The Lotus Eaters

Federated States Airborne Command and Control Ship (ACCS), 205 miles east of Santander, Terra Nova

The radar officer cursed with surprise. 'Motherfucker! Sir, three pairs of fast movers just popped over the mountains east of Balboa City. No identification.' The lieutenant made a quick speed check. 'Yes, sir. Definitely jets. Course suggests they came from somewhere in the Shimmering Sea.'

The lieutenant colonel stifled a curse of his own. Goddamned Navy. By what right do they cut us out?

'And, sir? That recon skimmer—at least I think it's a recon skimmer—from the UEPF will be in range in twelve minutes.'

Weapons added, 'I'm tracking it, sir. We can down it on your command.'

The colonel thought, This operation has to originate at echelons above God. No way I can get permission to fire in any timely fashion. Well . . . I'm an officer of the Federated States. I see my countrymen in action. I see a threat. I am duty bound to take out that threat, if it's within my capabilities.

That will sound great at my court-martial, won't it? Ah, screw the court-martial.

'Fire as soon as they're in range, Mister.'

Hacienda of Senor Estevez, Belalcazar, Santander, Terra Nova

Unable to sleep for all his worries, Estevez tossed and turned on his king-sized mattress. His wife, plump beyond her years, snored softly beside him. I would so much rather be in bed with Gabriela, or—better still—Isabel. But domestic peace was important. He couldn't sleep with either of his mistresses in his own home.

An unusual sound roused Estevez. He rolled to his back and sat straight up. Helicopters? Police come to arrest me? But what's that screech?

Whatever the sounds were, they couldn't be good. Estevez roused his plump wife. 'Marta,' he insisted, 'get up and gather the children! Quickly, woman! Go! Get to the basement. I'll join you when I can.' As the wife rose and began to rub the sleep from her eyes, Estevez ran out of the bedroom, pulling on a robe and shouting for his guards.

* * *

From five thousand feet overhead, Montoya turned on his siren, banked his plane over and began a dive. He felt himself pushed back into his seat so hard that he thought he could feel the stitching through his flight suit.

Flicking on the radio he announced his call sign for the mission and, 'Diving to the attack.' A voice answered, 'Roger,' with a strong Volgan accent.

Montoya saw the target hacienda and his personal target, a large barnlike structure a few hundred meters from the main building. Intelligence had identified this as a barracks for guards.

At twenty-one hundred feet, two blackish ovoid shapes, each a two hundred and fifty pound bomb, fell away from beneath Montoya's aircraft. He felt the Finch balloon slightly as its load was reduced.

'Bombs away.' he announced to himself, pulling the stick back into the pit of his stomach. Whatever pressure he'd felt in the dive was nothing compared to the force pulling him down into his seat as he fought to pull out of the dive.

Far below, the helicopters began very slowly to approach the lawn around the hacienda.

* * *

The shriek coming from somewhere above wouldn't have been so bad if Francisco Estevez had ever heard it's like before. He hadn't. It might have been tolerable if some of his comrades had, and they'd been able to reassure him. They were running around like chickens with their heads cut off. It might have been acceptable if he'd been a trained soldier. He was a tyro, recruited to his cousin's guard force to provide a sinecure to a relative. In short, Francisco was completely unprepared for the attack, mentally, morally, and as a matter of training. It was about the limit of his ability to join the dozens of other armed men racing from their barnlike barracks to the main house.

As Francisco fumbled with loading a magazine into his rifle while trying to run across the manicured lawn to his assigned position, he saw his elder brother. 'What's going on?' he shouted out.

'Who the fuck knows? Just get to your position.'

Twin explosions, so close together as to be almost indistinguishable, rocked the world behind Francisco. A wall of hardened air slapped his back. He was slammed forward and down, first to his knees, then to all fours, then to his belly. The metal receiver of his rifle punched into his stomach.

Francisco felt, more than heard or saw, pieces of flying metal and wood tear the air around him. Lifting off the ground and twisting his head, Francisco saw that the barn was gone, it its place an expanding cloud, black and angry, that threatened to engulf him. Francisco shook his head to clear it. This was a mistake, he found, as pain and nausea shot through him.

Half deafened, still Francisco heard or felt someone screaming close by. Through the dark and acrid smoke he crawled toward the sound. Though it was only a few feet, it seemed like miles. A legless man, bones showing and blood spurting, thrashed the ground. One leg, still shod and covered in denim, lay nearby. He turned the over the body of the screaming, legless man.

'Oh, no. Oh, hermano, what will I tell mother?'

The siren shriek overhead returned. It was followed by more explosions, closer to the hacienda. Then there were many more explosions, smaller ones. A rocket passed over Francisco's head. He never heard whether it exploded or not.

Heavy machine gun fire, each burst like a series of fists against a wall, passed by him. Bright tracer lines burned themselves into his retinas. He turned his head in panic as the steady whop, whop,