Wolves of Roma

Chapter 8

Chapter 8

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American Avionics was a company headquarter in downtown Washington DC like many other companies whose primary client was the Pentagon. Set up about four years ago it quickly rose to fame and was renowned for developing guidance systems that helped deliver payload to a fraction of an inch.

In plain english, they developed navigation equipment for missiles, they also made and manufactured "Payload delivery vehicles" which again meant missiles but without the warhead. You see, you can customize your warhead and based on your need they would install the required warhead. But finally what only a handful of people knew that it was the wholly owned subsidiary for Roma, of course, carefully hidden by mirage of dummy corporations and owners.

Roma being a sovereign country in eastern Europe had its advantages, it was the only werewolf country in the world, not that the world knew it. It was the dream of founding fathers of Roma to have a werewolf state where any werewolf was safe and protected. It had successfully hidden this fact for centuries since its formation. For the world it was an insignificantly small but wealthy country in Europe known for its rich landscape, beautiful resorts and vibrant democracy, the world hardly knew about the Roma monarchy.

But the werewolf's of the world knew different, behind the thin vile of democracy stood the all-powerful monarchy which once ruled every single werewolf on this planet and while it was not all-powerful now, it was not toothless either, the wolves of the world still feared the Roma bite. The democracy in Roma was a charade, an elaborate show for the world to see. The strings were pulled from the famous but simply titled "Palace of Roma" the home of the reigning monarchy.

This illusion allowed them to do business with the world, acquire technology and hardware which was off limits to individuals or even corporations but as a nation they were business opportunity to the world. USA did quite some business with Roma, selling her hi-tech military hardware and training her soldiers in joint exercise in some of their best military schools, being a European country with relatively non-violent history had its benefits.

That is how the missiles were sold to them, ironically by one of their own subsidiaries which were to be fit on the helicopters they had purchased recently as well. Now they had to be replaced, which American Avionics would do with the right phone call and no paperwork.

As for the missiles themselves, once programmed and launched they were completely autonomous. Able to reach their programmed target without intervention, they did automatic course correction using a built in GPS chip which refreshed every five seconds.

 Now as they streaked in to the sky at sub-sonic speeds their navigation path was laid out by the on-board computer chip, and as they reached the appropriate height, distance and velocity the rocket shut off.

For an outsider it would look as if the missile malfunctioned because of its abrupt shutdown. As the thrust was slowly lost, the direction of the missile facing the sky slowly turned and started facing towards the ground, the missile was front heavy and so the front tilted first facing the ground. With no opposing force the missile started to accelerate towards earth in a free fall. There was no need to waste fuel now because, gravity, would take care of the rest.

The missiles hit the first group of wolves and vaporized the entire lot, mercifully they died in their sleep and the wolves that were guarding them died even before they could comprehend what happened. For safety reasons when wolves slept in groups some of them stayed awake to act as guards to protect them against surprise attack. Not that it helped in this case, they never even thought of looking up.

The sudden loss of connection to their brothers woke the other two rogue groups of wolves hiding in the forest. But, before they could react the missiles took out the second group. Only four survived to make it out alive and flee for their lives.