“Okay. Bill, I want your section on point. Stay sharp and watch yourself. If we’ve got off-worlders in this, we may be looking at off-world weapons, as well, so remember what happened when the NPA hit that lab.”

“You got that right, Sarge.”

“Sharon, put Stimson and Hadley on the flanks to cover Bill, but I want the rest of your section watching our six. Got that?”

“Check, Sarge,” Hillyard replied, then paused a moment. “Sarge, did the skipper say he wanted those people alive?”

“He didn’t say, and I didn’t ask,” O’Brian said flatly. The silence which answered him was eloquent. “All right, people, let’s move our asses.”

The squad of armored Marines turned their backs on that place of horror and headed east.

“Falcon Leader, Falcon-Three. Falcon-Three-Two reports movement coming at him from zero-three-seven.”

Lieutenant Kilgore’s voice was low, as if pitched to avoid the Medusans’ ears. Papadapolous glanced at his display in his hastily selected command post and nodded to himself. It seemed Major Isvarian had been right about the effect mekoha had on the Stilties. The bastards were making a beeline straight toward the enclaves from the site of the ambush, and that didn’t seem to indicate very much in the way of caution or forethought. Which was just fine with Captain Nikos Papadapolous.

“Falcon Leader copies, Falcon-Three. Keep your people falling back and stay clear of our fire lanes.”

“Aye, Falcon Leader.”

“Falcon Leader to all Falcons. Hostiles approaching from zero-three-seven. Prepare to engage on my command.”

He looked up as metal and plastic clicked behind him. A half-dozen of Isvarian’s NPA medics labored furiously, setting up an emergency aid station, and Papadapolous frowned. He gestured to the Fourth Platoon’s platoon sergeant, standing beside him.

“Yes, Sir?”

“Where’s Dr. Suchon, Regiano?”

Sergeant Regiano glanced away for a moment, then met her commander’s eyes levelly.

“She’s back where the shuttle dropped us, Sir.” Papadapolous’s head tilted dangerously, and the sergeant answered his silent question. “She refuses to move any closer to the front, Skipper.”

“I see.” Papadapolous drew a deep breath, and his eyes were hard. “Sergeant Regiano, you will return to the LZ. You will inform Commander Suchon, with my compliments, that her presence is required here. Should she refuse to accompany you back to the aid station, you will use whatever means are required—up to and including the threat and application of force—to bring her. Is that understood, Sergeant?”

“Aye, aye, Sir!” There was undisguised satisfaction in Regiano’s eyes as she saluted sharply and marched off to the rear. Papadapolous swallowed a venomous curse, then shook himself and forced his mind away from its fury at Suchon and back to the task at hand.

He turned to the visual display at Sergeant Major Jenkins’s right knee. It showed a birds-eye view of the valley, relayed from one of the two pinnaces invisible on station high above him, and his skin crawled as the ground itself seemed to flow towards his positions. The Stilties were coming at him in a mob more than two kilometers wide and three deep, flowing through the moss like a vast, ragged tide. There must be at least ten thousand of them out there, and that was far more than he’d allowed even his worst-case estimates to assume. Even with the NPA reinforcements, his people were outnumbered thirty or forty to one, and thank God they’d caught them in the open instead of in among the enclaves!