Invasion

and then they shot him. A hot burst of pain, right in his chest, sent him staggering backwards and crashing to the ground.

“Why?” He tried to say. A clinking sound as the remains of the bottle hit the roof answered his question. He’d forgotten all about the bottle and they’d shot him for it. He would have laughed, but suddenly it hurt so badly…

Darkness came for him, finally, a child lost in an adult world.

***

Ambassador Simon Carmichael watched grimly as the aliens completed the suppression of Riyadh. The American Embassy within the city had been almost under siege from the first alien landings in Texas, when the radicals had realised that they would probably never have a better chance to take complete control, but the month hadn’t ended with a repeat of the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Somehow, in defiance of all of his predictions, the Saudis had managed to hold on, barely, until the aliens had landed. They’d rapidly crushed the Saudi Army and National Guard, before moving in on the cities…

Idiot stupid prince, he thought, taking a puff on his cigar. He had the feeling that it would be a long time before any more cigars came in from Cuba, assuming the aliens let him live. No one knew if they had any concept of an Ambassador, even if they had treated the folks in orbit well enough, but they might seek to make an example of him. Judging from the complete collapse of the defences, they wouldn’t need to make any more horrible examples – the Ambassador’s Saudi aide had slipped through the streets and returned with tales of horror – but who knew how the aliens thought? What was he thinking?

He shook his head, watching the fires swelling in the distance; the fire brigade couldn’t cope with so many at once. The Saudi Prince in command of the Army hadn’t had any proper training; the Princes that actually did have such training were rarely allowed to actually put that training to use. There was too much fear, apparently, that someone who was genuinely popular and linked to the Royals might launch a coup…and that fear had led to a quick and complete disaster. The Americans attached to Saudi HQ, before the telephone links had been lost, had reported that the General in command had led his tanks out to do battle. He might as well have shot all of his men himself. It would have been quicker and perhaps kinder.

Redshirt bastards probably couldn’t believe their luck, Carmichael thought. There they are, knowing full well that they stomped us and that everyone else has been learning from those lessons, and here’s a complete dumbass leading his men out for the slaughter…

He turned, slightly, as Captain Harper entered. “Sir,” the Captain said. The Marine Protection Detail in Riyadh was much bigger than most cities. The thought of losing the ambassador and all of his staff had focused a few minds at State and they’d ensured that the embassy defenders were armed to the teeth. They couldn’t have hoped to hold off a full assault, not long enough to matter, but a rampaging mob might have been beaten off. “The gates are closed, but…”

Carmichael understood his problem. If the aliens took it into their heads to take the Embassy, it was going to happen…and the best the Marines could do was go down fighting. They might not even have that chance; several buildings in Riyadh had been destroyed from orbit and the aliens might just do the same to the American Embassy.

“Tell them not to open fire unless attacked,” he said, grimly. There was little point in trying to pick a fight with the aliens. Washington’s orders, before the aliens had knocked out the landline – had been simple enough; burn the documents, then do what seemed necessary in the circumstances. His lips twitched, suddenly; the Ambassador in South Korea was probably in worst circumstances. The North Koreans had gone over the border and had taken Seoul. “If the aliens want us, they’ll have us.”

“Sir,” Harper said. Despite knowing the man for nearly a year, and spending at least an hour with him each day since the invasion, Carmichael still found it hard to read him. Did the Marine wish for a final, glorious last stand, or was he silently grateful that his men would be spared a hopeless fight? “What do we do about the natives?”

Carmichael blinked. “The natives?”

Harper nodded. “Sir, we have already had hundreds of men coming to the embassy and begging for sanctuary,” he said. Carmichael lifted an eyebrow. He honestly hadn’t thought that that was a possibility. “Some of them are… well, just civilians, others are actually important figures in the government.”

“I doubt they even have much of a government now,” Carmichael said, looking out towards the towering flames. He wondered, idly, what to do. The compassionate answer would be to take as many in as possible, but the practical answer was to keep them out, reserving their stockpiles of food for the Americans. Part of him, he was unwilling to admit aloud, took a certain amount of pleasure in watching the former government suffer, the rest of him knew that it would be bad publicly. The practical side won out. “Keep them all out, unless they are actually working for us…yes, them and their immediate families.”

“Sir,” Harper said, without any sign of approval or disapproval. His face refused to crack from its harsh good looks. Carmichael had thought, from time to time, that he was a Hollywood stereotype that had somehow escaped into the real world. The man’s record certainly read like something out of a patriotic film. “What are you going to say to the aliens?”

Carmichael shrugged. He wasn't sure what the procedure was for being an enemy ambassador in an occupied country. “I’ll see what the aliens want to do,” he said, finally. “I’ll present my credentials at wherever they end up placing their government, and then…well, see what happens. Perhaps they’ll just send us back to Texas.”

“Or perhaps they’ll kill us all,” Harper pointed out. There was a dispassionate note in his voice, as if he were ordering dinner or discussing accounting, rather than issues of life and death. “You might want to start thinking about contingency plans for that.”

Carmichael laughed, despite himself. “Die,” he said. The laugh became a louder chuckle. “Yes, I think I might just manage that…and if I can’t, I’m sure they’ll help me.”

Chapter Thirty

In the long, fierce struggle for freedom of opinion, the press, like the Church, counted its martyrs by thousands.

– James A. Garfield

Joshua had lost track of time. It had been days – or had it been weeks – since the aliens had burst in and snatched him and Loretta out of his apartment. He hadn’t seen her since the day of their arrest…and he hadn’t even seen any other humans. The aliens had kept him isolated, preventing him from having even the comfort of seeing another human face, while they decided what to do to him. His world had shrunk to the cell and the regular mealtimes; the aliens, it seemed, had a sense of humour. They might as well have fed him on bread and water. From time to time, they’d pulled him out of the cell into another room, where they’d asked questions, and then, without really caring about the answers, they’d placed him back in his cell.

The police stations in Austin, he’d heard, had been defended vigorously during the fighting. The aliens had rounded up police officers with the same care they’d used to round up soldiers and former soldiers, but armed and dangerous, some of the police had fought back and died in the defence of their city. Enough of the police stations had survived, he saw now, to ensure that the aliens could keep their special prisoners secure, regardless of the cost. Joshua, it seemed, wasn't going into a work gang or the rumoured camps outside the city. They probably had a different fate in mind for him.

He had very little to do, but sleep, eat and speculate on what was going to happen to him. The aliens normally put people who resisted them in work gangs, but he’d been doing a damn sight more than just resisting them, hadn’t he? His blog from the middle of occupied territory had ensured that the rest of the United States knew what was going on…and what alien rule was really like. Joshua wouldn’t have bet against new appearances of The Truth in America, founded by humans looking for something to believe – hell, if there was a Jedi religion, there would be humans who wanted to embrace the alien religion – but if people knew the truth about alien-controlled territory, they’d resist, right? He’d spread the word…until, finally, he’d been discovered.

The thought tormented him when he slept. It wasn't easy to sleep in the cell – the light burned brightly, day