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National Aerospace Defense Center, buried beneath the Ravenberg, northwest of Altenburg

High General Pathyrn Yong of the Loftegen 2 Air Force, overall commander of that service, was standing in an observation room overlooking the main command center of the NADC. His guests from the Imperium of Leonism were standing with him, gazing down at the activity below. Exercise Schedule was slated to officially begin in just over ten minutes. Unofficially, it had begun six hours ago when a thousand or so Vanguard bombers had taken off from their bases, followed two hours later by half that many Valiant's, and two hours later still by 250 each of Valkyrie's and Devastator's.

Yong looked at his watch for the third time in as many minutes.

"Nervous?" Großadmiral Trajan Claussen of the Luftwaffe asked.

Yong chuckled. "Unofficially, Schedule kicked off six hours ago. Un-unofficially, it started twelve hours ago when twenty-four Wraith stealth bombers left Newton AFB. They flew out for six hours, then turned around and headed back. They should be arriving in the area of the 'Orange Capital' any time now, and the fact that our air defenses haven't spotted them yet is...worrying."

"You're trying a decapitation strike, to kill the Orange leadership," Trajan observed shrewdly. A screen nearby showed a map of Orange, which was no more that a map of Loftegen 2 flipped horizontally and rotated 90 degrees. The Orange 'capital' was represented by a city that wasn't Altenburg, the proper name of which Trajan couldn't member at the moment.

"And we didn't tell our air defense people that we would be," Yong said in confirmation. "If they get taken by surprise, so will Orange. That'll make our 'attack' that much more likely to succeed."

The seconds ticked away. With barely five minutes to go before Zero Hour, the East Regional Aerospace Defense Center signaled that they had detected unknown aircraft approaching 'Orange Capital'. That information wasn't made available to the officer commanding the attack, though. He'd find out if and when 'Orange' reacted in an observable manner. A computer program was judging how long it would take the Orange chain of command to react.

The answer came at H minus 2 minutes 11 seconds.

"Orange Capital defenses engaging something!" one of the techs monitoring the recon satellites shouted.

Over General Douglas Veers had his instructions.

"Transmit exercise launch order," he said.