The collectives had not bothered with assaulting the gates with low-class ground combat units. Coming through the gate was a segmental class seven combat unit. It was tossing plasma charges off its horns at everything that looked like a threat. Four Abrams were smoking wrecks as were all the Bradleys and most of the bunkers that were supposed to shelter the infantry. And the thing just kept coming out of the gate, like a giant nightmare centipede, pouring fire in all directions.
As he watched, though, the thing hit one of the antitank mines the engineers had installed. The massive explosion punched up through the thing, sending a self-forging round upward through the first segment. The secondary explosion, even at five hundred meters, tossed the sergeant off the berm and down into the grass yard of the burning house.
He shook some life back into himself, again, and climbed back up the berm, wishing that his LBE hadn’t been in the bunker. All he had to fight with was a single magazine for the M-16.
It wasn’t going to matter, much, though. The front segment of the monster was a smoking wreck but it had already been detached and the thing continued to extrude. Now fire was leaping into the sky, intercepting incoming rounds of artillery. There were more antitank mines, but Horn was pretty sure there wouldn’t be enough.
“Anybody got a radio!” Horn yelled. “Call somebody and tell ’em this thing ain’t going to stop any time soon!”
“This is Bruce Gelinas in Woodmere, Ohio, where units of the Ohio National Guard have again been repulsed from an attempt to retake the Cleveland Gate. Fighting is reportedly heavy and from the looks of the casualties I’d have to agree. Besides the segmented tank there are now rhino tanks and something like large spider tanks, along with large numbers of dog aliens and thorn-throwers. The unit has had to retreat, twice, and now is simply trying to slow the monsters down as well as it can. More units are being brought up but the situation looks very bad.”
“Bruce have you been able to talk to anyone from the National Guard, there?” the anchorwoman in New York asked.
“No, the spokespeople don’t seem to be available,” Bruce said. “From what I heard they were issued weapons and have been sent in to replace losses in the infantry units, which are taking a real beating. I spoke, briefly, with a sergeant who had been injured in the initial assault…”
The scene cut to a recording of a soldier on a stretcher, his left arm in a thick bandage and scorch marks on his uniform. His face was partially bandaged and he could only see out of one eye.
“Sergeant Horn, you were part of the gate defense force?” the reporter asked.
“We couldn’t stop it,” the soldier said, almost incoherently. “It took out the Abrams before we even knew it was there, it was blowing up everything in sight! It took three mines and it didn’t stop it, it just kept coming!”
“We have further reports that an attempt to deliver strategic nuclear weapons was unsuccessful,” the reporter said, again live. “Orders to prepare for a strike were issued and we were warned, then nothing. Heavy fire could be seen from the direction of the gate and it apparently intercepted and destroyed the incoming nuclear rounds. As I said, at this point it looks as if nothing can stop the Titcher. This is Bruce Gelinas, in Woodmere, Ohio.”
“Thank you for that… disturbing report, Bruce,” the anchorwoman said. “Breakouts are reported at all of the formerly inactive bosons, ranging from Georgia to Canada. In addition to Titcher attacks, the gate in Oakdale, Kentucky, appears to be sending out Mreee soldiers and some sort of giant, silver spiders. We go now to Erik Kittlelsen who is reporting, live, from near the front lines. Erik?”
“We’re live in Oakdale, Kentucky,” the reporter shouted at the microphone just as an explosion occurred, very close, in the background. “I’m with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 149th Infantry Battalion of the Kentucky National Guard!” He looked over his shoulder at the wall of earth behind him and then back at the camera. “The attackers here seem to be Mreee and what the military now believes to be Nitch, the giant spider species we had previously only heard about from the Mreee. It’s clear, now, that the Mreee were allies of the Titcher all along!”
“Erik, we’re getting some very disturbing reports from other defenders,” the anchorwoman said. “How are things, there?”
“Not good, Roberta,” the reporter shouted, then hit the ground as an enormous explosion occurred close enough that the flash could be seen even with the camera pointed at the wall of the trench. In a moment he was back up again, though, and the camera was back on him. “The Mreee and the Nitch are using some sort of homing explosive round. Even if they appear to be missing, the round tracks in on our combat vehicles and bunkers! Infantry are doing better but not much. And they have antiair and antiartillery support from some sort of Titcher weaponry. They’re holding them to a perimeter for the time being, but more of the Mreee and Nitch are pouring through the gate and the gate is on a hilltop, they can drop fire on our lines and it’s hard to even get a head up with all the…”
The screen went blank then showed the anchorwoman again.
“We appear to be having some technical difficulties,” the woman said. “We’ll try to get Erik back as soon as possible.”
“Not this side of the grave.” Miller grunted, setting down his beer.
“No,” Bill said, through steepled fingers.
They were alone in the physics trailer at the anomaly site. The SEAL was wearing a skin-tight jumpsuit, and Weaver fatigues. Bill looked up at the SEAL and shook his head.
“You smell like a goat,” Bill commented.
“It’s your fault,” Miller replied, noncommittally. “What are you going to do?”
“Why does everyone want to know what I’m going to do?” Weaver replied, angrily.
“Because you’re always the man with the plan,” Miller explained, shrugging, and taking another sip of his beer. “So… what are you going to do?”
“By the time we create enough quarks to matter, we won’t be able to get to any of the gates,” Bill said, thoughtfully. “Even if we were set up in Savannah already. Which we’re not. And we can’t knock back any of the assaults with nukes, because we’ve exhausted half our subs firing into them to no effect. Something the news guys apparently haven’t found out. But there is one bright spot.”
“What?”
“We know that with the right technology, SDI works,” Bill said, still in a thoughtful tone.
“Very funny.”
“I think there’s only one thing to do,” Bill said, sitting back.
“And that is?”
“Beg.”
“Beg the Titcher to not kill us?” Miller asked. “I don’t think that’s gonna work.”
“No, beg for help,” Weaver replied, pulling out his cell phone. The charge was low; he’d forgotten to charge it up last night. He hoped it would last long enough. “First I’m gonna beg for an airplane. A few. One for me, one or more for you.”
“Why?”
“I’m going to France. You’re going to Kentucky.”
“I think I’m getting the better deal,” Miller said, watching the world end, live.
“We need Tchar,” Bill said, striding through the Adar gate with Admiral Avery. “Even more important, we need that artass guy.”
“You don’t speak directly to him,” Avery pointed out. “That’s important. If he’s not available we can’t even ask where he is.”
“We need somebody like him,” Bill replied. “Somebody who can make policy decisions.”
“We get what we get,” Avery said.