When the Devil Dances

by John Ringo

  "Yes, Captain?" Tommy said.

  "Arrrrgh!" Captain Slight shouted.

  "Sacrilege!" Stewart yelled.

  "No rank in the mess, Tommy," O'Neal said, waving everyone down.

  "President of the Mess!" Duncan continued. "Call the pipers!"

  "We don't have any," Tommy complained. "We checked the whole battalion and nobody knows how to play them. And we don't have any pipes anyway."

  Stewart leaned over and pointed at a device in the corner, whispering in the lieutenant's ear. Tommy went over and, after whispering to his new AID, keyed the controls.

  "But it does appear that we have a pirated version of 'Flowers of the Forest,' " Tommy said. "Lucky us."

  Duncan cleared his throat and took another sip of beer as the melancholy notes of a uilleann pipe echoed through the mess.

  " 'Twas the darkest days of the fourth wave, January 17th, 2008, when the sky was still filled with the meteoric tracks of Second Fleet, its smashed remains leaving trails of fire across the sky, when, if you cranked up your visor, you could catch a glimpse of the last task force battling its way through the Posleen wave, towing away the pulverized wreck of the Supermonitor Honshu.

  "First Battalion, Five Hundred Fifty-Fifth Infantry had been tasked with holding a vital ridgeline outside of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. From the ridge it was just possible to see the smoke from the final assault on Philadelphia and the millions of fresh Posleen, newly landed from their ships, were even more evident. The Planetary Defense Center to the north was heavily engaged with airmobile landers, and repeated kinetic energy strikes were hammering into it as the battalion sustained wave after wave of suicidal Posleen assaults. Conventional units were heavily engaged to the south, so heavily engaged that they had full priority on all artillery, leaving the battalion to fend for itself. The air was filled with the shriek and silver of grav-gun rounds as the sky was pierced with nuclear fire.

  "That was, until the Alpha company began to run low on ammunition. To their front was a gully, and the Posleen waves were, in part by accident, sheltered by said gully. The Reapers had used their grenades to good effect, but the resupply line had been partially flanked and was sustaining heavy interdicting fire. So, slowly, the company got lower and lower on ammunition until they were down to firing individual rounds.

  "The Posleen, meanwhile, had through trial and error rediscovered the concept of 'cover' and the survivors were hunkering in the gully, popping up to fire a few rounds, and then hunkering back down.

  "The situation was at an impasse; the company did not have the grenade rounds to destroy the Posleen and the Posleen had gotten tired of getting killed in the open.

  "It was at that moment that our redoubtable leader made his appearance by running full tilt through the hail of fire that had already garnered three of the resupply personnel. Arriving at the Alpha Company lines he wandered down the slit trench, observing the goings on, until he reached the Alpha Company commander. That would be . . ."

  "Craddock," Mike said, taking a gulp of beer.

  "Captain James Craddock," Duncan continued, raising his glass. "Absent companions."

  "Absent companions," everyone murmured.

  "Captain Craddock related their predicament and noted that if they didn't do something, and soon, the Posleen would build up to where they had enough force to engage in hand-to-hand. And that would be . . . unpleasant. He requested that the supply personnel, the medics and techs basically, do whatever was necessary to support his operation, at whatever cost.

  "Our esteemed leader, doing his notorious impression of the sphinx, then looks around, picks up a small boulder and rolls it down the hill."

  "You could hear the crunch when it hit the horses," Stewart chimed in. "It was nearly as big as he is. . . . He looked like an ant lifting a big chunk of dirt. . . ."

  "Then he turns to the company commander and says . . ."

  "He who laughs last is generally the one that thought fastest on his feet," Mike said, taking a sip of beer.

  "We edited for content and punch," Duncan said. "Using boulders from the surrounding terrain, Alpha Company then proceeded to play 'Bowling for Posleen' for the next few hours."

  "Then we got our artillery support back and everything was hunky dory," Mike noted. "Artillery is what has saved this war. But I've noted that surviving these little predicaments is generally a matter of who comes up with the winning tactic at the last possible moment. You go in with a plan, knowing it's going to . . . go awry. And then you adjust. Whoever is the best, the fastest, at adjusting usually is the winner."

  "We're very fast at adjusting," Slight said thickly. "And when I say 'we,' I mean the veterans in this room. That's why we're here."

  Stewart raised his glass. "To those who think fastest; may they always be humans!"

  Chapter 20

  Rabun Gap, GA, United States, Sol III

  2047 EDT Friday September 25, 2009 ad

  "Cally, don't take this as an insult," Mueller said, leaning back from the table with a grin. "But you're going to make someone a great wife some day."

  "It's not like I enjoy cooking," Cally said, with a shrug. "Well, not much. But if you want to eat up here, you have to do it all yourself."

  Dinner had been a rousing success. Papa O'Neal had cut about ten pounds of moist, succulent pork off the pig, thinking that would be enough and intending to cut the rest up and freeze it for later meals. As it turned out, he had had to go back to the porker twice for more meat. In addition to the corn on the cob and cornbread, Cally had cooked wheat bread, a creamed green-bean casserole and new potatoes, all of which had been eaten. Dessert was pecan pie.

  The children, stuffed to the gills, had finally been sent off to bed leaving only the "grownups"—Cally seemed to be included in that group—sitting at the table, picking over the remains of the meal while the CD player cycled in the background.

  "I know what you mean," Shari laughed. "There are cafeterias in the Urb, but the food is really lousy; there are days I could kill to just call Domino's."

  "I sort of remember them," Cally said with a shrug. "But the last time I ate fast food was the month that Fredericksburg was hit." She shook her head and shrugged. "We went on vacation down to the Keys and there was still a McDonald's open in Miami. We fix pizza sometimes, but it's made from scratch."

  "None of the kids even remember fast food joints," Wendy said, pulling a piece of pork off the haunch Papa O'Neal had brought in. "Well, Billy and Shannon do, a little bit. But not really. They sort of remember the playgrounds and the meal toys. But that's about it."

  "It all just went away so fast," Shari said quietly.

  "It did that," Mosovich replied. "Wars tend to cause that sort of thing. Ask Germans of a certain age about how things change in a real war, or read diaries of Southerners in the Civil War. Gone With the Wind is a good example; one day you wake up and your whole life is gone. Some people adjust to it, thrive even. Some people just curl up and die, either in reality or inside."

  "Lots of that in the Urbs," Wendy said. "Lot of people that just gave up. They sit around all day, either doing nothing or talking about when the good times will come back."

  "Ain't gonna come back like of old," Mosovich said. "I'll tell you that. Too much damage. Hell, even the 'fortress cities' that they made out in the boonies are basically toast. A city is more than a bunch of buildings filled with soldiers. Richmond, Newport, New York, San Francisco, they're just hollow shells at this point. Making them cities again . . . I don't know if it's gonna happen."

  "The interior cities ain't any great shakes either," Mueller pointed out. "We were up in Louisville a few months ago at Eastern Theater Command. Most of the people there were trying to get into the Urbs. At least the Urbs were set up for foot traffic; with the shortage of gasoline, getting around in cities is really difficult. Just getting to the store is usually a long hike."

  "Especially with the weather being as bad as it's been," Shari said.

  "What w
eather?" Papa O'Neal asked.

  "Well, we get the reports down in the Urbs; there were record lows all winter. They're already talking about a new ice age from all the nuclear weapons."

  "Huh," O'Neal laughed. "Can't tell it by me. If there was an ice age coming on, farmers would be the first to know. Now, the Canadian harvests were screwed up, and it probably was in part due to the China nukes, but even that has stabilized out."

  "I can't really blame the Chinese, either," Mueller said. "Except for thinking they could beat the Posleen on the plains. Once they lost most of their army, slagging the Yangtze was the only way to keep the Posleen off the stragglers."

  "Oh, hell," Papa O'Neal grunted. "They were slagging the stragglers there at the end. That way the Posleen would slow down to eat. And it's not like even that slowed 'em down, it only took 'em a month to reach Tibet. Hell, with all the antimatter and nukes we've built up, better hope we never get to that point; we'll end up glazing the whole eastern U.S. And probably to about as much use.

  "But as to the weather, we're in a long-term aggressive weather cycle, but that's affected by a pod of warm water in the Atlantic and it was predicted before the invasion. Other than that, the weather's been fine. Great, this year. Rains just on time. Could have been a bit more, but then I'd be wishing they were a bit less."

  "We're always hearing these terrible weather reports from the surface," Wendy said. "Record cold, snow in April, stuff like that."

  "Well, I've been living here for . . . well, for a long time," he said, looking sidelong at Shari. "And this has been as good a year as we've had. Yeah, it snowed in April. Happens. It was seventy-two two days after the nukes."

  "Did that person just say what I think they said?" Elgars asked.

  "Who?" Papa O'Neal replied, looking around.

  "On the CD player," she said, pointing into the living room. "I think he just sang something about smearing the roast on his chest."

  "Ah," said Papa O'Neal with a smile. "Yeah. That. Warren Zevon."

  "Warren who?" Wendy asked. Elgars had been picking up socialization fast and she had to wonder if the captain had just done a very deliberate topic change. If so, go with it.

  "Zevon," Mosovich said. "The Balladeer of the Mercenary. Great guy. Met him once. Briefly."

  "Where?" Shari asked. "I recognize the name, but I can't come up with a song and . . ." She listened to a few lyrics and blanched. "Did he just say what I think he did?"

  "Yep," Papa O'Neal said with a grimace. "That's 'Excitable Boy.' It's . . . one of his rougher pieces."

  "I dunno," Cally said with a malicious chuckle. "Why don't you sing her a few bars of 'Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner'?"

  "I don't think that will be necessary," Shari said with a smile. "And, believe it or not, I can take a little black humor."

  "Oh, yeah?" Cally said with a sly grin. "Why'd the Posleen cross the road?"

  "I'll bite," Mueller said. "Why did the Posleen cross the road?"

  "To get to the fodder side," Cally said.

  "Okay," Mosovich said. "That was pretty bad. Try this one: How do two Posleen resolve an argument?" He waited, but nobody jumped in. "Thresh it out between them, of course."

  "Ow!" Papa O'Neal said. "What's the difference between a lawyer and a Posleen?"

  "I dunno," Shari said. "One gets paid to eat you alive?"

  "No, but that's pretty good," Papa O'Neal said. "No, one is a vicious, inhuman, cannibalistic monster; and the other is an alien."

  "You hear the new slogan for the Posleen that fight Marines?" Wendy asked.

  "Hah!" Mosovich said with a grin. "I can imagine a few. Oh, that would be sailors."

  "The few, the proud: DESSERT!"

  Cally looked around for a second then grinned. "How do you know that Posleen are bisexual? They eat both men and women!"

  "I can't believe you said that!" Papa O'Neal grumped as the others laughed.

  "Christ, you have me listening to Black Sabbath and Ozzy Osbourne, Granpa!" Cally said. "And that little joke bothers you?"

  "What's wrong with Black Sabbath?" he protested. "It's a good group. Great lyrics."

  "Oh, I dunno," Cally said. "The name?"

  "Christian!"

  "Catholic, thank you very much."

  "Okay, okay, breaking the mood here before bullets fly," Mueller said. "How many Posleen does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"

  "I dunno," said Papa O'Neal grumpily. "How many?"

  "Just one," Mueller said. "But it takes a really big lightbulb."

  "I don't get that one," Elgars said.

  "They're hermaphroditic," Wendy said. "They can't really self impregnate, not without help. But any two can reproduce with any other two so since 'go screw yourself' is an insult, people joke about them screwing themselves."

  Elgars nodded her head. "I still don't get it."

  "Think about it," Cally said. "In the meantime: Why did the Himmit cross the road?"

  "I don't know," Elgars said.

  "It didn't; it's on the wall behind you," Cally said with a grin.

  Elgars regarded her calmly. "This is a joke?"

  "Never mind," Wendy sighed. "Then there's the one about the Himmit who sat in his car for three days, in a no-parking zone, blending into the upholstery of the driver seat." She paused for a moment. "He got toad." She looked around. "Get it? Toad. T-O-A-D."

  "Aaaagh!" Papa O'Neal shouted. "That's awful!"

  "I don't get it again?" Elgars said. "What is a Himmit?"

  "One of the Galactic races," Cally answered, shaking her head and throwing a biscuit at Wendy. "They sort of look like big frogs. They can blend into the background so well it's like they're invisible."

  "Thank you," Wendy said, bowing at the table. "Thank you . . . Or the Himmit in the piano bar? One of the customers says to the piano player, 'Do you know there's a giant invisible frog having a beer on the wall behind you?' And the piano player said: 'Hum a bar or two and I'll pick it up.' Or the one about the extrovert Indowy? He looks at your shoes while he's talking to you."

  "Those are awful!" Cally said.

  "Worse than the bisexual joke?" Mueller asked. "Okay. Two soldiers in a foxhole. One says, 'I heard about two orphans passin' through town today. Those godamn aliens hit their town a week ago, killed their dad—he was a marathon runner, of all things—and ate their Ma. Didn't eat him—just her. Crazy damn aliens, why'd they do that?' The other says, 'You idiot. Their Pa's lean'."

  "That's terrible," Shari said. "Nearly as bad as this one. What's a good mascot for the ACS? A lobster: so good to eat, so hard to peel."

  "Hey!" Cally said. "My dad resembles that remark! What do you call a Crab on a sugar high? Flubber. It just bounces and bounces . . . You know what they call a Crab studying Marine Biology? Speaker to shellfish."

  "How do two hungry Posleen greet each other?" Papa O'Neal asked, not to be outdone. "With salt and pepper of course."

  "Why did the Posleen leave an honor stick at the McDonald's?" Cally asked. "They saw the sign '6 billion served.' "

  "You barely remember McDonald's," Papa O'Neal said suspiciously. "Who told you that?"

  "Just . . . a guy," Cally said with a twinkle in her eye.

  "Oh, shit," Mueller muttered. "Hey! How did the bus full of lawyers escape from behind the Posleen lines? Professional courtesy."

  "What guy?" Papa O'Neal asked.

  "What did the Posleen say when they took Auschwitz?" she asked, ignoring the question. " 'I prefer Sushi.' "

  "What guy, Cally?" Papa O'Neal asked again.

  "Just a soldier," she answered. "At the Piggly Wiggly. He told a joke and so did I and I left. It was no big deal. . . ."

  "What do you call Posleen in the open and a Fuel Air Explosion?" Mueller asked desperately. "A Whopper and fries."

  "What do you mean, no big deal?" Papa O'Neal said dangerously. "I don't want them changing the song to 'Cally went down to town.' "

  "Okay," Shari sighed. "Look at me, Michael O'Neal."

&n
bsp; "Yes?" he said grumpily.

  "What do the Posleen call call Carl Lewis?"

  "I dunno," Papa O'Neal said, shaking his head. "You're not going to let me pursue this, are you?"

  "No. Fast Food."

  He snorted. "Okay."

  "What did the Posleen say when confronted by an Ethiopian?"

  "I dunno," he said smiling at her. "What?"

  " 'Nouvelle Cuisine AGAIN?' I gotta million of 'em. What do the Posleen call a doctor?"

  "What?"

  "Lunch. What do the Posleen call a construction worker?"

  "I dunno."

  "Lunch. What do the Posleen call a politician? Competition. What do the Posleen call a lawyer? Trouble. Do you know why they substituted lawyers for Posleen in their chemical warfare experiments? Lawyers bred faster. There are things a Posleen won't do. And the researchers were taking pity on the Posleen.

  "And last, but not least: Why did the Posleen take less than a month to go through China? Well, you know how it is, you eat Chinese and an hour later . . ."

  "Jeeze, you're something," O'Neal said with a laugh.

  "You got any Van Morrison in this dump?" she asked.

  "I think I've got his 'Best of,' why?"

  "Because I want to dance," she answered, taking his hand and standing up. "Come on."

  "I've got two left feet," he protested.

  "You put your arms around me and shuffle around," she said with a twinkle in her eye. "How hard's it gonna be?"

  "You might want to rephrase that," Mueller muttered.

  "Oh, shut up."

  As the music changed in the background, Elgars poured a small sip of the better moonshine. She swirled it in her cup and looked at Mosovich. "I think now is a good time."

  "Now's a good time for what?" Cally asked.

  "I told Mosovich about a flashback while we were walking," Elgars answered. "There was something about it he really didn't like."

  "Yeah," Mosovich said. "You're right." He poured himself some of the moonshine and leaned back. "What I didn't like about it is that the person who had that experience is real, and she's really dead. I saw her die."