“Three hundred and seventeen prisoners, General.” Shon’s aide saluted, and Shon acknowledged him wearily.

“And the trucks?” asked Shon. “We’ll need to resupply before the next assault.”

“They should be here tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow,” said Shon. He blew out a long, slow breath. “Five thousand of our soldiers may be dead by tomorrow, and certainly by the day after.”

“The rest of us will avenge their deaths,” said the aide.

Shon only grunted. He accepted the aide’s written report and sent him away, closing the door behind him. The final outpost of the human army had been entrenched in an old army reserve compound called Fort Tilden, at the base of the Marine Parkway Bridge, and Shon had taken the main building for his army’s temporary headquarters. The building was dilapidated and broken, like every other building on this forsaken island—the fence sagging, the windows broken, the few doors still on their hinges swollen from moisture and sticking in the frames—but it was clean, and it was dry, and, most of all, it was familiar. He had been born in a warehouse, dumped out of a vat by masked technicians, one of thousands in his batch, but he had been raised on a military base, so much like this one that he could close his eyes and almost hear the sounds of home: Jeeps in the street outside, shouts in the yard as a troop ran drills, the distant call of cadence as a sergeant marched his unit home to barracks. There was a baseball field outside, covered in snow and weeds and discernible only by the crumbling wooden bleachers that surrounded it. There was a part of him, a bigger part than he wanted to admit, that wanted nothing more than to go out there in the darkness and sit down in the middle of that field until he froze.

How can I fight when more are still dying? Fight or not, win or lose, five thousand of my soldiers will die tomorrow, and there’s nothing I can do about it. I don’t even have orders to follow. Just my own objective. The only thing left.

Revenge.

He sat down heavily in his chair, staring at the reports in his hand, wondering what to do next. He was shaken from his reverie almost immediately by the sound of pounding feet in the hallway, and the bitter link data of surprise and anger. He opened his door before the messenger even had time to knock on it.

“What’s happened?”

The messenger saluted. “A prisoner, sir. A refugee from the camp.” The guard’s link was laced with hatred. “He’s a Partial, sir.”