“I blew my own ship to shards of scattered steel and took as many of them with her as I could,” Eric said. “Right now, Dallas is the biggest attractant for five hundred miles. We don’t know why, but you guys sure as hell got more than your share, and right now that means we’ve got a huge number of these things sitting right here, waiting to be wiped out. Do you really want to let them eat your city?”

“Hell no,” Swenson grumbled, “but I sure as hell don’t want to see it burn in nuclear fire either!”

“Better to burn it yourself than hand it over to those things,” Eric countered.

He could see the ranger being swayed, see the decision being made behind the man’s eyes, and Eric just waited. He’d worked with men like this before, and when they were making a decision it was better to give them a chance to come to the right path on their own. Push the wrong way at the wrong time and they’d dig in and you’d never get anywhere.

He could just take over, pull rank on the Guardsmen around them, but they’d resent that and drag their heels on him. And that didn’t count on how any civilians or police personnel would react. No, it was better to get the ranger on his side now, if he could. In either case, however, Eric knew that he couldn’t waste much time if things started to go against him.

Swenson grimaced before speaking grudgingly. “There aren’t many people left in the city. We had to get everyone out when those things took down the first few office buildings. The dust was choking people out. We had a lot of folks die from respiratory problems.”

Eric nodded. “We knew that the populace was light inside city limits. We’ve got satellite intel on that, so start pulling out your own people and anyone they know about. I can bring in some evacuation lifters if you need them, but we have to start now.”

The ranger clearly didn’t like what he was hearing, let alone what he was about to say, but finally he nodded.

“Fine. You call your lifters.” Swenson poked Weston in the chest, hurting his finger on the armor but not flinching. “We don’t leave no one behind. You clear on that?”

“That’s the plan, Ranger.”

“Fine. Then let’s do this.”

“Mr. President?”

Conner sighed from where he was sitting, but smiled sadly at his wife and got up.

“Yes?”

“Something has changed, sir.”

He lost his annoyance, his expression growing serious in an instant. “Talk to me.”

“Admiral Gracen is approaching NEO, Mr. President. The Drasin threat in orbit seems to have been neutralized.”

Conner wobbled a bit, his knees suddenly feeling more than a little weak.

“Are you sure?”