Everything moving this night was a foe and a target. The Frisians’ only chance was to hit hard and keep on hitting before the enemy forces could organize their superior numbers. In the morning, every corpse in Hamlet 3 would be tagged as an Association soldier or an Association supporter. Like other forms of history, after-action reports are written by the survivors.

Mother Love bounced onto the Auerstadt Road from the dike which had concealed the vehicle in the darkness. The gunners depressed their tribarrels, raking the troops who’d jumped into the fields to either side of the causeway. A gout of steam flew up at each bolt, whether it hit a flooded paddy or superheated the fluids within a soldier’s body.

The flames enveloping the hamlet rolled in redoubled fury, whipped by The Facts of Life’s powerful drive fans. The combat car bellied through the blaze at a walking pace, firing continuously from all three weapons. Cyan bolts cut down the soldiers who had jumped from wagons and truck beds to run toward the fancied safety of the buildings.

Lennox made a point of destroying each of the stalled vehicles. Blazing fuel geysered over the paddies, igniting rice and troops alike.

“Good Lord!” the Marquis said. He turned from the display to Coke and continued, “Get those tanks back here now, you fool! How dare you leave me at risk at a time of such danger?”

“Yessir,” Coke said. “They’re on their way back now.”

The Facts of Life bulldozed burning wreckage off the causeway, clearing the route by which to return to Fortress Auerstadt. The driver was buttoned up within his compartment, using the curved bow slope to butt aside a truck festooned with corpses.

The tribarrels continued to fire. The visors of Frisian commo helmets could be switched to either light enhancement or thermal imaging modes. The latter could pick up bodies even through the shallow water of the paddies.