The only real advantage the human defenders had was that they fought under a friendly sky, with two out of three orbital landers being blown to hell before they could touch the Earth, courtesy of the Confederation Navy and the NACS William J. Clinton, which was parked a hundred miles offshore.

On the ground, though, they could only rely on themselves and what they could find in between material airdrops from the Block Air Force. Forces all across the world were on definitive search and destroy, and no one could spare them much, if anything at all.

For the people of New Delhi, however, suffering under an invading force was an old and familiar story. Those who couldn’t handle the new reality died quickly, but they were the minority. The people of India were used to hardship, and given a common enemy they could easily identify, they quickly came together and turned their city and its environs into quite possibly one of the most hostile places in all of history for an invader to be.

It was a scene that would play out similarly across the planet, as the Drasin found that those who were to give up easily did so and died early. After thirty days on planet Earth, those people were gone.

Those who were still alive fully intended to stay that way, and if the price was the total obliteration of every alien they saw . . . well, that was a price they were very happy to pay.

Ben Sahid swore as he leaned into the ruined wall he was sheltering behind that he could hear the stomping of the beasts as they rummaged through the rubble. He still remembered the first time he’d seen them doing that, how confused he’d been. Confusion had evaporated after watching for the first time the demon things birth one of their own.

He didn’t know how they did it, but the threat was clear. The things fought and ate, and when they ate enough, they produced more of them to fight and eat.

He gripped his assault weapon closely, edging up to peek over the edge of the jagged wall.

There they are. Five of them, this time.

He swallowed. He didn’t think he had enough ammunition for this job, but that wasn’t going to matter. He palmed a grenade from his pack, one of two he had left, and looked across the field to where a few others were waiting for him to make his move.

A flash of light and smoke passed by overhead, causing Ben to hesitate a moment and wait for what he knew was coming. The sonic boom of the aircraft tore through the air. That was the signal he was waiting for.