*****
'Welcome back to Surround Broadcast, this is War Debate and I'm your host, Himloch Sant. With me is PD Ouvre, the face of the interplanetary campaign known as, by some, Project Death Planet.'
'No hold on, that's unfair.'
'And on the opposing side we have Sentry Coolp. Now, if I may, PD Ouvre, let me get this straight. If I were a soldier sent to this planet, and I manage to avoid the huge areas of this exoskeleton-melting liquid, and I convince these beings to leave their dwellings, leaving behind their ready supply of clean H20, maybe even convince them to be as naked as I will be. Now, I do all that, and they can still spit at me and mutilate my face?'
Coolp leant in and said, 'It also drips from their eyes when they are distressed.'
'Corrosive liquid squirts from their eyes when they're unhappy? And we're going to attack these things?' Himloch said.
Ouvre said, 'They are unlikely to spit. They craft their own weapons. Weapons which expel metal fragments at high speeds. Reports show they are unable to pierce our natural exoskeletons. It is one of the reasons I know this will be a safe and sound invasion.'
'No exoskeletons,' Himloch said, turning to his other guest. 'Coolp, do you accept this?'
'I'm sorry, but no,' Coolp said. 'Yes, I am aware that our physiology is, on the surface, much more advanced. But, Himloch, your audience should be aware of another aspect of this... of the H2O...'
'Let's hear it.'
'It has been known, in fact, it is fairly common, for the uh, for this water, to, ah... There's no easy way of expressing the enormity of this. It falls from the sky. Almost at random. As weather. Seriously. We've attempted to predict their atmospheric patterns using their own meteorological technology, but with no success.'
'Corrosive liquid falls out of the sky,' Himloch said, not hiding the exhaustion in his voice, 'and, just so we're clear, our troops are going in naked?'
'Fairytales,' Ouvre said. 'The idea that liquid death falls from the skies is a simple scare tactic that... Well look here. Understand that taking this planet is considered of great importance to our cause.'
'Our cause,' Himloch said. 'And what is our cause this time?'
'Peace, of course. The population of this planet is hugely violent and warlike.'
*****
'Bad guys, huh?' One soldier asked.
'The worst,' General Boont said to his crew. The ship was entering their target's solar system. 'Such a warlike species can't be allowed to continue in this universe. They fight as siblings, they murder each other continuously, and you see those separate sections of land on the imaging sensors? They fight over those. They kill each other in their thousands, sometimes millions, to control the land. If it's not that, they will kill each other over differences in each other's appearance. Or over which fictional superbeing they believe is superior.' Boont might not believe in the mission, but he would do his best to make sure his soldiers believed it.
This got one or two of his team to relax. To feel it was their duty to invade. The soldier who had made the bad guys comment wasn't so sure. He said, 'They're a warlike species and must be eliminated. So warlike, they kill each other over, well, over almost anything.'
'That is correct. They must be wiped out.'
'Then, I have to ask General, then why don't we just leave them to it? I mean, come on! You already said they can't get off the planet to any real consequence. Let them get on with it, make themselves extinct.'
Boont hesitated, 'A decision has been made. Do your duty. We're aiming for the drier areas and-'
'At least blow a few of them up before we go down there,' another soldier said.
'We will, don't you worry. We've been assigned limited ammo for the ships' weapons, but I know how best to make use of it. We'll break their infrastructure. Before you land, our ships are going to destroy the dwellings of every world leader. They won't like that. Now, you know the risks, you are professionals. I'll be waiting back here for you.' Boont didn't wait for a response. He hurried through the exit in silence.
On his way to the control room he stopped in the medical section. He asked the doctor if they were prepared for a large percentage of casualties. The doctor said, 'Who can tell? Even if our boys stay dry, we don't know what else on that planet can kill them. Many are claiming they're too sick to fight. They know we don't have the supplies to cure them, or even test to see if they're faking it, so they're likely to be allowed to stay behind.'
Not a bad idea. Boont himself had already made changes to the tactical plans so that his role was to stay on the ship. He said, 'What are you saying? No medicine?'
'General, there isn't even a budget for vaccines.'
The End.
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Plus One
Another SF short story by Antony Bennison
Winstanley’s girlfriend works with a machine that tests simulated universe theories. She wants to be left alone to fix an experiment gone wrong. He wants to know why she doesn’t want him at her office party. Both will find that it may not just be their relationship that is broken.
The Earth Invasion Budget Cuts Page 2