Silence engulfed the bridge. For a moment, nobody knew what to say. Montwik, who too was at a loss for words, stood in his place, motionless. "D..Did you double check?" He managed to say. "Yes, sir." the soldier replied. "The Kenjah's forces will have launch capabilities in five minutes, sir." the soldier replied. "Can our fighters take out the nuclear silos?" Montwik asked, grasping for possible solutions to what can only be called a crisis. "Sir... we designed this system. We neither have the manpower on the planet nor the time to destroy the silos." He replied. Montwik face turned pale. The look of helplessness washed over his face. I've never seen him like this before. "B...Bolius." Montwik fumbled. "Issue a code black. Send in everything we have to the targetted cities. Get as many people as you can out of there. Send all the forces we've got. Forget the Kenjah, forget his palace, divert all forces. Tell them to clear the blast zones. NOW." Montwik instructed. "Yes, sir." Bolius replied, beads of sweat forming on his forehead. Bolius barked out instructions to the communication staff. "Sir, the missiles have been activated. The first nuclear missile will hit the Capitol City in seven minutes." The soldier said. "What about our defense systems in the cities? Can they intercept the missiles?" Montwik asked. "Our defense systems are active, sir." The soldier replied. Montwik nodded.
"The first missile is away, sir." The soldier said. "Did they activate their countermeasures?" Montwik asked. "Yes, sir. Defense systems are active." He replied. Suddenly, his head bolted up from his screen. "Sir, the ground units report that they do not seem to be able to get a lock on the missile." He said, his voice filled with panic. Montwik slammed his fist into a wall in frustration. "What about the areal units? Our space units? Someone!" Montwik asked, his voice desperate. "Sir the missiles disappeared off our screens as well. None of them are able to track the missile sir." He replied. "Holder, what can we do?" Montwik asked him. Holder was just as helpless as Montwik was. "Bolius, what is our situation on the ground?" Montwik asked. "Sir, we have initiated evacuation protocols. Ground units are getting the people out of the blast zones as we speak. The areal units are airlifting as many people as possible, sir. Most of our areal bases and some of our ground bases are outside the blast zone, sir. But we are looking at a severe loss of life." Bolius replied. "Goddammit" Montwik muttered. "Did anyone try to open a line of communication with the Kenjah?" Montwik yelled. "We are not able to make contact with them, sir." A soldier replied.
I looked at Reneesh who was walking over to the observation deck, from which Photrox was clearly visible. Souvik followed him. We infact were moving closer to Photrox every minute. I walked over to Holder, who had his arms crossed and was staring into thin air. "You alright?" I asked him. "You think?" He replied, his voice void of emotions. "Sorry. Wrong question." I said, deciding to keep my trap shut. I proceeded to walk over to another soldier standing there. "What percentage of the people on Photrox live in the targetted cities?" I asked him. He turned around and looked at me. "About sixty percent." He replied, the realization hitting him as soon as the words came out of his mouth. About fifty-five percent of the population of Photrox was about to be incinerated today unless a miracle takes place. "Sir, the missile should be making an impact anytime now." The soldier said. Montwik and Bolius walked over to the observation deck and I followed them. "We can see the impact from here, you know?" Montwik said to me, his eyes boring into mine. "It is almost evening in the Capitol City right now. If not for this war, kids would have been playing in the parks. People would have been taking a stroll along the river bank, enjoying the scent of the river. People would have been watching the sun go down the horizon. But now, a father is saying goodbye to his child. Families are huddled in their basements, hoping all this were just a bad nightmare, and that they would wake from their sleep soon. People are running down the streets, trying to escape, with tears running down their faces, tears of desperation, tears of fear. Friends are bidding farewell to each other and we... fruitlessly trying to convince ourselves this is not our fault. Karma gets back to us, eh Rithvik? As you people say, Karma is a...". His sentence drifted away with the sight of a mushroom cloud making its' way through the clear skies. People gasped, screamed and yelled. The black clouds of smoke carried the souls of millions of innocent people, whose only fault was being born in this era of violence. All the soldiers stood up from their workstations and walked towards the observation deck. Soon, mushroom clouds sprouted from other locations. Nobody saw this coming. Nobody had imagined in their wildest dreams that the Kenjah would bomb his own country.
Montwik walked away from the deck, tears rolling down his face. "Sir, we have a group of spacecrafts trying to exit the Palace Air Space. It might be the Kenjah trying to make an escape." He said. "Do we have any units in that area?" He asked. "No sir. We have lost contact with all areal units in the Capitol City Air Space." He replied. "The nearest squadron is an hour away." He replied. "What about our space units?" Montwik asked. "We are dispatching five jets sir. More are en route."
"Sir, the space units report heavy fire." The soldier reported. "Instruct them to shoot the spacecrafts down. Nothing should escape us." Montwik instructed. "Yes, sir." The soldier replied. A few anxious moments had passed. The nuclear strikes were the perfect distraction the Kenjah needed to escape from here. And judging by the situation here, his plan was working. The person responsible for what can only be called a massacre was fleeing our hold. He had this planned for quite some time. "Sir, we have lost contact with our space units. We are not able to get a visual of the spacecrafts, sir." The soldier said. "The Kenjah has escaped."
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