“Open fire,” I say, talking into the radio sewn into my shoulder.

We do. It’s the most brutal, ruthless attack I have ever been involved in. Chinese troops are literally razed to the ground in systematic sweeps. The ones who are deep enough into the crowds turn on their heels and run south. Some drop and return fire, aiming blindly at muzzle flashes. It won’t do them any good. They’re surrounded on all sides. As they pull away from the troops who are dead or dying, they expose themselves, too. And so they die.

I struggle to see through my scope at one point, brushing away moisture from the eyepiece. I blink a few times, tasting salt on my lips. Tears? I’m crying?

I can’t do that right now. I shake myself and keep fighting. Someone from our militia fires an RPG into the middle of a mass of Chinese soldiers pushing their way north. It lights up the dark hillside with an orange glow. The screaming is horrible. The smell of gunpowder is sharp.

So this is what winning looks like, I think. I don’t feel victorious.

Yet at the same time, the knowledge that these troops have invaded our homeland and killed every innocent man, woman and child in their path softens the pain of killing. I’m not a murderer. I’m a defender.

They forced my hand. They expected us to surrender silently.

They underestimated our will.

And now they are paying the price.

The attack goes on for hours. Until the twilight hours, when the hills and sky are one shade of muted gray and the sunrise throws color over the battlefield. It is at this point that there are barely any standing Chinese troops left to fight. The rest of the forces — which number at maybe two and a half thousand — never even come around the corner.

“Alpha One, I’ve got a situation.” Chris’s radio crackles with Max’s voice.

“Give me details,” Chris replies.

“They contacted us. They want to parlay.”

“Are they crazy?” I snap. “It’s too late for that.”

“What are their terms?” Chris asks.

“Just you and their messenger. He’s got something to say to us, apparently.”

“We should be talking directly to their commanding officer,” Uriah spits.

“We’ll parley,” Chris replies. “But they come to us, and they come up.”

“Roger that, sir.”

I lay down my rifle, exhausted, sweaty, and emotionally spent.

“What do you mean, up?” I ask.

“They’ve still got two thousand men out there, almost three thousand,” Chris answers, popping his canteen open. “If we can avoid getting any of our men killed, I’d like to do that.”

“We’ve had no serious casualties so far.”

“Don’t think the Chinese will be stupid enough to come into the canyon twice.” Chris offers me a drink. I take it gratefully. “Eliminating the rest of them will be more difficult.” He wipes a droplet of water from my chin, smiling softly at my shaking hands. “And a break in fighting will be good for everybody.”

“Where are we going to meet with their messenger or whatever?” I press.

“On top of that hill,” Chris says, gesturing to the hill behind us. “We’ll make them come up to us.”

“Dang it. Then we have to climb the hill,” I sigh.

“No. We’ll ride up.”

The sun peeks over the eastern horizon, glowing brilliantly even through the haze of smoke and debris in the air. I hang my head and close my eyes, praying that this parley will bring good news — not bad.

The puzzle of Omega has always been the question of who are they really? Chinese? Korean? Syrian? Russian? Who controls Omega? And who decided to unite all of these radical factions to gang up on us? Is it one man? A group of men? A woman? A body of government? A mysterious, legendary secret society come to destroy us all and take over the world?

I don’t know. And sometimes not knowing who the enemy is can be maddening. They’re standing right in front of us, and we don’t know who they are.

All part of the plan, Walter Lewis would say. Nothing they’ve done has been spontaneous. They’ve been planning this for a long time. The only question is who they are.

As we wait at the top of the hill, Colonel Rivera joins us. There is a static tension in the air between our militia and his presence. When I look at him, I see the man that refused to send us backup when we were in need. I can’t help but feel resentful.

Both Rivera and Chris stand next to each other as we wait for the Chinese messenger to arrive. We’ve brought a small detachment of armed militia with us, and unbeknownst to the Chinese, our forces are still holed up in the undergrowth around the mountains. If they try anything dirty, they’ll die.

The early morning light casts a defining glow over the landscape. The temperature is cold and biting, but I hardly notice. I’m focused on the vehicle moving up the hill. It’s a Humvee, but it’s painted with the Omega symbol — a white, stylized O on the side of the door. Max is with us, and so is Sophia. She’s standing next to me.

“What do you think they want?” she whispers.

“I have no idea,” I reply. “But Chris seems willing to negotiate for some reason.”

“He’s trying to avoid unnecessary bloodshed.”

“Rivera, on the other hand, doesn’t care.”

“He cares,” Sophia corrects. “His methods are just different.”

I keep my comments to myself. It’ll probably take a few years for the bitterness over Rivera’s abandonment of the militia to wear off. And then I’ll understand. But that day is definitely not today.

Chris turns his head slightly, sharing a glance with me.

Don’t worry, he seems to say. We’ve got this.

As far as I know, Jeff and Derek are with their platoons, still safely hidden. As the vehicle comes to the top of the hill, it slows to a halt, and the troops slowly come out. Chinese soldiers surround a man exiting the front passenger door. They protect him with their bodies, a human shield. They move him towards us, standing in a straight line in front of his body.

“Start talking,” Colonel Rivera states.

Chris says nothing. His silence speaks volumes.

The man shielded by the troops is obviously the messenger, and as he begins to talk, his soldiers pull apart enough for us to get a view of his appearance. Sophia slaps her hand across her mouth, unable to contain her shock. A stone drops to the bottom of my stomach.

Wavy brown hair. Tall, lean figure. Piercing blue eyes. All of this wrapped up in a recognizable blue Omega uniform that contrasts the Chinese’s black suits perfectly.

“Now Colonel,” he says, his voice smooth. Perfect. “Let’s not dispense with the pleasantries simply because we’re on a battleground. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Harry Lydell, and I am the acting Commander for this detachment of troops.”

Of all the people I had expected to see in the midst of this Armageddon, Harry Lydell was not one of them. The Englishman who spied on Sophia and I during our imprisonment at an Omega labor camp. The guy who fed information to the enemy before the attack on Sanger, costing us the lives of too many good men.

And I definitely didn’t expect him to be a commander.

“Don’t look so shocked, Cassidy,” he says, looking directly at me. “You didn’t think I’d just disappear forever, did you?”

Well, actually…

“You know this man?” Rivera asks, turning to Chris.

“He was an Omega spy. He betrayed my men,” he replies simply.

“Betray is a rather harsh word, don’t you think?” Harry asks, still watching me. “Betrayal implies that one was loyal to a cause before turning their backs on it. I did no such thing. I’ve always known where my loyalty lies, and it was never with the militias.”