Invasion

be heard all over the city. One of his team, an ex-Marine, had been working overtime to make them and emplace them around the city, including – somehow – in a building the aliens were using as a barracks. By now, they had to be feeling a little paranoid…

The ground crunched under his feet as he ran. It was easy to pick out the remains of hundreds of Transformer toys, shot up by the aliens. It was a complete mystery why they were there, unless the aliens had decided that they were something to do with human religion and destroyed them, and he dismissed it as he ran. The alien helicopters were coming closer and he threw himself into a lobby as they swooped past, engaging anything they saw that looked hostile. He pulled himself to his feet and started the climb towards the vantage point, hoping that he’d be able to see something of the overall situation. The office block, almost like the one they’d used as a base, what felt like years ago, was covered with broken glass and completely deserted. He hoped that the occupants had managed to escape before the war began, or maybe they’d remained in the city, maybe fighting the insurgency. It was so hard to be sure of anything these days…

Austin was burning, again. He stared out over the city as dawn rose, revealing new fires burning through the city…and hundreds of aliens on the streets. Humans were almost completely absent, the only man he saw clearly an alien collaborator, although not one he recognised. The insurgency seemed to have been defeated, again, but conventional wisdom proclaimed that a victory. They had survived another alien attempt to annihilate them. He wanted to draw his pistol and shoot the collaborator, but it wouldn’t be easy to hit him with a handgun at that range…and it would definitely give away his presence. The aliens seemed to have regained control and, for the moment, it would be unwise to challenge them again.

He looked up at the streaks of light, coming down in the distance, and shuddered.

He knew what they meant.

***

The tank charged forward, gunning its engine, every member of the crew knowing that the next second could be his last. There was no way of knowing just how badly the alien orbital bombardment system had been damaged, or even, really, just how it worked. The observatories swore that they’d seen the projectiles launched from the parasite ships and guided in by the orbital radar system, but how could they know for sure? The weapons weren't perfectly accurate, but given how much power even a single KEW possessed, they didn’t have to be perfect. They just had to come down within a few meters of the tanks to destroy them.

But there was no choice. The aliens had massed a few kilometres to the south and the three-prong human force had to break through and destroy their base, and their armoured forces. If they could be destroyed, they could use infantry to continue the assault when dawn rose and the aliens got back into position, but if not…they would probably lose the war. Captain Jim McCoy peered nervously through his sensors, probing the darkness for the first signs of the alien tanks, and waited. It wouldn’t be long before they had what they’d been longing for all along; a direct clash with the alien armour, without their orbital weapons. His tank, Heavy Messing, had been lucky to survive so far, but now…

“There,” he snapped, as the first shape appeared. It was an ominous shape, even though part of him admired the design, and the flexibility it gave the alien leaders. The Americans had knocked down bridges across Texas, but the aliens had just crossed the rivers like hovercraft, which he supposed they were. They were very suitable for intimidating civilians, but against American tanks…they were about to get a surprise. “Load antitank, prepare to fire!”

“Loaded, sir,” the gunner said. The laser targeting system had the enemy tank perfectly targeted. The alien driver was bringing has vehicle around with terrifying speed, far faster than his tank could move, but it wouldn’t save them. “Ready to fire…”

“Fire,” McCoy barked. The tank shook as it fired the shell towards the alien vehicle. A moment later, they were rewarded by a billowing fireball consuming the alien craft and it’s crew. A second alien tank appeared, and then a third, turning to face the Americans. The other tanks in the force were firing now, as well, with the aliens caught out of place. The aliens lost seven tanks before the remainder could start to return fire…

But when they did, it was effective. McCoy had taken part in the invasion of Iraq and he’d come face to face with a group of Iraqi tanks that should have made mincemeat of his entire force, but instead their shells had bounced off the Abrams, while they themselves were ripped apart by the American vehicles. The aliens, on the other hand, were quite capable of destroying the American tanks and when they hit, they destroyed. Losses, now, were going to be about even.

God bless the infantry, he thought, as they engaged the alien tanks with Javelins. The aliens had to know that they’d been caught out of place and that retreat would be the best option, but the tankers had been warned not to allow a single vehicle to survive, if they had a choice. The higher-ups believed that the aliens had no way of getting a resupply from their homeworld, wherever the hell it was, and any destroyed vehicle, they lost permanently. One by one, the alien craft were destroyed and he drove forward, onto what had once been a training camp for scouts or something. A hail of high-explosive shells finished off the remains of the alien positions, leaving the entire camp in flaming ruins…

“Call in,” he ordered. They couldn’t use their radios, but now they’d managed to get a new network of field telephones set up, they could communicate with HQ. “Tell them that…”

Something moved across the sky. He had barely a second to realise what it was before the KEW came down a bare meter from Heavy Messing. There was nothing left of the tank, or of its crew.

***

“They’re getting slaughtered out there,” the aide said, in growing dismay. The first parts of the assault had worked so well, but now…now, the aliens were counter-attacking and they’d moved up more orbital bombardment platforms. The passive sensors, tuned to detect alien radar sweeps, were warning that they were deploying more space-based radars…and, in slow inevitable motion, the armoured forces were being destroyed. “Sir…”

General Ridgley closed his eyes. “Call them off,” he ordered, and knew that the aliens wouldn’t let it go. They’d known more about their operations than he’d realised; they’d picked off, almost casually, several bases they weren't supposed to know about, including the dummy ones. They hadn’t used dummy weapons either. “Call them all off and terminate the offensive.”

It hadn’t been a complete loss, he knew, as the further reports came in. They had hurt the aliens, sometimes badly, and they had managed to get a few thousand civilians out of the firing line, but overall…they had lost. The aliens had managed to make the red zone completely impregnable, as long as they retained their command of space, and yet…getting at the aliens in space seemed impossible. Perhaps the captured ship would provide some clues, or maybe…maybe, they had lost. Maybe it was the end.

“Get the post-battle reports in as soon as you can,” he ordered, finally. “Once everyone is debriefed, we can decide what to do next.”

***

The President looked a broken man. “Operation Lone Star failed,” General Hastings admitted. “I take full responsibility and…”

“Enough of that,” the President said, bitterly. The guilt in his voice made the listeners shiver. “I ordered the attack, after all. What happened?”

“They kicked our asses,” General Hastings said. “We had some successes, but once they brought up more parasite ships, they pounded everything of ours that they could see. I don’t think that there’s an active tank left in Texas or the surrounding states. The insurgents hurt them worst, but without our support, the aliens gave them a beating as well.”

The President didn’t want to ask, but there was no choice. “How many dead?”

General Hastings hesitated. “Around two to three hundred thousand,” he admitted, reluctantly. The President blanched. America hadn’t taken so many losses in a single battle since…well, ever. “We massed every fighting man we could who wasn't needed elsewhere, with all of the armour and supporting units that we could muster, and