I took my binoculars and peered through. The transports had opened and soldiers were piling out of the bays. They were compact, mottled and thickly skinned; Arrisian, all of them, like their leader. This was another way this invasion force differed from General Gau’s fleet. Gau spread the responsibility for his incursions among the entire Conclave; Eser was saving the glory of this attack for his own people.
The soldiers formed into platoons; three platoons, thirty or thirty-five soldiers each. About a hundred overall. Eser was definitely feeling cocky. But then, the one hundred soldiers on the ground were an illusion; no doubt Eser had a few hundred more back on his ship, not to mention that the ship itself was capable of blasting the colony from orbit. On the ground or above, Eser had more than enough firepower to kill us all several times over. Most of the Arrisian soldiers slung the standard Arrisian automatic rifle, a slug-thrower known for its velocity, accuracy and high rate of fire. Two soldiers in each platoon carried shoulder-mounted missile launchers; given the incursion, this looked like they were going to be for show more than anything else. No beam weapons or flamethrowers as far as I could see.
Now came Eser, flanked by an honor guard. Eser was dressed in Arrisian military gear, a bit of show because he’d never served, but I suppose if you’re going to try to show up a general in a military mission, you’d best dress for the part. Eser’s limbs were thicker and the fiber tufts around his eyestalks were darker than those of his soldiers; he was older and more out of shape than those who were serving him. But inasmuch as I could figure out any emotion from his alien head, he seemed pretty pleased with himself. He stood in front of his soldiers, gesticulating; it looked like he was giving a speech.
Asshole. He was only a klick away, motionless over flat ground. If I or Jane had the right rifle, we could have taken the top of his head clean off. Then we might be dead, because then his soldiers and his ship would flatten the colony. But it would be fun while it lasted. It was moot; we didn’t have the right kind of rifle, and anyway, no matter what happened, we wanted Eser alive at the end of it. Killing him was not in the cards. Alas.
While Eser talked, his guard was actively scanning the environment, looking for threats. I hoped that Jane, in her position, was making note of that; not everyone in this little adventure was entirely incompetent. I wistfully wished I could tell her to make a note of it, but we were in radio silence; we didn’t want to give away the game before it had begun.
Eser finally stopped with his talk and the whole company of soldiers began to walk across the field toward the road that linked the farm to Croatoan. A squad of soldiers took the lead, looking for threat and movement; the rest moved in formation but without much discipline. No one expected much resistance.
Nor would they find any on the road to Croatoan. The entire colony was awake and aware of the invasion, of course, but we warned them all to stay in their homes or in their shelters and not to engage while the soldiers passed into Croatoan. We wanted them to play the part of the cowed and frightened colonists they were supposed to be. For some of them, this wasn’t going to be a problem; for others it was going to take effort. The former group we wanted to be safe as possible; the latter group we wanted contained. We gave them tasks for later, if there was a later.
No doubt the forward squad were scanning the surroundings with infrared and heat sensors, looking for sneak attacks. All they would find are colonists up and at their windows, staring into the darkness as the soldiers marched by. I could see in my binoculars that at least a couple of colonists stood on their porches to see the soldiers. Mennonites. They were pacifists, but they sure as hell weren’t scared of anything.
Croatoan remained as it was when we had begun: a modern-day take on the Roman legion camp, still ringed by two sets of cargo containers. Most of the colonists who had lived there had long abandoned it for homes and farms of their own, but a few people continued to live there, including me and Jane and Zo?, and several permanent buildings stood where the tents used to be. The recreation area at the center of the camp still remained, in front of a lane that passed along it and behind the administration building. In the center of the recreation area stood Savitri, alone. She would be the first human the Arrisian soldiers and Eser would see; the only one, hopefully, that they would see.
I could see Savitri from where I was. The early morning was not cold, but she was clearly shivering.
The first of the Arrisian soldiers reached the perimeter of Croatoan and called a halt to the march as they examined the surroundings to be sure they weren’t walking into a trap. This took several minutes, but eventually they were satisfied that there was nothing there that could harm them. They restarted the march and the Arrisian soldier tromped in, piling up in the recreation center, keeping a wary eye on Savitri, who stood there, silent and now shivering only a little. In a very short amount of time all the soldiers were within the cargo container-lined borders of Croatoan.
Eser came up through the ranks with his guard and stood before Savitri. He motioned for a translator device.