Not good was a polite way of telling the Commander in Chief that he was probably about to lose another American city and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it.

“Lay it on me, Captain.”

“The city is infested, sir. Preliminary estimates”—Eric shook his head—“hundreds of drones, maybe thousands. They’ve had the munchies, sir.”

“Damn. Can you clear them out?”

“Maybe. Depends on how much air support we can have, sir.”

The President glanced to one side for a moment, then looked back. “We’ve got plenty of planes and pilots, but conventional ordnance is coming up short. We’ve been dropping tons of munitions all across the planet, Captain. We’re tapped out of smart bombs, and we’re running low on unguided weapons as well. Captain . . .”

The President hesitated. “Eric . . . we can’t lose Detroit.”

Eric frowned. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand. We’ve lost three cities already, and Detroit is evacuated now. Sir, we can’t afford this fight.”

“Eric, we can’t afford not to fight this fight,” the President corrected him. “I suspect that you don’t follow economic stories, otherwise you’d know that we moved a hell of a lot of our defense industry into Detroit years ago. There are at least fifteen factories there, making arms, munitions, and even armor. We can’t lose that.”

Eric slumped in place, closing his eyes.

“Mr. President, I don’t think I have enough forces here to clear the city out,” he said honestly. “It would be suicide, and we’d still lose the city.”

“Maybe not,” Connor said. “We have a bird left over the area. It has a Kinetic Kill Array and is intact.”

Eric stiffened, eyes widening. “You have a Kilo Kilo over Confederation soil? Sir!”

The President held up a hand, forestalling Eric’s reaction as best he could.

“Wasn’t my call, Captain. This bird has been sitting there since the war. There was some concern that we’d lose and have to fight them here at home. The point is, we have it, and we can use it.”

“That’s not going to save your factories.”

“They’re mostly outside the city, largely untouched so far,” the President said. “I want you to secure the factories as best you can, then call in the strike. When it’s done, you and yours will have to clean up whatever survives. Do you understand my orders?”

Eric nodded. “Yes, Mr. President, I understand.”

“Good. God be with you, Captain.”

“God be with us all, Mr. President.”

“Alright, listen up,” Eric said as he stepped into the cleared area made by the circled tanks and armored vehicles. “We’ve got a mission from on high.”