Omar Doyle waited outside the Colonel’s tent.

He had an idea why he’d been summoned, of course. By chance or luck, his unit had been paired with Belessar.

Whenever he thought about it, he wanted to get on his knees and thank a merciful God for that.

Doyle had thought Belessar to be just another useless mercenary. Likely to run at the first sign of trouble, like most others. Instead, when they’d been ambushed by an unseen attacker, the ultrahuman had picked up the slack.

Mentally, Doyle ran through the actions of that day. The long-range ambush that took out their tanks. The alien patrol they’d stumbled upon. The battle at the Gershwin theatre.

The continuous skirmishes as they stumbled across the length and breadth of Manhattan.

It had been his first mission against the aliens, and he’d expected it to be his last. He’d hoped that at least half his unit would survive.

And now they had the lowest casualty count in the division, and….

Forty-one alien kills.

For a unit with forty-two men.

It was unheard of. Entire regiments had failed to fight off incursions of a dozen aliens. That was, after all, why ultrahumans were tolerated.

And this crazy kill ratio had been achieved by a unit with only four deaths, and - as of now - zero soldiers invalidated due to permanent injuries.

When he’d been sent to fight, he’d hoped to kill an alien. When they ran him through the OCS training, he’d expected that his platoon might, someday, kill two or three aliens in a battle.

Forty-one.

He kept repeating the number to himself. It was crazy, insane….

It was Belessar.

The tent flap opened, and the Sergeant-Major stepped out. “The colonel will see you now.”

Doyle nodded in acknowledgement, returning the man’s salute before stepping in.

Colonel Edwin Packard wasn’t alone. Along with him was another man who Doyle had never expected to see here - General Walter Xavier.

Commander of the U. S. Northern Command.

Doyle came to attention and saluted.

“At ease,” ordered Colonel Packard. “Lieutenant Doyle, General Xavier. He’s read your reports.”

Doyle fought hard to keep his face calm. Having a four-star general reading through your reports… he’d rather fight the aliens.

“They make interesting reading,” commented General Xavier. “I had a few questions and some time to spare, so I thought I’d swing by and find out about your unit’s performance.”

“Sir.”

“I understand Belessar healed your men?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And you, when you got hit by enemy weapons fire?”

“Yes, sir, he did.”

“Did you ask him to do so?”

“No, sir.”

“He did this on his own initiative.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And the rest of your men? The part about him pulling two men from a burning tank - did it happen exactly that way?”

“Yes, sir.”

The general glanced at the colonel. “Would that we had more ultras with half as much selflessness. Even if he had a fireproof costume.”

“It wasn’t fireproof, sir,” said Doyle.

The general and the colonel focused their attention on him.

Doyle fought down his nervousness. “Later in the day, I asked him about his costume and whether it could handle flames. He said no, it wasn’t actually fireproof, just well insulated.”

“So he could theoretically have burnt to death?”

“He mentioned that he could heal himself as well, sir.”

The general nodded. “Still, to react in a firefight with that much poise… is what I’d expect from a trained soldier. Not a civilian. Did he show any signs of military training?”

“Sir, he definitely isn’t military. He didn’t know hand signals, what taking point means, or a half dozen of the things covered in basic training. My assessment is that he has courage, but very little formal training in military matters.”

“And yet he followed your orders without question?”

“Yes.”

“Did you order him to charge that alien patrol?”

“Sir, he attacked the Sarnak patrol on his own. Before I could even give orders.”

“Sarnak?”

“He … called the lizards by two different names. Sarnak and Raptor. Sarnak are the ones with fat noses and Raptor the ones which are thinner and meaner-looking.”

“Are these made-up names?”

“Sir… he did not believe they were. In fact, he seemed to believe it was their actual species names.”

“An aspect of his power?”

“Yes, sir. He told me afterwards that the Raptors have a clan system but he’s not sure of how it works.”

General Xavier leafed through a folder on his tablet. “That wasn’t in your report.”

“My mistake, sir.”

“No matter. You reported whatever was asked of you. There is no doubt of Belessar’s combat performance.”

Doyle remained silent. The General hadn’t actually asked for a comment.

Xavier put aside his tablet. “The Stratospheric Guard wants to declare Belessar an anchor combatant,” he said. “In his first battle against the aliens. Not even Bastion could claim that.”

Colonel Packard spoke up. “Sir, he did eliminate nearly twenty per cent of the enemy.”

“And he fought for close to seven hours. At current rates, we’d be paying him one point seven five million dollars for today.” He shrugged. “Half the ultras in the USA would cry foul, say he didn’t deserve it for his first battle. Massive political fallout, too. So I told General Yavuz that it was the support of the U.S. Army troops he was embedded with that made it possible.”

Packard shrugged. “I believe our men did help, in some way.”

“General Yavuz had a different view. He told me that if a rifle platoon had made a significant difference to killing forty-one aliens, I should be handing out forty-two Medals of Honor. Do you think your platoon deserves that, Lieutenant?”

Doyle gulped. “Sir, we merely did our duty.”

“So, Belessar did it all? Your men just hung back and let him do all the fighting?”

Carefully now, thought Doyle. “I think, sir, that we functioned well as a team.”

“Despite the fact that ultras generally have too much of an ego to fit in with soldiers?”

“Belessar isn’t like other ultras, sir. He’s more grounded.” Doyle recalled the ultra plunging into the burning tank. “He also cares for those he fights with, sir.”

“He handed one of your men a laser rifle, right?”

“Yes, sir. I've ordered the device sent to R&D for examination.”

“In the last twenty years we’ve been fighting them,” mused Xavier, “this is the first time we’ve known the names of the different alien species. Packard, I’m transferring your platoon for a special assignment. Lieutenant, I want you to connect with Belessar. Build relationships between him and the men of your platoon.”

“Sir, yes, sir.”

“You will persuade him to take part in more battles. You will become his friend, his drinking buddy, his pal, whatever. And you will find out from him everything he knows about the Hierarchy. Dismissed.”

Doyle saluted the General and marched out.

Time to pack the platoon for Tanisport.