“Truth again, Exalted Fleetlord,” Kirel said.

The fleetlord knew it was truth. Machine against machine, the Big Uglies could not match the Race: one landcruiser Atvar commanded, for instance, was worth anywhere between ten and thirty of its Tosevite opponents. The Big Uglies fought back with everything from mine-carrying animals trained to run under landcruiser tracks to set off their explosives to attacks that concentrated so many of their inferior weapons against the Race’s thin-stretched resources that they achieved breakthrough in spite of lower technology.

Kirel might have plucked that thought from Atvar’s head. “Will we resume our assault on the city by the lake in the northern section of the smaller continental mass? Chicago, the local name is.”

“Not immediately,” Atvar answered, trying to keep from his voice all the frustration he felt at the failure. Taking advantage of Tosev 3’s truly abominable winter weather, the Americans had broken through the flanks of the assault force, cut off the lead element, and wrecked most of it. It was the worst-and most expensive-embarrassment the Race had suffered on Tosev 3.

“We do not enjoy as many resources as we would like,” Kirel observed.

Now Atvar had to say, “Truth” The Race was careful and thorough: the weapons they’d brought from Home would have conquered a hundred times over the Tosev 3 they thought they would find, very possibly without losing a male. But on the industrialized planet they discovered, they’d taken major losses. They’d inflicted far worse, but the Big Uglies’ factories kept turning out weapons.

“We need to keep working to co-opt as much of their industrial capacity as we can,” Kirel said, “and to wreck that part which persists in producing arms used against us.”

“Unfortunately, the two goals often contradict each other,” Atvar said. “Nor is our progress in destroying their fuel sources as great as they would wish us to believe, though we persist in those efforts.”