Life as a New Hire Ch. 35

ASSCAA Blake Jr. demanded...kinda, sorta...it was hard to pin him down on any specifics...that I give him my contact numbers to the Khanate. I refused (because I didn't want to give up the only one I had - Iskender) and he got pissy. Damn him. Temujin had made his job a hell of a lot easier by annexing half the countries in his jurisdiction. Ivy League jackalope.

ASSEAP Russel was plain pissy; no refusal on my part required. He left no doubt in my mind that our (the US's) friendship with the PRC was a MUST due to regional security and economic concerns. He seethed pure condemnation at me for turning his plan for policy integration (shrug?) in East Asia on its ear. It seemed that half a dozen diplomats from SE Asia expected him to have up-to-date information on what was going on in their backyard and to make sure they were included in whatever solution the US decided to implement. I was making him look incompetent to his so-called peers. (This level of embarrassment apparently ran contrary to his government servant turned richly paid lobbyist for Asian factions life plan.)

He was also blaming me for the birth of the Khanate and their war with China. I told him to calm down. I explained that I'd read all about him in college (a lie that fed into his ego), had come to utterly despise him for no earthly reason I could put a name to, and had set all of this in motion just to destroy his career and fuck him over. Then I hung up. Only when I saw Riki's face drain of blood did it occur to me that Riki was a 'China Expert' and thus a member of ole Russel's department. Whoops.

The United Kingdom: God praise the Queen! Somebody loved me. Maybe it was because I was screwing two of their traditional headaches - the Bear (Russia) and the Hooligans (either Manchester United, or the Irish), but they were the only ones to give me a pat on the back. I could keep my two British 'bestest' buddies in the World ... plus they sent some paratroopers to stop the Rangers from engaging the Russian Killer Death Squad in any unpleasantness.

Otherwise, it was 'keep up the good work', stay alive and if I ever attempted to set foot on the British Isles, they'd blow up the Chunnel, torpedo my vessel, or blast my plane out of the sky first. I blithely inquired about a spaceship crashing to Earth. The Russians did that stuff all the time.

The polite woman from SIS/MI-6 at the other end requested I give the phone to Colour Sergeant Tomorrow (Chaz). I looked at him, then informed the kind lady that he was in the WC at the moment. I could relay a message if she liked. She told me I'd clearly gotten the message, so that would not be necessary. Delilah told me the lady was joking. Chaz didn't look convinced of that.

Hungary: Officers Gala and Kupec of the TEK showed up to talk to me (and Pamela), armed with a Judicial request for Romania to hand us over to Hungarian law enforcement (aka them), if things got nasty. It got nasty real fast.

[Hungarian] "We told you to stay in Mindszent - you didn't. Instead, you beat up a foreign national (the German Pamela had convinced to give us his motorcycle - once she'd rendered him unconscious), stole his conveyance (his BMW, a sweet ride) and fled the country," Gala started.

[Romanian] "The language of our hosts, if you please," I sighed. "I made my case clear. We didn't want to die, or a repeat of the inn, so we left."

[Romanian] "I see...so you brought death to our neighbors instead," she taunted me. "You did a great job of getting the Romanians to do your dirty work for you. You brought this upon them."

That misinterpretation of events could have been a problem.

[Romanian] "Don't be stupid," I snapped. "Did I kill the forty-six women and children too?"

[Romanian] "I wouldn't put it past you," she glared right back. I took a deep breath. My eyes migrated to the floor. I wasn't shying away from her gaze. I was trying to not commit murder.

[Romanian] "I'm going to take a companion home for burial, Officer Gala. I'm never going to forget all the Romanian 'Vânători de munte' bodies lying beside her," I murmured. [English] "Apologize, or fight, because I swear to God, in five seconds I'm going to beat that apology out of you if you don't," I promised in my native tongue.

"Lady, I'm not like him," Chaz mused smoothly while looking at Officer Kupec whose hand was migrating to her firearm. "I'll kill you without hesitation and then go eat breakfast."

"Who would you be?" she countered icily. "I'm an officer of the law and you aren't Romanian."

"Colour Sergeant Charles Tomorrow of her Majesty's SRR," he was unperturbed.

"Five," I muttered as I launched myself at Gala. Even with a warning, my speed caught her off-guard. Boxing perfection - straight to the chin. She bounced off the wall, stunned. My follow up was a body blow that drove the air out of her lungs despite her ballistic vest. Rachel and one of the Rangers snared my arms and yanked me away. Gala slumped down.

Once pulled back, I saw that Chaz had his L129A1 sighted on Kupec. Her hand hasn't even touched the butt of her pistol and I was pretty sure she knew death was an electron's pulse away.

[Hungarian] "Son of a bitch," Gala shook her head. "You hit me." The two Romanian soldiers - men of the 24th - began to react and not in Gala's favor. I relaxed so Rachel and the Ranger let go.

[Romanian] "I was wrong. Everyone back off. This was my fuck up. Officer Gala, despite of what you think of me...I did this. This battle was mine. Ajax followed me here, but he tortured and murdered those women for his own twisted reasons. This was part of a vendetta that goes back a long, long time. He's dead, his men are dead and some very good men and women died to make that so," I confessed.

[Romanian] "Congratulations. You got me. I'm guilty. He came to Romania to kill me and now he's dead...and the fight is still not over. There are thousands of men of his mold out there, organized and ready to fight me and my friends no matter where they find us," I ranted. "You arrest me, they will kill me in jail...and the fight will still go on."

[Romanian] "This is nothing more than vengeance for you dead father," she retorted.

[Romanian] "Yes...and?" I shrugged. "That doesn't mean I'd put innocent lives at risk. They killed my Father. I want to make them pay for that. That is about as primal and human as it gets."

[Romanian] "That is why we have laws and a system of justice," Gala wouldn't relent.

[Romanian] "Ha," I huffed. "Have you tried to arrest any of them? You know; the people actually butchering people?" Selena slipped into the room, taking in the tense stances.

[Romanian] "Who are you with?" Kupec asked Selena.

"Cáel, what seems to be the problem?" she asked me as she ignored the cop.

"TEK," I told her. "They are here to drag me back to Budapest to stand trial."

"Right," Selena laughed. "That's not going to happen Officer..."

"Kupec and Gala," I designated each one.

"Oh, that's where I've seen you before," Selena eyed TEK Officer Gala.

"Do we know each other?" Gala kept me in her line of sight.

"My Mother's oldest brother knew your Father - you are 'Forbidden'," she stated without explanation.

[Hungarian] "Forbidden? What does that mean?" Gala swiveled toward Selena.

[Hungarian] "Life for a life," Selena tilted her head slightly. "Your father saved my uncle's life, so until that debt is repaid, you are 'Forbidden'," again with the half-answer. I lived in a small, all-around screwed-up world except the Black Hand was a tiny, mostly familial, organization. Selena's uncle must have been the Black Hand Assassin that Gala's father sprung from jail.

Not from any jail either - a political prison...probably with very high security, which was why the old man hadn't escaped on his own. That had to be its own separate adventure; I wasn't going to rush down the rabbit hole to figure it out.

"You are..." Gala dared not say it in a room with so many strangers. She held up an open hand.

"What have you been telling the outsiders?" Selena's eyes skewered me.

"She knows 'of' your group plus a few nom de guerre's," I replied. "I told her she was on the right track, but I was the wrong person to be talking to."

"You are with the Black Hand?" Kupec studied Selena seriously for the first time.

"The Black Hand is a criminal boogeyman," Selena scoffed. "There is no such thing."

"So...you are," Gala said. "If so, what are you doing here?"

"Strangely enough, I'm doing your job - seeing that justice is done," Selena responded.

"Were you at the firefight?" Kupec asked.

"Yes, I followed Cáel into battle and I witnessed him challenge the enemy champion to single combat. The pyrotechnic grenade going off over their heads obscured my sight of the confrontation," Selena replied. "When the smoke cleared, they were both down. Only Cáel got back up."

"So the grenade killed their leader," Gala wondered.

"No. I personally examined the body before the Romanians took it away. Not a burn on him and his facial lacerations were not caused by shrapnel. He had more dagger-like wounds - cauterized - and he'd been disemboweled. The man died in a great deal of agony," she related.

"What did you do to him?" Gala returned to me. Since Selena neglected to mention that the majority of Ajax's wounds happened beneath his intact clothing and armor, I decided to do the same.

"I'd tell you except you are already questioning my sanity," I sighed. "Suffice it to say, I knew two things that he didn't and I used that advantage to make him dead." Chaz's stomach rumbled.

"Let's cut to the chase," he yawned. "He killed the one called Ajax in front of dozens of witnesses. He's not going to tell you how he did it. He's not going to tell you why he came to Romania. He's not going back with you to Hungry. By now you should realize there is crap going on that is clearly above your pay grades.

Give it a rest, get a bite to eat and tell your superiors you are reexamining the available data. This is what they really want to hear anyway," he reminded all present. Maybe it was the tone of his voice. It could have been his casually lethal demeanor. Whatever the reason, his advice ended the discussion and I finally got to eat. I hadn't been able to eat last night - too much on my mind.

Romania: After much hand-wringing, late night cups of coffee and copious amounts of cigars and cigarettes, somewhere at the top of the Romanian hierarchy it was decided I was a hero. To paint me as a criminal would ruin all the pain and death I'd brought with me. It would make all the dead men and women of the 22nd and 24th stupidly dead, not martyrs.

At that moment, they needed martyrs in order to rally public opinion over what had happened. I wasn't going to be a divisive figure, despite my claims of Transylvanian nobility. Let the Székely rejoice at their Warrior-Prince's return ...as long as I loved Romania and the Vlach people, too. While Flaviu's report was, as usual, a tad indecisive, many voices within the 61st Mountain Troops Brigade spoke volumes in my defense:

-I had provided useful and accurate information.

-I hadn't usurped anyone's authority (they didn't count enlisting Master Corporal Menner in my mad plan against me).

-I had fought bravely and in a manner most considered to have saved soldiers' lives.

-Also, one of my companions had perished and another had been gravely wounded in the defense of Romanian soil.

-I was a good guy...who should consider going to another country really really soon.

The Russian Federation: They apologized for any confusion concerning their men in New York and Hana. At the time, I had no idea what they were talking about. When I did, I felt like punching a Russian in the nose. Considering the twenty Spetsnaz close by, my ignorance probably saved me some quickly administered bleeding and bruising.

In their favor, they offered to help the Romanians hunt down the two remaining Greeks. One escapee had been taken, shot up, but alive, at around eleven pm. The Russian Military Attaché to Bucharest (Romania's capital) was getting into her groove. Riki gave me some of her 411. She'd had a promising career in the GRU until she was caught having an affair with her boss's wife, now she was in the hinterlands.

By the looks I was getting from Major Tatianna Semenina Volkov, she was at least bi-sexual. Despite my dubious nature and her being in a building full of prime physical specimens, there was her knowledge that I'd suddenly and unexpectedly resuscitated her prospects for advancement in her chosen vocation. Big people in Moscow were reading documents with her name on them.

If Operation: Funhouse was counted a success, there was a Podpolkovnik (Lieutenant-Colonel) promotion in her immediate future. If things fell apart...there was always that hope of being posted to the further hinterlands, maybe Uganda? A little past midnight, by way of Riki and the NRO, I got the first inkling that the Great Khan was implementing the directive I had suggested. It was the dawn of a new day and all I wanted to know was" how had I ended up here?"

End Cael's Geopolitical situation, Begin World News

While I was being beneficently informed that Russian troops had crossed the Nei Mongol border, their reconnaissance elements were racing unopposed toward the critical junctures of Morin Dawa and Zalantun. The Khanate was even clearing the designated routes of all traffic to ease their advancement, while Russian and Khanate Air Forces cautiously patrolled the same airspace.

By US estimations, the Russians had better hurry, too. The Mongolians at Morin Dawa were barely clinging to the eastern (Chinese) bank of the Nen River. Elements of the PLA's 69th Motorized and 7th Reserve were making near-suicidal attacks in an effort to collapse the shrinking Mongolian perimeter.

Meanwhile, repeated sorties by the PLAAF had damaged the bridge, but not brought it down and their planes paid a hellish price going up against the Khanate Air Force and anti-air defenses to get that much done. In doing so, the PLA had to leave the Amur River guarded by only a thin layer of lightly equipped military police units to oppose any Russian move.

To counter this crisis at Morin Dawa, Kazakhstan C-295's parachuted elements of the Panther battalion of the former Kyrgyz Army into the combat zone. The Kazaks had transport aircraft, but no paratroopers. The Kyrgyz used other nation's aircraft to train their paratroopers. As one Finnish journalist noted, it was bizarre to watch two military units from the same country, but who couldn't speak each other's languages, coordinating their actions on a dry-erase board and with hand signals.

At Zalantun, another desperate struggle was being waged. By the time the first Russians arrived, the Khanate had secured every one of the city's main chokepoints as well as the heights overlooking the southeastern end of the mountain pass. The 1st Mongolian Defense brigade (their National Guard), the North Mongol Banner Tumens and the 330th Mongolian Special Task Battalion slugged it out with the 3rd PLA Reserve Division.

In the final battle for the gateway to the Manchurian Plain, both sides threw in everything they had left. It was the ill-equipped versus the ill-equipped - the senior (largely made up of the men closest to retirement) battalion of the 1st MDB versus the support and security battalions of the 3rd Reserve Div. Both sides knew the price of failure.

In the last gasp, only concentrated counter-battery fire and close air support broke the final Chinese counter-attack. The death toll on both sides was ghastly. In the northeast, the Khanate and the PLA were spent forces. The Chinese would recover faster. Both sides were being forced to field older equipment, but the PLA had a massively larger force pool to draw from and much more equipment to field.

By this time, the logistic realities were eating away at the Khanate forces. High-tech equipment needed intensive maintenance. Soldiers needed to eat and sleep, ammo carriers needed to be reloaded and vehicles refueled. From a strategic standpoint, the Chinese military had plenty of fight left in them and were getting more units into the fight every hour.

The Tumens couldn't bypass every PLA strongpoint. Whenever they had to assault a place, their advance was paid for in priceless men and equipment. This was a factor known to every major military establishment. That the Khanate's initial offensive's first thrusts would run out of steam was a limitation Temujin accepted and the Chinese were counting on.

As critical as logistics were, there was a whole new category of woes applying a stranglehold to the conflict. Stocks, bonds, monetary exchanges and the flow of resources were all being strained. For 24 hours, at the urging of the key world governments, the major markets had remained calm. When it was revealed that the Khanate was an actual and long-term threat to global stability, panic set in.

Historically, every conflict ran on the strength of the involved countries' ability to feed and equip their armies and to tax their populace. In the modern age, colonialism, imperialism and mercantilism had complicated the equation. Suddenly nation-states were consuming materials in their martial efforts that they didn't personally possess.

When the British Royal Navy adopted fuel oil engines, the pattern of warfare changed forever. At that moment in time, the British Empire didn't own any oil fields - the fields were in Iran, the Ottoman Empire, Russia and the United States.

In the post-Imperialism, post-WWII period, China dropped off the economic radar, but the developing African, South American, Middle Eastern and Subcontinent nations more than filled in the gap. China reappearing in the 1970's and the fall of most of the Communist regimes furthered global interdependence.

Whether or not you considered the concept of the nation-state a dead ideal, the power of international banking had been a fact of life for over a century. Financial institutions, national banks, stock and commodities markets developed their own independent interests. When countries went to war, their governments rapidly had to float credit to finance their war debt.

At some point, their debt got so crushing they couldn't afford to lose...or, their bankers couldn't survive their failure. You could make a fortune in a war, or you could lose everything. Magnifying the issue was that virtually every nation now had to purchase foreign resources and goods they didn't have/produce locally. That caused massive price fluctuations, usually up - way up.

The Khanate had enough petrochemical resources to destabilize world oil prices. China produced so many manufactured goods for others that consumer price indexes worldwide were skyrocketing. China had massive financial reserves, mostly in the form of other nations' foreign debt. The Khanate had a massive inherited monetary 'Sword of Damocles' hanging over its head: Would the Khanate repudiate the debts of the old republics it had absorbed? Would close to a € trillion of electronic currency instantly evaporate?

The Chinese yuan (¥) wasn't globally traded. Until this moment in history, that had benefited the PRC. Now they were about to spend billions and billions in whatever currency you chose to mention for weaponry they couldn't produce, thanks to the Khanate's aerial campaign against their armaments industries.

In turn, the countries that had the resources and technology the Chinese needed were considering the possibilities of how to redress the fiscal and trade imbalances that had previously existed. The Khanate also needed a great deal of financial and technological assistance. How could a broke-ass, infant, semi-autocratic country afford anything?