Cutprice hit the ground again as the thermal signature attracted a storm of fire. "Are you just communing with nature or do you have a plan?"

Mike held up one finger in a "wait a minute" gesture then rolled back over. "I have a plan," he intoned. "My mother would be proud; reading is finally going to save my ass."

"Reading what?" Sunday asked.

"Keith Laumer short stories."

* * *

Colonel Wagoner looked at the video in his heads-up-display in disbelief. "Pardon me, General. Would you mind repeating that?"

Horner was smiling. Which as practically everyone in the world knew at this point meant the fecal matter had really and truly hit the rotary air impeller. "You are to cross the Genesee River and go into direct support mode for the ACS and the Ten Thousand. They are pinned down on the ridge that parallels Mount Hope Avenue. Cross the river, climb the ridge and give them on call direct fire support."

"General," the colonel protested, thinking about all of the really bad aspects of that order, "you do realize that . . . well . . ."

He paused for a second to collect his thoughts. "Well, for one thing, the rounds aren't exactly howitzer rounds, General. If they do hit something they're going to make an atomic fireball about a quarter the size of the Hiroshima bomb; it's going to be noticeable on seismometers from here to Tibet. Second, they go for a looong ways; there's a couple of fortress cities out there. New York comes to mind. Last but not least, we're not a tank for all we look like one. We don't have any armor over our tracks or on the gun mantlet. In other words, we're vulnerable to Posleen fire. And if we sustain a critical ammunition hit you're going to have an explosion that makes the Shanghai Strike look like a firecracker and you'll lose everyone in the pocket. And most of the forces on this side of the river."

He waited for a moment as Horner appeared to be waiting for him to go on.

"Is that it?" Horner asked.

"Well, yes, sir."

"Okay. You forgot that without infantry support the Posleen would be able to close in on either side and attack you from underneath. Which, all things considered, really is your most vulnerable direction. You don't have anti-Posleen secondary weapons."

"Yes, sir," the colonel said. "You have a point there."

"Also that unless the Ten Thousand pulls back, you'll almost surely crush them in large numbers. And that moving you through the assaulting corps is not going to be what you would call easy."

"No, sir, it won't," the colonel admitted.

"You also missed the more significant aspect of your possible demise," the general continued inexorably. "If you sustain a critical ammunition hit, the resulting ground level explosion will be on the order of seventy kilotons. While this will, undoubtedly, kill Posleen for miles around, it will also create a very large crater. This crater, based upon the subsurface structure, will probably dam both the Genesee River and the Erie Canal. While the large area of marsh that will result will somewhat impede the Posleen, they will then have crossing points over both water structures. Just at the time when the local defense forces will probably be in full-scale rout to Buffalo."

The colonel suddenly recalled the tiny and almost forgotten datum that Horner's original education was engineering. "Ah. That's . . . not a point I had considered, sir."

"Colonel, listen very carefully," Horner said with a broad smile, speaking as if to a child. "Move your vehicle over to the Genesee Valley. Cross the river. Engage the Posleen in direct fire mode in support of the ACS on the ridge. Fire your weapons low. As often as possible, engage concentrations on hilltops that you can impact; if there are occasional detonations of your antimatter munitions this is an unfortunate side effect for which neither of us can be held responsible. As you move up, the Ten Thousand will shift left to cover that flank. The ACS will provide you with close infantry support. Use the slope of the ground for hull down fire; it is, I am told, almost perfect for it. Try not to hit New York City. Is this understood?"

"Yes, sir," the colonel said quietly. He was beginning to get the impression that this was not entirely the general's idea. And that the general was not particularly happy with it.

"And Colonel Wagoner."

"Yes, sir?"

"Don't get hit. Especially in your magazines."

"I'll try, sir. Sir? One question?"

"Yes?" Horner snapped.

"The Ten Thousand are getting out of my way. What about the ACS? What if we roll over one of them?"

Horner paused and for just a moment frowned slightly, a sign of amusement. "Colonel, have you ever watched the Coyote and Road Runner?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, if you run over an ACS, he'll just have to dig himself out. There's one over there painted like a green demon; you have my personal permission to show him why you call infantry 'crunchies.' "

Near Seed Lake, GA, United States, Sol III

1147 EDT Sunday September 13, 2009 ad

"Good cosslain," Cholosta'an said, rubbing the superior normal on the back. The half oolt had returned from its first "patrol" on its own and from all appearances had made all the turns perfectly.

Many of the cosslain, the higher intelligence normals that were almost high moron level, could not have remembered all the turns in the complex patrol pattern they had been assigned. But the one good thing about his oolt was the cosslain, and this one sometimes seemed almost intelligent enough to handle God King duties. He couldn't talk, but his hand gestures were occasionally almost eloquent.

"Did you see anything of note?" Cholosta'an asked, signaling the half oolt to begin their daily feeding.

The cosslain gestured in the negative as he pulled a ration pack out of his harness. The food resembled a small mineral block and was just about as hard, but it gave the oolt'os something to do with their time.

"You'll go back out in a few hours," Cholosta'an continued, pulling out a slightly more palatable ration pack. It wasn't much better than oolt'os food, though, and he longed for a victory to give him the funds to afford better. "If you see any sign of the humans you are to fire off a magazine to bring the nearest Kessentai, you know that?"

The cosslain gestured in the affirmative, his triangular teeth grinding through the rations sounding like a rockcrusher.

"Good," Cholosta'an said. All the oolt'os seemed healthy and reasonably well fed so there wasn't much else to do.

"You do a good job," said Orostan.

Cholosta'an stifled his start and turned around slowly. The oolt'ondai had come up so softly that the younger Kessentai never even heard him. "Pardon me, Oolt'ondai?"

"You care well for your oolt'os. Many Kessentai, especially young ones, don't pay any attention to their care. It is good to see."

"They can't very well care for themselves," Cholosta'an said, wondering why the oolt'ondai was paying any attention to him.

"Let me ask you something," the oolt'ondai said, gesturing for the younger Kessentai to precede him. The newly dug cavern rang to the sound of devourers and the cries of the oolt'os manning them. It was only one of dozens that the hard-driving Tulo'stenaloor had ordered. It was his intention, apparently, to put the entire host underground, out of sight of the observers in the sky and out of danger from the human artillery. With more and more young and hungry Kessentai arriving every day, it was a matter of continuous construction.

The oolt'ondai fluffed his crest as he made his way through the thousands of waiting oolt. The bodies of the oolt'os, and the occasional Kessentai, stretched for acres in every direction. The smell was an interesting admixture of home and fear. The smell was of pack, but the continuous battle for survival and status in the pens never quite left Posleen subconscious. The oolt'os would wait stoically until called upon, but if something wasn't done with all the Kessentai, such as having them manage patrols, they would begin to bicker, gamble and fight. A firefight in the cavern, once started, would butcher the majority of the force.