“I always wanted to come back and make a big entrance…”
“Sunday.”
“Major?”
Sunday scanned the map but the icon of the commander was nowhere in sight. Stewart and Duncan were both heavily injured and no other officers were alive. Even with an arm so dislocated and broken the suit could do nothing but numb it he was as good as it got. But he had less than a platoon left so it wasn’t a particularly heavy burden of command.
“Yeah. I’m alive. For my sins. I’m heading out of Clayton now. I’ve contacted the SheVa; it’s prepared to deliver on-call fire from now until the local Posleen overrun it or somebody comes to save both our asses. You look like you’re clear.”
“Yes, sir. No Posleen in view.”
“They’re reconsolidating by Clayton. I’m calling for fire. But it shouldn’t affect your position. Hunker down and hold what you got. You look to be clean for the near future.”
“Yes, sir.”
“O’Neal, out.”
“SheVa Nine?”
“Go, Major.”
“One area denial round, UTM North 386187 East 280579.”
“Roger. Ah, what’s your position, over.”
Mike looked down at the ground; he was encased up to his armpits in rock and earth.
“Secure. Please fire the round.”
“Shot, over.”
“Shot, out.”
There was a pause. “Splash over.”
“Splash out.”
Mike smiled as the nuclear fireball consumed his old stomping grounds.
“I never really liked Clayton anyway.”
He waited until the majority of the dust had dissipated then looked around for more targets.
“The problem with nukes is finding a good position to be a spotter,” he mused. He dialed up his magnification and shook his head. “SheVa, can you reach UTM North 385846 East 278994. I would swear they’re reassembling over by Tiger.”
“Ah, negative ACS. Still out of our range. And we’re… sort of stuck. Again. The crunchies are on the way, though. As soon as they figure out how to get through the radiation they’ll be in support.”
“555 commander, we can reach that target point. And we’ll be there sooner.”
The voice was German-accented English and in the background a song was playing, just too faintly for Mike to pick out. As Mike watched a streak of fire like a meteor descended from the heavens and a nuclear fireball, followed by a mushroom cloud, erupted over Tiger.
In the distance he could see beams of light leaping into the sky and more beams, and streaks of fire, coming down. He looked around and the same could be seen in every direction into the distance.
“American Defense Command, hold what you got,” another voice entered the net. Presumably all the nets. “This is Vice Admiral Huber, Commander Task Force 77. Heavy fire incoming. Stand by.”
In the distance a wave of fire seemed to leap from the ground as fireball after fireball erupted into the sky. It was clear that kinetic energy weapons were taking out every single Posleen ship and settlement for as far as the eye could see. And undoubtedly beyond. Around the whole globe.
Mike looked up and half shook his head as a line of shuttlecraft, seeming half air and half matter, dropped out of the sky. Troopers began spouting from the sides, dropping on pillars of fire then assembling at impossible speed. Their suits, like the ships, seemed only half there, as if one with the land and sky. And on his sensors they didn’t appear at all. The air was filled with music and he shook his head and laughed hysterically again as the strains of “Ride of the Valkyries” poured through the air.
He lifted himself out of the ground as a shuttle approached and an armored figure dropped to the orange-tinted ground. He waited until it approached and then saluted the figure with the double star-bursts of a Fleet Strike major general on its shoulders.
“General,” Mike said, dropping the salute as it was returned.
“Colonel,” the general replied, taking off his helmet. The face was hard, Teutonic and very familiar.
“Oh, shit,” Mike said with a half laugh. “God damn, Steuben, it’s radioactive as hell out here. Put your damned helmet back on if you would be so good, General, sir.”
“ ‘Sorry we took so long, we had a spot of bother on the way,’ ” the general said, then wrapped the smaller suit in his arms.
Epilogue
“Sir, General Steuben’s here.”
Mike leaned against the rock looking out at the valley that had once been his home. He had seen the refugees and recon troopers extracted from the hole they had been huddling in and then turned his back and left. That hole had been designed for the express purpose of keeping his daughter alive. And when she needed it, she hadn’t been there.
“Colonel O’Neal,” the general said, touching his arm. “We’re about to lift. We’re needed in Europe.”
“Yes, sir,” Mike replied, turning and holding out his hand. “Thank you for your help, sir.”
“You had the situation well in hand, as always.” The suit turned and looked down across the valley and hills. In every direction there was nothing but an orange nothingness; the very soil had been stripped from the rocks. “I… heard about your choice.”
“Yes, sir.” His voice was cold and distant.
“It was… the right choice, Colonel. I… don’t know that I could have made it, but it was the right choice.”
“It would have been the right choice. But the timing… the Posleen couldn’t have forced their way through to the Cumberland.” Mike stopped. “They couldn’t have from the beginning. Not with you on the way. You would have arrived before then.”
“But to Asheville?” the general asked quietly. “Four million civilians, Colonel. To overrun the SheVa? To wipe out another division of troops? Or two or four or five? And you could not know. It was clear that everything that was known to the Earth forces was known to the Posleen. I don’t know what they would have done if they had known. Perhaps there was nothing they could do. But this one, Tulo’stenaloor, he was too smart. Who knows what he might have done?”
“True,” Mike sighed. “But… oh, God…” He slumped down to the ground and curled into a ball. “My daughter!”
The general looked at him for a moment and then sighed. “I think… Europe will wait. At least for me.”
He reached down and lifted the suit to its feet, taking the colonel by his shoulder and turning him towards the waiting shuttle. “I think, you and I, we will go get very drunk. And cry for the death of a world.”
“This is absolutely unacceptable!” the Tir shouted then stopped, panting.
I wonder if I could drive him into lintatai? Monsignor O’Reilly thought. No, no reason to change the plan.
“How is it unacceptable, my good Tir?” the Jesuit said aloud. “Surely this is a day of rejoicing.” In fact, through the doors to the conference room much rejoicing could clearly be heard; O’Reilly thought he was probably the only person in the entire complex who was actually working. On the other hand, while getting the Posleen off their backs was a good thing, to the Bane Sidhe it was just one step in a more complex war.
“Those forces were not to leave Irmansul uncovered!” the Tir said, firmly but back in control. “There will be… consequences.”
“A Fleet issue, I would think,” O’Reilly said. “As has been reiterated many times before, the Fleet does not belong to the United States, or even Earth, but to the Federation. Any… irregularities in unit dispositions is surely a Federation… irregularity.” The monsignor smiled thinly then made a complicated hand gesture. “I would consider taking it up with your pet admirals, Tir. The United States government has all it can do to handle the sudden cessation of hostilities.”