by John Ringo
There was a sudden sharp blow, passing through from one side to the other, blasting flesh, blood, heart and lungs and tearing Roderigo from his horse. Mouth still open with the unfinished command, the old man fell with an audible thump, dead even before he hit the ground.
Outraged, tactical sense forgotten, the remnants of the family still in the field opened fire on the point of the approaching Posleen column even though these were still too far away to make an ideal ambush target.
Posleen fell, of course, especially where the remaining machine gun stitched across their ranks. This time, however, precisely because the Posleen were too far away to be massacred before they had time to react, there was effective return fire, pinning the Mirandas in their ambush position.
Worse, at the sound of the first rounds the wide sweeping alien pincers turned inward, churning claws raising dust clouds on the humans' horizon.
The horses broke, even though the men did not. As the animals stampeded, the enveloping Posleen swept them with fire. Thresh were not to be wasted and the animals were as good a threshform as any. Of the several dozen animals that broke all but one were chopped down by the alien fire. This one, never too bright to begin with and now mindless with fear, raced for what its tiny brain thought of as home and safety.
Meanwhile, the rest of Roderigo Miranda's little command automatically pulled in their flanks and formed a tight circle. Perhaps . . . perhaps if they could hold on until nightfall they might manage to escape.
The Posleen, however, led and lashed on by their Kessentai, were having none of it. Heedless of losses they bore in, railguns and shotguns blazing, boma blades sweeping high overhead.
Though there was no one left in command of the trapped humans, they were a family and they did tend to think much alike. Determined to sell their lives as dearly as possible they fixed bayonets, except for a couple who drew their more familiar machetes, just before the crest of the alien wave hit them.
Let the actions of one speak for all. One of the last survivors, Emilio Miranda, twenty-seven year old grandson of Roderigo. Emilio had a drinking problem. His face and back still bore the marks of his great-grandmother's riding crop as mute testimony to that problem.
Never mind that. A drunk Emilio might have been. He was not, however, a noticeably cowardly drunk.
As the Posleen galloped close, Emilio arose from his covered position and emptied his last magazine point blank and on full automatic at the enemy, sweeping his Kalashnikov from left to right. Three Posleen went down immediately, while a fourth, apparently hit on a knee joint, stumbled forward before falling. Gripping his rifle firmly in both hands the man lunged forward, frantically driving his bayonet into the wounded Posleen's yellow eye. As the bayonet entered the eye the Posleen tossed its head in agony, ripping the rifle from the Emilio's hands.
Heart racing, Emilio drew his machete and ducked under another alien's swinging blade. He chopped at the alien's forelegs, severing one and embedding the machete in the other. Shrieking, that alien fell to one side. The embedded machete was also wrenched from Emilio's hand.
Ducking again under another awkward swing of a boma blade, Emilio leveraged himself onto another normal's back as if it had been the horse it somewhat resembled. From there, he reached an arm around the alien's throat, squeezing and twisting in an instinctive move that might well have killed a human—either by strangulation or by broken neck—but only succeeded in panicking the thicker necked Posleen.
The normal bucked and twisted, trying desperately to throw off the thresh whose encircling grip threatened to cut off its windpipe. As it did so its rear claws mauled another normal who had come to its rescue. This one, enraged at the undeserved wound slashed off the rear legs of the beleaguered Posleen with a single stroke.
That Posleen immediately fell on its dripping haunches and rolled, trapping Emilio underneath it.
Stunned, Emilio lay there momentarily with his lower torso trapped under several hundred pounds of quivering centauroid alien. This was perhaps fortunate as he never really saw or felt the descending blade that removed his head and ended his young life.
Digna's heart sank as she watched a lone horse, mouth frothy with exertion, gallop across the bridge that led to her home. When the firing to the south ended with a whimper she crossed herself and said a prayer for her lost children.
"It is time," she said to a boy serving as a runner. "Tell Señora Herrera that she can't wait any longer for stragglers. She is to begin moving our people to Gualaca," a small town to the north, "now."
"Si, Mamita," the boy answered, breathlessly, before racing off to find his own mount.
The foamy-mouthed horse passed by. Digna didn't even try to hold it. This road led unavoidably to where the noncombatant part of the family had gathered. They could stop the horse, if it could be stopped. Most likely the animal would halt of its own accord once it saw the herd of Miranda clan horses loaded down for the trip north. They were herd animals, after all.
Digna turned her attention back to road that led to the bridge along which the enemy must soon appear. They had to cross the bridge until they either gave up—an unlikely possibility, she knew—or found one of the fords north or east that led across the river. These she had covered with flanker parties under the command of one of her sons and Tomas Herrera.
The bridge was wired for demolition. She was sure it was inexpertly done; she had little knowledge of demolitions herself and none of her family knew much beyond the little bit needed to blow an old stump. Still, she remembered from the little bit of demolitions training she had had in OCS that there was an overriding factor in demolitions that could make even the rankest amateur a proficient combat engineer. This was called "factor P"; P for plenty.
The underside of the bridge was packed with nearly three hundred and fifty pounds of plastic explosive she had traded food for over the last several months. This was "plenty," indeed.
Wired or not, though, she did not want to blow the bridge until the last possible moment. It was an obvious way across the river. As long as an obvious way existed the aliens, who were reputed to be fairly stupid, they would be unlikely to start nosing about for an alternative crossing.
And besides, she wanted the bastards to cross for a while. She wanted to let the murderers of her children into the welcome zone she had prepared for them. She wanted to kill some of them herself, to assuage the grief of her heart.
Digna affectionately patted her husband's old rifle. She and, in spirit at least, he would pay back the aliens for the harm they had been done.
Whatever satisfaction Filaronion felt as the last of the thresh went down under the slashing blades of his oolt was short-lived. He was certain that there had been at least two such groups; nothing else would explain the way they had operated. That he had destroyed one meant also that another had gotten clean away.
Moreover, weighing the meat being harvested and the remnants of the bodies gave the God King more frustration than satisfaction. He had lost many times that number of normals and more than a few God Kings along the road before trapping and destroying this small group of threshkreen.
Disgust rising, Filaronion twisted his tenar away from the scene of massacre. Then the God King glided up the road, his oolt clattering and chittering behind him.
Elevated and forward as he was, the God King was first of his band to spot the bridge. He didn't like it, somehow. It seemed . . . too . . . easy.
Filaronion reined in his tenar and ordered a lesser Kessentai to investigate with his own scout oolt. Right after that he ordered two other oolt, the same two which had made up the enveloping pincers he had used earlier to destroy the threshkreen, to again split off to either side and find a crossing place through this flowing body of water.
For whatever reason, and perhaps it was because she was connected to so many of them by an unbreakable spiritual umbilical, Digna felt her family stiffen before she ever saw the Posleen tenar. Most likely one of her descendants had seen it as it rounde
d the road bend, then tightened up with fear and anticipation, and that it was that tightening which had passed unconsciously across the battle line even to those who had not seen the enemy.
It was only a fraction of a second, though, before she saw it, too; a quietly and smoothly gliding piece of plainly alien technology, bearing an unbelievably horrible monster.
Digna patted her husband's rifle affectionately. It had been his pride and joy in life, a custom-made piece of old-world, English craftsmanship, perfectly balanced and heavily tooled, firing a powerful, beast-killing slug.
Easing herself down into a firing position next to the 85mm gun she planned to use to begin the carnage, Digna peered through the scope and took a careful aim at her personal target.
My God, she thought, it's even uglier close up than it was at a distance.
Carefully she settled the cross hairs on the reptilian alien head. At a greater distance she might not have risked a head shot. But the thing was closing to within two hundred meters. At that range, even though this was her husband's rifle and not her own shotgun, she felt the head shot was justified.
I hope your mother, if you have one, weeps as I will weep once I have time to count my losses, beast.
Taking in a deep breath, then releasing most of it, Digna slowly squeezed the trigger while keeping the cross hairs on her target's head. By surprise, as all good shots should be, the weapon kicked in her grasp, bruising her shoulder. She had the satisfaction, however, of the barest glimpse of an alien head literally exploding before the recoil knocked her scope off target. When she returned the sight to the target she was gratified to see the alien slumped down, dead, while the flying sled slowly rotated above the bridge.
With a cry of rage the aliens below on the road exploded into action. The old bridge shook under the thunder of their claws as they poured across. As the aliens reached Digna's side of the bridge they began to spread out.
The ones who had crossed didn't interest her very much. Rifle and machine gun fire would account for them easily enough once she gave the word to open fire. Instead, she was much more interested in the dense cluster of aliens massing in confusion on the far side of the bridge.
"There must be a thousand or more of them there," she whispered aloud. "A fair honor guard for my lost children."
Digna twisted her head toward the waiting gun crew.
"Fire!"
Her command was immediately rewarded with a resounding blast from the gun's muzzle. An imperceptible moment later a wide swath of the aliens clustered at the bridge went down as if cut by some gigantic scythe. Their bleating and screams might have been pitiful had they not been so satisfying. Less than a second after the first round of canister had slashed through the enemy ranks, the other three guns joined in. A great moan went up as scores, then hundreds, of the invaders fell. Before the last of the victims of the other three guns went down, the first gun spoke again.
Rifle and machine gun fire joined the big guns cacophony. These, however, concentrated on the several score Posleen who had made it across the bridge before the 85mm pieces had opened fire. Unable to see their tormenters before it was too late, these aliens were knocked down right and left. By the time the big guns had finished reaping their grim harvest, three to four rounds each, cranked out in rather less than ten seconds, the others ceased fire for lack of targets.
A few of Digna's family had been hit by alien return fire. Two were dead, she was sure, from the way their bodies hung limply as they were carried back. Others screamed or, more commonly, bit their tongues half through to keep from screaming. Hers was, in the main, that kind of a clan.
No time for tears. I can mourn later.
Digna ordered the wounded and the dead, both, carried to the rear. The wounded would be cared for, as best they could be. For the dead there were fire pits, the seasoned wood already stacked, soaked with gasoline, and waiting. She would see no more of her own turned into meals for their enemies.
And at least they would be buried on their home ground.
Interlude
He never reached the fighting again. Moving, of necessity, with painful slowness, Guanamarioch and his band reached a crossroad somewhere in north-central Colombia. There, another one of the tenar-riding seniors of the clan sneered at the scruffy and underequipped appearance of the normals.
"You lot won't be worth anything at the fighting," the senior said to Guanamarioch. "Turn right here. Go about three thousand heartbeats until you reach the Kenstain, Ziramoth. He has surveyed our holdings. He will assign you one of those. Take charge of it and start preparing the land for farming. That's all your wretches look good for, young Kessentai."
Biting back a nasty retort, Guanamarioch nodded in seeming respect and turned, dejectedly, to his right.
"What's this; what's this, young Kessentai? Why so down, lordling? Abat gnaw on your dick?"
Ordinarily such words might have angered Guanamarioch. These, however, were delivered in a cheerful, bantering tone that almost succeeded in bringing a smile to his face. He looked over the Kenstain and saw a mid-sized, crested philosopher, missing his left eye and his right arm, and bearing serious scars along both flanks. Strapped across those scars were fully stuffed twin saddle bags. The Kenstain took a couple of steps toward Guanamarioch, walking with a stumbling limp.
The Kenstain, seeing the God King hiding one hand, reached out for the injured limb. Rather than resist and risk having any force exerted on the hand, Guanamarioch let him examine it. The Kenstain turned the palm over gently and bent to examine it closely with his one remaining eye.
"That's a right nasty burn you have there, young lordling. If you don't mind my asking, how did you come by it?"
"Thresh weapons get hot," the God King answered simply.
"Do they indeed?" asked the Kenstain, releasing the hand and twisting his torso to rummage in one of the saddle bags. From the saddlebag he pulled a dull tube. This he took a cap from, holding the cap between his lips. Then he again took Guanamarioch's injured hand in his and turned it palm up before releasing it. Using the same hand the Kenstain squeezed a measure of goo out onto the palm in a long, snaking line. The goo immediately began to spread out on its own, sinking into the burned flesh.
"Demons! Thank you, Kenstain," Guanamarioch said, the relief in his voice palpable.
"Never mind, young lordling. All in a day's work. I'm Ziramoth, by the way. Were you sent here to farm?"
Guanamarioch nodded bleakly.
"None of that, Kessentai. Farming, taking sustenance from the land, is the best way to live. You'll see."
Chapter 15
No captain can do very wrong if he
places his ship alongside that of the enemy.
—Horatio Nelson
At sea, south of the Peninsula of Azuero, Republic of Panama
The three warships steamed through the day, their bows cutting the waves and raising a froth that spilled to either side of each. They were in echelon right, with Salem forward and to port, Des Moines rearward and to starboard, and Texas in the middle. The ships were spaced far enough apart that any one of them had considerable maneuver space to zig and zag without risking a collision if the Posleen chose to engage from space.
The precautions seemed wise to McNair. He worried terribly even so. The ships were tough, true, and well armored against any surface threat. But warships, like tanks, were so vulnerable to attack from above—had been since 1941 at the latest—that he couldn't help but worry. The thought of a salvo of space-launched kinetic energy projectiles straddling his beloved Daisy Mae was simply too horrible for him not to worry.
Even so, except for the streaks through the sky as spaceships battled with Planetary Defense Batteries, there was no sign of the enemy.
"It makes no sense," McNair said aloud inside the heavily armored bridge. "It just seems so incredibly stupid that none of the warships have been engaged from space. We're big. We're metal. We're heavily armored and have impressive clusters of guns. Why the he
ll don't they attack us?"
Daisy's hologram answered, "They're a fairly stupid race, Captain. None of their technology, so far is as known, was invented by them, with the possible exception of their drive. Even that appears to be a modification of Aldenata technology, rather than something truly original. The way they breed, leaving their brightest to struggle to survive on equal terms in their breeding pens with the biggest and most savage of their normals; they can't help but be stupid. Add in that they've never before fought a race that really fought back and . . . well . . . they're dummies."
"And when we show our teeth?" McNair asked. "Will they fail to engage us then, too?"
The avatar shrugged. "That we will see when we see it, Captain. They might attack. Then again, they might not. And if they attack it might be from space, which we have a chance of maneuvering to avoid, or it might be with a low-flying lander which we have an excellent chance of beating in a heads-up fight. Even if we cannot maneuver to avoid the fire from space, Texas mounts a Planetary Defense Gun in place of each of her former turrets. An attacker who engages us from on high won't last long with Texas watching out for his little sisters."