“You have troops?”

He waved back down the road where Toshiro could indeed see columns of figures marching along each side of the dual carriageway and what looked to be three tanks plus some trucks, all heading in this direction.

“Right, well, we have this large urban area here to take next, which I anticipate is going to be nasty. The first day of the invasion was easy as there was no real organized resistance, but since then, we’ve been slugging it out to gain even a few kilometers each day as the resistance has been hardening up. They’ve got mortars, machine guns, and real soldiers facing us now. There are no tanks or heavy artillery on this front yet, but I imagine it’s only a matter of time until they get stuff down here from up further north.”

“Yes, fill me in. The original survey said this was the capital of only a small civilized area that was in the immediate vicinity of this city on a world that had been hit with a nuclear war some centuries ago. Was it wrong?”

“Yes and no. Nuclear war, yes. Only a small civilized area, not really. This was the capital of the Commonwealth of Ostraya, as they call Australia here, but their country stretches right up the east coast to the far north and westward to the edge of the desert at least. They have real weapons and a real military due to past problems with their northern neighbors, although it is taking them a while to get their regulars down south to oppose us.”

“I see,” Uesugi commented.

Before Toshiro could say anything further, there was a sudden roar as a jet aircraft appeared from the west, flying extremely low, which accounted for why they hadn’t heard up to now. It came roaring over the urban area they had to assault next and began dropping munitions on the troops on the road. In a couple of seconds, the plane had disappeared into the distance, disappearing as if it had never existed apart from the figures that were now lying in the roadway and one of the trucks which was burning furiously.

“Damn, that’s new.” Toshiro heard himself saying.

“I wasn’t briefed on them having jet aircraft,” Uesugi said dourly.

“Neither was I. That’s the first one I’ve seen. I hope they don’t have too many.”

“You and me both.” The older man added as he looked back down the road trying to determine how many casualties his force had just taken. It was too far away, and his men too spread out to tell easily, so he gave up his survey and turned back to Toshiro.

“I suppose I had better get my troops added to your men so we can assault this urban area together, then.”

Toshiro nodded. He quickly counted the surviving troops Uesugi had brought with him.

“Seeing your forces are here on the road. You can assault from this corner. I’ll get my troops to assault along the northern front of the built-up area to distract them while you get your men into position. Then you hit them in the flank, and hopefully, we’ll roll them up quickly.”