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"How were you to know?" Valentine said. Lambert walked over to the east-facing windows and looked out at the Kentucky woods.
"Helluva way to fight: Make someone get so beat up about themselves they start thinking about taking their own life. I'd rather be shot at some more."
"I understand that," Valentine said.
"What ifs-you know. What if I could have been stronger, or figured out something was wrong with me. Does it make you not crazy if you recognize that you're sick in the head? I remember knowing I felt different. I thought I was just cracking under the strain."
"You did better than anyone would have expected."
"It was beautiful for a minute, wasn't it? When we showed up and found the Green Mountain Boys there. Colonel Lambert, you know you did all that. Too bad you couldn't have seen it. Oh, that was a good day."
Lambert turned back to face Bloom. "They fooled me just as much as they fooled you. Wish I'd been a little more careful."
Valentine wondered if his repeated requests to Southern Command for assistance to be sent to Ahn-Kha's coal-country guerrillas figured into Lambert's calculus when she'd decided on Javelin as Southern Command's next venture into the Kurian Zone. She knew Valentine, trusted him. Had he let her down? Maybe that's why she'd been so formal of late.
"I think the Green Mountain Boys were happy to see Southern Command arrive too," Lambert added.
"It's still the spot Javelin landed, as far as I'm concerned. I think we'll be back, one day." Bloom focused on Valentine. "I'm sorry, Val."
"Not your doing. I know you'd have stuck."
Bloom took a deep breath, brightened. "At least everyone's rested and refit. We'll make it the rest of the way . . ."
"Easy," Valentine said.
"I'd settle for hard. One twist away from impossible, even, just so long as I get them home."
Valentine stood flanking Lambert, watching the brigade walk out of camp under an iron gray sky. The soldiers moved in step-a rarity for the men of Southern Command, unless they were moving as part of a graduation class or parade review or under a general's nose.
Valentine expected the Kurians would let them return across the Mississippi. The Kurians liked to see defeated men live to tell their tales. It was the ones who'd beaten them they went after.
Men like his father.
It was hard watching the men he'd come to know on the long advance and the longer retreat file off down the road.
Of course, the few volunteers stayed on: some technical staff, communications people, and trainers helping transform the Quislings into something that could stand up to the Kurian Order. Even Galloby, the agronomist, had remained, waxing enthusiastic about learning more about legworm husbandry. He had some kind of idea about putting a special bacteria in the legworm's digestive tract and getting concentrated fertilizer from the other end. But while he put droplets into petri dishes and ran chemical tests, he advised Evansville on how they could do a better job growing their own food without the rest of Indiana to rely on.
Pencil Boelnitz also stayed, and Valentine wasn't sure how to feel about that.
The supply train left, and then some of the artillery Southern Command had brought in and were now towing out, and finally the rear guard departed, pushing burdened bicycles. Red Dog dodged in and out of their wheels to the turn into woods leading to the gate, then plopped down in the sun to pant.
"You ready for this, Dots?" Valentine asked Lambert, using her old military college nickname in an effort to lighten the mood.
"No," she said, looking around as if she were seeing the tree lines of Fort Seng for the first time.
Valentine chuckled. "Too bad."
"You're helpful."
"I'd be a lot more worried if you were more confident. What's my first order, sir?" Valentine asked.
Bloom's command car came roaring back into Fort Seng. Bloom hopped out before it even came to a stop, hauling with her a Kentucky "vol"-short for volunteer: a local who served in the loosest, most disorganized militia imaginable. Their only common element was a dark blue band around their baseball-style caps. Valentine smelled blood on him.
"The Kurians moved already. They didn't waste time. We aren't even out of camp yet," Bloom said. "I'm sorry I've got to leave passing you bad news. Evansville just hauled this guy out of his boat."
"Where?" Lambert said.
The vol spoke up. "It's lights-out for Evansville and Owensboro. A bunch of flying whatsits have taken over the power plant, and some Reapers and Moondaggers are holding the technical guys hostage."
