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117 Minutes of hell

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Hot blood covered his tongue as he swallowed again, trying to get rid of the iron-like taste from when he bit into his own tongue during the attack, but it was futile, it just kept coming.

'Fuck, I hope I won't be the first president to die by bleeding to death from biting my own tongue.' he thought, only to be interrupted by a stinging pain shooting up his back as he rolled over to the side, his wrists hurting badly behind his back.

He looked up, barely able to move from the way his arms were bound behind his back. He tried to get into a more comfortable position, but he glass shards all over the Oval Office prevented this, and the two armed men were eyeing him with dangerous gazes as he moved a bit.

The president grinded his teeth, as he tried to come up with a solution. It was now surely half an hour since these man had attacked the White House. Everything happened to fast, the security was simply overwhelmed by their firepower and the sudden appearance.

'There must have been a mole, otherwise they would have had no chance of avoiding every single alarm here.' he thought as he looked through the room.

On the other side of the room he saw the Vice-president lying, two blood-stained holes on his back. He had been lying there ever since the start of the attack, breathing raspingly for over fifteen minutes before he took his last breath.

It was so painful for him to see his college and friend simply waste away right in front of him and he was unable to do anything.

When the president looked up again through the shattered windows, seeing some columns of smoke rising up over the city, he asked himself how bad this attack was, it surely must have been raging on all over the city.

He asked himself who these people were, they spoke English without any notable accent, but this was something you could train, so this was no help. Their ethnicity looked Caucasian, yet he was not so sure about them either, but what he was sure about that these men were not using any Soviet-style weaponry they purchased on the black-market, no, these were top-nodge weapons and other equipment as their own soldiers used. So who were these people?

The silence in the room was suddenly broken by a soft 'Meow'. All three men in the room turned their heads to the shattered door where the noise came from. A little kitten was suddenly sitting there, licking its paw and cleaning its face.

They all seemed surprised, but especially the President. His children were allergic to both cats and dogs, so there should not have been any cat at all in the White House. The thought of his family made him sigh in relief inside, luckily his wife and two children have been on a holiday trip to New Zealand, so they were safe.

The kitten interrupted its cleaning and walked over to one of the armored soldiers, rubbing its flank against the black boots.

A grunting noise could be heard as the man knelt briefly down and grabbed the kitten at its scruff, lifting it off.

The president was surprised that these brutal men didn't simply shoot the kitten, after all he himself had gotten himself into some bad beating when he asked them several questions after they tied him up here. Their only response was a boot to his stomach, making him nearly throw up. He had to learn this way that these men were not answering to any questions, only listening to whoever gave them orders over their radios.

The man lifted the cat in front of his face, looking the animal directly into the eyes. He grunted and lifted off the darkened protective glasses to have a closer look at the black and white cat, which just meowed again.

The things happening next was so confusing and also so fast that the president would still have nightmares two weeks after this.

Suddenly the eyes of the cat opened wide, lighting up as two blinding white beams of light shone directly into the eyes of the man.

He screamed, throwing the cat away as he covered his eyes in pain. Before the other soldier could even respond, the cat's tail detached and flew into the middle of the room, where it exploded with an ear-shattering bang, confusing the two men even more.

The president, tried to roll away, ignoring the pain as some shards pierced his skin, trying to get some cover under his desk. He himself was half-deaf and partially blinded by the explosions, so he only half-consciously noticed the cartridge cases landing on the ground near the door.

He tried to crawl under the desk, trying to get some cover somehow from whatever was happening right now.

Suddenly he felt two hands grabbing his ankles, pulling him out from under the desk again. He tried to fight whoever was trying to get him but it was in vain.

He was roughly turned around, looking into the face of another armed man, his face hidden under a balaclava, though with one difference. This man had the distinctive emblem of the US Marine Corps on his shoulder. A deep sigh of relief escaped the President's mouth as the man reach behind him and opened the bindings around his wrists.

"...you...right?" asked the Marine as the president was slowly getting up, rubbing his hurting wrists. He saw three other Marines in the room, their rifles ready, securing the area.

The President pointed at his ears, as they were still ringing from the explosion, indicating that he could not hear that well right now.

"I guess I am, somehow. Thanks, Marines. I already thought I was done for." He winced as he fully got up, some wounds on his back hurting horribly, now that the adrenaline of the shock was slowly wearing off.

"Sir, I know that you are confused and all, but we have to get you to a safe location right now. As far as we know these attackers will get reinforcement very soon. We have to get you out of here." The marine said quickly. "We will patch you up in our vehicle, but I have to ask you to follow us now."

The President just nodded, following the Marine, the other one's securing his back.

"What was that robo-kitten?" the President asked on their way out.

"An experimental infiltration and attack unit, the idea behind it was, that about 80 percent of all people would be drawn closer to the kitten because it looked so adorable, so it can listen and transmit their conversations or as your case has shown, to attack them and distract the attackers from our human forces. But you know, budge cuts..." He just shrugged, briefly looking around the corner to look if there were more attackers.

They quickly got out of the White House, stumbling over the bodies of more of attackers the marines just killed, some of them missing either limbs or parts of their head, but all of them shared the bullet holes in their chests.

As they reached the front of the building, the president was surprised to see two normal looking Vans, and not some sort of armored vehicle, yet he followed the Marines inside. Inside a surprise awaited him.

"Jim?" was the only thing the President could mutter as he saw the head of the FBI inside waiting for him.

"Yeah, I am glad to see you too. Now take a seat and let one of these men patch you up, you look like you could need it."

With a loud bang the doors of the vans where shut and off they were.

While they were heading off, the president with the help of one of the Marines removed his shirt to get his wounds treated.

"That was about time Jim, I thought I was gonna die there in the hands of these terrorists."

The chief of the FBI looked at a tablet briefly before he answered.

"I hate to tell you this but the situation is even worse than you think. Right now we are at the brink of something that we have not experienced since the civil war."

The President winced, both from the pain on his back and the thought of what he could mean.

"Worse? You mean, these terrorists are not only attacking here in D.C.? Why...?"

He was suddenly interrupted by several super-sonic booms right above their heads, the car shaking. The president looked through small window at the side of the car and he thought his mind was playing tricks on him, as he was sure one of the jets he saw flying extremely low above them was bearing a Red maple leaf.

The leader of the FBI just shock his head.

"Not terrorists. These men...that attacked you...they were part of a conspiracy to remove you from office...they are part of our own armed forced...we are right in the midst of a Coup D'etat."

The President's eyes widened, he was unable to speak anything at all, he didn't even felt the pain as the Marine wrapped him up with some bandages. Only when the car suddenly took a sharp turn to the left, his head hitting the side of the car, he regained his senses.

"A coup...d'etat..that can't be....that makes no sense..." he muttered.

"Unfortunately, that is the case. A group within our armed forces and secret services has decided that both you as well as congress were too weak to deal with the current situations. Which is why they decided to remove you by force. And that was just the beginning...in the very moment they seized the control over our communications, we went at war with the rest of NATO in an attempt to subdue them as well. I was lucky that I was able to inform this group of Marines here about the intentions of this rebel group beforehand, otherwise they would be on their side too."

As the chief of the FBI revealed this information to him, the president's eyes nearly popped out, unable to respond in any kind. The car took another hard turn to the right this time.

"You know, there were members in the military and even some of our intelligence services we have been watching closely for the past few years, as they became quite...suspicious in their behaviour.

First how your predecessor handled the situation in the middle east during his terms, then the start of the second cold war....they really hated you politicians for how you handled this all. But the final straw was that the Euros, together with the other member of their secret alliance, managed to install an orbital laser defense network, and you did not respond in the way they hoped you would. Which is why these putschists bombed the capitals of Canada and every single capital of the EU.

Our information are pretty sparse, but from what we know there are some pretty heavy tank-battles happening right now in Germany and Canada. And I don't even want to know what is happening right now in Japan and Korea."

The president shook his head, trying to bring some order into his mind.

"But that does not make any sense, our soldiers would not..." he began, only to be interrupted again.

"They don't know that you are removed from your office, they think that the orders to bomb Berlin, Paris, Vienna and Helsinki or whatever place, are coming from you and your Joint Chiefs of Staff. They just follow their orders they get."

"We have to stop this, I have to get to some command post, some place where I can give the order for all our soldiers to lay down their arms. I have to..."

A hand was placed on his shoulder, as the FBI-chief sat down at this side. He just shook his head.

"Mike, it's over. The only thing we can do now is get you out of here, and hope that there are some troops overseas that we can gain their trust. We have a learjet waiting at Reagan, we will get you out here and then you can form an exile government. But I fear we won't be welcomed with open arms at any place right now."

"No, there has to be another way. I won't let any maniacs from yesteryear take over our country to install some fascist government."

He started tearing his hair as tried to figure out what to do.

"Do you know if the rebels have control over Air-Force-One?" he finally asked.

One of the marines looked to another one, who was working on a small notebook on his lap.

"Sparks, any new info?"

Sparks briefly nodded as he hammered his fingers into the keyboard, obviously he was the guy responsible for cyber-warfare of this group.

"Jeeeeeez....that is not looking too good, guys. And I am not talking about AFO, for some reasons it is unguarded on Dulles Airport. What I mean is..." he tapped on the screen. "...from what little I can gather around, our forces are taking a pretty heavy beating all over the place. Looks like the Euros were better prepared than these rebels anticipated, as I am getting Intel in here about battles that look more like a WW III scenario. Looks to me that these rebels prepared for this offensive the same bad way these idiots did in 2003, totally overestimating their own power. Oh and we lost pretty much every ship in Norfolk to sub-launched cruise-missiles." he said somewhat calmly.The FBI-chief just shook his head.

"What do you wanna do with the Air-Force-One, that thing will just become a huge target."

The president replied, more determined than ever before.

"This plane acts as our central command post in any case of emergency, so I should be able to get into contact with every single soldier that is fighting a useless fight out there against our own allies, and god forbid, maybe even our own citizens. We have to get there now! I could order you to do so, but I hope that you agree with me." He tried to look at determined and convinced as possible, hoping that these men would follow his lead, trying to hide his own doubts.

But to his surprise there was just one command, as the driver spoke into the smart-phone attached to his arm.

"Cortana, fastest route to Dulles Airport.

---

"Tell your men they can rob the minibar, they truly deserve it." was the only response the president could muster as they closed the door of the Air-Force-One.

They were truly lucky, not even was the aircraft totally unguarded, for unknown reasons there were even two armed fighter jets with their pilots stationed on the airport. As soon as they saw the president, he ordered them to ignore from now on any orders from any commander of the US armed forces except for him, ordering them to protect his aircraft now at all costs.

The aircraft rumbled quickly towards the runway, totally ignoring the calls from the tower that called them to come back.

The president stumbled with the chief of the FBI into the strategic command room, even while the aircraft took off, quickly followed by the F16 and the F35 behind them.

The President held to the sidesar of the control panel as the machine took off, barely able to stand on his feet. He dismissed the plea of the FBI-chef to take a seat while taking off, he tried to enter his codes as fast as possible to gain control over the main communication-systems to give the order to stop fighting and arrest the conspiracists.

But his code was not accepted.

"Frack....the NSA must have abrogated my codes, I cannot get into the system." He placed his right hand on the chest pocket in his jacket, the place where he had 'The Biscuit', the card with the Gold Codes to launch their nuclear missiles. He did not know if the attackers had changed these codes too, but it was likely, after all it was the NSA that changed these codes on a daily basis. He could probably not even launch a firework rocket right now.

He looked at the cyber warfare marine.

"You, what was your name, sparkles? Get over and show me how good you are, I need a connection with this system here, even if it is just for a minute. Only then I can stop this fight."

Sparks just nodded and clumsily walked over to the console as the aircraft was still gaining altitude. He cracked his finger-knuckles before he started his work, while the president slid downwards towards where the FBI-chief was standing, both of them holding to the large console in the middle of the room.

To the President's surprise it was actually showing real-life feeds from where the putschists were engaging. And from what he could read there, things were looking more than just grim. The rebels in their military and secret services obviously have totally underestimated the power and determination of the European nations.

He could see spots indicating Canadian forces nearing the outskirts of Seattle, while others showed air-battles between RAF/CAF and USAF over the Midwest. And others in many major cities all over the US were labeled with 'Domestic uprisings'.

"Oh good lord....this just cannot be true...all these people..." his knuckles turned white as he held tot he keyboard in front of him.

By accident he pushes several buttons as he held to it, revealing a list of possible connections. Pretty much every one was listed as 'Unavailable' except for the last one. He looked at the FBI-chief briefly who looked on the list as well, then he simply nodded. The President swallowed his pride as he placed his finger on the touchscreen, initiating the connection. He would need every help he could get now to put down this coup d'etat.

It needed nearly a minute to establish the connection, or maybe it just took the person on the other side to pick up.

But finally the screen in front of the two men lit up, showing the face of a woman. She looked to be more than just angry, it was the pure essence of abhorrence, her eyes cold as ice and her voice as sharp as a razor-blade.

"Now look who is calling, the lunatic cowboy himself. I do wonder though why you are calling. Are you maybe asking for your surrender, after all, we managed to defeat pretty much all your forces here in Europe, your nuclear missiles are all grounded and both my intelligence as well as some of your own news-stations tell me, that even though you managed to send some forces to Toronto and central Canada, you are already loosing ground everywhere, especially to your own rebelling citizens."

There was no political correctness left as the President of the European Union addressed him. Her political office had been created by the EU just two years ago in an attempt to have a symbol for their unity, a person they could identify with and prevent a similar identity crises in 2014.

"Look, I know what you are thinking but the situation is not as what it looks like." he said, trying to explain himself.

"Oh, what do you think that I think?" the EU's president was quick to answer. "Well, it is not about what I think, it is about what I see and I see a nation ruled by a group of lunatic militarists in both politics and their armed forces that have resolved to gunship politics as if we were in the 19th century again, first threatening and then using their military power to implement their own will on other nations, bombing our capitals, even the ones of neutral nations."

"These attacks were not carried out under my command. I and some of my men barely made it out of DC. We are....we are currently experiencing a Coup d'etat."

The eyes of the female president closed even more, as she eyed him the same way a snake was fixing on its prey.

"And you think that this information is supposed to calm me down?" she hissed. Several men were shouting something behind her. The president briefly looked on the map, only to see the spot for the Ramstein Airforce Base showing the words 'Signal lost'.

"I tell you now something, Mr. President." She leaned closer to the camera, her face nearly filling out the entire screen.

"If you want to, you can fly over to our continent and try to establish an exile in government, I am sure there are enough American tourists all over the world that could act as your population in exile to elect yourself a new government. But I assume you are more thinking of us helping you to put down this rebellion of yours." She folded her hands. "Let it put me this way for you: Va te faire foutre!"The president did not speak French, yet the tone of what she just said made it all to clear what she meant. Before he could even respond she continued in quite a rage.

"Why would we try to help you, the Paranoid States of America, who got so paranoid to attack their own Allies to assure their own power, who are unable to even control their own armed forces. No, Mr. President. You are on your own if you want to do this. We don't care if you fall now into your second civil war. We have the means to prevent every nuclear attack from your side, so don't even try to threaten us with these. For all I care you and your people can all go to hell. And I am also pretty sure that if your own internal conflict spills over your borders, we and our allies would be happy to pay you a visit under a UN-Mandat and simply occupy your nation to teach you some manners!"

Her face was red in pure anger as she finished her rant. Despite her being a professional politician and negotiator, she was unable to hold back now.

"I'm through." Sparks suddenly yelled in joy. "But I dunno for how long before the NSA will notice. So quick Mister POTUS, tell them what you need to tell them."

The president hurried to the other console, leaving the EU President's connection still online to let her hear what he is saying.

"Attention to all forces of the US-Armed forces currently engaged in fights against our allies. This is President Peterson speaking, identification code Alpha-Zero-Nine-Kilo-Eagle-Foxtrot-Tango. I am calling all US forces. If you are currently in an active battle in Europe and Canada, surrender immediately. I repeat, cease fighting and surrender to the forces you are battling right now. The order for the attack on our Canadian and European allies did not come from me and my staff, but by a group of rebels within our Armed Forces, who have also captured all members of Congress and the Senate. Since it is unclear who is actual involved in this plot, I hereby declare a nation-wide state of war and order all soldiers to arrest every officer with the the rank higher than Colonel or Captain, as well as the entire leadership of the CIA and NSA. If these individuals resist the arrest, I order you to use any force necessary, even deadly force should they resist."

In that moment the connection was disrupted again, cutting the Air-Force-One off from the chain-of-command. He just hoped that the members of their armed forces would obey him and that the higher ranks of their armed forces would understand this order, after all it would take a long time and careful investigation to purge their ranks from these rebels.

"Nice speech, you just came up within just a few seconds. I doubt though your soldier's will really follow them." said the EU president, as the US president walked over to the other console again. He rested his arms on the console, overlooking the world map, showing the active forces of the US. Nearly all the bases in Europe were already red, indicating they were captured.

After a few minutes somebody walked over to the European President and whispered something in her ear, before the officer walked off again.

"Looks like you are lucky. I was just informed that your last few tank battle-groups have surrendered to the Armed Forces of Belgium and Germany. I hope for you that enough soldiers in your nation have a change of heart too and will follow your orders. Because we just got new problems in the East.

It looks like the Russians have joined you in the club of nations that do not care about international laws or agreements, trying to use this opportunity when you distracted us. So I suggest you just bugger off now and gather what forces are loyal to you, cause we have more serious issues now than your shattered union."

Before the president was able to respond in any way, the connection was cut, leaving the screen dark, only showing a faint reflection of the President's face. He just stood there, barely noticing the incoming calls of various smaller battle-groups or Captains of various ships that assured that for now they would only follow the direct orders of the President.

He just looked at his wrist, looking for the time on his old watch. It was hard to believe that he had been in this hell for barely two hours.

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(Artist of the cover art is Panzerfire on DA )