There was a protective berm that had been thrown up around the boson and Horn crawled to the top of it, looking over the edge. What met his eyes was a nightmare.

The collectives had not bothered with assaulting the gates with low-class ground combat units. Coming through the gate was a segmental class seven combat unit. It was tossing plasma charges off its horns at everything that looked like a threat. Four Abrams were smoking wrecks as were all the Bradleys and most of the bunkers that were supposed to shelter the infantry. And the thing just kept coming out of the gate, like a giant nightmare centipede, pouring fire in all directions.

As he watched, though, the thing hit one of the antitank mines the engineers had installed. The massive explosion punched up through the thing, sending a self-forging round upward through the first segment.

The secondary explosion, even at five hundred meters, tossed the sergeant off the berm and down into the grass yard of the burning house.

He shook some life back into himself, again, and climbed back up the berm, wishing that his LBE hadn't been in the bunker. All he had to fight with was a single magazine for the M-16.

It wasn't going to matter, much, though. The front segment of the monster was a smoking wreck but it had already been detached and the thing continued to extrude. Now fire was leaping into the sky, intercepting incoming rounds of artillery. There were more antitank mines, but Horn was pretty sure there wouldn't be enough.

"Anybody got a radio!" Horn yelled. "Call somebody and tell 'em this thing ain't going to stop any time soon!"

"This is Bruce Gelinas in Woodmere, Ohio, where units of the Ohio National Guard have again been repulsed from an attempt to retake the Cleveland Gate. Fighting is reportedly heavy and from the looks of the casualties I'd have to agree. Besides the segmented tank there are now rhino tanks and something like large spider tanks, along with large numbers of dog aliens and thorn-throwers. The unit has had to retreat, twice, and now is simply trying to slow the monsters down as well as it can. More units are being brought up but the situation looks very bad."

"Bruce have you been able to talk to anyone from the National Guard, there?" the anchorwoman in New York asked.

"No, the spokespeople don't seem to be available," Bruce said. "From what I heard they were issued weapons and have been sent in to replace losses in the infantry units, which are taking a real beating. Ispoke, briefly, with a sergeant who had been injured in the initial assault. . . ."

The scene cut to a recording of a soldier on a stretcher, his left arm in a thick bandage and scorch marks on his uniform. His face was partially bandaged and he could only see out of one eye.

"Sergeant Horn, you were part of the gate defense force?" the reporter asked.

"We couldn't stop it," the soldier said, almost incoherently. "It took out the Abrams before we even knew it was there, it was blowing up everything in sight! It took three mines and it didn't stop it, it just kept coming!"

"We have further reports that an attempt to deliver strategic nuclear weapons was unsuccessful," the reporter said, again live. "Orders to prepare for a strike were issued and we were warned, then nothing.

Heavy fire could be seen from the direction of the gate and it apparently intercepted and destroyed the incoming nuclear rounds. As I said, at this point it looks as if nothing can stop the Titcher. This is Bruce Gelinas, in Woodmere, Ohio."

"Thank you for that . . . disturbing report, Bruce," the anchorwoman said. "Breakouts are reported at all of the formerly inactive bosons, ranging from Georgia to Canada. In addition to Titcher attacks, the gate in Oakdale, Kentucky, appears to be sending out Mreee soldiers and some sort of giant, silver spiders.

We go now to Erik Kittlelsen who is reporting, live, from near the front lines. Erik?"

"We're live in Oakdale, Kentucky," the reporter shouted at the microphone just as an explosion occurred, very close, in the background. "I'm with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 149th Infantry Battalion of the Kentucky National Guard!" He looked over his shoulder at the wall of earth behind him and then back at the camera. "The attackers here seem to be Mreee and what the military now believes to be Nitch, the giant spider species we had previously only heard about from the Mreee. It's clear, now, that the Mreee were allies of the Titcher all along!"

"Erik, we're getting some very disturbing reports from other defenders," the anchorwoman said. "How are things, there?"

"Not good, Roberta," the reporter shouted, then hit the ground as an enormous explosion occurred close enough that the flash could be seen even with the camera pointed at the wall of the trench. In a moment he was back up again, though, and the camera was back on him. "The Mreee and the Nitch are using some sort of homing explosive round. Even if they appear to be missing, the round tracks in on our combat vehicles and bunkers! Infantry are doing better but not much. And they have antiair and antiartillery support from some sort of Titcher weaponry. They're holding them to a perimeter for the time being, but more of the Mreee and Nitch are pouring through the gate and the gate is on a hilltop, they can drop fire on our lines and it's hard to even get a head up with all the . . ."

The screen went blank then showed the anchorwoman again.

"We appear to be having some technical difficulties," the woman said. "We'll try to get Erik back as soon as possible."

"Not this side of the grave." Miller grunted, setting down his beer.

"No," Bill said, through steepled fingers.

They were alone in the physics trailer at the anomaly site. The SEAL was wearing a skin-tight jumpsuit,and Weaver fatigues. Bill looked up at the SEAL and shook his head.

"You smell like a goat," Bill commented.

"It's your fault," Miller replied, noncommittally. "What are you going to do?"

"Why does everyone want to know whatI'm going to do?" Weaver replied, angrily.

"Because you're always the man with the plan," Miller explained, shrugging, and taking another sip of his beer. "So . . . what are you going to do?"

"By the time we create enough quarks to matter, we won't be able to get to any of the gates," Bill said, thoughtfully. "Even if we were set up in Savannah already. Which we're not. And we can't knock back any of the assaults with nukes, because we've exhausted half our subs firing into them to no effect.

Something the news guys apparently haven't found out. But there is one bright spot."

"What?"

"We know that with the right technology, SDI works," Bill said, still in a thoughtful tone.

"Very funny."

"I think there's only one thing to do," Bill said, sitting back.

"And that is?"

"Beg."

"Beg the Titcher to not kill us?" Miller asked. "I don't think that's gonna work."

"No, beg for help," Weaver replied, pulling out his cell phone. The charge was low; he'd forgotten to charge it up last night. He hoped it would last long enough. "First I'm gonna beg for an airplane. A few.

One for me, one or more for you."

"Why?"

"I'm going to France. You're going to Kentucky."

"I think I'm getting the better deal," Miller said, watching the world end, live.

"We need Tchar," Bill said, striding through the Adar gate with Admiral Avery. "Even more important, we need that artass guy."

"You don't speak directly to him," Avery pointed out. "That's important. If he's not available we can't even ask where he is."

"We need somebody like him," Bill replied. "Somebody who can make policy decisions."

"We get what we get," Avery said.

Avery spoke to one of the Adar guards on the gate and was directed to the meeting hall where theywere directed to sit in one of the cubicles.

"Our world's dying while we sit here," Bill pointed out.

"I know that as well as you do, Doctor," the admiral replied, tartly, and Bill remembered that he had started off life as a "nuke," working the ballistic submarine fleet. His remarkable ability at languages had been put to use later. The admiral, in his own way, was a warrior, a man who had carried a key that could lead to the extermination of millions of lives and who had run the risk on every deployment of having to use it.

"But," the admiral added, more thoughtfully, "the longer we sit here, I suspect, the better."

"Why?" Bill asked.

"If we'd been received immediately, we would have gotten, at most, Tchar," the admiral said. "If we're being kept waiting it's because someone whocan discuss policy is being summoned and briefed."

Bill shrugged, then pulled out a calculator and started tapping keys.

It had been a four-hour ride from McCoy to France in another F-15. Bill was logging up some serious hours in that jet at this point. Then a brief ride by helicopter; one had been waiting with the rotors already turning when he landed. By the time he got to the gate, the news had worsened. Huge areas around the gates had been opened by the Titcher and, in those where the areas were in view from a safe distance, the Titcher "fungus" was already spreading. Even if he closed the gates, it might be too late to save the world.

Finally, after an interminable wait that turned out to be all of twenty minutes, another Adar came to the cubicle and waved for them to follow. They were taken to the same meeting room that had been used during their previous, less hurried, visit. Tchar was waiting for them and so, to Bill's relief, was the unnamed artass.

"Tchar," Bill said, inclining his head.

Tchar spoke hurriedly to the admiral, who shook his head.

"They've already been informed of the breakout," Avery translated. "They ask if you think it's possible to stop the Titcher."

"I'm not the Army Chief of Staff," Bill replied. "But the frank answer is: no."

"Why then are you here?" Avery translated. "Do you seek shelter for your people? Our foods cannot be mutually consumed. There is no way that we can support many of you on this side. If you, yourself, and a few others wish to flee, that can be granted."

"No," Bill said, "I've come for help. I have spoken to God, as you told me to, and he has told me that there is a way to break the gates. But it requires a large amount of quarks, free quarks. We have figured out a way to produce them, but not enough and not in time. I am hoping that you have such a way, such a weapon. I think you do."

"And if you get such a weapon, even supposing we have it, what would you do with it?" Tchar asked. "There is one gate I believe possible to retake," Bill answered. "I would use it on that gate. It should shatter the entire fractal, if the math is right. At the very least it will shut all the gates, giving us time to retake them and set up more effective defenses at each. But, again, my understanding is that it will turn them off, perhaps more."

The artass suddenly leaned forward, examining Bill with the single eye in his forehead. He peered at him for a moment, then spoke.

"You say you have spoken to God," Avery translated. "What did he say."

"To cut matter to the smallest form it becomes, when it will no longer cut because it is light, it is water.

That is the secret of the gates," Bill answered, staring back.

"And if I told you we had tried this method and failed?" the artass asked.

"I'd say you didn't use enough," Bill replied. He turned back to Tchar and nodded. "I think I should add something. When the Titcher take our planet, they will gain access to the bosons already generated and the boson generator. That meansany bosons you make will be potential gates. You could find yourself in the same predicament we are."

Tchar didn't answer, just sat looking at Avery. Nor did he turn his head to the artass.

"Please," Bill said, looking at the artass, now. "In the name of all that is holy, in the name of God, please.

Help us."

The artass looked at him out of both side eyes then said a word.

"I don't recognize that one," Avery said. "Artune a das?There are some similarities to other words.

Destroyer of Small Things?"

"There is a device," Tchar said, abruptly standing up. "Come with me."

He led them out of the building to a rank of small cars, somewhat like golf carts. All four piled in one and then he put it in gear.

Bill had previously seen the Adar drive but had never been in any of their vehicles. The thing looked like a golf cart and was open on all sides but it drove like a Ferrari. He held on for dear life as Tchar, who apparently considered this no more than normal, rocketed across the compound and around a series of buildings. Pedestrians, clearly, did not have the right of way and he nearly smashed some poor human that had never heard of Adar driving techniques.

They stopped at the base of the mountains that half ringed the site where there was an open corridor leading into the mountain.

Tchar and the artass led the way; the guards at the entrance, which had the sort of blast doors Bill had only seen at a very few military installations, stood aside at their approach, saluting cross armed in the Adar way.

"I would be delighted to figure out who the artass is," Avery whispered as they strode down the tile-lined corridor. It was sloped downward, with several doglegs, heading deep into the bowels of the mountain. "I am K'Tar'Daoon," the artass said in very clear English. "The Unitary Council is composed of nine members, each with their own separate area of responsibility. We do not break it out the same way that you humans do. I would be something like your secretary of high technology defense. I am currently the rotating head of the Unitary Council."

"Holy crap," Bill whispered, then realized that the question had not been translated. "Sorry."

"You said that you spoke to God," the artass replied. "And I sensed no lie in you. You are a fortunate man to have been able to speak to God, twice. Such a person does not deserve to die at the hands of the Titcher." He paused in front of a blast door and made a complicated hand gesture. "On the other hand, the philosopher/scientist Edroon pointed out that alliances are based upon mutual need as well as friendship. Your point about the Titcher taking your planet was well timed." There were guards in front of this door, as well, and Bill considered them to be nervous. It was hard to read body language among an alien species, but they didn't look very happy.

The artass placed a hand on a pad and then leaned his forehead on a curved plate. This placed his center eye against the plate and Bill suspected something like a retina scan was being conducted. As the artass leaned back the door swung ponderously open.

It was not, by any stretch of the imagination, the last door to be accessed. There were a total of four, the last requiring that two more Adar, who were awaiting them, give their identity and approval.

When the last door was opened it revealed a small room with shelves along one wall. There were several devices on the shelves, including one long line of what looked like small artillery shells. On the opposite wall was a vault which the artass opened by a combination. It was the first nonelectronic security device Bill had seen.

The artass pulled a box from the vault and then closed it. But Bill got a glimpse in the vault and saw that there were two more. The vault was, otherwise, empty.

The two stranger Adar were standing to one side as the artass came out with the box. They, too, looked strangely nervous, turning their head from side to side to watch the box that the artass carried, with apparent indifference, by one of two handles placed at either end.

The box was about a half a meter long, a quarter meter deep and wide, and colored a rather pleasant shade of violet. It appeared to be made from plastic or carbon fiber. On the top were a series of symbols and some readouts.

"I will brief you carefully upon the use of this device," the artass said. "Then I will carry it to the far side of our mutual gate. After that what you do with it will be up to you."

"Yes, sir," Bill said, eying the box warily.

"This is an ardune," the artass said. "The ardune requires a period of time to become useable." He pressed a key and a bar on the top of it outlined in blue and began slowly flashing. "It will require half a cycle, some fifteen of your hours, for it to become fully useable."

"Fifteen hours," Bill said, looking at his watch. "Got it."

"Each ardune uses a different initiator key," the artass said, pointing to the symbols. Bill noted that there were fifteen, three rows of five. "In this case, you press these five," the artass continued, not actuallytouching the keys. "When you do, this indicator begins to blink," he said, pointing to a readout that was, at the moment, quite dead. "You press this key and it increments up in time. It is in our sadeen which is about two thirds of your seconds."

"Okay," Bill said.

"It only increments to thirty sadeen," the artass continued. "Twenty of your seconds."

"Okay," Bill said, his stomach clenching.

"You then have to input the code again. You have thirty sadeen to reinput the code, after which the counter resets and you have to start all over again. When you complete the second input, the countdown starts."

"Okay," Bill said, breathing out. "Can I input all but the last key as long as I don't go over the thirty sadeen?"