Invasion

“And would nukes add to our chances of stopping them?”

“Not easily,” Paul said, sparing General Hastings. “The aliens can – and do – shoot down every missile we launch at them. The mass use of every known ICBM left on Earth would probably not destroy the Red Zone. Long- range fire from artillery has also been shot down in flight. We would have to hide the weapons along the expected lines of advance…”

“But we could use them,” Senator Ovitz said. “We could put an end to their threat…”

“The issue is closed,” the President snapped, firmly. “Colonel James, what progress has been made with the SSTO program?”

“Useless,” Senator Ovitz muttered, just loudly enough to be heard.

Paul privately agreed – partly – but kept that thought to himself. “The program for constructing our own fleet of SSTO craft has been accelerated, now that we have a working model of our own,” he said. “We hope that within two to three months we will have around thirty craft that we can deploy – if we can get rid of the alien orbiting systems. As long as they control space, we cannot actually get anything of our own into orbit – and they will be very aware that as long as they control space, their ultimate victory is assured.”

“So, son,” Senator Ovitz said, “are you saying that it’s time to haul up the white flag?”

“Hardly,” Paul said. “The one great advantage of the war is that a lot of research programs into advanced weapons and concepts have been kicked into high gear. We may not be able to duplicate the alien laser weapons, not yet, but we have other weapons of our own now. The latest models of lasers can actually harm the alien craft in orbit, although they cannot inflict significant damage in seconds. The alien parasites have too much armour to be easily taken out from the ground – and, of course, any missile boosting upwards from Earth is easy to detect. We took down their space-based radar network in Operation Lone Star and forced them to use parasite ships in that role, but that means that we cannot take the network down again, not easily.”

He paused. “But we do have options,” he continued. “Give us three months and we might be able to convince the aliens that they’ve been in a fight.”

“Three months,” Senator Ovitz said, more thoughtfully. He looked over at the world map, showing the Red Zone in Texas and another, larger one, covering most of the Middle East. It would only be a matter of time before Israel fell and the aliens ruled from the Suez to the Pakistani border. They even had diplomats from the Middle East talking to their counterparts from Europe and the rest of the world. Quite a few African nations were on the verge of surrendering. “Can we hold out that long?”

“If we deploy the weapons we have now, we will lose the advantage of surprise,” General Hastings warned. “Some of the newer weapons will only be useful if deployed all at once, without the aliens having any kind of warning. Others can only be deployed if we have reasonably clear skies and a chance to work without alien interference. We cannot liberate Texas yet, sir, but give us enough time and we’ll have a very real chance at victory.”

“If the country holds together that long,” the President said, tiredly. His eyes looked tired; he hadn’t slept properly in weeks. “Is there no way we can take down their network again?”

“Not as yet,” Paul said, and he grinned. He couldn’t tell them everything, but if the psych teams were right, the alien prisoners might be converted to human ideals. “We do, however, have the help of one of their tech experts. If we can work on the prisoners and convince them to help, we might just manage to pull off a real surprise.”

Senator Ovitz looked at him. “You trust them to help us?” He asked. “And what if it fails?”

Paul smiled. “If it fails, Senator,” he said, “we lose. If that happens, we all die. You’re part of the old government…and, as far as the aliens are concerned, you’re marked for death.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

Do not confuse 'duty' with what other people expect of you; they are utterly different. Duty is a debt you owe to yourself to fulfil obligations you have assumed voluntarily. Paying that debt can entail anything from years of patient work to instant willingness to die. Difficult it may be, but the reward is self- respect.

– Robert A. Heinlein

Captain Brent Roeder pushed down on the remote control and the IED exploded. It had taken him nearly twenty minutes, using a mixture of children’s electronics and pre-packaged explosive, to make the device, but it was worth all the effort. The blast exploded from a pile of rubble and slaughtered the handful of alien guards who’d been standing there, watching the execution. There was no need to bark a command; his two remaining snipers, hidden on rooftops, started to fire down into the remaining aliens, forcing them to duck and dive for cover. For a few moments, no one would be paying any attention to the remains of the crowd, which was now running in all directions, and that would give him his chance. He ran forward, holding his pistol in one hand and a knife in the other, towards the stake.

Up close, it looked barbaric…and he hadn’t believed his eyes when he’d seen them bring out the poor bastard who was now tied to it. The insurgents in Iraq had had plenty of interesting and horrible ways to make a man die – and he'd sent a few of them to Allah himself in unpleasant manners – but he’d never burned a man alive, not deliberately. The aliens had been telling everyone that there would be a public punishment of someone for ‘treason and perversion,’ whatever that meant to them, but he hadn’t realised just what they had in mind, not until he’d seen the stake. If they’d lit it, the best his men could do was avenge the poor bastard’s death.

The man cringed away from him as Brent came up to him. “US Army,” Brent hissed, suddenly very aware of his appearance. Any Drill Sergeant would have thrown a fit and had him cleaning toilets for months if he’d dared to report dressed as he was, although neat freaks and anal-retentive morons didn’t tend to last long in the Special Forces. They were fighters first; posing in proper uniforms came a long way down the list. “Stay calm, understand?”

“Yes,” the man gasped. Brent checked him over quickly – seeing a thin man, slightly too pale for his build, with a week’s worth of stubble on his chest – and started to saw through the bonds. The alien material, whatever it was, resisted fiercely, but he sliced through it and unwrapped the captive quickly. He didn’t have any idea who the man was, but messing up the aliens fun and games was probably worthwhile, if only to remind them that the insurgents existed. “What…”

He came free in an instant and almost stumbled over the small pile of wood. “Never mind that now,” Brent snapped, as he caught his arm and dragged him back towards the rubble. The crowd, knowing what the aliens did when it came to counter-insurgency, had dispersed, but a handful of aliens had taken cover and were still trying to fire back. They were pinned down and effectively helpless – he hoped – unless they wanted to die, but the longer he kept his forces in one place, the more time the aliens had to organise a counterattack and slaughter his men. “Come with me!”

He keyed the second remote control and heard the series of explosions as they blasted through the alien complacency. If they were lucky, the IEDs would convince the aliens that they faced a third all-out insurgency, rather than a relatively limited strike aimed at embarrassing them. A handful of collaborators, men and women forced into serving the aliens, had risked their lives to smuggle in the devices, which would have the added side benefit that the aliens would no longer be able to trust their collaborators – if they ever had. He counted the explosions quickly, noted that one of the devices seemed to have failed, and then smiled in relief as a final explosion billowed up in the distance.

“Now, run,” he snapped, and led the charge down the street. The remainder of his men would have seen him flee and would be disengaging as well, while the aliens, still trapped, would be unable to impede their retreat. He felt, more than heard, the presence of alien helicopters swooping in from high above, but by now they were under some cover and fairly safe. “Don’t look back, just run!”

The area had been devastated by one of the earlier rounds of fighting, but there were still some families squatting in the remains, unwilling or unable to move. The aliens, for some reason, had started to move families into intact buildings, and then they’d stopped. It was a mystery, but not one he had any time to solve, not when the