Invasion

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Riyadh, Ambassador Simon Carmichael had decided, hadn’t changed for the better under alien rule. It had been a repressive environment in so many ways, with the religious police watching for the slightest hint of un-Islamic behaviour, and the political police watching for anti-government attitudes, but it had been fairly safe, provided that you were an Arab male. Now, aliens patrolled the streets, the Burka was banned and every mosque in the city had been destroyed. The entire city was waiting nervously for the penny to drop.

The aliens had rounded up, with the help of a number of senior princes and government officials who had fallen into their hands, every member of the religious police they could find and transported them out into the desert somewhere. Rumour, never the most accurate source in the world, claimed that the aliens had simply made them dig their own graves and then shot them, but given that rumour also claimed that the United States had been destroyed and that Mecca was burning rubble… well, it wasn’t very helpful. The only piece of truth that had been spread had been that Tel Aviv had been destroyed by the aliens… after Israeli nukes had fallen on several of their formations. The aliens now ruled from the Mediterranean Coastline — they’d overrun North Africa in a week — to the rapidly dissolving Pakistani border. They had not been short of ideas, this time, on how to treat the people who were suddenly under their control and a full-fledged insurgency was underway.

It wasn’t going well. The Iraqi Insurgency had benefited from dozens of factors, including the misuse of the Iraqi Army, the presence of literally millions of weapons in the country and plenty of outside support. The Saudi Army — and, for that matter, every other army in the region — had been destroyed. Those soldiers who had been captured — or, so rumour said, surrendered rather easily — had been placed in prison camps and carefully kept away from the cities. Insurgents had managed to break one of them open, but the aliens had rounded up most of the prisoners, leaving only a handful on the loose. Experienced fighters were rare among the new insurgency… and the learning curve was steep. The supplies being smuggled in from outside, mainly from Europe, weren’t enough to tip the balance, although the commandos and Special Forces were very helpful. The irony was thick enough to slice with a knife — they’d spent blood and treasure on suppressing radical Islam, and now they were trying to support it — but it still wouldn’t be enough. The aliens had learnt from Texas as well.

Worst of all, they’d found allies. Carmichael wouldn’t have believed that anyone brought up in a strictly religious environment would have been willing to work with the aliens, but he’d underestimated them. The Saudis had imported tens of thousands of guest workers to do all the shit work… and treated them, well, like shit. They’d taken the opportunity offered by the aliens to get some revenge on their former masters and taken an unholy delight in exposing insurgents wherever they found them. There were even some Shias from the oil-rich regions who were willing to join the aliens. They had to know that that would merely put them last on the alien list for conversion, but perhaps they just didn’t care. It wasn’t as if the Saudis had offered them anything better.

Carmichael scowled as he peered down over the city. A rising column of smoke announced the detonation of another IED, although it was anyone’s guess as to what — if anything — it had destroyed. The insurgents were still learning, while the aliens were becoming much quicker at rooting out and destroying insurgent cells before they could become active. Part of it was through collaborators, but judging from what Captain Harper had said, the aliens used sensors to sniff for explosive residue and other signs of insurgent activity. They were probably using such methods in Texas too, now, and perhaps they would win there as well.

Bastards, he thought suddenly, clenching his fists in helpless rage. He’d known people in Washington who had vanished somewhere under the mushroom cloud. The not knowing was worse than any report of their deaths. They might have survived, or they might have been killed, but there was no way to know. The single communications line to the government bunker had to be reserved for important matters. A question regarding the dead, however important, wouldn’t go through. It was a complete mystery why the aliens had allowed the embassy to continue to exist, without either throwing them out of the country or dumping them all in a POW camp, but it would be selfish not to take advantage of their generosity.

Captain Harper appeared, as always, perfectly silently and cleared his throat. “Welcome back,” Carmichael said, refusing to give the impression that he’d just jumped. His ears were good… and yet the Marine managed to sneak up on him all the time. “Did you find them?”

“Yes, Mr Ambassador,” Captain Harper said. The aliens had wanted the Americans to stay mainly in their embassy, but with so many other diplomats around, they had reluctantly agreed to allow the foreigners to talk with each other, if not the insurgents. It wasn’t much, but it allowed a great deal of mischief, much of which was taking place right under the aliens’ noses. The aliens might not be willing to respect the embassies forever, but for now — covertly — they could be used to help the insurgents. “They’re in place.”

So were four of the Marines, the ones who could pass for Arabs, but neither man mentioned them. Officially, they weren’t there. “Good,” Carmichael said, finally, looking back towards the rising sun. The aliens were in for a surprise. “And the equipment?”

“Untraceable, I hope,” Captain Harper said, dispassionately. His face showed none of the difficulties in smuggling in large quantities of weapons into territory the aliens controlled. “If anyone, they’ll blame the Russians…”

Carmichael wanted to laugh, but it wouldn’t come. The Russians had retreated completely inside themselves, not taking part in the insurgency, or even fighting the aliens. They’d engaged the aliens during the first battle, back when it had looked like Earth could do more than kick and scratch on its way to the gallows, but now they were almost completely uncommunicative. News from Russia was very sparse and talked, in worried tones, of tanks in the streets and chaos at the highest levels. Langley had wondered if the Russians were in the middle of a civil war, but with so little intelligence leaking out, it was impossible to tell. They’d grown too used to intelligence being available at the push of a button.

“That would be fitting,” he said. He knew that some European governments were shitting bricks after Washington, even though they had lived with the threat of nuclear war since the fifties, because the aliens had proved that they could and would strike cities. The destruction of Tel Aviv had only reinforced that impression. He worried that some of them would back off from supporting the insurgents, but now… it was much harder to call off an operation just because it was politically inconvenient and might embarrass a major government. “Perhaps they’ll go invade the Russians instead.”

“There’s also an ugly little rumour being passed around the bazaar,” Captain Harper said. “They were saying that a lot of refugees have been coming into the city, claiming that the aliens have driven them out of their homes and sent them into the desert to die.”

Carmichael blinked. “Fake, do you think?”

“Impossible to tell,” Captain Harper said. He shrugged. “Except there was a similar story being passed around the Internet from Texas, claiming that the aliens were depopulating entire towns, for no apparent reason. They just show up, order the people out, and take over. It could be an odd coincidence, but…”

There was no change in the noise of the city, no call to prayer echoing over the city, but the streets suddenly became empty as shoppers and civilians, most of them completely unemployed now since the government had collapsed, headed to their homes to pray. The aliens hadn’t twigged, openly, that any Muslim could lead prayers, although their experience with other sects in Texas would probably tip them off, sooner or later. Sergeant Sean Gartlan watched from his position as the civilians started to filter home, clearing the streets completely, apart from his small group.

He looked back at them now. They were all young, Arab, and determined to fight. They’d also been pains in the arse, and if he hadn’t needed them, he would have dumped them all or done the resistance a big favour by selling them out to the aliens. The aliens had crushed their semi-comfortable lives, and now they wanted to fight, but they needed training and experience. They had once followed mullahs and clerics who had promised bloody revolution and a change in the established order, but if nothing else, the massacre of the young religious students on the day that Riyadh fell had convinced them that the mullahs didn’t have the slightest idea of how to fight. Neither did they; Sean had tested them, several times, and had realised that they were more likely to be dangerous to each other than the enemy. Given time, and a proper training camp, they might have made soldiers, but without such luxuries, the best he could do was give them a quick course in urban combat and hope that they could take a few of the aliens with them.

“Remember,” he hissed, in Arabic. “Do not open fire until I give the word, or I’ll cut off your dicks, understand?”

The alien patrol was late, unsurprisingly. They’d learned after a few ambushes in Texas to keep their patrols on a varying schedule, just to make planning an ambush difficult. Sean had been careful to keep the young men from attacking until conditions were absolutely perfect, even though they wanted to attack as soon as they saw a hint of the alien presence, knowing that they would need all the advantages they could get. The aliens, if nothing else, would have passed through the area several times, unmolested. Like every other city they had occupied, Riyadh was now almost completely without moving human vehicles. There were a handful driven by collaborators, some of them formerly the possessions of princes who’d been killed, captured, or quick enough on their feet to flee, and one of them had been parked on the curb. The collaborator had been, apparently, a lousy driver… and the trunk had been packed with explosives.

A thin whistle echoed through the air from the lookout; the aliens were coming. Sean gripped his weapon in one hand and checked it, again, as he heard the strange noise of alien vehicles. A few weeks ago, the religious police would have been on the whistler and beaten him, but now… now, the young men could whistle all they liked. The aliens wouldn’t notice until it was too late. He saw them turning the corner, a handful of armoured fighting vehicles… and pushed hard down on the detonator. The IED exploded with colossal force.

“Now,” he barked, and opened fire, spraying bullets across the alien forms. The blast had been more powerful than he’d anticipated and the alien convoy had been dented, although the two armoured vehicles had survived. Their gun barrels traversed with frightening speed to bear on the insurgents, but two of the young men hurled satchel charges onto the vehicles and detonated them, caught in the blasts themselves. The handful of remaining aliens took cover with commendable speed and returned fire, but knew that they were trapped. Their only hope was to hold out long enough for help to arrive and, hopefully, wipe out the insurgents.

He waved across at Kalid, a young man who was slightly more responsible than the others, and gave the retreat signal. Five of the men obeyed at once and came running, while a series of detonators and firecrackers exploded high above, trying to convince the aliens that they were still under attack. Sound-wise, it would be as if an entire Company was attacking their positions, although the absence of bullets pinging off their armour would be a bit of a giveaway. The remaining men continued to fight, trying to get as many aliens killed as possible, but Sean knew that they would all die. He wanted to stay and fight himself, but they would just end up trapped; grimly, he led the retreat though the streets, heading for the safe house.

“We can’t leave them,” Kalid protested, as they ducked under cover. A flight of alien helicopters passed overhead with menacing speed. A moment later, he heard the scream of rockets as they pummelled hell out of the surrounding buildings, apparently still under the impression that the buildings were occupied by dangerous insurgents, firing down at trapped aliens. “Sir…”

“There’s no choice,” Sean snapped back. He missed the remainder of the platoon desperately at such times; he would have welcomed a Royal Marine or even a Paratrooper, rather than such poor raw material. The other lads were likely to get killed by the people they were meant to be training. “They knew the dangers and they knew what would happen if they disobeyed.”

He looked back as the sound of human weapons cut off abruptly. The Saudi culture, as far as he could tell, was a bizarre mixture of Islam, machismo and a superiority complex that dwarfed anything else he’d ever met. He could imagine what the idiots he’d left behind had thought — there was no reason why proper Saudi lads couldn’t do the job of the infidel and probably better — and, in doing so, they’d gotten themselves killed. He wouldn’t shed any tears over them, not now, even though he saw a hint of the young teenager he’d been in their eyes. They’d never had to learn the way the world worked until it had been far too late.

The walk back to the safe house was easier as the streets filled with people again. They might have realised that several of the insurgents were returning to their base, but Sean had taken the precaution of ordering his men to keep their weapons hidden, both from the humans and the aliens. A collaborator could be anyone, and, unlike Texas, the collaborators were more often genuine than not. He’d taken a more complex precaution as well — none of the boys, apart from Kalid, knew the location of the safe house, but they would have to be more careful in the next few weeks. The aliens might have taken prisoners… and everyone broke eventually. There were more horror stories than hard fact about the alien methods for interrogation, but no one doubted that they worked, although the cynical part of his mind suggested that it had more to do with hard cash than anything else.

“Check the traps,” he ordered, as they entered the house. The noise of alien helicopters was growing louder, but they didn’t seem to have picked up any scents, just buzzing around to see who reacted. He refused to be panicked by them. “Once that’s done, we’ll lay low for a few hours, understand?”

The house had once been owned by a wealthy man, although none of them knew who, and he had had an astonishing — and probably illegal — collection of DVDs, some of which were borderline pornographic. He also had a collection of drink, including some quite rare vintages, all of which Sean had poured down the sink. The young men would have tasted alcohol before, on trips to Bahrain and Europe, but the last thing he needed was for them to get drunk near weapons. That was asking for disaster.

“Not a bad days work,” he said, once they’d checked the traps and confirmed that they were undisturbed. The aliens would have gotten a surprise if they’d tried to burst in. “We might just make soldiers out of you yet.”

“They’re not happy,” Captain Harper reported, that evening. The Marine seemed more excited than normal, almost smiling. “It seems that several attacks were made against their forces in the city and they want answers.”

Carmichael smiled thinly. “And are they blaming the attacks on us?”

“Not yet, but they do have their suspicions,” Captain Harper said. “They might not want to disturb the embassies, but I think it’s going to be harder to move around now. Hell, we don’t even know why they let us stay here…”

Carmichael had been giving the matter some thought. There seemed to be no logical reason for it, but the aliens had actually treated them as a semi-official delegation, although they seemed unwilling to say so out loud. “They don’t have an embassy in… America,” he said. He’d been about to say Washington, but that was too painful for words. “Or anywhere else, for that matter, unless they have one in Russia and the Russians haven’t told us. Perhaps they want to have some way of communicating officially with us…”

He broke off as a dull rumble echoed over the city. “Are we under attack?”

“No, that’s coming from further away,” Captain Harper said. He tilted his head for a second as the rumbling grew louder. The entire building, as large as it was, was shaking slightly under the pressure. “I think… I think we’d better get up to the roof.”

He led the run up the stairs and onto the roof. The sky was alight, not with the strange twinkling of the first battles in space, but with a thousand glowing engines. He thought of fireflies, hanging in the sky, but these were falling down towards the south. It wasn’t like the first invasion, or other alien activities, but something else…

Captain Harper put it into words. “My god,” he breathed. “They’re landing their population! We’ll never get rid of them now!”