore. You and your team need to leave now. Do you have the secretary?”

“No, sir, we diverted to a rescue call on the Incheon Bridge. We are airlifting civilians now.”

“What?!” Rose said, livid. “Your orders were clear! They are waiting for you, Lieutenant!”

“General, these are children! When we’re finished here we will pick up the secretary - ”

“Damnit, Emerson! There isn’t enough time! I am giving you a direct order - drop what you’re doing right now and get your team out. You’ve only got six minutes until detonation! If you don’t leave now, you won’t make minimum safe distance!” William stared across the terrified city. Defying the general’s orders would certainly gain him expulsion from the Air Force but there was a nuke coming so, at least to William, that did not really bother him at the moment.

A young girl with jet black hair and emotionless eyes looked up at him from the bridge. She was to be the last pulled up. From the cabin door, William could see she was no more than ten years old. Sergeant Jones was giving her the typical instructions before lift to get her ready for the ascent. Could he really leave this little girl to her doom, to burn in the fires of an artificially created sun?

I knew what it was like to die by water. I was not going to let this girl die by fire…

A drive so powerful, so as to forget all external consequence, tunneled his mind. He had to save her. “No, General,” he said. “I’m sorry. Goodbye...” William switched off the channel and continued with the mission at hand. General Rose changed his orders to the Valor pilots, trying to get them to leave. William immediately burst into the cockpit and turned off the radio. Both pilots looked terrified.

“The general said we only have six minutes left. We need to leave now!”

“We can’t, we still have this one girl to save and us talking is only delaying the hoist. We are not leaving until she’s up, understood? When she and our men are up, we’ll go.” Both pilots just looked away and out the cockpit windows. Sergeant Jones radioed up to William.

“Lieutenant, the girl coming up is named Kyung Soon. She doesn’t know a word of English. Just thought you might like to know that for when she gets aboard.” “Thank you, Jones. Raising the basket now. After her, we’ll get you up, and we’ll get out of here.”

“Copy that, sir. Connell is going up in his own basket any second now.”

The winds around the aircraft had grown to become a problem. As the girl’s basket ascended, it swayed perilously in the gusts.

“Damnit,” he grumbled. “Come on, come on!”

As the wind grew stronger, so did the panicked crowd. Finally forcing their way past the lone police officer, they stormed Sergeant Jones. Some tried to jump up to Connell’s basket, which hadn’t even made it ten feet off the ground. The Valor tipped due to a sudden weight imbalance. William looked down. One man had latched on to the basket and was trying to throw Connell out. He screamed over the radio.

“Sergeant,” he radioed to Jones, noting the chaos of the crowd below. “Get those people back! They will swamp you and the basket when I bring it back down! Sergeant!” The sergeant’s voice was drowned out by the crowd. They could be trampling him. A full-scale riot had broken out over the waters of Incheon harbor.

“Four minutes ’til detonation, Lieutenant,” cried one of the pilots. “We can’t hold this position for much longer. The winds are pushing us into the bridge.” “Alright, alright, the girl and Connell are almost up. I’ve lost visual of the sergeant. He is in the riot somewhere!”

His smart glasses scanned the crowd but nothing came back. Then he checked on the baskets. Connell was gone. His empty basket swayed as it traversed the last few feet to the cabin.

“No…” quivered William.

Harden and Grace grabbed the empty basket and brought it securely inside. Blood stained the interior of the basket. A jolt on his line brought his attention back to Kyung. She was getting closer and closer to the cabin, swaying now like the pendulum of a grandfather clock.

A loud ship horn rocked the Valor and its crew. William looked down and saw a destroyer steaming out of the harbor in a desperate attempt to escape the blast radius directly under the bridge. He watched as sailors rushed from deck to deck, trying to secure the ship for the impending shockwave. Waves trailed the great metal hulk; it was traveling at speeds that had to be tearing its engines apart. Hot thermals from its smokestack hit the Valor and it temporarily lost altitude in the warm air column. Diesel fumes and soot filled the cabin. He soon lost view of it behind the Valor but he could still hear its horn, alerting all to take shelter.

“Hold her steady! The basket!”

No longer able to keep the basket aligned, the cable swung around one of the bridge’s suspender cables, wrapping itself several times around. The Incheon Bridge and the Valor were now connected by a two inch thick steel wire.

William had to act fast. There were only three minutes left until detonation. He strung up a separate line, got into a harness, and clipped himself in at the waist. Grace took William’s position at the cabin door winch.

Grace stopped William just as he was about to jump out of the cabin door.

“Good luck, sir, whatever happens,” said Grace sorrowfully.

William nodded. Grace started the winch, lowering the lieutenant down on his new line, down the trapped wire until he reached the stranded basket with Kyung inside.

“Hello. I’m William,” he said pointing to himself. “You must be Kyung Soon.”

The little girl looked surprised at the sound of her name. Attaching a second harness to his own clip and wrapping it under her arms, William quickly got Kyung up and out of the basket. She was now level with his knees as she dangled from his harness. He cut the tangled wire to detach the Valor from the bridge cable. Once disconnected, he waved up to the cabin for the hoisting to begin of his own line. The downwash from the spinning rotors buffeted them from above. Thump, thump, thump, thump.

“Just keep looking at me, Kyung,” he said to the girl, pointing towards his eyes. “Right here.”

Kyung nodded and held onto him tightly. Over the radio came an ominous message from the pilots.

“Nuclear detonation imminent. We now have only one minute, thirty-six seconds. Get the lieutenant up!”

“Winch is going as fast as it can!” shouted Grace frantically.

Harden sat back in his seat, putting his head in his hands. They weren’t going to make it.

Radio calls began to flood his ear, the voices blending together until they became indistinguishable.

“This is the USS Gridley. How many evacuees do you have - ”

“Are people still on the road? We don’t have - ”

“Captain Bryant, what is your posi - ”

“Can anyone get a fix on - ”

“Does anybody copy? We got civilians trapped on the Inche - ”

“The airport is secure, permission to - ”

William reached for the cabin door frame and swiftly swung himself up into the Valor. Kyung had let go of his legs so he could get up and in the aircraft; she was now hanging, alone, two feet below the cabin. She swung dangerously below the aircraft, a toy for the wind to play with.

“Sixty seconds! Get her up!” screamed the pilots.

“Grace, Harden, get my legs, pull me in,” ordered William.

As his fellow soldiers dragged William back in the cabin, the clip holding Kyung snapped. She plummeted towards the ground. William leapt and caught her, hanging his upper body out the door. Harden and Grace each had a leg, groaning and straining. Kyung dangled in his shaking hands with hundreds of feet of air below.

“I’ll pull you up, don’t worry!” William wheezed. The radio chatter was now louder than the Valor’s engines and the riot on the bridge below was gruesome. F-16 fighters flew by, afterburners in full and ascending. A glimpse up gave William a tourist’s view of downtown Incheon. It was still, and its proud glass towers beamed over the city. The forests around the harbor and city still had some of their natural beauty as they covered the mountains like green shag carpeting until one could see no more at the smoggy horizon. Water below was blue and shimmering; a true city of paradise. A glint of light in the distance caught William’s eye.

“My god,” he said softly.

“Twenty seconds until detonation,” shrieked the pilots.

“I’ve almost got her up,” William said, beginning to pull her up. “She can make it!” he screamed. “She’ll make it!”

William had most of his body back in the cabin. One last pull would do it. One last pull…

I pulled has hard as I could in that collapsing hallway with what little strength I had left. I watched as she drowned in front of me, in my hands. The current was unstoppable. It would not let her go. Wind and rain came between us. She said goodbye as water spilled into her mouth. If I had had one last pull then… maybe… …And then it struck.