Final Assault by Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Kathryn Rusch Read Free Book Online Page A

altered plan to the president. Otherwise, this plan remains.” Cross felt a shiver run down his back. It was a minimal damage plan. People would die in the country and villages. Some of them would just refuse to leave. He hoped that his assessment was right; that the aliens would continue to target fertile areas only.
    Portia looked down. She obviously didn’t like this plan at all. Perhaps she was still young enough to believe they would all survive this. Or perhaps she was in denial about the extent of the problem that faced them.
    Maybe, with all the work she’d been doing, she hadn’t even had time to think about it. Cross decided that he’d try to talk with her later. He didn’t want her angry at the program so that she stopped working hard. She was one of their very best assets.
    “Anything new on the ships?” Maddox asked Britt. “We haven’t been able to observe much yet,” she said. “At the moment, we estimate that there are one hundred and eight ships coming our way.”
    This sparked discussion among all the groups— worry that this was just the first wave of ships, and concern that the ships would use more nanoharvesters than before. Some worried that the aliens were going to use new, different weapons on the Earth.
    Maddox agreed that all of this was possible, but that there was no evidence to support any of it.
    While the discussion continued, Cross watched Portia. She had left her cookie stack alone. She was cuddling the stuffed dog and plucking at its fur. The conversation about the nanorescuers had bothered her. She obviously wanted to blanket the entire planet, and she was disturbed at the changes in the plan.
    After a moment, Bradshaw entered the discussion, explaining what his grad student group had discovered about the aliens. Some of the biologists talked about their studies of the dead aliens, and what the theories were.
    Cross forced himself to look away from Portia and concentrate on the conversation. He knew all of this stuff, so it wasn’t of much interest to him, and he knew that Bradshaw could handle much of it on his own.
    It wasn’t until one of the Egyptians said, “I do not care whether the aliens need our planet as a food source. I do not believe that understanding the enemy makes much difference in this case.”
    Cross stared at the man on the screen. He looked fierce. Maddox started to answer, but Cross said softly, “Let me.”
    Maddox nodded.
    Cross said, “We don’t know a lot about these aliens. We don’t know their cultural norms. We don’t know how they are born, how they raise their young, or how they live when they’re not at war. What we do know is that they are intelligent, they are—or were for many millennia—significantly more advanced than we are, and that they work well together in groups.”
    The Egyptian was watching, arms crossed. Some of the other scientists leaned forward. Cross felt a shiver run through him. Britt had told him time and time again that people listened to him more than they listened to the others. It surprised him every time he saw evidence of it.
    “The biggest thing that we know is that they harvest Earth like lost travelers in the desert would harvest an oasis. As far as we can tell, we are their only food source. For thousands upon thousands of years, we did not fight back.”
    His voice was rising. He tried to keep it in check. He didn’t want to sound strident, even though he was feeling that way.
    “It would be as if every animal group that we slaughtered for food, from chickens to cows, suddenly started fighting back—and also fighting to protect the crops and the grass around them. That’s what I believe these aliens are facing.”
    “So?” the Egyptian said. “I cannot—I will not—feel compassion for them.”
    Cross let out a small breath. Ah, that was where this argument was going, then. “When we try to understand the aliens, we’re not doing it so that we can empathize with them. We’re not doing it so