The road ran south-southwest, then curved slightly more west before turning almost due south. They pulled up next to a tin shack that was obviously some farming building or at least had been. The ramshackle external appearance was completely at odds with the desk full of computers and screens inside the gloomy building. Andrew had spotted a farmhouse to their east just before they reached the shack and wondered why the company headquarters wasn’t set up there and filed that question away until he could ask somebody at some point.

Captain Wright was a slightly rotund, relatively short man balding on top, even though he was probably only thirty or so. The lieutenant saluted.

“Lieutenant Colonel Gray is still not convinced the Japs are going to attack your positions directly. The indications are that their main attack will fall to the east, probably hoping to break through and encircle the town from behind. However, he is not leaving you hanging out to dry entirely. He’s retaining the headquarters company back up the road, ready to deploy if needed in your support, and he sent you Private Harris here along as a reinforcement.”

Captain Wright did not look overly impressed with this information.

“Is this some sort of joke?”

“Harris here is one of Greaves’ people. She deliberately assigned him to this flank because, according to him, he is the next strongest mentalist after Greaves even though he’s only just arrived at the front.”

The Captain studied his new reinforcement with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. Then he frowned.

“Only just arrived at the front, eh? Where were stationed before that?”

Here we go, Andrew thought to himself.

“Boot camp at Singleton.”

The Captain swung around to face the grinning Lieutenant Frost.

“Is the Colonel’s idea of a joke, Frost?”

The Lieutenant didn’t appear to be intimidated by the captain’s ire. He was slow to wipe the mirth off his face as he answered Captain Wright.

“Well, he doesn’t seem to think you’re going to be attacked, but Captain Greaves thought you needed mentalist support,” he waved at Andrew. “She’s over on the east side.”

“Jesus Christ!”

The Lieutenant drew himself up at attention and saluted. “I need to report back to headquarters, Captain. I’ll leave you to it.”

“Shit! Yeah, piss off Frost.”

The Lieutenant gave a very sloppy salute and disappeared out the door. Captain Wright stared after him for some considerable time before he finally wheeled around and studied Andrew.

“So you’re a brand-new mentalist, are you?”

“I’m a brand-new soldier, sir. Not a brand-new mentalist.”

This response caused the Captain’s eyes to narrow.

“To me, you appear to be a waste of time. However, I’m willing to listen for a few moments if you can tell me what you can do for me.”

“That depends on the tactical situation, sir. If you are convinced the Japs are about to attack your positions here, first, I would need to look at a map so I can see the tactical situation, sir. Any intel on where their mentalists are would be helpful as well, sir.”

The lieutenant marched forward, came to attention, and saluted as did Andrew, and they received a lazy return salute from the man with Lieutenant Colonal’s insignia on his collar behind the desk.

“So what’s Michael’s problem now, Geoff?” He asked the Lieutenant after a moment.

“The Captain is convinced that the japs are about to launch a major assault directly on our part of the front, sir. Apparently, half the Japanese army has deployed in front of us, sir.”

“I seriously doubt half their army has deployed in front of us.” He turned his attention to Andrew. “And who are you?”

“Private Andrew Harris, sir. Captain Greaves told me to report to you.”

The man behind the desk eyed Andrew with a speculative look on his face. “One of Greaves’ people, eh? Your uniform looks fairly spiffy; how long have you been at the front?”

“I just got here, sir. I just finished training, sir.”

“Did you now? And why did the good captain send you to me?”

“She seems to think the Japanese are about to assault our positions in this area, sir. She’s gone over to the eastern flank and sent me to you.”

“So she thinks they’re about to attack too, hmmm. And their main attack will be over to the east.” The Lieutenant Colonel muttered as if talking to himself.

“I wouldn’t count on that, sir. She sent me here because I’m the best she has.” Andrew offered and then realized he should probably have kept his mouth shut.

Gray leaned back in his chair and glared at Andrew.

“You’re straight from boot camp.” He said finally.

“Yes, sir. I’m still the best she has.”

Gray snorted but nodded as well. “I like a man who has confidence in himself. Geoff. Run him out to Michael and tell him that I am taking his warnings seriously and have sent him reinforcements.”

At this point, he waved a hand at Andrew in a languid manner. The Lieutenant laughed.

“Righto, sir. Come on, Harris. I’ll run you up to the front line.”

The Lieutenant gave a lazy salute to his superior, but Andrew didn’t feel he should follow suit and instead came to attention and gave the Lieutenant Colonel a proper salute. That worthy glanced at him, gave what could be generously described as a return salute, and turned his eyes back to the paperwork on his desk. The lieutenant was already nearly out the door, so Andrew had to hustle a little to keep up with him. They piled into the Emu and were soon haring back down the road from the direction the car had come originally. The Lieutenant made a show of concentrating on the road, so Andrew held his peace.

It could well be that the Lieutenant was one of those people who were heavily biased against the genies. Andrew had been brought up hearing about the way many people are biased against those with genetic engineering, which was one of the reasons his father was so against him using his magic, but he didn’t have a lot of first-hand experience with that sort of bias himself.

“I’m thinking that we should arrest you as a spy. You’re probably here to assassinate the Colonel.” The one on the left said.

“Yeah. No orders. Just wants to walk straight into the joint.”

Andrew crossed his arms over his chest and studied the two men. If they made the list attempt to arrest him, they would find out that he wasn’t just any old private.

“You two are getting funnier all the time. You know that, don’t you?”

The one on the left went to sling his assault rifle, but Andrew waved a finger at him.

“You don’t want to be doing that, fella.”

The soldier hesitated before Andrew was faced with trying to work out how to re-respond to them pointing their weapons at him, another vehicle pulled up. The vehicle was a militarized version of the Emu 4×4 made by Macedon Motors, which was one of the more popular off-road vehicles on the Ostrayan market. It was painted in the usual green and brown camouflage colors and had military markings on the front and back bumper bar, body reinforcement panels, and roof racks. An officer hopped out of the driver’s side and strode towards the three men who had stopped their now heated discussion to observe the arrival of the Emu.

The officer, a Lieutenant Andrew saw, nodded the two idiots, glanced at Andrew, and made to walk into the building but then stopped and turned to look at Andrew again.

“I don’t recognize you. Who are you?”

“Private Andrew Harris, sir. I was told to report to Lieutenant Colonel Gray, sir.”

“Orders?”

“Only verbal ones from Captain Greaves, sir.”

The man’s eyes open slightly. “You’re one of her people?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Right. Come with me, and I’ll take you to the Colonel.”

The Lieutenant strode off inside the building, and Andrew managed to get in a smug smile at the two idiots at the door before following him. The building had clearly housed an industrial operation before the invasion but was now fully given over to military activities. There was a maintenance bay along the right-hand side of the complex with several vehicles and APCs being worked on. Andrew guessed that most of the left-hand side of the building had been empty originally as well, but the small office area at the left front had been expanded backward nearly the whole length of the building.

The Lieutenant marched straight past what had to be the secretary or orderly’s desk, the occupant turning her head to watch them walk past without saying a word, merely nodding to the Lieutenant as he strode past. There was a short corridor dividing the two sections of such offices, the old ones and the new ones, by the look of it that he headed down, and at the far end, there was a door on the left at which he stopped, looking back to make sure Andrew was behind him and then knocked on the door and entered. Inside was a drab office with two metal chairs off to one side and a large metal desk in the center with a dark-haired man in his forties sitting behind it. To the left, there was a large map on the wall of the immediate area that Andrew thought was showing the dispositions of the Ostrayan forces in the area with a few not-so-clear markings on the map, which from their position on the map, he felt showed the invaders positions.

Chapter 9

Front lines

The vehicle that drove up was indeed a car rather than a military vehicle. A car that the army had requisitioned then had some splashes of green and dark brown paint applied over the original paint, and army insignia stuck on to turn it into an army vehicle. He trotted to the car and, spotting people in the front, opened the back door. There was a private in the back seat on the far side of the vehicle who nodded and smiled.

“Eighth Battalion?”

“Yeah, mate,” Andrew answered and settled into his seat. He started putting on his seat belt, and the fellow grinned.

“Hey, Andy. This guy must’ve heard about your driving already!”

This comment produced a snort from the front passenger and an upraised middle finger from the driver.  The car took off a fair clip, and Andrew quickly decided that his fellow backseat passenger’s implied assessment of the driver’s style of controlling a vehicle wasn’t that far off. They headed southwest and then south out of the built-up area and raced south along some main road for a distance before pulling over to the left and stopping in front of an industrial building.

“HQ is in there, mate.”

“Ok. Thanks, guys.” Andrew replied and hopped out.

The car barely waited long enough for him to shut the door before it took off in a cloud of dust from the driveway. Andrew shook his head bemusedly and turned towards the entrance to the industrial area. He supposed the couple of fellows standing at the entrance could be seen to be on guard, although their slovenly stance was at odds with the crisp men on guard at every other military base he had visited since volunteering.

“Private Harris. I was told to report to Lieutenant Colonel Gray.”

“That’ll be to the Lieutenant Colonel himself, will it private?”

Andrew couldn’t decide which way to jump at this point in the face of their rather odd manner.

“Can you direct me to his office, please?”

“Hey Frank, he said please, and everything.” The one on the left said to the one on the right.

“Straight out of boot camp, I reckon. Look at his uniform, looks like it only came out of the packing two days ago.”

“Yeah, you’re right, mate. You’re just out of boot camp, aren’t you, sport?”

For some reason, Andrew felt embarrassed about having to admit that he was straight out of boot camp.

“Yeah. I am. Captain Greaves assigned me to the eighth Battalion and told me to report to Lieutenant Colonel Gray. I have the right place, don’t I?”

The one on the left shook his head. “Privates don’t report to the CO, maggot. Which company you assigned to?”

“I’m not assigned to any company. I’m assigned to the Eighth Battalion.”

“What’ya orders say?” The one on the right asked.

“I don’t have written orders. I have a verbal instruction from Captain Greaves to report to Lieutenant Colonel Gray. Is he in here?” Andrew said, nodding towards the building that they were ostensibly guarding.

He was gradually becoming quite sick of these two galahs. Lead to smart alecs looked at each other and grinned momentarily before turning their attention back to Andrew.

“Not even I can slice that far!” She said, frowning at him. “We are going to have to sit down and go through this journal of your grandmother’s. Did you bring it with you?”

He nodded. “You mean, like, right now?”

She shook her head. “No. We don’t have the time at the moment. I want you to get down to the Eighth Battalion and get yourself integrated with them. The Japs have a lot of mentalists, but they generally only employ one really strong one and any one section of the line. Depending on how big the attack is, you might find that there are two or three weaker mentalists in support of the main one. Their job will be to provide shields for their troops, while the main one will be looking to take over our people and disrupt our formations. Your job will be to disrupt him.”

Jason nodded, trying to look calm. He wasn’t about to admit that he was as nervous as he was feeling. The captain studied him for a moment and then nodded in return.

“Leave your kit here, but take enough water with you to keep you going today. They’ll have supplies at the Battalion HQ. Report to Lieutenant Colonel Gray. His HQ is on Bellangi Road, somewhere south of the racecourse. The railway makes a big loop down there, and we are trying to defend the line of the railway. They took the airport last week, not that we’ve got many planes left and practically no helicopters anymore, so we didn’t try and defend it too heavily. The railway line is more important so do as you can.”

There was a tone of finality in this last sentence which Andrew took as being a dismissal. He collected himself together, stood at attention, and saluted, which the Captain returned, and then he left her office. Outside he stopped and checked his phone to make sure that there was a map available of the area which there was. He turned to the Corporal, who was looking at him expectantly.

“The Captain said I was to leave the kid here, grab some water, and head down to the Eighth Battalion’s HQ. So, water and transport? And should I take a tent?”

The Corporal shook his head. “Eighth Battalion will organize a billet for you. Fill your water bottle through there while I organize some transport.”

The man indicated another door that Andrew hadn’t really noticed when he’d arrived, so grabbing his army-issue water bottle, he headed through the indicated door while the Corporal got on his phone to arrange transport. Through the door, he found a small kitchen area with a sink, and he quickly filled up his water bottle and returned to the main office.

“There’ll be a car here in five minutes that will take you to Eight Battalion’s HQ.”

The Corporal informed him. Jason nodded and stepped out to wait for the car.

She reflected on the fact that practically no one had escaped once the Japanese occupied an area. Early on, there were reports of atrocities, such as the reputed killing of a large number of patients in the Gilong Hospital, which had led to the Government adopting a mandatory evacuation order for any area under threat of occupation. Several fellow officers she had spoken to told of seeing seriously wounded Ostrayan soldiers or civilians being shot out of hand but advancing Japanese troops, and they were only taking healthy people prisoner. Aerial photos showed work gangs clearing rubble off roads and such behind the lines, which seemed to be the primary use of prisoners. How the prisoners were actually treated was unknown.

“We have gotten some high-altitude drone intelligence which seems to indicate the Japs are going to attack Backus Marsh in the next day or two. I’m assigning you to the eighth battalion NOR which is tasked with defending the southwestern side of the town. You’ll be used mostly to provide mental shields to protect the troops from their mentalists. If you can coordinate physical shields with the troops, that would be beneficial as well, even if it is only a local area effect. But do concentrate on the mental shields, as disrupting our positions by taking over soldiers and opening fire on everyone in the area is the most common way they make advances. I will be teamed up with a sniper with a heavy-duty gun, and we will hunt their mentalists while providing support to the southeastern flank. Are you ready for real combat, soldier?”

“I think so, Captain. I won’t know until I’m actually faced with enemy fire and enemy mentalists, I guess, but I think I’m ready.”

“Good. Now I’ve read the report from Sanchez, but just how powerful are you in practical terms?”

Andrew scratched his head. “I have no frame of reference, I’m sorry.”

She studied him for a moment. “Hmm. Sanchez said you could slice ten meters. Is that right?”

“I can probably do a bit more than that. I tried not to show off in front of the others.”

“Oh?” She said and studied him again.

Andrew started to fidget as her steady gaze made him uncomfortable. She turned away and pointed at a tree maybe thirty meters away. Probably more like twenty-five, he decided. There was a branch jutting out from the trunk, not too far above the ground.

“Can you cut that branch off?”

Right. Andrew thought to himself. Time to stop mucking around and hiding what he can do. He’d been looking for an opportunity to impress the Captain. He looked at the tree, extended his invisible force blade, and sliced the branch off about ten centimeters out from the trunk of the tree. He glanced at the Captain, grinned, and turned back to look further beyond where the tree with the branch was. There was a small tree maybe another twenty meters further on, and he cut the trunk clean through about a meter above the ground. He heard a hiss behind him and turned to face the Captain.

“As far as we can tell, the Japanese invasion was fast running out of steam. They had a brief surge in combat units a couple of weeks ago, followed by a lot more civilian militia, and they are still getting lots of people through their gate, but they’re mostly women and children over the last couple of days. Surprisingly, the Japs still weren’t using women in combat, at least not in any large numbers. The government was still concerned about the Indos up north choosing to invade while we were occupied fighting the Japs, and we’re keeping a large part of the regular military in the north for that reason. I don’t agree with that policy, but who listens to the troops on the ground anyway.”

“Anyway, the Japanese advances have been slowed but not entirely stopped as both sides are running short of munitions. The lasers of the Japanese cyborgs and the armored vehicles give them a combat edge as they don’t require ammunition, so as long as they remain within the slowly increasing broadcast power area. Last week they deployed a new type of tank that carries a humongous powered mortar. It’s only good within their broadcast power range but packs a wallop and can fire very accurately.”

She moved over to the mat with a stick and pointed at a red irregular line inset within the Japanese occupied area.

“That’s the broadcast power limit at the moment. We think they’re building a new repeater station in this area here and another one there, but they’re being very careful so as to not let us spot them and then blow them up. Things are becoming increasingly difficult for the us as our ammunition supplies are in short supply. We are ramping up production, but the demand is still greater than the supply at the moment. The Nuzeelanders are sending us ammunition and troops, but so far, only the ammunition has arrived and that in small amounts. Attempts to take out the power relay towers were a continuous activity, but to be honest, we are struggling to achieve significant results as we’ve used up a good deal of our combat aircraft in earlier attacks, and the production rate of new aircraft has yet to gear up. We had hoped drones would work, but their damned lasers are too effective.”

“We’ve given up trying to sneak saboteurs past their mentalists at the moment, thank goodness. It very much depended on whether their mentalists in the area were wide-awake, and after the first raid, they’ve generally had at least one mentalist awake and looking all along the front. They’ve brought down two of the last trained mentalists from up north who both have very good mental shields, and they’re being assigned to two special forces units that were going to use their magician’s mental shield to hide them from the Japanese mentalists, which will hopefully allow them to sneak into their rear areas. We have so little information on what went on behind the lines apart from the occasional aerial photo that any information would be welcome.”

Someone asked for maps with Taroniah – I meant to put one in the front of the latest Taroniah book – sorry
I’ve posted these before but here some

“Such as?” The Captain still looked skeptical.”Well, in one section, she mentions using her invisibility spell to sneak into a building. Unfortunately, at no point in the journal does she explain how the invisibility spell works, which is really frustrating. Nor is that an isolated example. Do you know how to levitate?”Greaves opened her eyes and then shook her head. “No. I’ve thought about it, but I’ve never managed to come up with anything that works. I have heard of an Indo mentalist who could levitate stuff but only at second hand. He may not even be alive now as that story has been around for years.””I haven’t worked it out either, but then I’m still struggling to master the ordinary stuff and haven’t really put much thought into it.””Is your grandmother still around?””No. well, probably not.””Probably?””Well, over the years, she faked her own death on several occasions, and then she would set up a new life somewhere else. I never actually saw her body as it was a closed coffin. She was officially a hundred and five, although she only looked to be in her eighties to me just before she died. I was very young when she died, so my memory is not reliable. Having read her journal, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if she was masquerading as a woman in her sixties somewhere, possibly out west.””Are you being serious?”Unlike earlier, this was more of a polite inquiry. He opened the palms of his hand in a gesture of not knowing.”I actually think she’s dead this time. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have her journal. On the other hand, if in a few years’ time somebody said they’d seen in Nuzeeland I wouldn’t be at all surprised.”The Captain sat back and considered this. Then her eyes opened wide, and she stared at Andrew.”Wait. You said that officially she was a hundred and five. Yes?” Andrew nodded. “How old was she really?”Andrew took a moment to think about his answer and then decided to tell her the truth.”My grandmother was one of the original Tellies in North America. She happened to be far enough away from the main site that she wasn’t killed in the nuclear attack.””Holy Shit!” The Captain studied him for a moment. “You’re serious, aren’t you? That explains why you’re so strong.” Andrew decided not to tell her about his grandfather. Captain Greaves studied him in silence for a bit longer and then shook her head. She pulled up the latest map of the frontlines that had a computer displayed on the wall to the left.”This is the situation at the moment, as far as we can tell. Intelligence on foot is almost impossible, with their mentalists spotting anyone almost immediately. Drones keep getting eliminated as their cyborg’s lasers can knock them out at several kilometers range if they spot the drones.”Andrew moved slightly and turned his head so he could study the map better, which allowed Captain Greaves to study him in profile without him realizing. His face looked leaner and harder than it had when she had sat next to him on the train.

Sorry – went away for a week and forgot to post last week.

“So, how did you come up with the idea of grounding the shields?” She asked finally.

Andrew shrugged and trotted at the same story he told everyone else.

“The magical shields are essentially no different to the padded protection we used in football training. They couldn’t stop the big, tough tacklers any more than the ungrounded shields could stop the rifle bullets. All they did was protect you somewhat from being knocked over. I tried to think up a way of making them less likely to be knocked over and came up with the idea of digging the shields into the ground. They have a very narrow profile, like a slice spell, so they can be worked into the ground quite deeply fairly easily, even through concrete or tar, although I did suggest to the Corporal that people being trained to dig their shields in should be warned about not doing it in built-up areas.” He grinned at the captain at this point, and she found herself smiling back at him involuntarily.

“I see. Or at least, I don’t see. I’m afraid I find the link between the two rather vague. Is that really where you got the idea?” It was just a stab in the dark because the story sounded too trite even though it was probably the truth, but she saw the slight flinch and smiled. “It was a good story to tell Corporal Sanchez, but it wasn’t the truth, was it?”

She leaned forward and stared at him. Damn! Andrew thought. Should he stick to his story or tell the truth?

“What other techniques do you know?” She asked after a moment.

Andrew thought quickly. He hadn’t realized they didn’t know about grounding shields, and there were probably other techniques, as she called them, that they didn’t know, but the problem was he didn’t know what they didn’t know. He smiled as he wondered if that even made sense.

“You think it’s funny?”

“Ah, no, sir. I was just thinking about techniques and the fact that I don’t really know what the others don’t know that I do know. Does that make sense, sir?” He could feel himself blushing for sounding so stupid.

She studied him balefully as if he was trying to pull her leg. He knew he was looking nervous as the silence dragged on while she just sat and stared at him. Finally, she leaned back in her chair.

“You’re serious, aren’t you?” she asked.

“Yes, sir. I might be able to do magic, or techniques I guess we’re calling them now, but I’m not psychic, sir. I know what I know, but I don’t know what you don’t know.”

“And how do you know so much, soldier?”

Okay, time to tell the truth. She’d get really annoyed if he kept pulling interesting techniques out of his arse. Besides, he still thought she was cute.

“I have a journal my grandmother left me, sir.”

“A journal your grandmother left you. And it contains mentalist techniques?”

“Yes, sir. Although in a lot of cases, she just mentions the spell, she calls them spells, sir, without any explanation of what she’s talking about or how to achieve the effect. I’ve managed to guess some, but many of the journal references are just too unclear to determine exactly how she was doing what she said she was doing.”