General No'Drak had been a staff officer in the Confederate military for decades. He had started his staff officer career as the one star general in charge of the 4313rd Infantry Horde and slowly climbed the ranks. He had been given an opportunity to serve as the commander of the Smokey Cone Defensive Forces or taking command of the V Corps and a shot at commanding VII Army at a later date.

He had, of course, taken V Corps. An "Old Blood" unit was prestigious, but also had a mathematically measurable chance of being dropped into the fire. Chaos theory mathematics could account for why, once the phasic energy formula were added.

While holding the command was a pleasure, V Corps had a tendency to, well, roll hot.

Which is why he was nibbling at the tip of a bladearm as he stared at the holotank. He was not worried about the mopup of the Precursor machines. Trucker, Ekret, and A'armo'o had that well in hand and he knew they would all operate best if he merely observed from a distance.

No, it was a single icon.

1st Telkan Marine Corps, HHQ Battalion, HHC, 1st Platoon.

Of course, having Casey's icon attached just made it worse.

I have a Telkan who ignited a volcano that emits pure molten warsteel, No'Drak thought, staring at the tank as he slowly packed his cigarette pack. To top it off, I've got a human who is not only capable of detonating antimatter enhanced atomic weapons in a civilian populated area, but has shown his willingness by doing so when he felt there was no other choice.

He slowly opened the pack, using the gold winder thread to break the seal on the plastic. He carefully unwrapped the cellophane from the top as he stared.

Sergeant Addox isn't much better. His platoon was cut off for two weeks during the Second Telkan War and he got them all through it. Superficially, it looks good, but at the end they were all jacked up on stims to the point they were sweating amphetamines, he thought to himself. And it wasn't the first time Addox was cut off. During the Skalcupeck Rebellion he held together a patchwork force of miners, wildcatters, and logistics personnel for almost six months in a firebase that had been abandoned two decades prior until relief arrived.

He opened the pack, slowly withdrawing one cigarette, turning it over, and sliding it back into the pack.

The Telkans were pushed to the brink twice in less than a decade, and the two Terrans supporting them are both men with records that are worrisome apart and downright concerning together, No'Drak thought.

He slowly pulled a cigarette out, holding it in his mandibles as he put the pack away.

Glory isn't as innocent as her warsteel chassis might suggest. During the Unverak-7 Conflict she 'body swapped' twice into a lobotomized BOLO chassis and held the moon of Cultineeti virtually on her own, he thought. Three borderline red-line cases with a Telkan infantry platoon, beneath the surface of the planet, in what can only be a Mantid Precursor facility.

He withdrew his lighter, slowly opening it, and struck the wheel. The flame was blue with yellow edging.

Many of our allies believe that the Terran Confederacy believes in 'Victory at All Costs', when nothing could be further from the truth. There are members of our military that will go to any lengths necessary to survive and achieve victory, but we know well that the truth of victory lies in the proper application of force when necessary, No'Drak thought.

He lit the cigarette, puffing on it several times to ensure it was well lit. He felt the nicotine and other chemicals enter his system, bringing about a steady calm as his own pheromones were swept away.

But we fight the Precursors, who are hell bent on exterminating all life to conserve resources that they believe only they may possess, he took another long drag, only peripherally aware that the Lanaktallan officer Ge'ermo'o was watching him.

It is wars like this one that have battles where men like Casey and Addox and Glory shine. Where historians point at logistics, or enemy mistakes, or other factors, and ignore that Sergeant Addox and his men ate rock dust ran through a broken nanoforge for six months, No'Drak mused.

"General," one of the Military Intelligence analysts on the floor called up.

"Go ahead," No'Drak said, his voice steady and level, betraying none of his internal concern.

"Another data request from Sergeant Casey," the analyst said, as if it was the most banal thing in the world. "I've cross-checked with the Imperium forces and they have the data Casey is requesting."

No'Drak nodded, puffing out rings of smoke around his footpads. "What data is he requesting?"

"A First Mantid War Era linguistic codex," the analyst said. He consulted his screen. "Intelligence estimates a 85.5% chance that the facility is a Precursor Mantid facility with a 12% chance of being occupied. Currently the last estimation has jumped to 92%, based on observational data transmitted to 108th Military Intelligence."

"Toss the request transmission up to my tank, let me see it," No'Drak ordered, shuffling in place to turn and get a good look at the holotank.

A window opened up and No'Drak could tell it was being recorded from the internal cameras on Casey's faceshield. Casey was in the upper right of the picture, in a small window, while the rest of the window was panning over wreckage.

"Peak, Case here. Check this out. Mantid bodies, the majority of them the chitin exploded outward," the man was saying. His face was sweaty and the bottom of his eyepatch glittered red. "Check this out."

The window focused on an object that made No'Drak hiss and back up two steps. Ge'ermo'o made a bellows noise, inflating his crests.

It was a massive Speaker corpse. Well, the chitin that had hardened into resin-like epoxy, like amber from a hundred million years prior. The brain case was ruptured, same with the compound eyes, the rupturing obviously occuring by increased pressure internally. The view panned down the body, showing that the thorax and abdomen had suffered rupturing in a line.

"That's his primary phasic spinal trunk. Had to have been overloaded," Casey said. He took a swallow of water from a tube them grinned. "Wait to you see by who."

The view slowly moved upward and No'Drak realized with a shock that he was staring at a Mantid Queen's corpse, still hanging from the gantries and exuded biomatter. Her chest was slashed and punctured, her head had huge rips in it, both eyes were ripped from the sockets.

"She got ganked by her own people, babe. Her and the others," Casey said. The view panned across, showing a half dozen massive shadowed forms, one substantially larger than the others. "But that don't mean this place is empty, babe."

Casey took another hit off the water as the view changed, Casey moving. He knelt down, the angle changing, to show a small green Mantid running a welder along a pipe.

"Check him out," Casey said. "Watch for a moment, Peak. I don't think this has happened since the Mantid hit Earth."

Casey's psychic shielding dropped to only 60%.

The little green mantid suddenly stopped, shutting off the welder. It started to look around, the antenna lifting, its eyes seeking out the source of the disturbance.

It made a click and a chitter.

"Now watch this, Peak," Casey said. He moved back quickly, the psychic shielding rising back up to 125%.

The little green mantid stood still for a long moment, then the antenna drooped. It lifted the welder and began working again.

"Peak, babe, see if you can get me a Pre-War Mantid lexicon. Use 12Zip compression so it doesn't take a weak and I'm not running up a couple more processors off my poor cracked nanoforge," Casey said. "Got a feeling I'm gonna need it."

The one eyed human suddenly grinned. "Glad things are going good topside. We'll get out of this, you'll see, then we'll party like it's Ninety-Nine Ninety Nine. Stay safe, babe."

No'Drak thought over what he'd seen for a long moment.

"Transmit the lexicon as soon as you have it. Let's see how this pans out," No'Drak said.

The room went silent except for the muttering of the intelligence analysts.

"He seems unusually upbeat and high morale for someone who is trapped behind, or rather, underneath enemy lines," Ge'ermo'o suddenly said. "That is a statistical aberration that concerns me and makes me desire more data."

"It's not his first hyperjump," No'Drak said absently.

Ge'ermo'o thought about what was said before opening his mouth to protest that Casey was not engaged in a hyperjump. He realized that No'Drak was hyperjump as a metaphor for Casey having been behind enemy lines before.

Ge'ermo'o was proud of his deductive reasoning.

After all, he was a most observant commander.

No'Drak felt a chill run down his upper and lower spine.

"All units not engaged with Precursor elements are to pull back from the mountain range central hub by at least two hundred miles. Alert any shelters in the area to prepare for heavy seismic activity," he ordered.

He turned back to the holotank.

Casey's one-eyed mug grinned back at him.

--------------------

Vuxten watched Casey grin as he sat on the fallen gantry, working on something involving the minigun without even watching his hands.

"So, the kid, right? He goes to fifth grade, since his dad is doing better now with that new job, he doesn't have to attend eVR classes and goes to a meat school. The kid does amazing, top grades, really popular, wins some science awards, even has a girlfriend even though he's too young to know what to do with her," Casey was saying as he pulled the ammunition belt from the minigun.

Vuxten nodded, caught up in the joke again. Casey had started it over, to remind everyone what was going on, and it had taken nearly a half hour to get to this point. The entire time everyone was eating, drinking, and the little green battle buddies were huddled up to comfort each other after the shock of seeing the dead queens.

"So the end of the year gets there and the kid is like a rock star. Star of the school play, everything. His father comes up and goes 'My son, my beloved only son, you have surpassed all I have asked of you and more. What can I give you that you feel would reward your gallant efforts? A trip to Mouse World? A trip to Zaginaw Beach? A trip to see where the Yamato was lifted from the sea bed to add to the Black Fleet?' and the kid, right, the kid looks up, his face resolute, and says "A pink golf ball, father. That is all I wish, all I have worked so hard for.' So the father, right, he figures 'well, the kid is consistent if nothing else,' and gets him the golf ball."

Vuxten saw the light blinking on the little device Casey had on the thigh of his armored loading frame go from yellow flashing LEDs to solid green.

"Your thingamabob is done," Vuxten said.

"Hell yeah. Peak comes through again," Casey said, his grin getting wider. "Goddamn, that girl is too good for me."

Vuxten watched as he plugged the datacable into it and text flowed by on his visor, backwards from Vuxten's point of view.

"OK, she forwarded us lexicon. Two types. Imperial, Republic, and Combine codexes as well as Mantid Civil War lexicons," Casey said. "Catch."

The big human waved one armored hand and Vuxten's armor automatically accepted the download.

"Even got stuff for the greenies to talk to their brothers," Casey said. He tapped the side of his helmet and his visor went dark. He reached down, grabbed the ammo belt, and snapped the last round into the chamber.

"We're good to go, sir," he said, thumbing the self-check stud on the weapon.

It came back green.

Vuxten turned to Addox and PFC Thoral. "He still there?"

Addox didn't move, holding still. A little green mantis was standing on his helmet, working on a wire Casey had cut above Addox's head.

"Yes, sir," Thoral said. "Looks like he's getting the patch done."

"471, you guys all right?" Vuxten asked.

--shielded and ready-- 471 answered.

"Got the lexicon loaded?" Vuxten asked.

--roger roger-- 471 answered.

Vuxten triggered the Lexicon, watching his armor's computer systems bog down slightly until the computer addons that Casey had fabbed up and put in between the phasic disrupters took over.

**AWAITING INPUT** his suit stated.

"All right, Sergeant, like we said," Vuxten ordered.

"Dropping psychic shielding by one percent every two seconds," Addox said.

Vuxten caught himself holding his breath as the little green mantid kept working.

"Under one hundred percent load," Addox said. "Keeping the aux system on standby."

More seconds passed.

The little green mantid suddenly paused, its antenna lifting, trembling, as it turned its head to feel the air around it.

"Right there," Vuxten snapped.

"Sixty-two percent load," Addox said.

Vuxten moved up, kneeling down.

The little green mantid turned and looked at him.

"Take it easy. Give it a moment," Vuxten said softly. His suit speakers chirped and clicked.

The mantid shivered, antenna flicking, as it looked around slowly, the hard chitin covers of its eyes flicking back and forth as it was trying to clear debris.

"Can you understand me?" Vuxten asked.

The little mantid gave a few chirps and some clicks and Vuxten saw the sine wave for psychic emissions begin to dance.

--compensating-- 471 transmitted. --formal speak old old old--

"Let us try again. Can you understand me?" Vuxten asked softly.

"Affirmative," the little green worker chirped. "Free?"

"If you stay right there," Vuxten said.

"Free?" the worker chirped again. It put its tools away slowly, carefully, as if it was made of fragile glass. "Speak?"

"Yes, you can speak. You can speak to me," Vuxten said gently.

"Cold," the greenie said. It lowered its abdomen until it rested on the top of Sergeant Addox's helmet. "Warm here. Am cold, is warm. Stop work?"

"Yes," Vuxten said. He was sweating hard, his muscles trembling like he was engaged in combat, and he knew his anxiety monitors were peaking. Vuxten looked closer. The little green mantid had a powdery look to him, and he could see the veins were blue instead of a healthy brown color. He switched to Addox's channel. "Turn up your internal heat a degree or two, he's cold."

"Roger that, sir. I'll dump nanoforge heat," Addox said.

"Is good," the little green mantid said after a moment.

Vuxten lifted his knife, where he had a small piece of meat that 471 had run off of the nanoforge on Casey's armor.

"Food," Vuxten said.

The little greenie reached forward carefully, stabbing the meat with its bladearms and bringing it up to its mouth. It began munching and paused.

"Is real meat? Is good," it said.

"Turkey is delicious," Vuxten said, feeling slightly foolish at repeating 471's comment.

"More?" it asked.

Vuxten held out another strip of it and the little greenie took it.

"Cannot hear others," it said. "Lonely."

Vuxten switched channels. "That's your cue," he told 471.

The other mantid moved out of the shelter, heavy psychic shielding on his helmet. It moved up, crawling quickly up Vuxten's armor to stand on its head.

"Oh. Another," the little one said. It hid the turkey strip behind its thorax.

Vuxten watched as the two started comparing mathematical formulae rapidly, almost too fast for his suit's computers to keep up. Complex theorems and long formulae that Vuxten didn't even bother to try to decipher.

"If we let him go, he will get smothered. He cannot think, cannot report anything but equipment and machine statuses," 471 said over the translator. "He says there's something called the phasic hive mind augmenter still running, still doing the job of the queens."

"Can he show us where it is? Where the computer core is?" Vuxten asked.

More formula.

"Yes. Can show. More turkey?" the little green one asked.

Vuxten handed him another piece of turkey.

"Will ride here. Is warm. Am cold," the greenie said. It pointed with a bladearm. "Direction."

"He says the computer core and the phasic system is that way. We'll ask him more on the trip," Vuxten said, standing up. "Addox, he's gonna ride on your head."

"As long as he doesn't start talking about pink golf balls," Addox grumbled.

----------------------

MANTID FREE WORLDS

Did anyone else hear that?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Hear what?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

MANTID FREE WORLDS

I could have sworn I heard a tiny voice say that turkey is delicious.

It's probably nothing. I'm still stressed over what the Lanaktallan have been doing with all those resources.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Well, the voice isn't wrong. Turkey is delicious.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

It very much is.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---