NationStates Jolt Archive

OOC: This is a remake/redo of an RP first done in early 2005 and was set in 1998, three years after the Layartebian defeat and withdrawal from Kaliningrad. The original RP (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=395088) established a good amount of background for the coming times with Layarteb and even gave more of an in depth look at Jack Delaney, one of the Empire's primary character.

Friday, November 6, 1998 - 09:00 [AST]
Dnalkrad City IAP, Dnalkrad City, Labrador
Day One

Dnalkrad City was small, for a capital. Home to just half a million people, the capital sat on the southwestern shore of Lake Melville, a moderately sized lake that eventually led out through various inlets and estuaries to the Labrador Sea and thus the North Atlantic Ocean. Unfortunately, the port was frozen between January and May and sometimes as early as December. Still, it was a major hub for the Layartebian Empire and thus the capital of Dnalkrad, a small province that sat north of the main province, Layarteb. Dnalkrad consisted of just Labrador, Newfoundland, Baffin Island, and Greenland. Land area, it was the biggest of all the provinces but population wise, it was the smallest. Dnalkrad City had first been conquered by Layartebian forces in 1986 after a short war started when the Free Land of Dnalkrad, consisting then of only Newfoundland and Labrador, seized control over the Layartebian embassy in protest over the Empire's annexation of Venezuela, which had come in 1983. The war lasted shortly over a month and ended in the total submission of Dnalkrad to the Empire and thus the province of Dnalkrad was born.

The war wasn't particularly brutal, in comparison to most of the other wars the Empire fought during the Era of Conquests but it was one of the fastest. Layartebian Air Force fighters and bombers poured munitions onto key, strategic targets in and around the capital and along the border with precision guided munitions accounting for over 65% of the weapons used. Ground forces crossed the border shortly thereafter and moved to within sixty-five miles of the capital when the government surrendered and agreed to annexation into the Empire. An initially unhappy populace were soon placated by the benefits of being part of the Empire, especially its economic might, which would exponentially increase over the course of the next ten years. Treated as equals underneath the Layartebian Empire, the Dnalkradians found themselves comfortable by the mid-1990s with the Empire and, by then, its expansion was quite significant.

Labrador was a harsh environment during the winter and this year, the harshness came early. Unseasonably low temperatures and significant rainfall from a pair of nor'easters in October had caused some concern for residents and meteorologists alike. Forecasting a harsh winter, meteorologists weren't surprised when a powerful Gulf Stream low-pressure system off the coast of Florida formed just as a major Arctic high-pressure system formed. The two systems combined together and created a major imbalance in the atmosphere. With Hurricane Mitch dissipating off the eastern coast of Layarteb, near North and South Carolina, the imbalance grew and grew. Hurricane Mitch became the fifth most intense Atlantic hurricane and caused nearly twenty thousand fatalities, bringing category five force winds over the course of its romp around the Caribbean Sea.

The nor'easter that formed on November 1 and strengthened thereafter was powerful, very powerful. Likened to the 1993 "Storm of the Century" and the 1991 "Perfect Storm," the nor'easter was definitely not to be taken lightly. Quickly, it grew in size to over eight hundred miles in diameter. Packing sustained winds of forty-five to fifty knots, gusting to over sixty-five knots, the nor'easter was wrecking havoc all around northeastern Layarteb, southeastern Dnalkrad, and everywhere above, below, and all around. Out at sea, waves were over thirty feet high and the water was very foamy. There was barely any visibility and the storm had yet to make landfall. Its center was just east of Nova Scotia and Dnalkrad City, even though it was more towards the outer edges of the storm, was being battered. Up and down the eastern coast of North America and as far inland as central Pennsylvania, the nor'easter was making its presence known. Airports were the most affected with flights being canceled and delayed across the board throughout the Empire. Any flight going to the area of the nor'easter was guaranteed to be delayed and more than 35% of them were being canceled.

Layarteb Airways, Flight 929 had already been delayed four hours by the time 08:00 hours rolled around. Intended to be an early morning flight to Incirlik, Turkey, the flight had never even been allowed to board until 08:20 hours, when its scheduled departure time was set at 09:00 hours, a five hour delay. The Boeing 777-200 was full when the final passenger boarded it at 08:42 hours, plenty of time for cabin procedures and taxi. A lull in the storm's winds and rain would allow the wide-bodied airliner to get into the air and get on its way. The flight would be bumpy and rough for the first hour and a half but, from there on, it would be smooth. Scheduled now to arrive at 21:00 hours, local time, the three hundred and forty-eight passengers made their way through the two-class cabin, found their seats, stowed their bags, used the restrooms one last time, sat down, and buckled in for the flight. Stewards and stewardesses walked up and down the two aisles in the cabin, quickly checking everyone, conducting their pre-flight safety drills. With the five hundred and forty-five thousand pound aircraft finally checked, tractor drivers on the ground pushed the mammoth, two hundred and nine foot long, sixty-one foot high airplane back from the gate far enough away that the pilots could pivot and begin taxiing the plane to the runway, where it would use over eight thousand feet of asphalt before lurching into the skies.

The ride up to cruising altitude was rough. The aircraft was loaded with thirty-one thousand gallons of fuel, enough to get the plane all the way to Turkey with almost two thousand miles to spare. The plane would be going up to thirty-five thousand feet where it would begin cruising at five hundred and thirty-five miles per hour, eventually rising to just over forty thousand feet and over five hundred and sixty miles per hour as it burned its fuel and became lighter.

The 777-200 left the ground just in time as winds picked up along with the rainfall. The bands of rain and wind would keep flights grounded for the next hour and a half, Flight 929 being the last aircraft to get into the air for that lull period. The two pilots held their aircraft in as best a way as they could, trying to make the ride as comfortable for their passengers as allowable but they couldn't do much. The nor'easter whipped and slammed their aircraft as they climbed through the storm, trying to get on top of it. The ride up was rough, really rough but both pilots knew what they were doing. They had flown through storms before, never one this intense but they had. At the controls was Captain Joseph Harmon, a retired naval aviator who had flown sorties over Venezuela in the 1970s and during the initial stages of the Conquests. He was a trained aviator who had his fair share of close calls and rough weather. During a vicious storm in the Caribbean Sea in 1976, he landed his F-4J Phantom II fighter onto the deck of an aircraft carrier, snagging the third wire as he touched down. It was a harrowing experience he would later recall. To his right was First Officer Vincent LaPrice, an retired air force pilot who had flown throughout most of the early Conquests until he retired in 1993. He had flown an F-15C Eagle for most of his career and was credited with three kills over Venezuela and three more over the southeastern portion of what had now become the Province of Layarteb, making him an ace whereas Captain Harmon had only four kills in his entire career. Most of his missions were combat air support or suppression of enemy air defenses.

Neither of the two pilots were worried as they flew through the turbulence. The aircraft could certainly handle the stresses it was experiencing and at full throttle, they would be over the top of the storm in no time, twenty or so minutes. A long twenty-odd minutes, the pilots eventually settled the aircraft at 41,250 feet, well above their initial cruise altitude but at a position where the aircraft was only going to be intermittently bothered by the storm. With the aircraft level, accelerating to its cruise speed of five hundred and fifty miles per hour, Captain Harmon picked up his microphone and selected the option to address the whole aircraft. "Alright we're stable at forty-one thousand feet. We're above the storm for the most part but we're going to be experiencing intermittent turbulence. We'll try our best to avoid it but it will be a bumpy ride. I am going to keep the seatbelt sign lit but if you must use the restrooms you may. Once we clear this storm I'll turn off the sign and you'll be permitted to move around the cabin freely. Thank you." He put down the microphone and engaged the autopilot, relaxing for now as the plane moved away from the continent of North America.

The 777-200 was left and flying as smooth as could be expected. With the turbulence mostly below them, there was only a pocket or two here or there that they encountered. The ordeal was, for the most part, over and everyone on board was happy to be comfortable. The storm remained below them, its center calm but its walls raging with anger, fury, and rage. Forty thousand feet in the air, the sky was blue, the sun over the horizon, shining its rays everywhere yet forty thousand feet below, the sun and the blue sky was nowhere to be found. It was dark and gray, winds and rains battering the air. The plane had traveled more than one hundred and fifty miles from the airport by the time it leveled off and it still had thousands more to go to make it to Turkey. After four hundred miles in the air, well after the plane had settled at its cruise speed of five hundred and fifty miles per hour, the captain finally turned off the seatbelt sign. Half of the plane stood and stretched, the lines to the lavatories instantly becoming long; although, several people had braved the bumpiness and went already. Many others were too afraid to get up, fearing that they would hit a pocket of turbulence and they would be flung across the plane like a rag doll. "Alright ladies and gentlemen it looks like we're past the rough stuff. We should be landing on schedule in Incirlik and weather shows smooth flying all the way from here." Captain Harmon said into his microphone as he sat back and relaxed, looking at the autopilot's settings, his altitude, and his airspeed. His glass cockpit was state of the art and the screens in front of him told him everything he needed to know about the plane.

The plane was broken into two classes, first and coach. First class had thirty-six passengers and economy or coach had three hundred and twelve for the full three hundred and forty-eight plus the sixteen crew members. In first class, the thirty-six passengers sat comfortably in twenty-one inch wide seats that pitched back thirty-eight inches in three rows of two. Behind them, in coach, passengers sat in eighteen inch wide seats that pitched either thirty-five or thirty-one inches, arranged in a two-four-two layout. There were ten lavatories on board the airplane, seven galleries, and seventeen televisions. There would be an in flight movie, Men In Black, released just the previous year. Everything on board seemed normal, fine, and more than routine. After a few minutes, passengers settled back into their seats, the flight attendants came around and began to offer beverages and meals, the lavatory lines eased, and people sat back, fell into a nap or began to do work, read, write, listen to music, or play video games.

However, everything wasn't normal, fine, or routine. Six men, seated strategically inside of the cabin all looked at their watches, their hearts beating nervously in their chests. They all looked, on the outside, like normal businessmen who belonged on the flight but they didn't belong on the flight at all. They were there for a single and truly improper purpose, which was to hijack the airliner, force it to land, and use the hostages to send a message to the Empire, above all others. Seated in aisle seats in the rear, middle, and forward part of the economy class as well as one in the first class area, the six men began to fidget in their seats as the time approached. Each one wore a watch and each one carried a pistol on them, all of them varying in caliber. One of them, the leader, even had a hand grenade.

Hours before, they had passed cleanly through security, arriving at different times, through different gates, and with different reasons for being there. They entered and, at different times and individually, they walked to a variety of areas in the airport, two to bathrooms, one to a bar, another to a magazine store, and two others to relaxation saloons. There, they picked up their weapons, having had a man on the inside place them clandestinely the night before. Then, all six of them entered the airplane, acknowledging one another with only a stare and a nod of the head, subtle. They all knew each other, they had fought together for years now against the Empire in Kaliningrad. When the Empire withdrew in 1995, it brought shame to them. Kaliningrad had been left in shambles, devastated by the Layartebian Empire in an attempt to conquer the country. It was, thus far, the only failure the Empire had since the Conquests began. A brutal defeat, the Kaliningradian War saw two years of heavy fighting from 1993 to 1995. The capital, Kaliningrad City was devastated and the Empire left a quarter of a million people dead, four hundred thousand wounded, and sent one hundred and twenty-five thousand into neighboring countries, trying to flee the war. At the time of the war, the population of Kaliningrad had only been nine hundred and sixty-eight thousand people. The war cost the Empire fifty-two hundred and eighty-six lives, a horrific difference and ratio of nearly fifty to one. By now, three years later, Kaliningrad remained only partially rebuilt. Kaliningrad City was still war torn and the scars of the war were on both its people and its land. These six men would remind the Empire that they could not forget about their most humiliating defeat as this day, November 6, was that day that, five years earlier, in 1993, the Kaliningradian resistance first formed its specialist brigade of fighters known as "The Forgotten Warriors." They were all highly trained soldiers, who had previous military training most of them being paratroopers and special forces soldiers. They numbered less than five hundred but fought with the force of five thousand, dealing blow after blow against the Layartebians, shooting down several aircraft with man-portable missiles as well as helping to repel the Empire in the final battle of Kaliningrad City. Despite being highly elite and very successful, they had a high casualty rate with seventy-five percent of their forces being killed, wounded, or captured by the end of the war. With just one hundred and twenty-five left at the end of the war, they disbanded and, for the most part, returned to normal society or formed the contingent of the Kaliningradian Defense Forces, the military arm of the country responsible for protecting the country in the post-war era.

These six men were some of the only ones left who had not been killed, injured, captured, or absolved in the KDF. In total just twenty of the remaining one hundred and twenty-five had not joined the KDF. Disillusioned with the entire state of affairs in the post-war world, they had splintered off from all common decency and all moral fiber and formed a group they called "Revenge For Kaliningrad" abbreviated as RFK. They were a terrorist group that planned to exact some sort of revenge against the Empire for their two year war and for the quarter of a million dead Kaliningradians they left in their wake. They toyed with dozens of ideas for the years after the war but it wasn't until December 1997 that they decided on the plan they were enacting today. In the months since the final decision was made, their entire plan had been formulated and rehearsed. Now it was time to carry that plan out and exact their revenge.

The six of them on the plan went by code names to keep their identities hidden. Otto was the leader and with him were Johann, Erich, Joseph, Thomas, and Arnold. Otto stood up first in the rear of the aircraft, where he could see everything and quickly grabbed hold of a young girl seated in front of him, the barrel of his pistol pressed against her temples. Four of the other men stood up, their guns in their hands as well and the shouting began. "This is a hijacking! Everyone stay the fuck down or this little girl's head will be all over your laps! Everyone down! Now! Put your heads between your legs! No funny shit I'll gladly shoot a hold in your head for scratching your nose the wrong way!" People started screaming and the little girl, clenched in his arms, began to cry. Her mother was unable to follow the directions herself and she shot up from her seat, only to be shoved back down when Otto slammed the butt of his pistol against her head. She fell down, bleeding from her forehead, like a rag doll into her seat. He yanked the girl back as he walked down the aisle. The other four terrorists who stood up were pacing around the aisles as well with the sixth, acting as a sleeper, remaining in his seat, feigning fright while Otto walked towards the cockpit door of the aircraft, the girl in his arms, the pistol barrel pressed tight against her head still.

The moment Captain Harmon heard screams he looked at a bank of small video screens just behind him. They showed the camera feeds from a number of small cameras placed throughout the cabin of the aircraft. "Jesus Christ it's a hijacking!" He thought and, at the same time, said aloud. LaPrice didn't have to wait for any others and, instinctively, his left hand reached to a switch on the aircraft's panel just in front of the throttles. He flipped the switch to the right, activating the distress signal and, immediately, a beacon inside of the aircraft began to emit waves over an encrypted frequency. It took milliseconds for those waves to be received by a ground station in Labrador, the newest air traffic control center. Silence befell the floor as everyone listened to the audio tape. It announced the flight and that ominous word, "Hijack." The floor supervisor didn't waste a moments breath, picking up a red phone next to his terminal and immediately pressing down on the leftmost button. The button put him through to a specialized office within the Ministry of Defense, an office that was inhabited around the clock, every day of the year by just two people, one civilian, one military. The two people rotated in and out of the room every four hours on a normal basis. In the event of an emergency, the room would be sealed and those inside would not be allowed to leave until relieved by proper personnel. This would be one of those days. Private First Class Robert McHolland and Jessica Prince were those two people on this morning. McHolland was a green soldier, barely out of boot camp and Jessica was a woman in her mid-20s who had only started working for the MOD just six months prior. Together, they were as green as could be and here they were, thrust into exactly what their job entailed.

The phone buzzed rather than rang and both of them picked it up, audio and video recorders capturing their every movement and every word spoken over the telephone. Their hands hovered over a plastic cover, underneath which was a red button, a button that would activate the emergency proceedures. "Labrador ATC. We have a distress beacon emitting on Layarteb Airways Flight 929. Code is 'Hijacking.'" The voice on the other end of the phone, the floor supervisor said.

"Can you confirm that this is a hijacking?" McHolland asked, his hand hovering over the button.

"Beacon remains active, communications to the aircraft are unanswered."

"Roger that. Begin data transmit." McHolland looked across the room and nodded his head. They both lifted the covers and pressed the buttons. Now they were sealed in, signals being sent all over the building. It would take only moments for the Joint Chiefs of Staff to be notified, their cell phones receiving encrypted text messages with specific code words that would alert them to the hijacking. Meetings were canceled and another phone in the office rang, this one Jessica picked up and answered. It was an officer, a major within the Imperial Layartebian Defense Forces who was their direct superior. From him, the Joint Chiefs of Staff would receive their details.

"What's the situation?" He asked as he walked through one of the many pristine and immaculate hallways in the building.

"Sir. We've got a confirmed hijacking. Layarteb Airways Flight 929. It's position is currently 56°36'54.28"N, 47°42'14.44"W, five hundred and forty-two miles south-southwest of Nuuk in Greenland. Aircraft is a Boeing 777-200 with three hundred and forty-eight passengers and sixteen crewmembers. Destination is Incirlik and point of origin is Dnalkrad City IAP. No further details."

"Very good. Keep in contact with ATC and notify me immediately of any changes."

"Yes sir." She put down the phone and the connection was terminated. "Any change?"

"No." The young adults were nervous and anxious, afraid to do anything wrong that could jeopardize the lives of those on board the aircraft but anxious that the tediousness and boredom of the job had been vanquished.

Within five minutes, the major was seated in a conference room in one of the secure vaults of the building, two levels below the surface. He would physically be joined within minutes by the Admiral of the Navy, General of the Air Force, General of the Defense Forces, and the Minister of Defense. Then, they would be joined, through video-link by the General of the Army, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, ministers of Intelligence, the Interior, and Justice, as well as the Emperor and other members of the National Security Council, a makeshift body of leaders within the Layartebian government who were responsible for decision making matters on national security. The meeting began the moment everyone had joined, twelve minutes and sixteen seconds after the beacon had been set off, a quick turn around but slow by the Emperor's standards who joined the conference demanding answers. "Who is it? What do they want? How many are there? What capabilities do they have?" He demanded before anyone could speak. Before anyone could answer, he added, "And scramble some goddamn fighters!" The General of the Defense Forces quickly looked over to an aide and pointed. He left the room immediately with his phone in hand, replaced by another aide who entered as he exited. Before the aide could take his seat, a coded message was being transmitted to Ammassalik Air Force Base on Greenland. Ammassalik was seven hundred and five miles away from the airliner, to its northeast but that was also the same direction the airliner was heading. Ammassalik was home to the 164th Fighter Wing and under it, ten squadons with one hundred and sixty aircraft, ninety-six of them F-22A Raptors, thirty-two of them F-26A Typhoons, and another thirty-two being F-16C Falcons. The orders were simple, scramble three fighters and immediately intercept the airliner, which was traveling away from them at 550 mph.

With klaxons sounding, three Raptor pilots, dressed in gear, rushed out of their barracks and to their F-22s, ready on the tarmac, waiting on alert status. Gandler may have been miles upon miles away from the front lines in the Conquests but it wasn't a lax base. Standards were maintained, aircraft were kept on alert and these aircraft were just three of twelve kept on alert at all times. The other nine included three more F-22s and six F-16s. The remaining aircraft could be sortied quite quickly in the event of a full-scale attack. The pilots rushed out of their barracks, darting across the tarmac with their helmets in their hands. Ground crewmen rushed to the fighters to prepare them for take off, helping the pilots get into their aircraft, helping them get seated, yanking the ladders away, and removing the blocks that kept the aircraft from rolling. The pilots had their aircraft started up quite quickly. Because they were kept linked to an electrical generator, their systems were warm already and their engines ready to be powered on, all done within seconds. These were aircraft ready to fly, armed with two AIM-9X Sidewinder and six AIM-120C-6 AMRAAM air-to-air missiles, a full load of four hundred and eighty rounds for their twenty millimeter M61A2 cannon, and a pair of six hundred gallon, external fuel tanks, which could increase their range four fold. Within eight minutes of the coded alert being sent, just twenty-one minutes after the beacon had been activated, the three Raptors were taxiing to the runway, one behind the other, their canopies closing as they moved down the jetways. The fighters took up a staggered position on the runway, the lead aircraft out front and to the left with the trail aircraft next to it on the right, slightly behind, and the third aircraft, the element, behind the two of them, centered on the runway. Clearance from the tower came quickly and all three aircraft began their roll, separated by only eight seconds. The three Raptors bolted down the runway at maximum effort, their massive engines churning out thirty-five thousand pounds of thrust each, a thrust to weight ratio of 0.97:1.

At the end of their roll, the three aircraft pealed up, into the sky, their gear retracting, the pilots forming up into a triangle formation, separated by a quarter of a mile, speeding into the sky, sucking fuel from their external tanks first. As the flight of aircraft streaked into the sky, climbing at over 40,000 feet per minute, aiming for an altitude of fifty thousand feet, they connected into the Layartebian Air Defense Network and, from there, they could see the jetliner lumbering ahead of them, moving at 550 mph, almost seven hundred miles away. When the pilots reached fifty thousand feet, they would be lighter, much lighter, and quickly, they would accelerate to their supercruise speed of Mach 1.8 or 1,188 mph, gaining on the jetliner at a closure velocity of 1,738 mph or 2.63 times the speed of sound. At that pace it would take them under a half hour to reach the jetliner.

The trio of F-22A Raptors streaked towards the incoming airliner at 50,000 feet in the air, moving without afterburners, at Mach 1.8. When they got within one hundred and fifty miles, which wasn't very long, the Boeing 767 appeared on their radar scopes and they switched away from their air defense network link to their own radar. Closing at over 1,700 miles per hour, they would be there in no time and they quickly changed their course and slowed down their speed, to pass by the airliner without it knowing it. They dropped down, below the speed of sound, and changed to a more westerly course, passing the jetliner a few miles to its port side, high enough that it wouldn't be easily seen. Then, they would take up a position a few miles behind the jetliner, matching its speed. The terrorists, pilots, and anyone else inside of the plane would never know they were there. The whole thirty minutes or so that it would take for the Raptors to get into place behind the 777, a lot happened on the airplane.

The terrorist leader had walked up to the door to the cockpit, the little girl in his arms, her frightened, contorted face looking outwards with a blank expression of fear. Her lips cried "Help me," but her voice was silent as the terrorist leader looked into the small camera above the door. The door had been locked from the inside and, because it was armored, there would be no way to get into it without destroying the whole plane. Evidently, that wasn't the goal of the terrorists. Clutching the girl in his arms, Otto stood at the door and knocked. He didn't slam his fist against the door but instead made a slight alarm, knocking on the door twice. "Mr. Pilot. I think you ought to open this door immediately before anybody gets hurt." He pressed the pistol to the girl's head and she cried more. He comforted her, not that it would do anything, shushing her like a mother would. "Mr. Pilot. This isn't a negotiation. If you don't open this door I'm going to make sure this entire airplane sees this little girl's head open up or better," he thought of something as he stood outside of the door. Reaching into his pocket, he produced the grenade and handed it to the little girl. "Take this and hold onto it tightly."

"Please." A passenger pleaded but she didn't get much else in as Erich punched her in the head.

"Tightly. Very tightly. You must hold this piece of metal here. Do you have it tight?" She didn't respond. "I know you're scared but we're going to get into that cockpit." He pulled the pin on the grenade and put it into his pocket. "Mr. Pilot. This is a live grenade and this little girl's hands are shaking. I'll give you to the count of five before I accidentally knock it out of her hands." Passengers who could hear him began to cry, unable to do anything, paralyzed by fear. "One." He waited what seemed like an hour before he went to, "Two." Then came Three. Before he got to "Four," he could hear the lock of the door being disengaged. Inside, the pilot and his co-pilot had watched everything and they knew that, despite the protocols, despite what they had been told, they couldn't let anything happen. They had to comply, it was their only chance and the chance for anyone else on the airplane. Cursing under his breath, especially because the terrorist leader chose a little girl, a frightened, eight year old with straight, blonde hair, freckles, and a missing tooth in the front of her mouth. "Mr. Pilot. You've chosen widely."

"Put the pin back in," was all Joseph could muster and Otto complied, putting the pin back into the grenade and taking it from the girl. He put her down on the floor but, before he let her go, he bent down, keeping his eyes on the pilot.

"Go back to your mother. You did good little girl." She ran away quicker than anything else, ignoring the other terrorists, the frightened passengers, or anything else for that matter, darting into her mother's weakened arms, crying, begging for solace. Otto straightened himself up and looked at the pilot. "You have no doubt activated the hijacking signal." Before Harmon could think of a witty reply, Otto continued. "I'm not worried. I want your masters to know that we have this plane. There is a bomb on board," waves of cries went through the cabin as it seemed everyone heard Otto's bluff. "It is composed of fourteen pounds of high-explosive, Semtex. It takes a pound or less to down a Boeing 747, considerably larger than this aircraft so I trust you will comply with all of our instructions."

"What do you want?"

"Erich. Attend to the cockpit. Captain. If you wish to see the safe return of these passengers, you will fly this aircraft and land it safely according to Erich's instructions. Is that understood?"

"Yes."

"Good. Erich." Erich followed the captain back into the cockpit and though the door was shut, it was not locked.

Joseph remained standing with his co-pilot, Vincent seated, both of them looking at Erich, the young Kaliningradian terrorist holding a small Skorpion submachine gun. Small enough to held and controlled with a single hand, the weapon contained twenty 7.65x17mm rounds. The weapon was capable of firing all twenty in just a little over a second and that would be more than enough to kill both pilots, especially at this close range. A second magazine hung out of his belt, tucked into the front of his pants and he looked at both of the pilots and motioned, with the weapon, for the captain to sit down. He did but turned around and faced what he estimated to be a young boy. Erich was young looking but he wasn't a boy, he was twenty-four, a kid compared to either Vincent or Joseph but a seasoned, combat veteran. "You will fly this aircraft immediately to Khrabrovo Airport, coordinates fifty-four degrees, fifty-three minutes, twenty-four seconds north. Twenty degrees, thirty-five minutes, thirty-three seconds east." Khrabrovo was only a few miles northwest of Kaliningrad City and an airfield that was being used by the Kaliningradian military and civilian airlines. They would never expect to happen what was about to happen. Thirty-one hundred miles from Dnalkrad City IAP, they were still about twenty-five hundred miles away, five hours away. They had more than enough fuel to make it there and the pilot knew it. He knew exactly where Khrabrovo was. It was a black-listed destination, thanks to the recent war, despite it being three years in the past. Neither one of them had flown over Kaliningrad, both of them being retired by the time that war broke out in the early 1990s. Vincent, being a fighter ace, would have had no role over Kaliningrad as the Kaliningradian Air Force was destroyed in the initial stages of the war, mostly by stealth bombers striking them while they were on the ground. There had only been four fighters that managed to get into the air during the whole war and two of them had been shot down by surface-to-air systems, the other two being taken down in the same afternoon by an F-16C Falcon pilot flying a combat air support mission. The same pilot would later be shot down by a surface-to-air missile towards the end of the war. Unfortunately, he was captured and killed by Kaliningradian forces after he ejected.

With the destination set, the terrorists in full control of the plane, and order established, Otto made some changes. Johann came up to first class, leaving Joseph and Thomas in coach class. They each took up one side of the aircraft and stood guard. Johann's weapon of choice was a forty-five caliber M1911A1 while Joseph and Thomas both stuck to Stechkin APS pistols, each of them bored to 9x18mm Makarov rounds. Select fire weapons, they could each spray around six hundred rounds per minute but their magazines held only twenty rounds. The sixth hijacker, Arnold, sat in the rear of the aircraft, his weapon the most potent, aside from, perhaps, Erich in the front. He had a Beretta 93R machine-pistol loaded with twenty rounds as well but capable of firing up to eleven hundred rounds per minute in three round bursts. A single burst could easily devastate any foe. Otto carried the same weapon as Johann and those two were the only two without a select fire weapon and the only two with a magazine of just seven rounds but it didn't matter. Combined, they had plenty of fire power and their forty-five caliber bullets easily made up for the fact that their weapons were semi-automatic.

Trailing three miles behind the airliner, the three F-22A Raptors took up their trail course, reducing their speed to match that of the airliner, flying just four thousand feet higher than it so that they could see any changes in its course. As they arrived, that change in course came, as the airliner banked a few degrees to their port, changing to a more northerly course, putting them in a flight path that would take them through most of eastern Europe and into Ukraine. It was hard to tell just where they were heading but the change in course was noted and analysts pondered of where the plane was heading. In the Ministry of Defense, a secure conference room had been cordoned off, armed guards placed outside of it, and all of the information regarding the hijacked airliner pumped into its various projector screens. A secure video link connected that room to the Emperor's office, where a dozen men and women, on average, occupied the seats and space on either side of the giant, wooden, open, double doors of the office. The Emperor's secretary had already wiped his schedule clean, pushing back, indefinitely, a meeting concerning the progress of Northern Ireland and its union into the Irish Republic. This wasn't the day for meeting concerning such matters. This was a day for action. Hundreds of miles to the northeast, a hijacked airliner, with over three hundred frightened people on board, was moving away from the Empire, to some unknown destination out of the reach of the Empire. The new, altered course of the jetliner was taking it north of Ireland and Scotland, between them and Iceland. It was an air corridor the Empire controlled. Already, activity in both Iceland and Ireland had been started at a variety of air bases and ground bases. Certain, specific, and specialized units went on alert as fighter crews manned their aircraft, ready to relieve those already in flight if the word should come. A KC-10A Extender tanker had already begun to be readied for flight. Based at Tralee Air Force Base in Ireland, the Extender carried three hundred and fifty-six thousand pounds of fuel, enough to refill each Raptor several times. Once airborne, the tanker would fly to the north and then towards the fighters, approaching it from a totally different vector, keeping its presence unknown. The jetliner would never know they were being trailed or that the trailing aircraft were refueling. It was easy enough to do with a civilian aircraft but a military one wouldn't have been so easy. That would have required far more stealth and the refueling operation couldn't have happened.

The Emperor had been on his feet since being first told about the hijacking. He paced around his office, answering phone calls and speaking to the various staffers and aides, both civilian and military, who occupied his office and the conference room at the MOD. Contact with the aircraft had thus far gone unanswered and the Emperor debated whether or not ordering the Raptors to make their presence known would facilitate anything. It was a dangerous situation and even the Emperor knew that they held all of the cards. They wouldn't fire on the jetliner or endanger the civilians on board in any unnecessary way. The terrorists knew that and they knew the rules that the Empire played. They had studied the tactics and strategies of the Empire throughout history and throughout the course of their war especially and they knew that, when civilians were concerned, when hostages were concerned, especially citizens of the Empire, the rules were different. A Layartebian air strike would kill Kaliningradian civilians hiding near a military target with little disregard and they had, on several occasions. The fog of war primarily led to these atrocities but even some were deliberate. One such strike against a bunker used to store ammunition for small arms led to the deaths of six hundred civilians, using it as a shelter. The strike was made by a fighter flying thirty thousand feet above the ground, using a bomb weighing only two thousand pounds. The whole city block had been devastated as the bomb cut right through the roof of the bunker, blowing up inside of it, killing all of those inside.

With the Raptors in trail and the terrorists in complete control of the airliner, everything reached an ironic lull. The panic and screaming inside of the cabin had largely ceased and the terrorists allowed the people to sit up, to be as comfortable as possible, given the situation. They continued to assert full dominance in the cabin and without any air marshals on board, they would go unopposed. Otto moved around the aisles of the plane, looking at passengers and those all around him. He sized up everyone, determining who would be a threat and who wouldn't. It took only minutes but when he was done, he ordered his men, quietly, and in Kaliningradian, to round up the thirty-two passengers he determined to be threats, bring them to first class, bind them with whatever they could find, and put them on the floor. He essentially left only women, children, and the elderly behind in the regular cabin with the rest up front/ Those he determined to be taken up front had their hands and feet bound, their hands behind their backs. The terrorists used mostly cloths to tie their hands and feet, tearing fabric from the chairs. They shoved them to the ground and made blindfolds out of more fabric, using the blindfolds to make sure that they were even more uncomfortable. The whole time, Otto, supervising the proceedings, eyed a single stewardess, cowering next to a passenger in the front of the economy cabin. She was sitting in the aisle seat, next to a frightened passenger, shoved there by one of the hijackers as he made his way down the aisle.

Despite being frightened half to death, she kept most of her composure although her heart was racing along with her nerves. She couldn't hide that but she tried. Her body shivered a little every time a hijacker walked by her. She was afraid of a multitude of things aside from the actual fact that there was a hijacking. The biggest thing of those were the guns. She hated them and they always made her nervous. Even at the age of thirty-six, a woman who had been a flight attendant since she was twenty-six, guns still made her afraid, like a child's fear of the dark. She buried her face against the passenger beside her, trying to console the elderly lady, her long, straight, brown hair shielding her tender, soft skin. She was skinny, cute, and didn't look her age, a byproduct of a relatively stress free job. Sure she had her share of unruly passengers, turbulence, and odd encounters in foreign bars but she enjoyed flying enough to ignore all of those. This hijacking, on the other hand, was not something she had experienced yet and it was something she had hoped never to experience. Still, the reality was there and she couldn't ignore it. Instead, she kept herself as motionless as possible, trying to make it as if she wasn't there. It was working until Otto finally settled his eyes on her. It was obvious that she was a stewardess, she wore the same uniform as the others. For men it was a pair of black pants, a white shirt, a blue tie, and the emblem of the airlines. For women it was a white short, black skirts, black stockings, and black shoes. They were professional looking above all else with clean, sharp uniforms. She had a clip in her hair to keep it from going all over but it had fallen out in the scuffle and broken underneath the foot of one of the hijackers.

Otto eyed her up and down quickly before he grabbed her by the arm and yanked her out of the chair. Her hair flew off her face and revealed the contorted look of pain on her face. "You. Go to the front." She nodded and he let her go as she walked to the front of the aircraft. She entered first class, trying to compose herself but when she saw the men on the ground, blindfolded and bound, as if they were going to be executed, she lost what control over herself she had. She broke down into tears in the cabin and her sobs echoed throughout the rest of the plane. People began to cry as well. Otto, hearing it, quickly rushed to the front, right behind her, breathing down her neck. "What are you crying about!" He whispered to her, the muzzle of his pistol digging into her lower back. "You will tend to my men during this flight. If you do not I will personally put a bullet in the back of your head the moment we land this aircraft and I will leave your body on the runway for the birds to eat. Is that understood?" She nodded and walked forward, towards the galley. "We want water. And give some water to the passengers in the back. Just enough to take their thirst. Now!"

Rain swept over the Kensico Dam, thirty-one miles northeast of Governor's Island, where the Emperor and staffers continued to ponder over everything that was before them. Decisions had to be made and the most important of them was only minutes away from being made. It would involve a single call to a location, thirty-one miles northeast of Governor's Island, buried within the Kensico Reservoir. The Reservoir wasn't very large, by many standards, up to 30.6 billion gallons of water at its peak capacity, less than 2% of the water supply used by Layarteb City. As such, it wasn't a very attractive target for military or terrorist forces alike. Even if a contagion were introduced to the reservoir, which wasn't easy but yet not hard to do, its effects would be minor scale. That was what made the location so attractive for the most elite, secretive, and capable military unit in the entire world. Officially the 1st Black Operations Force but codenamed "Force Falcon," this unit's home was that reservoir. Buried underneath the reservoir and Great Island, their extensive facility which was dubbed "Zeta Facility" for the codenames, was extensive. It sat buried underneath two hundred feet of earth, rock, and water at its deepest point. A direct, thermonuclear hit to Layarteb City would not destroy this facility and it was meant to withstand even a direct, thermonuclear hit to White Plains, just four miles to the southwest. It was one of many places for Continuity of Government plans and though it was not a fallback location for the Emperor it was for the Minister of Defense.

Zeta Facility had been built in the 1970s by the Layartebian military as an underground, thermonuclear and chemical weapons storage facility. Before it could be completed, the Second Layartebian Civil War broke out and construction was halted. Resumed after the establishment of the Empire, the facility was converted into an actual base of operations for this elusive and entirely new Black Operations unit. Force Falcon had only four teams, One through Four, each of them eight men strong. Originally formed in the earliest years of the Empire, during the initial stages of the Conquests to handle deep, high-risk operations such as reconnaissance, VIP assassination and extraction, and POW extraction, their role morphed throughout the years. Team One, led by Colonel Jack Delaney, who had served in Delta Force during the Venezuelan War, underneath the Emperor, was responsible, primarily, for the protection of the Emperor. Those eight men, combined with other body guards, were the Emperor's primary protection force. When deployed, those duties fell to Team Two and so on and so fourth. By their very nature, only two teams could be deployed at any one time. One team was always on stand by and one was protecting the Emperor, using the Fortress of Comhghall as their base of operations during that time. As a function military force, Force Falcon was bred from the strongest, most elite, and most experienced and capable soldiers in the Imperial Layartebian Military. All of them had to come from Special Forces units and they had to have at least four to six years of experience, depending on the unit. Zeta Facility reflected this degree of skill as it was state-of-the-art, and entirely self-sufficient.

During this particular day, Team Four was on stand-by, Team Three in the Emperor's castle, Team Two deployed to Venezuela, and Team One active in the base. It was quiet and Colonel Delaney sat at his desk, in his office, reviewing personnel files. Despite being a Colonel, he was not the leader of Force Falcon. Rank served no purpose in Force Falcon, much like it had years earlier in the Emperor's Delta Force unit. As a major at the time, the Emperor commanded several units and enlisted men and officers were equal there, just as in the eyes of a bullet. Force Falcon was led by a Lieutenant General who took orders only from two people, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Emperor himself. For a unit that, flat out, did not exist, they were very much real. Few within the Imperial Layartebian Military even knew of their existence and those few who did knew few details. One could count, quickly, the list of those who knew. The Emperor, the Minister of Intelligence, the Minister of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and that was it. Whenever they were present in the Fortress of Comhghall, they were, for all intents and purposes, civilians. Part of the federal body guard unit, the Secret Service. The respective team leader was, at all times, to be in the same location as the Emperor. So while the Emperor was in the castle, so too was the team leader. His men he could dispense at his will. They were known simply as body guards, nothing more and nothing less. The Emperor knew who each one of them was but he never led on that they were an elusive, secretive unit within the military that could strike anywhere at any time. The things this unit did, while deployed, were more than just classified. No after-action reports were made and no record of their exploits existed. They held ceremonies for their dead, promotions, and awards in complete secrecy and they never left evidence behind. They simply never were.

It was ironic then that a phone should begin to ring in a non-existent office of a non-existent soldier in a non-existent base. That phone was in LG. John McClintock, the present commander of the unit. He knew exactly who it was, the caller ID saying so before his hand reached the receiver. He lifted it to his ear, the cord stretching out as he sat it against his head. "Secure Ops. Forty-nine. Dash eight. Seven."

"Secure Ops. Seven. Sixty-four. Forty-nine." McClintock responded, the voice being that of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "Sir."

"Immediate activation of ready team. Report to hold position Juliet. Situation critical."

"Understood." He didn't hang up the phone, instead, pushing down on the cradle to clear the line. Releasing it, he waited for the dial tone and pushed four buttons, sending his call immediately to a pager worn by Colonel Delaney. The four numbers connected to the pager and he entered a sequence of stars and numbers, eleven digits in total."[/i] Before he could open his tasking order, there was a knock outside of his door and standing present was Colonel Delaney, who had sprinted from his office to the general's. "Situation is critical."

"What do we have?"

"Tasking order." He displayed it on the projector screen on the side wall of his office. "Hijacked airliner en route eastward. No details other than it is being trailed by three Raptors. Eventually it will be landing. You are to ready your team immediately and report to Stewart Air Force Base. You will be tasked with capturing and/or killing all of the hijackers and rescuing all of the passengers once it lands. Your taxi is going to be a C-130J Super Hercules, one of the brand new ones. You are to be ready within the next hour. Pack appropriately."

"Understood. Who am I taking in place of Jackson." Steve Jackson, the team's demolitions expert, was lying in a hospital a few miles away with a life threatening case of pneumonia. He was out of action, being treated by a team of excellent doctors who gave him good hope for full recovery, so long as he stayed there. Despite wanting to ignore it and return to his duty, Jackson was ordered by McClintock to remain in the hospital. Despite rank being of no consequence, orders were to be respected, regardless. It was also a bit of a misnomer to regard him as the only demolitions expert on the team. They were all experts in everything they did. He was the dedicated man to deal with the explosives was all.

"You'll take Roberts from Four."

"Agreed. He is on base. Very well." Colonel Delaney was up and out of the office with the same notepad he had entered with, a few notes scribbled on the white paper. Before they left, they would have the full mission order, which was being printed. Colonel Delaney picked up a two-way radio that he also carried on his belt, a radio that was secure and only worked with the PA system on the base. He picked it from his belt, held it up to his mouth, and pressed the transmit key. "Team One. Report for immediate briefing in conference room one. Roberts, Team Four, your presence is requested." The seven men, throughout the base, dropped what they were doing, grabbed a piece of paper and a pen and were in the conference room in less than two minutes. Colonel Delaney beat them all but he was only a few feet away from it. "Gentlemen. It seems we have a situation. Prep and get ready to move out. We have a hijacked airliner. A Boeing 777 out of Dnalkrad City International Airport. Destination is unknown. Passengers number over three hundred. Force size and demands are unknown. Heading is east over the Atlantic with possible destinations in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, or elsewhere." He read from his notes while standing around a large conference table, the seven men seated comfortably. "We are to get in the air within the hour via C-130 out of Stewart. We'll take a helicopter flight from Westchester County when we're ready. It's going to be bumpy but that's why we have to speed it up. Our mission will be to capture and/or kill all hijackers, rescue all of the passengers, and return the aircraft to safety. Any questions?" There were none. They had rehearsed missions like this before, plenty of times. They would repair to their quarters, grab their gear, and be ready to go, visiting the armory to stock up on ammunitions, their packs filled otherwise. Because of the varied nature of their missions and the wide selection of weaponry available, they never loaded their ammunition ahead of time, packing it last. Each one of them had several packs ready to go too, depending on the nature of the mission. Less than forty-five minutes after getting the call, they were in the air, flying inside a UH-60L Black Hawk, which had departed Westchester County Airport amidst strong objections from the tower. They knew enough not to argue with the military but they weren't stupid either. Wind speeds, rain conditions, and lightning had grounded all of the flights into and out of the airport for the next four hours, minimum and here was an army Black Hawk, flying out towards a destination unknown. They landed minutes later and their helicopter rolled up to a hangar where, inside, a C-130J Super Hercules was beginning its engine start-up sequence. The eight men quickly departed the bird, walked around the cargo plane, climbed up its ramp, and got seated comfortably inside of its belly. The ramp was closed moments later and they eyed black cases stacked against the back wall, additional gear should they need it.

The C-130J Super Hercules was the newest production design of the C-130, a near five-decade old cargo plane originally designed in the early 1950s. The four engine transport served all throughout the world and with honor and distinction. Versatile, the C-130 airframe's upgrade in the "J" model guaranteed that the design of the C-130 would serve for decades more. Improved range, better engines, digitalized electronics, composite propellers, and a number of other changes allows the C-130J 40% greater range, 21% higher maximum speed, and 41% shorter take-off distance, amongst many other things. Still, it was nowhere near as fast nor could it fly as far as the Boeing 777 it was chasing. Its top speed was only 417 mph and its cruise speed only 400 mph whereas the Boeing 777 was over 550 mph for both figures. The C-130J wasn't meant to catch the jetliner or even keep pace with it, only follow it. With the three F-22A Raptors trailing behind the jetliner, relaying its course information to the ground control and thus back to the C-130, all they had to do was listen and follow. Where the jetliner was headed, nobody knew just yet but they did know that its recovery was of the utmost importance. With an initially very bumpy ride, the C-130 rapidly climbed above the storm where the air wasn't as turbulent but it still had a long way to go to get out of it and get to the clear, blue skies east of it, where the flight would be smooth sailing.

Inside the body of the jetliner, passengers were only marginally more comfortable. The terrorists were allowing bathroom usage but only limitedly and always with one of them standing right outside the door, his weapon pointed at it, ready to shoot someone if they weren't quick enough. The leader, Otto, had ordered a beautiful flight attendant to attend to both his men and some of the passengers, namely the fragile elderly and children. They were given cap's full of water, barely enough to do anything but quench their thirst and stave dehydration. It wouldn't be good enough long term but it wasn't going to be very long of a flight. He sat in first class, which had been emptied of its passengers, their presence replaced by thirty-two men seated on the floor, their hands and feet bound, mouths gagged. They received no water and no special attention. Summed up as dangerous to the terrorists, they were separated from the passengers and pushed to the ground, where they could be easily watched and countered, should they decide to act. First class was a quiet place because of it and while Johann eyed them and stewardess who handed out the water, Otto pulled out a tape recorder from his brief case, which he had retrieved the moment after he ordered the stewardess to tend to her duties. He looked at it and made sure that the tape inside, a small one, was rewound. It held a short message that was recorded through a voice distorter.

In Kaliningradian, he ordered Erich to play it over the airwaves, directed to the Layartebian Empire. It was an easy feat, the captain and his first officer complied with the request and switched to the proper frequency. This communication was the first from the hijacked airliner since it had come under terrorist control. "To the people of the Empire of Layarteb." The message began, the voice altered and though easy enough to discern, impossible to trace. "Layarteb Airways Flight 929 is now under the complete control of the R.F.K. Our soldiers have captured this jetliner swiftly and will control it and its passengers and crew until our demands are met." The message was in clear English and accents had been erased from the recording. "We have several bombs planted aboard this aircraft and will detonate them if we are threatened. We will be allowed to land in our destination, unimpeded where we our soldiers will begin execution of the passengers and crew, should our demands not be met." The voice on the recorded emphasized all of the proper words, striking fear more than anything else. "Our first and most important demand is immediate monetary and relief restitution by the Empire of Layarteb for the country of Kaliningrad to all of the families of those slain by the Empire and to our great towns and cities which have been left in ruins due to Layartebian bombardment. Secondly, the Empire of Layarteb shall release all political prisoners and freedom fighters it has captured from Kaliningrad and taken back to its unholy land for incarceration. Thirdly, the Emperor of Layarteb shall immediately resign from his position and be extradited to Kaliningrad for trial for the charges of crimes against the Kaliningradian people and country. Our demands will be augmented upon landing at our destination." The voice ceased and both the captain and first officer looked at each other with a sense of disgust for the terrorists who had seized control of the jetliner.

"What's R.F.K.?" Captain Harmon asked, sarcastically. Erich hit him hard for the way he said it and stepped back with the tape recorder.

"Revenge For Kaliningrad. You filthy swine killed our women, children, destroyed our cities, and laid waste to our country. We will exact revenge for our blood soaked land." He said with zeal as he handed the tape recorder through the now opened door to Otto on the other side. A remark from Otto, in Kaliningradian, caused him to shut his mouth quickly. In the first class cabin, the stewardess returned with a tray of empty caps and put them into the galley. She overheard some of the tape and the last bit of conversation between Erich and the pilots.

"What do you think this is going to solve?" She boldly asked of Otto, who sat with his pistol in his hand. The hand grenade was inside of his pocket, ready to be used if necessary.

"This? This is an act of rebellion against your Empire. Of course we don't expect the Emperor to resign nor do we even expect our demands to be met. States don't negotiate with what they call 'terrorists' regardless of the circumstances. Sure if we threatened to set off a nuclear bomb in Layarteb City, they might, under the table but a plane full of men, women, and children? Your death certificates have already been signed."

"So why slaughter all of these people if you know your own demands won't be met?"

"What's your name?" Otto wasn't changing the subject but he was curious who had the balls to speak to him in such a manner.

"Trisha." She wouldn't give him the rest. "Answer my question," she insisted. The men on the ground could only see her bravado, not cheer her on, although they tried, only to have Johann's weapon waved at them.

"Your government ordered your military to slaughter thousands upon thousands of men, women, and children. Rockets and bombs landed in our bomb shelters and specialized units tore through our countryside and ransacked our villages, hauling away teenagers and women, using them for collateral. Thousands of our own people remain unaccounted for, some buried in mass graves or carted off to your secret prisons." She didn't believe much of what he said.

"Rather than call yourselves civilized and take a higher moral ground, given what you're spitting out, you're just going to do what it is that you say we did to you." He looked at her with eyes aflame and she smirked a little bit.

"When we land you and these men will be personally coming with me." That was all he said and her smirk was instantly erased from her face.

http://www.forsakenoutlaw.com/Graphics/Nation-States/Role-Playing/Only%20in%20Time%20Can%20Pain%20Fade/kaliningrad-map-bw.png (http://www.forsakenoutlaw.com/Graphics/Nation-States/Role-Playing/Only%20in%20Time%20Can%20Pain%20Fade/kaliningrad-map.png)

After the jetliner had flown just over 1,900 miles of its 3,100 mile journey and spent nearly three and a half hours in the air, the first call was made to Kaliningrad. Kaliningrad was already in the midst of winter. It was 19:30 hours, local time, a seven hour time difference plus the three and a half hours since 9:00 hours Atlantic Standard Time, when the plane took off from Dnalkrad City IAP. The temperature had descended from its high point of 44.6°F to 42.8°F and it was raining lightly. It had been raining and snowing on and off all day long, starting just after 6:30 hours, local time. The winds had kicked up too, gusting to over 33 mph making it feel like it was below freezing. The jetliner was southeast of Iceland, not far from the Faroe Islands and its destination was evident. It wasn't going to Incirlik, it was going to Kaliningrad and being an aircraft of its size, it would be heading right for Khrabrovo Airport, which had served the Imperial Layartebian Air Force well during the war. Fighters and attack aircraft operated from the airport along with helicopters from the army and it was the last stronghold the Empire held before it abandoned the country. Just after the final cargo transports took off, fighters from the navy peppered the airport with cluster bombs and anti-runway munitions. The airport was rendered completely useless minutes later after a salvo of high explosive shells from a battleship in the Baltic Sea destroyed the control tower. It wasn't until early 1997 when the airport was finally repaired although operations remained limited, even this late into 1998 and daily air traffic was around forty aircraft per day.

The call originated in one of the secure, basement rooms in the Ministry of Intelligence, traveled into the air and up to a satellite hovering over 20,000 miles above the Atlantic Ocean. From there, it beamed right into a special communication set sitting in the closet of a shack in Zarech'ye, a tiny village just fourteen miles from Khrabrovo Airport. During the war, Kaliningradian insurgents used the town as a staging point before launching attacks into the capital. In the later part of the war, Layartebian aircraft dropped incendiary ordinance onto the town and all but leveled it to the ground but it had since been rebuilt, very poorly. It was quiet now, sparsely populated and very poor. Only two structures remained from the devastating bombing, both of which had been built from brick. They were skeletons, left as a memorial to the 281 people who were killed there over the course of the war, 184 of those during the bombing, which occurred in the middle of the night and without warning. Despite the death toll consisting mostly of civilians, two captains in the insurgency were killed as well, delaying an assault onto Khrabrovo Airport, which allowed the Layartebian military to be more prepared. That assault was a dismal failure for the insurgency. They were slaughtered!

The shack was home to an experienced agent with the Ministry of Intelligence with the cover name of Mikhail but he was really Andrew Hunt who had been with the Ministry of Intelligence since 1989, when he was thirty-two years old. He had served in the military during the First Venezuelan Civil War from 1975 until the Republic's withdrawal. During the Second Layartebian Civil War, he refused to take sides but, on paper, he was a member of the military and he served with military forces throughout the war, retiring from the military after the Empire had been declared. He returned to Venezuela and became an unofficial asset with the Ministry of Intelligence when the Conquests began, joining the agency as a full agent in 1989. A man of many talents, he was forty-one but it meant nothing. He had nine years of experience, seven languages, and a whole trade craft under his belt that any agent would dream for, let alone obtain. He had observed and reported, foiled, and plotted. Now he sat comfortably in a chair in his four room shack, which included a bathroom, kitchen, living room, and bedroom, none big enough to hold more than a few people at a time. It was dark already, approaching astronomical twilight with the full moon steadily rising, still low on the horizon and barely visible, just emitting a silver glow on the darkening horizon.

The communications box in the closet began to emit a low powered sound, like that of a cricket so that, should another person hear it, they wouldn't be alarmed. Andrew knew exactly what it was though and he stood up from his chair, pulled a key from his belt and unlocked the door, looking down at a wooden box, covered by a blanket. Removing the blanket and opening the box, he revealed the communications box and began to decode the sequence that was coming through. It would take a minute or so due to the heavy encryption but it was a simple message that explained the situation. His orders were to get to the airport, hide out, alert when it landed, and trail whatever happened afterwards. There was no doubt in his mind that they wouldn't stay at the airport but he didn't know where they would be going. Intel on the RFK was limited but he knew that they had strongholds inside Kaliningrad City and various other towns in the area including Yablonovka (18mi se of the airport), Medovoye (26mi sw of the airport), and Gusev (67.5mi sse of the airport). He coded back a simple response, which though it made no sense to anyone who didn't know it, told his superiors that he was on board. "Quantum." He walked out of the house, his jacket on, the rain ebbing slightly. The airport wasn't far away and the dense foliage to its east would give Andrew the perfect hiding spot to watch for the landing with a pair of night-vision capable binoculars, an encrypted radio transmitter, a long-range camera, and his sidearm.

The hijacked airliner continued to press on towards Kaliningradian airspace, without objection from anyone on the ground. Within range of North Germanian and Cottish radar stations, the airliner was picked up and tracked as it flew towards its eventual destination, almost a thousand miles away. In tow were the two Raptors and even further back was the Super Hercules with the Force Falcon team. While the airliner appeared to having been given a green light to enter Kaliningradian airspace, the Raptors and Super Hercules had no such authorization. While the Raptors were highly unlikely to be detected, if they were, it could spark a major, international incident and risk drawing the Empire back into war with Kaliningrad, something that few people within the Empire wanted. The Ministry of Intelligence had limited knowledge of the Kaliningradian military now that the war was over and assets on the ground noted that foreign, military imports had been flowing in rather freely since the end of the war. The Empire contemplated a limited anit-shipping campaign backed by the Cottish and North Germanians in order to stop the flow of arms into Kaliningrad. That idea, though proposed, had never been agreed upon by the Emperor and the mission was scrubbed. Instead, if the plane landed in Kaliningrad, the Raptors would divert into Poland where they would land and refuel to await further orders.

Inside the airliner, the terrorists had silenced everyone. They were slightly nervous themselves and wondered if their stunt would pay off as they passed through airspace that was decidedly hostile to them. They wondered if high command in Kaliningrad City would scramble what few fighters they had to intercept and turn away the airliner. They wondered if they would be arrested upon landing, if a coup had happened overnight and suddenly they were going to be heroes or worse. They wondered a lot. Cut off from their home world for days already, they knew that the moment of truth was fast approaching. They had a whole plan laid out that included supporters to meet them on the ground when they landed but who knew if they would be there. There were countless questions for them but no answers to be had and it made them stir crazy inside the confines of the airliner, flying thousands of feet above the Earth's surface. Those tied up in the front of the plane were kept quiet and weren't allowed to use the bathroom. They weren't allowed to move or to talk. Kept with a gun on them at all times, they maintained absolute stillness, even if they were uncomfortable. Sweat beaded off their foreheads and their shirts soaked up whatever they could, furthering the discomfort. Everyone else was shoved into the coach cabin, leaving just Otto, Johann, and the restrained prisoners in the first class cabin. Erich remained in the cockpit, closely watching the pilots while Joseph and Thomas stayed in the coach class cabin, where the rest of the passengers were kept. Stewardesses were barely able to move around themselves except for Tricia, who was now the personal servent to Otto, Johann, and Erich.

Set to touch down at 21:00 hours, the airliner was crossing time zone into time zone, landing six hours ahead of the time at Dnalkrad City. Growing nervous with the coming minutes, the terrorists pushed aside their nervousness, keeping from showing it. If the passengers saw them as weak, they would have revolted and if Otto had seen them as weak, he would betray them. Every one of them was nervous, especially Arnold, the sleeper, who sat in the cabin, feigning fright and fear. He sweat just like every other passenger did, shook and shivered like every other passenger, and he did everything he could to keep himself from being given away. It was easy for him, all the reason why he was chosen as the sleeper. The C-130 wouldn't be over Poland until early morning, after the sun had risen and they couldn't do anything but land and wait. They couldn't parachute in during the daytime and trying to drive into Kaliningrad was impossible sicne the border had been closed by the North Germanians during the war and never reopened.