Greenies

Chapter 18

Martian wastelands — 12 kilometers west of Eden

September 1, 2146

The latest artillery bombardment came raining down across the area, shells bursting just above the ground sending shrapnel into anyone unfortunate enough to be underneath and unprotected. Callahan was jerked awake once more as he felt the ground quake beneath him, as he felt the concussions hammer into him. He checked his time display and saw it had been less than fifteen minutes since he'd gone unconscious. That was typical. His body was crying out for sleep, was demanding it with every fiber, every molecule, every atom, but he had only been able to provide it with about three hours or so of that most precious commodity since they'd taken the Jutfield Gap seventy-seven hours ago — and that had all been snatched in ten to twenty minute grabs.

Callahan, along with his ever-battered, ever-changing, understrength company, the battalion it was part of, the regiment it was part of, and the division they were all a part of, along with the remaining tanks and APCs, were now less than six kilometers from the Martian main line of defense. If he were to climb out of the hole beneath the burned out APC he was hiding under and stand up he would be able to see the skyline of Eden off to the east, including the AgriCorp Building. Of course he was not so mad as to actually poke his head or any other body part out just to admire the pretty buildings — not with artillery and mortar fire coming in every ten minutes or so, not with Martian snipers hiding in the surrounding hillsides. To show yourself out there was to invite a quick and nasty death.

The artillery barrage went on for another three minutes or so and then petered out, the fire shifting to another sector of what was being called "the line". Callahan stretched out as much as possible, trying in vain to loosen up his sore and cramped muscles. During the battle of Jutfield Gap the division's APCs had been hit very hard — losses were well over fifty percent of the original vehicles. Losses in men, while heavy, were not as bad. What this meant was that there were no longer enough APCs to transport all of the ground troops no matter how many they crammed into each one. He and the remainder of his battalion had basically walked from the Jutfield Gap to here — a distance of more than thirty kilometers.

Of course it had not been a casual stroll through the majestic Martian landscape. Not at all. After pulling back from the gap the Martian forces had installed themselves in another set of hills ten kilometers to the east, forcing yet another bloody battle in which even more APCs were smashed, even more tanks were destroyed, and even more marines were mowed down by gunfire or artillery fire or mortar fire. And when they'd forced the Martians out of those positions — with depressingly little evidence of enemy casualties found — the Martians had fallen back another eight kilometers to yet another set of prepared positions where the entire process started over once again. In all, they'd engaged the Martian armored cavalry regiments a total of four times before finally forcing them off of the last set of hills. While it was true that the engagements became easier and faster as the valley leading to Eden opened up and forced the Martians to spread themselves out thinner and thinner when they made each successive stand — they'd bloodied the marines badly each time, destroying morale and overwhelming the medical resources with wounded.

Callahan took a drink of the lukewarm water from his reservoir — a very small drink. The reservoir was down to twenty-eight percent and there was not enough spare water to go around. The same was true of food paste, waste packs, and even air bottles. Nor was this the only shortage they were dealing with. Ammunition was being severely rationed, with orders given to no longer utilize suppressing fire when advancing, to no longer engage a target unless there was reasonable chance of hitting it. It was absolute madness, and a madness that was destroying the very discipline that held an army together in combat.

"No more suppressing fire?" Corporal Cayenne, the newest leader of his second platoon, said during a private conference Callahan had held with his "officers" (although only one of them was even an NCO at this point) after they'd dug in at this latest position. "How the fuck are we supposed to take a position without suppressing fire?"

"Shit," said Sergeant Nichols, a recent transfer to the company from another unit and the highest-ranking person after Callahan himself, "the fucking suppressing fire doesn't do any good against them anyway. Why shoot the fucking guns at all? We might as well just shoot thirty percent of the troops ourselves and then walk up the hill and save the Martians some time."

"Alexander Industries wouldn't like that very much," one of the other corporals put it. "They wouldn't get to sell us the replacement ammo."

"And meanwhile," Nichols said, "the Martians have all the ammo they need because they've got a secure supply line back to Eden and their base."

"Their wounded get to the hospital right away too," Cayenne said. "They just take them out the back side of them hills and fly them right to the base. When we get hit we have to lie there until the battle is over before a medic even comes to take care of us."

"That's it then," said Corporal Senate, who was leading third platoon, "I'm joining the greenies. They got better benefits, better healthcare, and unlimited ammo."

This was good enough for a small chuckle from the group but Callahan knew there was an underlying message to it. Everything they'd faced to this point had been nothing but a warm-up. Now that the main event was upon them they were being told not to shoot as much, not to breathe as much air, not to eat and drink as much, not to shit as much. In short, they were being told to do something that couldn't be done.

"All company commanders, this is Colonel West," Callahan's radio link suddenly spoke up. "I need you to make your way over to my APC for a conference."

"Fuck that," said the voice of Sergeant Mike Rollins, who was now in charge of Bravo Company (a fucking sergeant leading a company, Callahan thought in amazement every time he was reminded of this).

"What did you just say, Rollins?" West demanded. "I think I must have misheard you."

"Then let me repeat myself," Rollins told him. "I said 'fuck that'. Do you have a death wish or something? What do you think is gonna happen when those Martian snipers see four men go trotting through the open and climb into the same APC? Why don't you just put a fucking sign up that says 'command staff meeting right here, please put a laser through our asses'?"

There was silence on the channel for a few moments and then West said, "You do have a good point, Rollins, but you need to watch how you make them. You were being impertinent to a superior officer. Just because you've been put in charge of a company doesn't mean you can start talking to a lieutenant colonel like he was a plebe in the academy."

"If he wasn't gonna do it, I would've," Callahan said. "I'm sorry, Colonel, but if you want to have a conference I think we'd better all just stay right where we are and do it over the command channel."

"I'm willing to concede that point," West hissed. "But I will not have lieutenants and sergeants speaking to me in that manner."

"Whatever," said Rollins, and you could almost see the jerking-off motion he was making. "So what do you got for us?"

"A pull-back order I trust," said Captain Boothe, commander of Alpha Company. That had been the prevailing rumor of late, what had been deemed to be the only viable solution.

"Of course we're not pulling back," West said, shocked that one of his captains would make such a suggestions. "I've got our battle plans and objectives for penetrating the greenie main line of defense. We will start moving in at 1300 hours. This will be your battle briefing."

Since all four of the company commanders were separated by anywhere from thirty to one hundred meters it wasn't really possible for them to share a disbelieving look with each other — but somehow they managed it anyway.

"We're attacking that line?" asked Lieutenant Strawn, Delta Company's CO. "With only the men and armor we have here?"

"Yes," West said. "Is there a problem with that?"

"Is there a problem with that?" Strawn responded. "Colonel, I've been looking over the reports on that position Intel shipped to us. We can't punch through there without reinforcements."

"And even then we would take heavy casualties," Callahan added. "Have any of you high and mighty battle planners actually looked at what we're facing here?"

Callahan surely had. He had looked over the schematics and briefing material their intelligence department had sent to all company commanders and above. The Martian main defenses, though on much flatter ground and spread across a much greater area than in the Jutfield Gap, were much more formidable. The Martians knew they had to stop an enemy cold with this final defensive network or Eden was lost and they had constructed it with this thought in mind. Stretching all across the vast plain on the western edge of the city was a system of concrete trenches and pillboxes interspersed with concrete and titanium hull-down positions for tanks and APCs. Half a kilometer in front of this were networks of anti-tank ditches and tank traps that would prevent most armor from approaching the line at all and would channel that which did into vicious killing boxes from which there was no escape. Even if there were enough APCs for all the ground troops to mount up in, they wouldn't be able to bring them close to the Martian infantry positions. Any advance would be over five hundred meters of open ground that would be saturated with Martian artillery, mortar fire, heavy and light machine gun fire, tank and APC main gun fire, and, of course, small arms fire from the defending infantry.

"Yes, of course we've read the documents over," West told them. "We understand that our casualties have been a bit heavier than expected, but nevertheless..."

"A bit heavier than expected?" Callahan interrupted. "Save that shit for the media assholes. Those Martians kicked our fucking asses!"

"Goddamn right," agreed Boothe. "How many men have we lost in this sector anyway? I know my company was down almost thirty percent before you sent me that last batch of cooks and dishwashers from the LZ."

"I don't have exact figures on that," West said.

"Bull-fucking-shit," Boothe yelled at him.

"How dare you talk to me like that!" West yelled back.

"Yeah?" Boothe returned. "What are you gonna do about it, sir? Send me to fucking Mars? Oh wait! I'm already here, ain't I? And now you're telling me you want me to lead this ragtag, overtired, ass-kicked company against a defensive emplacement that makes the positions The Corps faced on Callisto look like a kid's tree house? If I'm gonna even consider doing that, I want to know how many goddamn men we've lost and how many we have left. You can throw me in the brig if you want, but that's the way it's gonna be, sir!"

West sighed, seeming to realize he was handling a batch of nitroglycerine that could explode in his face at any second. "We have taken almost eleven thousand casualties moving from the LZ to this point," he admitted.

Silence on the net, stretching out so long it seemed the net was broken.

Eleven thousand casualties? Callahan thought. Jesus fucking Christ! Eleven thousand? And that was just in the Eden sector of operations. How many at Libby? At Proctor? At New Pittsburgh? Not even counting the marines that had been killed in transit by the Martian "suicide attacks" and the so-called "accidents" among the Panamas, they had easily lost more men just getting to the main lines of defense than had been lost in all three attacks on Callisto during the Jupiter War.

"This is insane," whispered Boothe, so softly his words were barely heard.

"Amen to that," agreed Strawn.

"I understand how you men feel," West said. "We underestimated our enemy to a certain degree and we paid the price for it but now we know what kind of positions we're facing. We have a coherent and logical attack plan formulated by the best military minds on this planet and above it."

"Oh really?" said Callahan. "General Jackson was nice enough to come up with an attack plan for us?"

"That's blasphemous, Callahan!" West barked. "Don't ever let me hear you say anything like that again!"

"Truth hurts, doesn't it?" Callahan shot back.

"Look," West said, "I didn't ask you men to like your orders. You are WestHem marines and you will follow them. We will attack at 1300 and we will be standing on the streets of Eden by 1500. Now would you like to hear the briefing on how we're going to do that or not?"

"No," Callahan said. "I wouldn't."

"What?" West demanded.

"I'm sorry, Colonel," he said. "I've been in the Corps my entire career and I've been loyal to the Corps that entire time. I've always believed in our mission no matter where it was — Argentina, Cuba, and even Mars when they first sent us here. But I can't be a party to this. The way I figure it we're standing here with about seventy thousand combat troops and we're facing an enemy of at least twenty-five thousand. That is less than the three to one ratio that doctrine dictates for the best of conditions."

"That is against a professional army," West said. "These are a bunch of greenie weekend warriors we're facing."

"Greenie weekend warriors that have caused eleven thousand fucking casualties with their 'speed bump'," Callahan said. "And you'll note that I said 'the best of conditions'. That is hardly what we're dealing with here. We have lost almost half of our armor and most of us have walked the last thirty kilometers. We've lost most of our captains, lieutenants, and senior NCOs and we have fucking sergeants leading companies (no offense, Rollins), corporals leading platoons, and privates leading squads. We have cooks, dishwashers, toilet plungers, and computer programmers carrying guns out here now. Nobody even knows the names of the people in their unit anymore. We're short on medics, short on ammo, short on breathing air, short on water and food. Each and every one of us that have managed to live this long out here are living on less than six hours of sleep since we left the LZ however many fucking days ago that was. It is impossible for us to take those positions in these numbers under those conditions, sir. Impossible. And I will not order my men to engage this enemy any further unless we are allowed to rest, be fully re-armed, and, most of all, reinforced in some way so we can attack in the strength necessary to achieve our objectives. You can court martial me if you wish, you can execute me on the spot if you feel that's necessary, but I will not walk another foot forward under these conditions, nor will I order my men to walk another foot forward."

"I can't believe you just said that to me, Callahan," West said, his tone sounding more hurt than angry — like that of a father whose son has defied him. "You are relieved of command as of this moment. Your second in command will take over Charlie Company and you will be placed under arrest and transported back to the LZ for processing. I hope you like snow because you're going to be shoveling a lot of it at the penal colony for a very long time."

"At least I'll be alive to shovel it," Callahan said.

"You'd better save some room in the APC for me, Colonel," Captain Boothe said. "I'm with Callahan. I will not order my men forward into a hopeless battle. They will be killed for nothing and I will not be a party to that."

"Put me on the list as well," said Strawn. "That's a meat grinder in front of us."

"Me too," agreed Rollins. "I will not go forward from here."

Now the anger appeared in West's tone. "This is mutiny!" he yelled at them. "I could have you all shot for this!"

"That would certainly help morale, wouldn't it?" asked Callahan.

"Look, Colonel," Boothe said. "None of us are making this decision lightly, I can assure you of that. You're asking too much of us. You're asking us to commit our men to death when there is no possible hope of victory. Now you can sit there and debate the fine points of the legality of our position if you want, but my suggestion would be that you contact regimental command and let them know what we've done. My guess is we're not the only ones."

Colonel West did just that. And it turned out that Boothe was entirely correct.

Mars Orbit

Aboard the WSS Nebraska

General Wrath had just finished another briefing of the WestHem media in which he'd explained yet again why his forces were still not standing in the Martian cities. The story now was that the greenie terrorists manning the main line positions were utilizing "human shields" in the form of Martian civilians and captured Earthling non-combatants. They were placing these hapless civilians in the very trenches they were defending their cities from in order to keep the WestHem marines from unleashing the full fury of their superior training and firepower.

"They've committed this cowardly, unprecedented act in all four of the cities in which combat operations are under way," he'd explained with his usual straight face. "This is an action that defies any and all civilized rules of warfare, an action even more appalling than their use of suicide attacks against troop concentrations and unarmed transit ships. While this will not break our resolve or even bend it, and while we will neutralize and occupy those positions in a matter of hours no matter what, we have pulled back a bit and held in place in order to evaluate the best way to deal with this new tactic in a way that will eliminate or at least minimize the possibility of innocent deaths in this conflict."

And that was it. The explanation was accepted as the gospel without any questions about how the marines knew the Martians were putting civilians into the trenches, about how the Martians were getting these civilians outfitted in biosuits and marching them out there. And there were definitely no questions about the twenty-six thousand men who had been killed in the last three days, or about the thirteen thousand that had been wounded.

Major Wilde was waiting for him in the hallway when he left the pressroom. His expression was one of trepidation mixed with a little bit of sorrow.

"New developments?" Wrath asked, popping his fifteenth antacid tablet of the day.

"Yes sir," Wilde told him.

"By the look on your face I'm guessing it is not a favorable development."

"No sir," Wilde agreed. "Should we talk in your office?"

Wrath sighed and then nodded. They walked through the halls, past a few marine sentries, and entered the luxurious, blue-carpeted office just adjacent to the war room. A large window in the wall looked out over the surface of Mars far below. It was view that had seemed to mock him for days now.

Wrath sat down behind his desk, practically falling into his custom-made chair. Wilde took a seat before the desk without waiting for permission. The two men had long since ceased to adhere to such formalities.

"What is it?" Wrath asked, already bracing himself.

"It's what I was afraid would happen," Wilde said. "The morale problem among the combat units down on the surface has reached the breaking point."

"What do you mean?"

"In all four theaters of operations, company commanders and, in some cases, battalion commanders, are refusing to follow orders to advance."

"Refusing to follow orders?" Wrath repeated. Though Wilde had warned him that something like this might happen just twelve hours before the very concept was so foreign to a man who had spent his life in the Corps that he had trouble acknowledging what he was being told. "You mean... refusing? As in, 'I'm not going to do that'?"

"Yes sir, that's exactly what I mean."

"How many?"

Wilde sighed, almost ashamed to admit the truth even though he had foreseen this. "Nearly all of them," he said. "The dissent is pretty much unanimous at the company level in Eden and New Pittsburgh. In Libby, several of the battalion commanders are in on it too. At Proctor... well... you know how things are going there."

"Yes," Wrath said bitterly. He did. At New Pittsburgh and Eden the units were in position to attack the main line of defense that guarded the cities themselves. In Libby, they had already attacked it once and had been soundly repulsed. But in Proctor — the most mountainous of the four cities and the one protected by the narrowest approaches — the marines had still, after three days of vicious fighting, not pushed through the first line of defense. Every attempt had failed, resulting in bloody, agonizing defeats.

"Everyone from battalion level down to the platoon leaders — those that are left — are refusing to mount another attack on that line. They have defied General Baggenstein's orders and have actually pulled back thirty kilometers, out of the range of the Martian artillery. A message sent to Baggenstein read that we could come down and shoot every last one of them if we wanted but they were not going to attack their objectives any more."

"That's mutinous," Wrath said angrily. "It's absolutely mutinous!"

"I agree," Wilde said. "But it's also the reality we're dealing with."

"You send a message to those men down there that I order them to follow their goddamn orders and take those cities!" Wrath yelled. "How dare they defy me like that!"

"Sir," Wilde said, "I think you need to face some facts here."

"What facts?"

"The Martians have achieved their objectives in this first phase of the conflict."

"They've what?"

"We cannot take their cities, sir. Not with the configuration of forces we now have. I've been over this again and again in the past twenty-four hours and there is simply no way, short of utilizing tactical nuclear weapons, that we can clear those defensive positions with the men we have available. In every one of the theaters of operation our ratio is down to less than a three to one advantage in combat troops. Our armor has been decimated, particularly the APCs. The Martians have air superiority and the ability to suppress our artillery with impunity. Most of all, our unit cohesion has been destroyed by the loss of so many officers and NCOs. The commanders down there on the surface are not throwing a fit or trying to be difficult, they simply realize there is nothing to be gained by pushing forward but the needless deaths of their men. You can punish them if you want but they're only responding to the reality of the situation."

This was a very hard pill for Wrath to swallow. "So you're saying... we've lost?"

"We've lost this battle, sir. We haven't lost the war. We can still come out of this with a victory but we need to take some drastic steps."

"What kind of steps?"

"We need to pull everyone back to the LZs immediately."

"What?" Wrath cried. "Pull back? Retreat? That's impossible! Do you have any idea what the council will do to me if I even suggest such a thing? How would we even explain such a thing to the media? I know they're a bunch of sheep who do what they're told, but this would be too much for them to swallow."

Wilde sighed. "Sir," he said. "I'm not going to pretend to be an expert in relations with the council or with the media. The politics of this conflict are your field. I'm your aide because I hold a Master's degree from the WestHem military academy in Military Strategy. I only deal with the reality of the given situation and I'm here to tell you there is no hope whatsoever of taking even one of those cities under the plan we have operating now. We need to disengage from the Martians and pull everyone back to the LZs. We then need to launch our landing ships off the surface and pull everyone back into orbit."

"Leave the planet entirely? Wilde, you should be shot for even saying that! Marines don't run away!"

"We ran away at Callisto," he said, "and we need to run away here. We need to regroup everyone back in orbit, re-arm, re-assign, and get some unit cohesion back in this task force and then we need to go back down in full strength on a single target."

"Send everyone after one target? We can't recapture the planet that way."

"No sir, we can't," Wilde agreed. "No matter what we do, another task force is going to have to be sent here from Earth in order to recapture Mars completely."

"I can't accept that," Wrath said. "I can't do that! I came here with half a million troops to take this planet back from those greenies and that is what I'm going to do."

Wilde shook his head. "With all due respect, sir," he said. "You've already failed at that task. We're down to two choices here. You can continue to push forward and get a lot more men killed for no gain, or you can do as I suggest and withdraw to orbit and regroup. Once that is done we go after Eden with everything we have and we capture it."

"What about the other eleven cities?" Wrath asked. "What about Triad?"

"We're not going to take the other eleven cities or Triad no matter what. More troops, more equipment, more armor, and more fuel will need to be sent here in order to do that. But if we can at least take Eden from them, we'll have their most important city under our control until those additional troops get here. We'll have a sizable portion of their agricultural industry in our hands and, most important, we'll have a fully functional spaceport to which those additional troops can be offloaded. We won't have to land the next wave of marines out in the wastelands. We can land them at Eden, which is the central hub for their entire rail system. Troops can be moved to just outside the air umbrella of New Pittsburgh, assembled, and can then march in force on that city. Or we can head to Libby, or to Proctor, or to Ore City. If we control Eden, we will eventually take everything back under control."

"Eventually?" Wrath asked. "How long is eventually?"

"Several years, sir," Wilde admitted.

"Years? You're suggesting we let those greenies control the majority of this planet for a couple of years?"

"Again, sir, I'm talking realities here. We're not letting them do anything. We're going to have to fight and sacrifice heavily to win this war. What I'm suggesting is the best option we have. The Martians have turned out to be a worthy opponent. If we're going to retake this planet at all, the only way we're going to do it is to hit one city at a time with at least a six to one advantage. If we do anything less, they will defeat us."

Wrath leaned forward and took a cigarette out of his desk drawer. He lit up despite the knowledge that it was going to make his ulcer flare up within minutes. "The council will not like this at all," he said.

"No, sir, I don't think they will."

"They will remove me from command, probably have me arrested, probably blame this defeat on me."

Wilde nodded. "That's a very likely scenario, sir," he said.

"And yet you still think I should pull the men back?"

"You're going to have to face the consequences one way or another, sir," Wilde told him. "If you take my advice and pull them back they might have you arrested. I won't deny that. But if you don't take my advice and order them forward, they will be defeated as surely as I'm standing here, even if they do agree to follow your orders. You will surely be arrested when that happens, wouldn't you say?"

Wrath slowly nodded. "Yes," he said, taking an especially deep drag and blowing it slowly out of his mouth.

"So what are we going to do, sir?" Wilde asked.

"The frying pan or the fire, huh?"

"Yes sir."

Wrath gave a small smile, a cynical, unhappy smile, but a smile nonetheless. "I guess I'll have to take the frying pan then. Let's get a staff meeting going and start drawing up some withdrawal plans. Once that's done, I'll get on the line with the executive council and tell them what I've done."

The 17^th ACR, having defended the middle position throughout the entire first line of defense period had finally been pulled off the front line and moved to the rear twelve hours before. Now that the marine units had reached the main line of defense, which was guarded by the 2^nd Infantry Division, the 17^th, along with the other two ACRs, were being held in reserve, their job to respond to any potential breeches in the line as reinforcements when the marines attacked. Their tanks and APCs were spread out in a neat line some two kilometers from the entrance to the MPG base. Most of the men and women were taking the opportunity of this lull in combat operations to catch up on some much-needed sleep.

Jeff Creek had grabbed about six hours or so, stretching out on the ground next to his squad's APC. And now, after a nourishing meal of beef paste and reconstituted water he slung his M-24 over his shoulder and wandered off to the east, towards the tanks.

He knew Xenia was still alive and she knew he was still alive. Though the past three days had been an endless serious of bloody battles in which he'd killed hundreds of WestHem marines followed by frantic retreats from position after position, he and Xenia had still found the time to text message each other during the slow periods. She had told him about Sanchez dying out in the wastelands on the first retreat and about how Zen had been promoted to commander of the tank and she had been promoted to gunner. She had told him that a woman named Belinda Maxely (god how he even hated hearing his wife's name now) had replaced her as the tank driver. But those were just text messages, little thirty word essays that were almost impersonal. He wanted to see Xenia in the flesh — or at least in her biosuit — and talk to her person to person in real time. He only hoped she wanted to see him as well.

It turned out that she did. He found her by asking his combat computer to locate her for him and then followed his mapping software to the little red dot. She was sitting atop the turret of the tank, leaning against the main gun barrel and looking to the east where the flashes from the artillery cannons could be seen firing an endless stream of 150mm shells at the WestHem positions. Lying on the tread guard, seemingly unconscious, was another figure — probably Zen Valentine. Jeff crossed around the back of the tank until he was in Xenia's field of view. It took her a moment to recognize him but when she did she practically leapt off the tank and rushed to him, throwing herself into his arms and wrapping hers around his back.

As far as hugs went, it wasn't the most physically satisfying. They were both still wearing their biosuits, of course, and the body contact just wasn't there. Nevertheless Jeff found himself flushing at the contact in a way he'd never flushed when putting his arms around Belinda.

They broke the embrace and looked at each other through their faceplates for a moment. Xenia then tapped her leg where her radio controls were and held up seven fingers, meaning they should switch to the extremely short-range channel seven so they could talk. They did so.

"It's good to see you," she told him. "Especially after the pounding you guys took over the last few days."

Jeff nodded. The ACRs in the Eden theater of operations had suffered 650 killed, twice that many wounded. His own squad had suffered two killed outright, two injured badly enough to be permanently disabled, and one — Drogan — who had been wounded and returned to the line just yesterday. "It was pretty bad out there," he agreed. "You guys in the tanks didn't exactly have a fuckin' cakewalk either."

"No," she said. "We lost some tanks and... you know... Sanchez."

"I was sorry to hear about that," Jeff said truthfully. "How did he... I mean, what got him?"

She shook her head. "I don't know exactly. Our tank got disabled in the first retreat and we had to go out on foot. Another tank picked us up to get us out of there but the WestHems were right on our ass. Sanchez fell off at full speed and we... we couldn't stop to pick him up. We were hoping the WestHems would get him and take him to a hospital but they didn't. They killed him."

"Shot him?" Jeff asked, trying to envision the horror of being broke and injured and having an enemy just walk up and shoot you.

"I guess," Xenia said. "Zen says he patched into Sanchez's combat goggles and saw him get killed. He won't say anything more about it though. I think he saw something that..." She sighed and shrugged. "I don't know. Let's talk about happier things, huh? You like our new tank?"

Jeff thought it looked like any other tank out here. It was painted in the Martian camouflage scheme and was covered with Martian dust. "It's nice," he said.

"It's more than nice, it's one of the first fully Martian tanks."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"It rolled off the assembly line in New Pittsburgh less than two weeks ago. One of the first generation that we've produced without Earthling managers in the plant. How about that?"

"I think that's fuckin' static," he said, at first just saying what he thought she wanted to hear but after thinking it over for a second he really did start to think it was fucking static.

Another biosuited figure came strolling over to them. It was a female, Jeff saw, and, though it wasn't possible to make a really good assessment through the faceplate and the curve-hiding biosuit, it appeared she was reasonably attractive. She carried a long, steel, tubular looking device in her hands. She smiled as she saw Xenia looking at her.

Xenia held up seven fingers again and the woman switched to that channel.

"Belinda," Xenia said, "this is Jeff Creek from the infantry. He's the guy I've been telling you about. Jeff, Belinda Maxely."

"Nice to meet you," Jeff said, politely enough.

"Nice to meet you," she returned. "Xenia's been telling me a lot about you these last few days."

"Has she?" he asked, pleased and a little surprised.

"Well... not a lot," Xenia cut in, her face obviously in a state of blush. She shook her head a little, as if to clear it. "Jeff, did you know that Belinda here is a master chef?"

"A master chef?" he said. "No shit?"

"No shit," Xenia confirmed. "She's from New Pittsburgh, like Zen. She went to culinary school after high school and worked in a Mama Rosa's as one of the culinary techs until the war."

"Mama Rosa's?" Jeff said. "Ain't that one of them high-class rich prick places the Earthlings all eat at?"

"Yes," Belinda said. "I guess you could say that. Have you ever been to one?"

Jeff laughed. "I ain't never been in a fuckin' restaurant in my life," he said. "I'm fuckin' vermin, you know."

This statement made Belinda look a little uncomfortable. Silence descended on the net. Xenia gave an annoyed look at Jeff and then turned back to Belinda. "What do you got there?" she asked. "You lubing the tank again?"

"I just want to put a little more in the seals," she confirmed. "Just to be sure."

"It's a brand new tank, hon," Xenia said. "I don't think it's up for a maintenance regiment yet."

"Better safe than sorry," Belinda said. She looked at Jeff again, looked away, and then back at Xenia. "Well, I'd better get to it. Nice to meet you... uh..."

"Jeff," he said.

"Right... Jeff," she responded, something that seemed almost venomous in her tone now.

She walked over to the other side of the tank, disappearing from view.

"Why don't we take a little walk?" Xenia suggested. "My legs can use a stretch after all the sitting around."

"Uh... right, fuckin' aye," Jeff said.

Xenia gave him an uninterpretable look and then led him off to the east, in the direction of the artillery guns. They passed other tanks and a few APCs, most of them with crewmembers sleeping on the ground or on the tread guards. A few infantry troops were wandering around, doing what Jeff was doing and visiting acquaintances. They all nodded at him when they saw him, as the tankers did when they saw Xenia. Soon they came to the base of a small hill, well outside the one hundred meter range of the extremely short-range frequency. They found a rock to sit on at the base of a shallow hill.

"What's up with that Belinda bitch?" Jeff asked. "She looked like she wanted to tear my asshole out."

"Belinda's a sweetie," Xenia said. "She's just shy with people she doesn't know."

"She a clit-licker?"

Xenia winced a little and gave him a sour look. "The correct term for lesbian homosexuality is 'muff muncher'," she said sternly. "I'll thank you to use that in my presence."

Jeff looked at her, somewhat taken aback. "Sorry," he said, wondering what he'd done to offend her. "Muff muncher then. Is she one of them? I mean she is a culinary specialist and seems to know a lot about tank mechanics."

"She's a muff muncher," Xenia confirmed. "And she has a bit of a crush on me as I'm sure you've picked up on. That's why she was giving you the cold shoulder." She blushed a little. "I'm afraid I've been talking about you quite a bit these past few days."

Jeff felt the flush again, worse even than when she'd hugged him. "Really?" he asked.

She nodded. "Really," she confirmed, flashing him a smile that shined right through the faceplate.

"I've... uh... been talking a lot about you too," he said. "And thinking about you too."

"I know," she said. "And so has Belinda."

"She just met you," he said. "She just wants to eat your tuna casserole, doesn't she?"

"No," Xenia said. "To both questions."

"Huh?"

She sighed. "We didn't just meet. Belinda and I went to basic together and were sent to armor training together. She was assigned an admin position until now because there weren't enough combat positions open. When Sanchez died she requested transfer to my tank. And she doesn't just want a piece of my casserole. She's been in love with me since the beginning I think."

"In love with you?" he asked.

She nodded. "We had a... well... a little fling in basic," she said. "It seems that might have reinforced the feeling a little."

Jeff was completely unshocked by this revelation. In Martian culture there was no stigma whatsoever about homosexual relations, bisexual relations, or even both at the same time. Among women especially a little feminine piece on the side was almost the normal state of affairs, although until the revolution the FLEB had tried to crack down on that sort of thing. "Doesn't she know you like the beefsteak better?" he asked her.

"Who says I do like the beefsteak better?" she shot back.

This one shocked him a little. He had taken her for primarily heterosexual. "You... you don't?" he asked.

She shrugged. "I'm only twenty-two," she said. "I'm too young to know what I like the most. I'm also too young to be falling in love."

"So what are you saying?"

"I'm not saying anything," she said. "I'm very fond of you, Jeff. I'm very fond of Zen too, although I think that is more of camaraderie thing." She took a deep breath. "And I can't stop thinking about Belinda either. She loves me."

He had never said this to anyone in his life before — not his parents, not his best friend, not his wife — but he said it now. "I love you too."

She shook her head violently. "Don't say that right now, Jeff," she told him. "Don't even think it."

"But, Xenia..."

"This is the same thing I told Belinda the first day she came to my tank. It's the same thing I told Zen and even Sanchez, rest his soul. Don't say you love me and I won't say I love you. We're in the middle of a fucking war here in case you haven't noticed."

"Yeah," Jeff said, letting a little of the confusion and bitterness show through. "I seem to have noticed that, especially when one of my squad members got his fuckin' head shot off right in front of me."

"That's my point," she said. "Any of us could die at any time out here. Don't you see what that means? We can't love out here, not when death is so near."

"Why can't we?" he asked. "I've never felt like this about anyone before. Never."

"You want to fuck me?" she asked. "Okay. We'll do that as soon as they let us inside again — assuming we ever get inside again. We'll change out of these biosuits and we'll fuck, just like Martians have done since the Agricultural Rush."

"No," he said. "I don't wanna fuck you."

"What?"

"Uh... maybe I should put that another way," he said. "I do wanna fuck you — more than anything — but I'm not going to fuck you."

"You're not going to fuck me?" she asked, confused. "What are you? One of those God-freaks or something?"

"No, I'm not a God-freak, but what I feel for you is so far beyond just fucking that I won't cheapen it by tearing one off with you. I'm making a vow, Xenia, a fuckin' sacred vow. I will not fuck you until you tell me you love me."

She looked at him as if he were mad. "You won't fuck me?"

"Until you tell me you love me," he confirmed. "And you have to mean it too."

"Wow," she said, shaking her head a little. "That might be the most counter-productive pick-up line I've ever heard."

"It's not a pick-up line," he said. "It's the truth."

She thought that over for a few seconds. "In that case," she said, "it's one of the most romantic things anyone has ever said to me."

He shrugged, a little embarrassed. "No one ever accused me of being romantic before. I'm just sayin' what's on my mind and shit."

"Does that include all forms of sex, or just fucking?"

"All forms of sex," he said.

"You won't let me blow you?"

He wavered a bit but held his ground. "No. No blow jobs, no muff munching. Not until you tell me you love me."

She leaned closer to him, so her faceplate was touching his, her brown eyes looking into his through the two layers of plexiglass. "How about a kiss?" she asked. "Will you do that?"

He looked at her, his mouth suddenly dry. "I don't think I could keep from doing that," he told her.

She pursed her lips and pushed her head forward, so they were touching the inside of her faceplate. He did the same. They touched them together. It didn't carry the physical sensation of a real kiss, but it did carry the emotional one.

They broke apart and looked at each other, both unsure what to say next, what to do next. That was when another biosuited figure appeared over the small rise that hid them from view. Jeff knew, ever before he made a positive visual identification, that it was Hicks. Who else would it be?

"Hey, guys," Hicks said when he figured out what channel they were conversing on. "What the fuck's the haps?"

"We was talkin'," Jeff said, trying his best to shoot a murderous glare at Hicks but finding himself hampered by the face shields.

"Oh yeah?" Hicks replied. "About what? The war and shit?"

"Yeah," Xenia said, casting a warm look at Jeff. "Something like that."

"Well uh... sorry if I interrupted anything," Hicks told them. He laughed a little. "It's not like you can fuck out here or anything, right?"

"Was there some reason you came out here, Hicks?" Jeff asked. "Or did you need help finding the fuckin' bathroom again?"

"Hey, man," he said. "Chill your shit a little. I was just coming out here to tell you the main line units are reporting lots of movement from the Earthling positions."

"What?" they both exclaimed.

"Are they moving in on us?" asked Xenia.

"Why the fuck didn't they broadcast an alert?" asked Jeff.

"They're not moving in on us," Hicks said. "The word is they're packing up their equipment into their APCs and getting ready to pull back."

Xenia and Jeff both forgot about their fledgling romance.

"Pulling back?" Xenia asked. "Are you sure?"

"No confirmation yet," Hicks said, "but that's the word."

Lisa was looking through her combat goggles, trying to find the next target for her AT laser when the mass movement of marines began. She was on her belly atop a shallow hill on the northern edge of the WestHem positions. The artillery had just pounded the area they were watching and then shifted fire to another position. Suddenly hundreds of marines broke from cover, crawling out from under rocks, from beneath wrecked APCs and tanks, from within hastily constructed foxholes, and began to move in a semi-orderly fashion towards the scattered undamaged APCs to the west.

"Holy shit," Lisa said. "You seeing this, sarge?"

"Yep," Lon said from the next hill over, where he was sequestered with Jefferson and sighting in on potential artillery targets. "They're going to mount up."

"All of them?" asked Horishito, who was with Lisa. "There's not enough APCs for them all. What the fuck are they going to ride in?"

"And look," said Lisa. "They're all carrying handfuls of stuff. Ammo boxes, waste packs, food packs. This doesn't look like an advance."

"It's not," said Lon. "It's a retreat."

"A retreat?" Lisa said, the very word foreign to her in relation to the WestHems. They had been out here for the last three days, moving from position to position mostly on foot, getting resupplied by daily Hummingbird drops, paralleling the marines as they slowly but surely pushed the MPG armored cav units out of each position. They'd inflicted a considerable amount of damage of their own during these battles, sniping at APCs, calling down artillery and mortars on exposed troops, and occasionally — very occasionally — getting into brief, violent firefights with marine units that got too close to them. Each battle had been marked by a hasty retreat of their own before the increasingly accurate WestHem mortar fire could zero in on their position. At one point they'd waited too long — either that or the WestHems had just gotten lucky on their first volleys. Two members of the squad had been hit with shrapnel — one dying right there on the Martian sand, the other with one of his legs blown off. All of them had taken the casualties very hard but Lon — as commander of the squad — had become almost morose.

"A retreat?" Horishito asked. "Holy fuck. They're pulling back?"

"That's the general definition of the word," Lon said. "They know they can't push past our main line with the numbers they have available so they're pulling back. Someone finally made a sound military decision on that side of the war."

"So what do we do?" Lisa asked.

"We report it," Lon said, "and we call down artillery on their asses and kill as many of them as we can while they're exposed. What the fuck else do you think we'd do?"

"Uh... oh... sure, sarge," Lisa said, a bit taken aback by his tone. "I guess that's the plan then."

"Right," Lon said. "Jeffy, get on the com and send off a quick report. Take a couple pics of the retreat if you can. While you're doing that, get me a side channel to fire control so I can get some shells flying at these murdering fucks."

Jefferson made it so. Fire control, however, had to put him on a waiting list.

"A fucking waiting list?" Lon screamed back at them. "There are exposed WestHem marines all over my sector at this very moment! Get some shells down on them before they get in their APCs!"

"Sorry, Lon," the lieutenant on the other end of the link told him. "The same thing is happening all up and down the line. They're pulling back in force. There are too many fucking targets for us to hit them all."

"What the hell are we supposed to do then?" Lon asked.

"When your sector is up I'll get hold of you again for current targeting info. Should be ten or fifteen minutes."

"Shit," Lon said in disgust before breaking the connection.

They went back to watching. The marines continued to appear from nowhere and move backwards, deliciously exposed in large numbers but there was nothing they could do. A few of them fell here and there as the snipers hidden on the other hills took potshots at the target-rich environment but Lon knew if they were to engage they would hit ten, maybe twelve of them before they'd have to retreat from the answering mortar fire. Since the deaths of two of his men he liked to make the body count worthwhile before he committed to an engagement.

"Look what they're doing," Horishito said. "There's a squad of APCs pulling out three klicks to the west, at three o'clock."

Lisa looked over there and saw what she was talking about. The APCs had been presumably stuffed as full as possible on the inside and then other troops — eight to ten on each vehicle — had climbed onto the outside as well. They were clinging to the gun mounts, sitting on the tread guards, sitting atop the turret. "There has to be twenty-five marines to each APC."

"And they can't go much more than ten or fifteen klicks an hour that way," Jefferson said. "They're sitting ducks."

"You want us to engage them, sarge?" Lisa asked. "We have four AT lasers. We can kill a hundred or so right now before they get out of range. That's a good body count, ain't it?"

"Goddamn right," he agreed, something like emotion in his voice for the first time in days. "AT teams, light those APCs up. Everyone, get ready to displace as soon as they burn."

Lisa sighted in on the slow moving formation, picking the furthest forward of the APCs. She zoomed in with her goggles until she could see the individual marines holding onto the sides for dear life. They looked a bit pathetic, even though she couldn't actually see their faces, and she felt a bit squeamish at the thought that she would have to put her laser shot right through one of them to get it into the main body of the vehicle where it belonged. Oh well, she thought as she put the recticle on the man's chest, you gotta do what you gotta do. At least he would go fast. "I got the three o'clock tank," she said, letting the other AT holders know not to target that one.

"I got twelve," said Morales, on the next hill hover.

"Sarge," interrupted Jefferson before the next AT holder could chime in. "I got a priority message just came in from command."

"Give it to us after we pop these fuckers," Lon said. "Who's taking six o'clock?"

"Sarge," Jefferson said, "I think you need to listen to this. It's a cease fire order."

"What?" Lon said, his voice picking up a notch. "What the hell are you talking about? A cease fire order for us?"

"For everyone," Jefferson said. "Let me read it to you. 'All MPG units on Eden defensive line are to cease offensive action until further notice. Do not, repeat — do not fire on any WestHem unit, vehicle, or personnel unless fired upon or unless they are advancing toward an occupied MPG position. Defensive measures only until further notice.'"

Lon was appalled. "What in the fuck is that shit about?" he asked no one in particular. "Don't fire at them while they're at their most vulnerable? Who in the fuck ordered that?"

"It didn't say, sarge," Jefferson told him. "It came directly from Eden command and was correctly coded."

Lon shook his head. He seriously considered just ordering his AT teams to engage anyway. They would be able to claim they'd fired before getting this most asinine order. In the end, however, he couldn't quite bring himself to do it. "Discharge your weapons," he told them. "Let's see if maybe they want us to bring those poor marines some food packs or something next."

Lisa and the rest of the team discharged their lasers, feeding the energy back into the charging batteries. They put the weapons back down and watched helplessly as the mass exodus of marines continued, as more and more of them piled into and atop APCs and began to move slowly off to the west, unharmed and untouched. They noticed that even the artillery had stopped.

Thirty-six kilometers north of Lon and his squad, Brian Haggerty and Matt Mendez were in the cockpit of their Mosquito, screaming in through the hills preparing to make their fourth firing run of the day. It had been very productive so far. They'd had last night off and had lifted off for the first time at 0700, well rested and well fed. Nineteen marine APCs had fallen to the their flight of two so far and the news that their targets were now in motion, going slow, and chock full of marines inside and out, had instilled the blood lust in them. Since flight crews had the luxury of not having to see the people they killed — before, during, or after their strikes — the thought of massacring twenty or thirty per shot was not the least bit repugnant to them. After all, their mission was to kill marines, wasn't it?

But now this puzzling message had come across the all units network just a minute or so before they reached their IP. Matt read it to him as it decoded, wondering just what the hell this was about. "All units on the Eden defensive line?" Matt asked. "That doesn't apply to us, does it?"

"Well, we're not on the defensive line, that's for sure," Brian said, his eyes continuing to track on the terrain before him, turning and diving as they moved closer and closer. "It must be just for the ground pounders, although I can't imagine who would order something like that."

"Maybe they surrendered?" Matt asked.

Brian shook his head. "No way in hell," he said. "They may be pulling back but it's only to regroup. They're not giving up yet."

"Then why the fuck would they tell anyone to stop shooting them? That's against the rules of war, ain't it?"

"It's certainly against conventional military thinking," Brian agreed. "In any case, I can't believe that message was meant for the air crews. We'll finish this firing run and then get clarification after we withdraw and break radio silence."

"You're the boss, boss," Matt said happily, pushing the buttons to charge up his lasers. "You're turning right to one-seven-zero in five, four, three..." A distinctive beep sounded in his headset, alerting him to a priority message from Air Ops Command. "Shit. Priority message."

Brian made the turn and then leveled off. "Bring it up fast," he said. "IP in less than thirty now."

Matt quickly changed to the communications screen and ordered his computer to decrypt and display the message. This took two and a half seconds. He stared at the words on his screen, wondering if the whole planet had been smoking dust. "All air units disengage immediately from hostile action," he read. "Do not fire upon enemy vehicles or aircraft except in self defense. Units on firing runs return immediately to your staging areas and await further instructions."

"Fuck my ass," Brian said helplessly. "What in the hell is going on around here?"

"Someone got some explaining to do, that's for sure," Matt agreed. "You want me to go manual and plot us back to staging?"

"Yeah," Brian sighed. "I guess you'd better. I guess it's okay to break radio silence too. Get me our wing on my channel."

Matt pushed a few tabs on his screen. "You're on," he said.

Fifteen seconds later both aircraft spun around the hill that was supposed to have been their initial point for their run and headed back the way they had come, their lasers unfired.

The cease-fire order had been transmitted not just to the units deployed at Eden, but planetwide — to New Pittsburgh, to Proctor, and to Libby as well. It was an order that was universally derided as asinine, as idiocy, as against all rules of military logic by every soldier of every rank who heard of it. Most wondered just who in the hell it had originated from and what kind of hell General Jackson was going to raise when he heard of it. Only the highest of the command staff — at the moment anyway — knew that General Jackson was the one who had sent the order.

"Kevin," pleaded General Zoloft, commander of Eden forces, "you are being criminally negligent by letting those marines walk away from the lines untouched. They haven't agreed to a cease-fire, they haven't asked for terms of withdrawal. We are still in active combat with them! You can't just let them retreat to regroup in safety!"

"I can and I will," Jackson replied. They were on a video link with the other generals in charge of the other cities' defenses. "We will not shoot at a retreating enemy. That is MPG doctrine."

"But they're not retreating from the war!" cried General Montoya — commander of the New Pittsburgh forces. "They're only pulling back to regroup. You know as well as I do that they're just going to launch back up to orbit and then come down in a single group, probably at Eden or New Pittsburgh. Every one of them that we let back to their LZ is a soldier we'll face in the next battle."

"I understand your logic, Frank," Jackson told him. "I even agree with it. But you're not following my logic."

"What fucking logic?" asked General Azacan, commander of Proctor forces. "My people beat the shit out of those fucks. They never even broke through my first line! My tanks and my APCs are more than ninety-eight percent intact while theirs are down more than seventy percent! Do you know what that means, Kevin? I can counter-attack them while they retreat and while they're vulnerable. I can use my armor to circle ahead of them and cut them off at the entrance to the gap! We'll kill or capture all of their combat units that are left! How can you possibly order me not to do that?"

"Because it would be a bloody battle that would unnecessarily kill MPG troops and because it would go against the precedent I'm trying to set for the WestHems with this unpopular order of mine."

"What precedent?" demanded Zoloft. "What the hell are you trying to accomplish by letting them walk away untouched? They're going to hit us again!"

"Yes," Jackson said. "I know they're going to hit us again. That's why I'm doing this. I want every WestHem soldier that fights in this war to know that we will not shoot at them if they retreat. I want them to know at all times that retreat means their safety, that it means an end to the death and the bloodshed. I want them to be able to walk away from a battle with us at any time because if they know that, eventually, when we push them enough, they'll do it."

All three of them were shaking their heads in consternation.

"I'm sorry, Kevin," said Azacan, "but I must protest this order in the strongest possible terms. I've got enemy units retreating in disarray over here. They're clinging to their APCs like they were lifeboats. Do you realize they can't even return fire from their armor when they have men holding onto the outside of them? I can not only defeat the forces that attacked Proctor but utterly destroy them in a matter of hours! Your order makes no sense to me and I'm demanding that you rescind it immediately and fight this war like it's supposed to be fought!"

"Your demand is denied," Jackson told him. "My cease-fire order will stand until such a time that enemy units are advancing instead of retreating."

"I will not accept that," Azacan said. "You're throwing this war away."

"You will follow my orders, General, or you will be relieved of command and returned to civilian status," Jackson told him. "Is that clear?"

"Maybe you should be relieved of command," Azacan shot back. "You've fought brilliantly up until this point but you're making a lethal decision right now that could very well cost us this war."

Jackson looked at the images of his other three generals. "What do you say, guys?" he asked them. "Are you with Azacan? Are you going to forcibly relieve me from command?" He looked directly at Zoloft. "How about you, Matt? You're second-in-command. Are you going to take over for me?"

Zoloft shook his head immediately. "No," he said. "I strongly disagree with your logic and with this decision and I implore you to change your mind, but I'm not going to disobey your order and I'm not going to advocate your removal."

"I agree," said Montoya. "On all counts."

General Visser, commander of Libby forces, nodded his head. "I too will obey this order though I strongly protest it, and I will not advocate General Jackson's removal."

Azacan was fuming, his face red, his eyes actually bugging out with anger. "You just lost this war for us," he told his colleagues.

"We've trusted Kevin this far," Zoloft said. "He's engineered the complete humiliation of a professional armed force that outnumbered us more than five to one when they left Earth. Though we disagree with his decision now, I think we owe him our continued loyalty and faith just for the simple fact he's gotten us to the point where we have to worry about what to do with retreating forces."

"Thank you, Matt," Jackson said. He looked at Azacan's image. "So what do you say?" he asked. "Are you staying or going? You're a brilliant military strategist and you've done an outstanding job defending Proctor. I'd really hate to lose you but if you can't work with me after this, if you can't abide my orders any further, I'll accept your resignation now."

It took him a few seconds to answer. Finally, he said, "You're not getting my resignation that easily. I'll obey your orders."

"And that means no recon in force that's designed to draw their fire," Jackson said. "No Mosquito fly-bys designed to make them shoot at us. Is that understood, General?"

Jackson could tell by his face that he had been considering just those options. He gave a little smirk and then nodded. "Agreed," he said. "My units will remain disengaged until further orders."

General Wrath and Major Wilde were in the war room, still trying to process the fact that their units were being allowed to retreat without attack when the door opened at the far side of the room. Wilde looked up and saw General Todd Browning — Wrath's second-in-command — enter the room accompanied by four armed military police officers. He knew instantly what this had to mean. After all, he'd been semi-expecting it ever since Wrath had sent his last transmission to the council.

Wrath looked up from his screen for a moment and saw them. Wilde could tell by his face that he realized the same thing.

"General Wrath," Browning said formally as he approached.

"Yes?" Wrath said, resigned to his fate.

"I have been ordered by the executive council of WestHem to relieve you of command, effective immediately, and to assume command of all WestHem forces in the Martian theater of operation." He held out a piece of paper. "This is my authorization."

"I see," Wrath said, taking the paper but not looking at it.

"And furthermore," Browning said, "I am ordered to place you under arrest and confine you to the brig for the duration of this mission."

"On what charges?" Wrath asked.

"Insubordination, criminal negligence of command, falsification of reports, and twenty-three hundred counts of manslaughter of WestHem marines under your command."

Wrath nodded, not even bothering to question. After all, he knew the game better than anyone. "Okay," he said, standing up. "I'll come peacefully."

A camera crew appeared from nowhere, their microphones and lenses probing at him. The MPs stepped forward. Their commander — a lieutenant colonel — removed Wrath's firearm from its holster. He then placed him in handcuffs, struggling a bit with the process since it had probably been years — if ever — since he'd last performed this task.

"Do you have anything to say, General?" one of the reporters accompanying the camera crew enquired.

"No," he said, a tear appearing in his eye and tracking slowly down his face. "I have nothing to say."

They led him away, the camera crew following. Browning stayed behind.

When they were gone, Wilde looked up at him. "And what about me?" he asked, not bothering to ass-kiss or grovel. "Am I relieved of my position as well?"

Browning looked at him, considering. "You and Wrath were pretty close, weren't you?"

Wilde shrugged. "I wouldn't call him my friend by any means, but I was his aide for the last six years. I helped him plan this war."

"And that right there should automatically result in your removal, possibly your arrest as well. The way this war has been run so far has been criminal."

Wilde reviewed what he knew about Browning. He was two years junior to Wrath, a WestHem Military Academy graduate, and the son of a famous pre-Jupiter War General of the Corps. His advancement through the ranks was rumored to be more because of his father's reputation than his own. He was, in fact, a hopeless yes-man who kissed any ass put in his face and stepped on every head below him on the ladder as a matter of course. He probably knew next to nothing about military history and only a little bit more about military strategy. In short, he was a man who would rely on his staff to make decisions for him, just like Wrath.

"I agree with you, General," Wilde said. "It was apparent to me from day two or so after the landings that we were in serious trouble. General Wrath tried his best to control this situation but, unfortunately, he did not always take my advice on the best way to conduct this war when things began to turn for the worse. You can call me criminal if you wish, but I am a military realist and I have tried to give the best advice for the situation at all times and I would continue to do so if retained in my position as aide."

"I already have an aide," Browning said. "Major Mitchell Fling. I understand you were a classmate of his?"

"That is correct," Wilde said. Fling had been an English major of all things — a man who had cheated and backstabbed his way through the academy and had cheated and backstabbed his way up the ladder since. If Browning started taking advice from that clown they might as well just go home now and save all the blood that would be shed as a result.

"Do you think you are better qualified to act as my aide than Major Fling?" Browning asked.

"Yes," Wilde said. "If only for the fact that I have been intimately involved with all stages of this war since the beginning and I have already established the communication lines and the trust of the generals on the ground."

"But you think you know more about warfare as well, don't you?"

"Yes, sir, I do," Wilde confirmed. "I have a master's degree in military tactics and have made the subject my life's work. I understand that Major Fling's degree is in English Composition, is it not? He may be able to write prettier reports than I, but I don't think his advice would be quite as sound."

"You're very arrogant about your experience," Browning said. "I like that. So tell me, Major Wilde, what do you think is the best, fastest way to bring this war to a successful conclusion? Major Fling is of the opinion that we should turn those troops around right now, right this moment, and order them to blast through the greenie lines in a lightening fast assault."

"Major Fling's opinion is as wrong as an opinion could be," Wilde said. "As I told General Wrath when I suggested we withdraw to orbit and regroup, we cannot push through any of the lines guarding any of those cities after the losses we've taken to this point. It is flat out impossible. A perfect example of a military unreality. To even attempt it would be to doom thousands more marines to their deaths and to give the Martians a morale boost that later expeditionary forces would have to deal with. We've lost this battle, sir. There's no way to turn things around at this point. All we can hope to do is capture a single Martian city and hold it until the next wave of marines gets here."

"So you're saying there is no way to achieve the objectives we were sent here to achieve?" Browning said.

"That is exactly what I'm saying, sir," Wilde said. "The Martians have proven to be a much more formidable foe than we ever dreamed of giving them credit for. I was as guilty of underestimating them as anyone else in the beginning. But now that I see the reality of the situation, I can state unequivocally that the absolute best we can hope for at this point is to capture and hold a single Martian city — I would suggest Eden — and wait for more troops to come to help liberate the rest of the planet."

"So you're saying that I cannot fulfill the orders the executive council charged me with when they put me in command?"

"If those orders were to capture the entire planet with the troops we have left, I would have to say yes. That is what I'm saying."

"But Major Fling tells me that I can capture this planet with those troops."

"He's either stupid or telling you what you want to hear," Wilde said.

"That's a very inflammatory proclamation," Browning said.

Wilde simply shrugged. "If you want to have a few moments of glory on the Internet cameras and then eventually end up being led away in handcuffs like General Wrath, you just keep listening to Major Fling. If you want to walk away from this war with your rank and career intact, you listen to me. It's your choice, General, although I think those marines down there on the surface would fare a lot better if you chose me."

Browning thought this over for a few moments. "Okay," he finally said. "Why don't you give me an outline of your master plan? If I agree to retain you and listen to your advice, what would you advise me?"

"We haven't been treating this like a real war," Wilde said. "We've been treating it like a pushover. Well, it's turned out that the Martians are not a pushover and I think its time we start treating them with the respect due a worthy adversary."

"What do you mean?"

"Pull everyone back up to orbit," Wilde said. "Get them re-outfitted, re-armed, re-organized into one huge army designed to take a single target — as I said, Eden makes the most sense because it's centrally located, it's a rail hub, and it's their largest agricultural production center as well as their most important city. Before we make our landings we need to send atmospheric craft down and bomb their railheads and rip up their intra-city rail tracks. This will keep them from moving forces from the other cities to help defend Eden and will break their supply lines. We also need to send space fighters out to destroy every communications and navigation satellite we can hit. This will take away their GPS advantage and cripple their ability to talk to each other and send orders out. Once we've done all that we come down and send everything we have through the Jutfield Gap and into the main line of defense. Our numerical superiority should be somewhere in the vicinity of ten to one, maybe a little more since the Martians are not attacking our units as they retreat. We'll capture Eden and occupy it."

"And from there we can take the rest of the planet?"

"It will take a while," he admitted, "but eventually, we will prevail. With the ability to land our forces directly in one of their cities and move them by rail to where they're needed next, we will be able to capture each city one by one until they are all back in our hands."

Browning paced about the room for a minute as he considered what Wilde was telling him. It was obvious he didn't like the thought that he would not be able to take all of Mars in one fell swoop like the council wanted him to. But it was also obvious that he retained just enough military knowledge from his academy days and his years in the Corps to realize that Wilde was right.

"Okay," he finally said. "You've convinced me. I want to have a full briefing for the council by this time tomorrow. You start drawing up your plans and have them on my computer by 0600."

"Yes, sir," Wilde said, feeling something like hope for the first time in weeks.