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  “A dome of force generated by their invasion ships?” she said thoughtfully. “A shield powered by ninety pillars? Is that it?”

  “Yes.”

  “What are they doing under there?”

  “We don’t know. But nothing has come out, or gone in. There was a small town in the region called Hammonton—we’re assuming the worst.”

  “Hammonton? I’ve never heard of it… Still, this is alarming. I’d assumed they’d landed in a field somewhere. I don’t like to complicate the situation with civilians.”

  I snorted. “I bet they’re not too happy about it down there in Hammonton, either.”

  Galina’s eyes slid to regard me for a moment, then slid back to Drusus. “Nothing has come out of there? None of McGill’s flapping bird-robots?”

  “Nothing. We’ve surrounded it, and we’re moving in more troops all the time. But we don’t really know what we’ll be facing when they do decide to come out.”

  “We should go in,” I said firmly. “March right in there and clean them out. Whatever they’re doing in there, I’m certain we won’t be happy about it when we learn the truth.”

  Drusus looked a little troubled.

  I knew he was thinking about the people. Checking my tapper, I looked up Hammonton. The local population was around thirty thousand. That was a lot of hostages to be responsible for.

  “I think your hero is right, Drusus,” Wurtenberger said. “You should do it now—before they make their next move.”

  Drusus was in command of local Earth Defenses. One time, years ago, he’d been responsible for the entirety of the planet’s defensive armies. I don’t think he’d enjoyed the death toll back then, and I don’t think he liked contemplating it now.

  At last, he nodded. “Galina, you’re going to deploy Varus tomorrow morning. Solstice is already out there, setting up shop.”

  “What about the Iron Eagles? Or Germanica?”

  “They’re both on other planets, doing guard duty.”

  Galina knew this of course. I figured she was bringing up these other legions with valorous histories to point out the fact Earth was overextended.

  It was a serious problem. We’d gained planets, but that meant we had to guard them all to keep them. We only had so many seasoned legions—and we were spread pretty thin these days.

  I’d finished my first plate by this time. The rest dug in, and I felt happy to have another plate waiting. To a casual observer, it looked like I’d waited for them.

  The truth was, of course, that I had stacked the first plate under the second. It was a little wobbly that way, but it worked well enough.

  -13-

  That night I slept with Galina. There was an urgency to the sex I knew all too well. When people think they’re about to die, or when they just had a near-death experience, they go at it with intensity.

  In the early predawn hours, we were a little fuzzy but relatively happy. We’d worked out our differences and become determined to see our mission through to the end.

  Outwardly, we were all business by the time we hit the lifters and were transported to the battle zone. Landing on a green sward of pasture just south of the Wharton Forest, we joined a mass deployment.

  From the air, we could see the enemy dome directly. They’d built up something that projected a wall of force. All around the outer perimeter were those strange, bat-winged landing craft. Each one was a source point for the force field.

  “Doesn’t look like it’d be too hard to pop that bubble,” I commented to Harris, who was sitting on my right.

  “You’re right,” he replied. “A few tactical shells would take out the ships and boom! No more dome. I don’t know why Drusus even needs us out here.”

  “You’re fooling yourselves,” Leeson said from my left. “They don’t want to light up a nuke out here in the middle of Jersey. They’d rather see us all die twenty times than lose a tall stack of voters.”

  Leeson was probably right. The brass didn’t think the invasion was all that serious, and it was in the middle of a heavily populated area. No one wanted to see a radioactive dust cloud floating over New York City. Troop losses were far more acceptable to any politician—especially when they could print out new copies of us when it was over.

  “They’ll mass us up and have us charge under there…” I said, thinking about it. “This will be bloody. They’ve got hostages in Hammonton.”

  “Hostages? Ha!” Leeson snorted. “They probably ate them or something by now.”

  Frowning, I began thinking of tactical dispersal of troops, and how I should march 3rd Unit under that dome when the order came to advance.

  When the lifter landed, the big door cracked open, and we rushed out. Graves was in the lead, at least you had to say that for him. The man was no coward.

  The first thing I discovered when I got out into the open was a massive stink. All around me, my troops were recoiling, squinting, and shaking their heads like dogs with dust up their noses.

  Thousands of Blood Worlders had already deployed here. They marched in ranks that went all the way up the highway, then off the road into Wharton forest. I’d forgotten they had a training facility in there.

  The Blood Worlders were mostly heavy infantry—hunched-over men who were about three meters in height. They weighed as much as grizzly bears and were about as physically powerful.

  “Hate the way these apes smell,” Harris complained.

  “You should learn to love that stench,” Leeson said. “These boys are easy on the eyes to me. Just think: who do you figure the brass will send under that dome first? A horde of big, ugly near-humans—or us?”

  Harris considered. The longer he thought about it, the more distrustful he looked. “I don’t know… Look who they sent out here: Varus and Solstice—both of us are shit-outfits. We’re only one notch better than a zoo legion to the brass. I doubt they even have a favorite in the field today.”

  I didn’t say anything. First, I had no idea who they were going to order to march under there first. Secondly, I was bored with the topic.

  “There’s nothing we can do about it either way, so shut up,” I told them both as their argument began to get heated.

  “That doesn’t sound like the McGill I know,” Harris complained.

  After I glared at him a bit, he finally shut up.

  Soon we reached our checkpoint. We ate some rations, checked our gear and did a headcount. As was oftentimes the case in the military, we had to wait around after that. Not every unit was in place yet.

  The morning wore on, and it soon turned into afternoon, then evening. It wasn’t until around 1800 hours that Graves finally contacted me for a readiness report.

  “All present and accounted for, sir,” I told him. “We’re ready to eat steel and shit nails out here.”

  “Outstanding. You’ll be leading this charge, and it will be recorded by drones all around the world. Don’t piss on your boots today, McGill.”

  “Uh…” I said, blinking in confusion. “Leading the charge? Really?”

  “No, not really. You’ll go in with the first wave, which will come from every direction at once. The point is: the cameras will be on you.”

  “Really…? Exactly why is that, Primus?”

  He frowned at me. “You’re the hero, remember? Earth’s just had a bad scare. They needed to feel like they’re protected. Accordingly, your story has been relayed to every news-vid online.”

  “I… I see, sir.”

  Graves closed the channel, and I turned to Harris and Leeson with a wide grin.

  “It’s our lucky day, gentlemen! We’re going to play hero together. Trust me, there’s no better way to get lucky later on with the ladies back home.”

  Throwing out a gauntleted hand at waist level, I urged them to slap their hands on top of mine. After a few glum looks, they finally did it.

  “All right, let’s move out!”

  Trotting away toward the enemy lines with manufactured enthusiasm, I got them
to follow me. Sometimes, that was the key to leadership: to lead by example.

  Less than an hour later it was dark out, and we were creeping up on enemy positions. Those bat-winged invasion ships were dark metal, and they looked sleek up against the night sky. They were as wicked-looking as our lifters were ungainly.

  “Leeson?” I hissed.

  “Huh?”

  “You think those landers have anti-personnel weaponry?” I asked. “Like ours do?”

  He looked at me in alarm. “Hells bells… I didn’t even think of that. Of course they do. This can’t be the first time these pirates invaded a planet. They have to have it all planned out. They’ll mow us down on this open ground!”

  It was all open fields around Hammonton. There wouldn’t be anywhere to hide if we just charged in.

  “Maybe you should go talk to Turov,” Harris suggested. “Maybe she could be… convinced to cut us a break.”

  I shook my head, knowing that wasn’t going to happen. Galina enjoyed my company, and she might even love me a little—but telling her I was going to die wouldn’t impress her one bit. She knew I’d come back out of the revival machines as good as new.

  “I’ve got a better angle,” I said, using my tapper.

  I contacted Turov, and she frowned out of my tapper.

  “Can’t you see those drones swarming overhead, McGill?” she demanded. “They don’t have endless battery power, you know. Get a move on!”

  “Well sir, I’ve just gotten to thinking—”

  “Don’t do that. Try following orders instead.”

  “I’m thinking about those drones, sir. Of what they’re showing, and who they’re broadcasting to.”

  “They’re broadcasting to the entire planet.”

  “Exactly right, sir. What if, let’s just say, these landing craft are equipped with heavy weapons like our lifters? We’ll be mowed down before we can reach the barrier—and it will happen on live camera.”

  “Hmm…” she said, thinking that over.

  Galina had a heart of ice when it came to the pain and suffering of her troops—but she understood PR quite well.

  “That could spell disaster… All right, hold your position.”

  My men were flat on their faces in the dirt.

  “That was well-played, Centurion,” Leeson said.

  “It sure was,” Harris agreed.

  A tall woman walked up to us. It was Barton.

  “Get down here, and hug the ground,” I ordered her.

  She threw herself down beside us and scrutinized the field. We were about a kilometer out from the ring of enemy ships and the force field that shimmered above them.

  A voice spoke up nearby a moment later.

  “No orders to charge in yet, huh?” Specialist Cooper asked in disgust. He was wearing his stealth suit and invisible.

  I looked around, but my favorite chunk of cannon fodder evaded my eyes.

  “We’re sending in scouts,” I told him. “Get up there, Ghost. Do your job.”

  “Who’s idea was it to send in the scouts first?”

  “Mine.”

  I heard him cursing quietly as he crawled forward. “Do you really think an alien task force that has traveled across hundreds of light years is going to be fooled by my Vulbite stealth suit?” he asked.

  “You’d better hope so. Now, get out there and start hopping, bunny-rabbit.”

  Cooper trotted off, muttering unpleasant things.

  Checking my HUD and altering the settings, I could see the ghosts. They were blue dots superimposed on my vision. Every ghost specialist in the cohort was advancing toward the enemy position.

  Then I got a kick in the ribs. Startled, I rolled over to yell at whoever was thumping on me. There was no one there.

  “Who’s that?” I demanded. “Another ghost?”

  “Yes, of course. We’re all going.”

  I knew that voice, and my heart sank. It was Della.

  -14-

  Della had finally moved up into the specialist ranks. She’d never been big enough to be a weaponeer, stable enough to be a bio, or bookish enough to be a tech. Instead, she’d had to wait until they’d finally created a specialty rank that fit her perfectly.

  That rank was known as a ghost—a noncom that operated as a scout.

  The ghosts employed a personal stealth-generating system. Invisible to the naked eye, they activated light-bending garments and were able to evade the enemy with ease. In fact, the running joke was that you never saw your unit’s ghost until chow-time—and maybe not even then.

  Della had been a scout of sorts in Dust World’s military back when I’d first met her. She had skills in stealth and tracking that were legendary in my unit. Coupled with new tech that literally made her invisible, she was among the best ghosts in the legion. I’d kind of forgotten about all that until now.

  After kicking me, Della walked off, and I lost track of her.

  The rest of us hugged the dirt, watching our HUDs and the circle of invasion ships. Nothing happened for what seemed like a long time—then the sparks began to fly.

  “That’s snap-rifle fire, or I’m a midget,” Harris said. “Looks like the ghosts are engaging with… something.”

  “Which means they’ve been spotted,” I added.

  Zooming in, I could make out very little of the scene on the ground near the base of those enemy ships. The shielding was brightest there in color and intensity. It was like looking into a floodlight that shifted constantly. The enemy force field reminded me of the northern lights—aurora borealis.

  “Adjunct Barton,” I said on command chat, “advance your light troopers into range. Provide covering fire if the ghosts fall back toward our lines.”

  Butts humped up all over the field as Barton moved her lights forward in the grassy fields.

  “Could be a trap, sir,” Leeson called out to me. “Those ships… they’re like gun towers. They’ll blow everyone to Hell and back if we make a target of ourselves.”

  He could have been right, but I didn’t see how that mattered. The brass wanted us to take out the enemy on the ground to reduce local civvie deaths and destruction. Implicit in that goal was the fact they didn’t give much of a shit about me and my troops.

  The local voters were much more important than we were. They knew they could just print out fresh copies of my men, which was infinitely preferable to everyone on the grid posting pictures of their permed grandma if they struck too hard.

  I could appreciate their position, but I still wanted to do this as cleanly as possible. Accordingly, I contacted Graves.

  “What is it, McGill?”

  “The ghosts have made contact, sir. No news yet on what the fighting is about. There’s some kind of interference keeping us from getting voice responses from the ghosts.”

  “I know about that,” he said. “No one has been able to get a radio signal to penetrate the edge of that force field. If that’s all you—”

  “I’m calling to request star-fall artillery, sir,” I said quickly before he could cut the channel.

  Graves hesitated. “I can’t do that, McGill,” he said after a pause. “We have our rules of engagement, and they’re pretty tight when we’re this close to urban areas.”

  “I appreciate that, sir,” I said. “But as any battle with an unknown opponent tends to go in unexpected ways, I’d suggest we prepare for the worst.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Roll up the star-falls and the 88s. Set them up behind our lines as a back-up measure.”

  “That’s specifically against—”

  “Drusus will only know if you use them,” I told him. “At that point, he’ll call you hero.”

  Graves shut up for a moment. I figured he was checking on the displacement of our heavier weapons.

  “I’ll take your comments under consideration,” he said at last. “Graves out.”

  Harris wormed his way over to my position on the ground and looked at me expectantly.

  “
Yes, Adjunct?” I asked.

  “Well?” he demanded. “Did it work? Are we getting some support or not?”

  I flashed him a grin. “Legion Varus isn’t going into this fight with one hand tied behind our back.”

  He grinned in return, buying my half-truth immediately. “That’s great to hear, McGill! You’re shady as fuck, but it all works out for the best sometimes.”

  Deciding to take his words as a compliment, I went back to studying the tactical situation with my HUD. Officers had abilities and equipment the regular troops lacked, mostly involving our helmets and onboard computers. They gave me a layout of our forces. It was the best view anyone could get short of working one of the battle-tables in an HQ tent at the rear of our formation.

  Legion troops were closing in from all sides, and there was a definite firefight going on along the front lines—mostly involving our ghosts.

  The strange thing was that I didn’t see any counter-fire coming back at us from the invaders. Repeatedly, I tried to get a report back from Cooper or Della—but failed.

  “Do you see anything yet, Barton?”

  There was some static on the line as she replied. “…not sure… something coming. Troops marching toward us…”

  “Dammit,” I said, feeling a rare moment of indecision.

  Each moment I delayed, I saw more figures come out of that blazing field of colorful plasma. It did look like an advancing army—but then again, when I’d been aboard their ship the enemy hadn’t looked like humans at all.

  “Shit…”

  I could just order Barton to shoot into the advancing ranks—but what if they were civvies? What if some of our local populace had escaped and were approaching our lines?

  With a growl, I got to my feet and rushed forward a hundred meters. I threw myself down again next to Barton.

  “What the hell is going on out there?” I asked her. “Are those things people or aliens? And what about my ghosts? Are they shooting at that advancing line?”

  “Take a look at the base of the landing ship on the left,” Barton said.