Major Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov felt her world had turned upside down from darkness into light. Her therapy at Dr. Arthur Adler's facility had done wonders for her nervous anxiety and despair and helped her recover from her shell-shock breakdown, and she was filled to the brim with gratitude and happiness, the weight of the world off her shoulders. Right then she saw Tanya, the person who had done more for her than anyone else in her life, who had given her incredible emotional intensity, more highs and lows than a normal person could have ever felt, and saved her life more times than she could count, so she rushed to her with feelings of profound affection, love and freedom. She hugged her, she kissed her, her heart overflowing with love.

And then everything went to hell. Tanya suddenly broke apart, with agonized tears, began sobbing in a way Visha had never seen before in anyone, much less her stoical commander, a tortured look on her face. Then she stiffened and collapsed in her arms.

"Help me! Help me!", Visha started to scream at the front desk of the facility. "Please, for God's sake, someone help me!," she yelled, tears now streaming down her face, as nurses, then doctors came running. They told Visha to set her down on the floor until a gurney arrived, and she refused. She could not, would not let her go. Then they asked her to wait in the waiting room as the doctors and healing mages attended to Tanya, and she refused that as well, the look on her face, for these experts in traumatized combat soldiers, was of extreme danger if someone were to try and interfere with her. So they let her come along.

A senior healing mage later said that Tanya was in a deep coma, then asked if she had any recent head injuries, concussions or other serious health problems. Of course Visha didn't know, but thinking quickly she spotted Tanya's driver outside, called him inside and told him the situation and asked him. He didn't know but she had a medical appointment in Fiena recently that lasted several days. One of the doctors then called Dr. Dreuf in Fiena to make an inquiry, as he knew most of the physicians in the city.

Since there was nothing more she could do there for a while, Visha asked the driver to take her to the nearest military base in the area, which turned out to be that of a Feldgendarmerie (Military Police) company. They were taken aback by this very determined, bristling with intensity, combat mage Major, who demanded a high security international phone line. It took several hours for a connection to be made to the East Afrian colony, but once she had been connected to a divisional command there, only a few minutes to get connected to the Island of Mazotte. The night duty officer in Mazotte ran to Lieutenant Colonel Weiss's quarters to wake him, and Weiss ran back to the duty office in his underwear, untied boots, and carrying his rifle.

Major Serebryakov told him that Colonel Degurechaff had collapsed in Berun of an unknown cause, and that as such he was in command, and that was all she needed to say. Within an hour, Mazotte was on high alert and was unapproachable either from the sea or the air. Major Koenig, with his fresh "dueling scar" from the assassin's bullet on his face, that he refused to let healers mend for honors' sake, just knew that it was another Russyan assassination attempt on the Colonel, and Lieutenant Colonel Weiss had to be very clear that the Legion would not act on guesses and without orders. However, he quickly organized and dispatched a security team to Berun.

But in the time it took Visha to make that very brief phone call to Mazotte, Dr. Marta Dreuf, who had been attending a medical conference in Berun, had called her office in Fiena to let her father know she was soon to be coming home, only to be told to "stop by Dr. Adler's facility, as they might have a patient of ours there, a very important one." Before she left the conference, she made it a point to ask another conferee, Dr. Otis Rank, to join her. Though done because he was part of their select group, it was a wise choice as he was a top expert in brain damage and trauma.

Their arrival at the Adler facility was distracting, because after finding out who the patient was, Dr. Marta Dreuf started issuing orders to the doctors, that though Tanya was in a coma in a bed, that she was a highly dangerous individual. Wrist and ankle restraints and a chest strap. And everything about this patient is top security, so all records, all mention of the patient outside the facility were high level classified and all inquiries from outsiders were to be screened through her. Dr. Rank was as surprised as the other doctors there at her pronouncements, until she let everyone know that "this patient is one of the few people who might kill you in her sleep."

During this long interlude, Tanya was dreamlessly sleeping when she woke up to find herself next to the same old bridge on a muddy street, staring at the old door, whose dim sign became brighter, to say "Magisches Theater", but this time there was a second sign, beneath the first, which legibly said "Eintritt Nicht Fur Jeden" (Entrance Not For Everyone). The thought crossed her mind that she was right, that it was the back door for some venue. On impulse she tested the handle and found that it was quite rusted and wouldn't open, whether or not it was locked.

Then the thought crossed her mind that she should go back to her hotel for some important reason, but it was unclear why, and then the thought dawned that she was dreaming. With that thought, everything gained clarity and she felt compelled to examine her hands, front and back. The more she did, in glances, the clearer everything became. And then she woke up in a hospital bed in Dr. Adler's facility. Even with her status when it became clear that she was not actively affecting things with manakenisis, the facility was so crowded with veterans that she had to share a room.

In the other bed in the room with her was an old artillery veteran, a Captain named Fritz Nikolaus. In his '80's, he described himself as a social critic and philosopher, and he told her where she was, and that it was late at night. Tanya quietly listened to him for a while before concluding that he was an enthusistic warmonger who had never fought in a war, with a ridiculous fantasy idea of how noble and fortuitous war was. In discomfort, as his jingoism and racism got progressively more vehement, when he finally ranted about war to eliminate "inferior peoples", Tanya lost her patience.

Not that he would notice it, her demeanor remaining calm, even ice cold. She then told him who she was, "The Argent", the great war hero. At first he was thrilled, but then as she described the inhuman, dehumanizing, filthy, horrible, mind wrenching massacre that war really was, in which there was no honor or dignity or nobility, just industrial savagery, carnage, depravity and defilement, he looked increasingly horrified and embarrassed. Then as punctuation, she passed out and returned to her coma, leaving him unable to reply, or sleep, beginning his long reevaluation of his now shattered beliefs.

The final ten years in the life of Fritz Nikolaus began with books renouncing and critizing his earlier works, and at his literary best to advocate for peace and non-violence. While some civilians lashed out at him in the newspapers, most veterans embraced him as the voice of reason and rationality. He never told anyone about his meeting with The Argent.

Once again finding herself next to that damned old bridge, this time the sign on the door had changed, to read "Entritt Nur Fur Madmen!" (Entrance Only For Madmen), and the old door was slightly ajar. Tanya thought that was just ludicrous, and was just going to walk away, but suddenly she was inside. It was a noisy, smoke filled nightclub smelling of sweat and spilled wine. Men, women, and androgynous people filled it and danced to a jazz band on the stage. She found it to be oppressive and repugnant, and asking a waiter where the exit was, and then yelling the question at him, because he didn't seem to hear, he pointed in a direction. It was the W.C. Opening the door she saw the largest restroom she had ever seen, with endless toilet stall doors.

"Enough!", She yelled. "This delusion or dream is stupid. I'm leaving!" And she woke up in her hospital bed, surrounded by exhausted healing mages. And there, at the foot of her bed were Dr. Siegfried Dreuf and Visha, looking concerned. "What the hell is going on here?", Tanya asked.

"Ah, Colonel. You are feeling well? The best we could tell was that you had what is known as a nervous breakdown. The healers here are very experienced with that, though treatment can consume a lot of mana. In your case, an awful lot of mana. Healing you has exhausted the staff here. So they are getting some time off, and a big bonus in their paycheck." The mages grinned feebly before trodding out.

At that point, Visha interceded by hugging Tanya and crying a bit while stroking her hair, as she was so glad to see her awake again. "I hope you are feeling better, because the general staff has been screaming for you. Some big crisis is brewing, and it's involving several nations, and you and the Legion seem to be the key to solving things. And they won't give out any of the details to me."

"Fine. Get me my uniform. Doctor, if I have your permission to leave, may we exit by the rear entrance?" "Yes, please do. Your security people make the rest of the staff and patients nervous."

Before Tanya could ask, Visha said that Lieutenant Colonel Weiss had dispatched a security rescue team from Mazotte. "Which one? Bear, Wolf or Viper?", asked Tanya. Wolf, replied Visha. Tanya breathed a little easier. Each of the teams was a reflection of their names. Bear was best when someone was trapped inside a building, though the building would be torn apart like a beehive if necessary for the rescue. And Viper would kill everybody but their rescue subject. Wolf was the most disciplined, and would obey orders. But if someone attacked their subject during the rescue, they would be brutal.

Generals Rudersdorf, Zettour, and Colonel Rerugen were present, along with some other top generals and admirals. And Tanya was shocked to see Ildoan and Dominion generals as well. Then Colonel Rerugen introduced an unusual looking Captain of the Empire, a "Hank" Mencken.

"Captain Mencken's family emigrated to the Unified States from the Empire, and he was born there, growing up to be a professional journalist and historian, specializing in political affairs in the Unified States. His family has chosen to return to the Empire once the Unified States began persecuting those who families had come from the nations other than the Commonwealth. He is here today to give the background on the current crises within the Unified States and his estimation that they are soon to make belligerent war in one or more directions."

"Greetings and welcome to assembled officers from the Empire and our allies from the Dominion and Ildoa. The problems in the Unified States began about the turn of the century with a philosophical split between the aggressive nationalists and the aggressive internationalists. The nationalist leader's family had originally emigrated from the Empire, and he was a strong believer in the works of Fritz Nikolaus, to the point of translating his works into the native tongue and plagiarizing it to use in campaign speeches. The internationalist leader's fascination was with worldwide communism, though he couched his beliefs in a more politically acceptable manner."

"For most of the time the nationalist party dominated, but then a series of crises, a decade long drought and the collapse of their economy forced the nationalists from power. The last nationalist president, named Booster, tried to restore their economy with overproduction in areas not hit by the drought and selling grain to other countries, which led to widespread domestic food shortage amid deflation. But it was not enough. Soon food riots, then racial and religious riots were happening everywhere."

"It did not help that two years before the election, his internationalist opponent, named Olfrank, caught an unknown disease called a "brain fever". He survived, but it left him deeply paranoid, subject to rages, and utterly hateful of racial and religious minorities, convinced that he needed a new form of internationalist communism to rule the world. At the same time, he was able to speak to the people with a dynamism and charisma that could not be matched by Booster. He and his party won in a landslide, the last election that was held in the Unified States as he effectively became a dictator."

"His first act was to order the deportation of all the Afrians whose ancestors had been brought to the Unified States as slaves a long time before. The harsh economic times and the starvation made them more than willing to leave, though not knowing they were to be left in poverty stricken West Afria rather than the more prosperous East and South. To accomplish this, he created an army of mostly criminals taken from prisons, who were outfitted in green shirts and pants, called "Green Rangers" to convey the Afrians to the ports, because all commercial ships had been requisitioned, though many were not sea worthy. Many died enroute and after their arrival, but in the mind of Olfrank it was a success, to be rid of them."

"Following that, he ordered that all the itinerant workers, and even citizens, that had come north from New Ispagna, the nation just south of the Unified States, be forced home. This was not as gentle, as many of them were prosperous, and their wealth, great or small was confiscated. They were often arrested at home or work or school at gunpoint by Green Rangers, and while they were unceremoniously put across the border and told to not come back or be shot, other rangers would loot their homes and property, making the green ranger organization wealthy and powerful. There was even a suggestion that at one point a train carrying them south was intentionally filled with poison gas."

"Now Olfrank's attention has turned to oppressing those who came from the Empire, the Kingdom of Ildoa, and the Akitsushima Dominion. And this oppression has been brutal so far, with those of the Empire and Ildoa moved to a giant camp in a swamp in the most southeastern state and those from the Dominion moved to an enormous camp in the desert of its southwestern coast state. This has been done at the same time as an unparalleled military build up."

"This last part is particularly disturbing. This build up is clearly with the intention of large scale invasion. Many adult men are being conscripted and sent to giant training camps, boys and girls are put into political indoctrination and military training camps. Adult women are working almost as slave laborers in military oriented industrial plants, which have been nationalized, as has most other industries and businesses. All the money at the state and local levels goes through trusted party members."

At this point, Captain Mencken ceded control of the lecturn to a Colonel from the Dominion who seemed to be both distraught and enraged.

"President Olfrank outlawed peace movements, calling them espionage tools of foreign powers, and ordered the arrest of peace movement leaders. A prominent and esteemed elderly priest from the Dominion was visiting to speak before a peace rally, when in front of witnesses, he was arrested, savagely beaten by Green Rangers, and when the crowd tried to save him, it was seen that they injected him with poison and threw him into one of their green euthanasia vans, before opening fire on the crowd to make their escape, killing several. This was the first confirmed case of murder by injection that had long been alleged for political prisoners and those that resisted the Olfrank regime. It was later confirmed that his body was seen after being thrown in a mass grave."

"When the Dominion Ambassador made his official protest, the Unified States Minister of State actually slapped him across the face hard enough to break his nose, and demanded that the Dominion embassy close and its personnel leave the Unified States immediately. Shortly thereafter similar orders were received at the embassies of the Ildoan Kingdom and the Empire. And unexpectedly by the embassy of New Ispagna, the nation south of the Unified States."

"The level of sorrow and rage in the Dominion is hard to describe. A large shrine has been built to honor the priest in a park adjacent to the Imperial Palace. On a national day of mourning, the Emperor left his palace, and in front of a great but absolutely silent crowd walked to the shrine, and bowed his head before offering a prayer for the priest and his nation. From that moment, conscription in our military ended, as the military has been overwhelmed with volunteers."

He then offered the floor to the officer of the Kingdom of Ildoa.

"Our intelligence service has been hard at work, in cooperation with the Empire and the Dominion, to quantify the Unified States military build up. They have been working around the clock to build aircraft carriers, battleships, cruisers, destroyers, submarines, support and troop ships, advanced bombers and fighter aircraft, and what are believed to be rockets with ramjet engines. For their ground forces they are emphasizing quantity over quality in tanks, tracked vehicles and trucks."

"Importantly, they have created what our scientists are calling "mana bombs", roughly based on the blast that wiped out one of their facilities. Fortunately they are large and unwieldy at a hundred pounds, so would have to be prepositioned prior to use. Some of our agents gave their lives to discover that the two bombs they have made have been placed underneath the concentration camps in their southeast and southwest. Their purpose is that if any of our three countries fight against them in the future, or try to rescue what can now be called the hostages in those camps, these bombs will be detonated, killing tens of thousands of civilians kept there and crippling our morale."

"Also, they have developed a ground based, anti-mage area weapon that will neutralize enough of the flight mage's mana that they will have to land so that they can be captured by ordinary soldiers or police. It does have some serious range and rate of fire problems, limiting it to one use every twenty seconds, and a maximum altitude of two thousand feet. Any higher than that and it will either just impair the mage somewhat, but they will still be able to fly, or recover enough mana before they land to continue to fly."

"In any event, we have assembled packets about all of these and other new weapons and what we know about them, which will be distributed here. But time is of the essense, as we don't know what the Unified States and the Olfrank regime are planning. So information about that is priority, as well as any other information you decide to share."

After the initial meeting was over, Tanya went to a separate meeting just for Imperial general staff officers. Generals Rudersdorf and Zettour, and Colonel Rerugen, as well as Captain Mencken were in attendance. General Rudersdorf was the first to speak. "Allegedly, even Chairman Joe thinks that Olfrank is deranged, if not outright insane. The Chairman approached Olfrank about a non-aggression treaty only to be cursed at and called a weakling and a coward. This led the Chairman, who is a serious atheist, to say that Olfrank 'must have been cursed by God to be made that much of a madman.'"

Tanya just quietly curled her lip.

He picked up a cigar, then set it down, saying that "My doctor says I need to quit these or they'll kill me." Then general Zettour responded by saying, "My doctor would not say such a thing. I think he hates me," said with a snort of laughter all around. Then Rudersdorf said to the assembled, "What are your initial thoughts?"

Zettour and Rerugen both deferred, so he asked the question to "Colonel Degurechaff?" She said until she could get a lot of information, she would have to defer on actual strategy, however, she wanted to know what goals they wanted to achieve. "First, to rescue the hostages? Second to reduce the military might of the Unified States? Third to decapitate the Olfrank regime?" She paused before adding the fourth possible goal. "And fourth, to do so in such a way as to limit our future animosity with subsequent regimes that rule that nation?"

This caught Rudersdorf's attention, so he asked her about the fourth goal. "Well, general, looking at Unified States history, president Olfrank is a major anomaly. We should not assume that their future regimes will be so deranged. Right now, in the world, the Unified States and the Russy Federation are the most dangerous regimes from the Empire's point of view. And fortunately they are not on the best of terms. So what if we make the effort, the Unified States were persuaded that this or these attacks were perpetrated by the Russy Federation? To have your two worst threats in bitter contention is not necessarily a bad thing."

All the general staff officers as well as Captain Mencken appreciated the idea. At that point, Tanya had already concocted a scheme, but in addition to Russy uniforms it would need some unusual special items that could only be produced by Dr. Schugel. Russy style flying gear was the least of it. She needed flying gear with its own mana source, that could be used to fly by non-mages, like they were mages.

Since the higher ranking officers were wrapped up in thought, she excused herself. Visha was waiting for her outside, and they were surrounded by the Wolf team, acting in pack fashion. So Tanya called over the head of the team, told him that the team were relieved of guard duty and job well done, and to return to Mazotte, with an important message for Lieutenant Colonel Weiss, on a folded piece of paper. Little did he know that it instructed Weiss to carry out intensive martial arts and anti-ship training for the Legion for the next month. Tanya wanted everyone to be in tip top armed and unarmed ground fighting condition.

Next, Tanya went to the Dominion embassy, to get a few months of intelligence data and speak to their naval branch. Right after, she went to the intelligence ministry to get the list of known Russy spies operating in the Unified States, from the journalist paid to keep a close watch on such things, because he was going to be a useful part of her plan. She also picked up maps, diagrams and charts, and a guide to the Russyan language.

Then after dropping off items at her office, Tanya asked Visha to join her for a trip to the Ildoan embassy, that only after they had arrived was it clear that they were there for dinner. The embassy was prepared with a banquet, and Visha knew that Tanya had somehow let the Ildoans know to the minute when they would arrive. And once again Visha could barely taste a bite without going on about how very delicious it was, and how the chefs were maestri, while they were blushing at her complements. When finding something truly delicious beyond compare, she would lapse into Russyan. And sipping her coffee, Tanya enjoyed the back and forth between Visha and the chefs, knowing that all would be satisfied and happy that evening.

The next day was the trip to get to Dr. Schugel's installation, to have the longest discussion the two of them ever had. After they had reached an agreement of what was needed and when, she produced an outsized cheque for him from her personal funds, as it would have taken too long to get it from the economics ministry, and he would need lots of extra production staff in a hurry. Then off to the Naval ministry with the odd request of a brigade of skilled warrant officers and able seamen, both with some very specific training. They were the first to get even a brief synopsis of her grand scheme, appropriately called "Operation Grand Slam", and were very supportive of the naval side, and would definitely attend the full presentation at the general staff headquarters later.

Grand scale, flashy business presentations were an absolute must even for giant corporations unveiling a new product on Tanya's old world. But here, business presentations were still small, subdued meetings filled with dry statistics and number crunching, typically boring to the point where nobody wanted to attend. So when it came time to make her presentation, Tanya went big. A theater projection screen both for film made by various spies in the Unified States, and Tanya's own amazing new invention, for which she had a prototype commissioned, a carousel slide projector.

At one time while walking through Berun, Tanya had chanced on the Imperial Patent Office (Kaiserliches Patentamt), and since then had taken out no fewer than 126 patents, and this was one of them. And besides her presentation, every officer who was there decided they had to have a slide projector, no matter the cost. The royalties from patent leases went to her numbered bank account in Waldstatte, kept with the substantial amount of gold she had picked up along the way.

Since giving such a huge presentation takes at least a day, Tanya had arranged a lunch break in the mess, catered by a team of Ildoan chefs, the "piece de resistance", at Tanya's suggestion, was an exotic Ildoan dish never before served in the Empire, called "pizza", which came in any number of variations and was itself a big hit.

It was late afternoon by the time Tanya's presentation was finished. And instead of immediately taking questions, she asked attendees to confer among themselves in their specialty, with cross conferencing encouraged, and then to reconvene after an hour for the big questions. Then the following day, if her plan was agreeable, only a single individual from each group would act as the liaison there, so that their group could get to work, yet still interact with other groups until the plan was formalized.

The technique worked well, speeding up the timetable, a very good thing, because word came through from spies in the Unified States that its military was undergoing preparations for a massive invasion of New Ispagna. President Olfrank had held a conference some months before on Antelope Island, a lake island in the western Unified States, that the Unified States army would invade from the north over land, while warships from the east and west coasts, filled with soldiers, would land in a grand pincher movement in the south of New Ispagna. Behind the soldiers were "elite" brigades of Green Rangers whose purpose was to exterminate all the civilians in captured territories. At the conference, President Olfrank spent a lot of time dehumanizing and damning the New Ispagnians as vermin and worse. While some of those there personally objected, nobody said anything nor showed any sign of disapproval, lest they be "tossed in the green van."

Addressing each brigade from her Legion separately, Tanya apologized for the mission requirement that they wear authentic looking Russy uniforms and gear. "I know this must make many of you distressed to have to wear these uniforms and equipment, but it is vital that it be done this way. By all appearances the enemy must think we are Russy personnel, which means on mission if you can't say it in Russy, you probably shouldn't say it. Of course if it is an emergency, speak as you must."

"With all seriousness let me say that anyone who is captured will likely be tortured and murdered. Take this into account when dealing with enemy combatants. If you are downed, you may have to rely on your close combat skills, and escape and evade until you can fly again. While your safety is first, remember that there are a large number of civilians depending on you to save their lives."

Her briefings to all the special purpose units varied a lot, including spot inspections of equipment and training. She felt comfortable with her commanders in the legion, and especially Visha, who would be directing a critical operation while appearing to be a mere translator, working under a large and fearsome looking NCO playing the part of a Russy general.

The Marine mages had improved a lot since she saw them last. Their insignia had been changed by adding double cutlasses, symbolizing their mastery of both capturing enemy ships and defending friendly ships. Some brutal training involved, Tanya had heard, alongside enthusiastic Dominion Marine mages. They likely had the most combat operations to perform in the plan. Tanya was also sure to let the Empire Marine mages know that they were fortunate to be carrying out just east coast operations, for if they were with the Dominion mages and they found some Green Rangers, "It might offend your delicate sensibilities." This gave them a good laugh, but on reflection they became thoughtful.

Tanya was soon provided a copy of the Dominion plan to read at their embassy, and after just a few pages was impressed by its clarity and order. Flipping back to the title page she was not surprised to see the names of Admiral Yamatoro, but also the name of his subordinate in charge of the army, one General Hideki Joto, who was an early adopter of Tanya's war philosophy. The best Tanya could tell, their plan was solid. It wasn't possible to move all the Dominion hostages directly to the coast, so knowing that New Ispagna would be chaotic because of the invasion, but not near them, they figured on first taking them south across the border, and then to the coast, at a more relaxed pace. Tanya was also impressed with their effective deployment of submarines on both coasts to serve several important roles.

A major problem that had come to light during the war with the Legadonia Entente Alliance and the Francois Republic was that the transatlantic cable passed through the Commonwealth en route to the Unified States, and they were more than willing to add or delete messages as well as to insert their own propaganda. So in the States, even though the Empire had been invaded, they were depicted as the villains. But it also meant they couldn't even talk with their own embassy without using an elaborate and dynamic coding scheme. So long term plans were made to overcome this handicap.

Now that the Empire had achieved secure communications with its colony, the Dominion, the Kingdom of Ildoa, and their military forces wherever they were, it was possible, in a new, high security building in Berun, to make a war room used by all three powers at once. Here would be the true conductor of the symphony.

However, just about everywhere there was a perpetual problem in maintaining security, that of infiltration from an unexpected source, communist volunteers. While not Russyans, they philosophically believed in the idealitic fanaticism of communism, and were more than willing to go to any length to betray their nations to further its terrible goals, thus they were aligned with the Russy Federation. However, its near invisible pervasiveness forced all other countries to maintain hearty counterintelligence efforts in those places most vulnerable to infiltration.

With considerable irony, the nation with likely the worst unchecked infestation of treacherous communists was the authoritarian communist regime of the Unified States. Olfrank's embrace of his own version of communism, and bringing his variety of true believers into the highest levels of government, yet disdaining the Russy version, meant that it was impossible for his counterintelligence forces to distinguish between the two, the loyal communists and the treasonous ones.

And yet, even before his regime had obtained power, Tanya's efforts had charted and infiltrated the Russyan-backing infiltrators, at least enough to feed them false, but correct ideological orders from Chairman Joe. A single journalist who was secretly employed by the Empire, had managed to penetrate the network of Russy supporting infiltrators, and become a trusted part of their leadership. Far too valuable to use casually, he kept the Empire's intelligence branch up to date on everything communist in the Unified States. And he was going to carry out a subtle scheme once "operation grand slam" was taking place, to insure the Unified States communists believed the Russyan communists were behind it all, and the Russyan-supporters would subtly back the attack, not knowing otherwise.

At one point, in contemplating his success, Tanya had remembered a line from a movie she had seen in her former life. That "This person, this traitor, will be worth more to us than ten legions of Sardaukar!" And yes, while not a perfect analogy, it gave her a wry smile for a while.

And she was reminded of this again, when he came through when he came through with a very important piece of intelligence, from Olfrank's inner circle. That Olfrank had lost confidence in the leadership of the Green Rangers, whose power and wealth had grown so much he suspected that they would soon seek to overthrow him. So after the invasion of New Ispagna, he intended to exterminate their leadership and seize their wealth. And if the invasion had any problems, or if the foreigners in the camps had to be incinerated, it would be blamed on them.

To carry this out, he had ordered the creating of an elite unit, recruited from the army, of a very loyal Praetorian Guard, answering only to his chief of finance. Unlike the criminals and street thugs of the Green Rangers, a requirement to belong to this "Protection Squadron" was that they had a minimum of a Master's degree, a high level of physical fitness, and swore an oath of loyalty just to President Olfrank. After their creation, Olfrank divided the Protection Squadron in two. The larger part was to be a combat group independent of the army command, taking orders from the finance branch and directly from the Green House, the home of Presidents of the Unified States and now Olfrank for as long as he wanted it. The smaller part of the Squadron, who despite their education were determined to have psychopathic tendencies, were to replace the Green Rangers who had been tasked with exterminating captured New Ispagnians.

Olfrank pitched this to the Green Rangers that it was far more important for them to defend the homeland from the increasing threat of traitors within when its forces were out of the country, a ruse they accepted at face value. He even offered them more latitude to torture and kill dissidents in their giant field barracks prisons around the country.

Meanwhile, a gigantic military base had been built in the most southern state north of the border with New Ispagna. At its center was a tank farm, giant tanks filled with fuel for both ground vehicles and aircraft. To its east and west were a seemingly endless numbers of tanks, mechanized vehicles and artillery. A pipeline went to the north to a great airfield with a thousand each bombers and fighter aircraft, far more advanced than in the rest of the world. Only a few companies of ill trained flight mages, mostly as artillery observers were there, since the government of the Unified States trusted them just a little more than did the Russy Federation. There were only a modest number of infantry as well, in tents on the south side, on either side of the great invasion corridor. The vast majority were in tent cities on either coast, waiting to board the invasion fleets, with warships temporarily modified and stocked to carry more than a hundred thousand soldiers down the coasts of the Unified States and New Ispagna.

Imperial intelligence worked overtime to thoroughly map this military base, and spent many hours trying to calculate how to neutralize it, before it was shown to Colonel Degurechaff. She took it as an assignment and said to them that it would not be a problem. The men standing around her paled, as by their estimates it would take three mechanized armies a week of "knock down, drag out bloodbath", an expression used in the States, to take down a base of over 500 square kilometers. "She must be friends with an archangel with a flaming sword of destruction," said one of the men. "No," said another, "She is one."

Just another assignment for Dr. Schugel, thought Tanya. The trick will be safely transporting it to the target. For his part, Dr. Schugel agreed with Tanya's estimation, but was almost contemptuous of the low level of technology wanted. "It will be ready in a week," he said. "It would be bad to remain in the area," he concluded as an afterthought. That is the understatement of the year, you madman, thought Tanya.

About then, the Yamato and several distanced tramp steamers left Mazotte, heading on a roundabout trip to the east coast of the Unified States, when at about the same time, the Musashi and seven of her sister Yamato-class submarines left the Dominion.

In an idle time some years before, Tanya had seen fit to visit the Imperial Berun Library on Unter den Linden, and much to her surprise and happiness many of the great classic works of literature from her old world existed there as well. Even the works of Shakespeare were intact, for the most part, with some differences. She only had the time to read Julius Caesar, which she knew well, and thought about using some key phrases when addressing her soldiers. She figured that this was one of those times.

Operation Grand Slam had officially begun. Never before had such a grand military plan come into play. Whereas the campaign at Cannae, the Battle of Austerlitz, the Battle of Gettysburg, and Operation Revolving Door had all earned chapters in the history books, if Operation Grand Slam was a success, it would rewrite the history of war completely.

Though the Commonwealth military had been substantially reduced by their new government, even they could tell from the encrypted traffic that something major was happening. They knew of the impending invasion of New Ispagna. It was hard not to. But they couldn't figure out why parts of the Imperial army were very noisy, yet other parts, and the Imperial navy, just had routine communications traffic. Their conclusion was that the Empire just wanted to see how the army of the Unified States performed in the field, though not to take an active part in that war. But this was an essential part of the scheme, from the point of view of the Empire, using a system that they knew was monitored for low volume, unimportant traffic, and their new, highly secure means of communication for the very high volume of real data. This meant that long after the war, they could assure other nations that the Empire had just remained neutral.

In the Green House over the last week, President Olfrank had been in almost a constant state of rage. He could no longer control his feelings of hatred at his subordinates, his nation, just everyone, that they had failed him, that they conspired against him and laughed at him behind his back, and that they were all traitors who should be shot. That, and the agonizing headaches that forced him to take drugs, though they did little for the pain or the frequency, they allowed him to issue orders. His aides knew that if they were to quit his service, they would be tossed on a green van within an hour, so they lived in terrible fear for themselves and their families.

The only thing that truly helped was that he knew that the moment he gave the order, the invasion of New Ispagna would begin. With its success all of his problems would be over, he would again be beloved by his people, and remembered forever as a national hero. Just then, after he had gone to the restroom and was washing his hands and face, a truly blistering headache hit. It was so fierce that it caused capillaries to burst in his left eye, turning its white bright red. After he shouted in pain, he screamed "Why do they hate me, damn them!"

One of his two aides standing near him made the wrong choice of offering the president a towel. Momentarily confused he thought it was an assassination attempt, pulled out his handgun and fired it at the face of his aide, instantly killing him. The other aide was about to say something, then had the red in the face, red eyed president point the pistol at him, yelling "Go ahead! Say the wrong thing!"

"I was about to say, sir, would you like me clean that up?", pointing to the dead aide on the floor. He mumbled "yes" and walked out. Back in his office, President Olfrank picked up his phone, pushed a button to connect him to the headquarters of the Protection Squadron, and issued an order code named "End of Green". When asked to authenticate, he used the word "Hummingbird", and hung up the phone.

The plan of the purge of the Green Rangers had recently been expanded to include all of them. It began in the early night and before the night was over, all their funds had been confiscated, the officers were arrested then executed in their cells, and the various barracks of the Green Rangers around the Unified States, and their enlisted men, had been burned by flame throwers. Within a few days, there were almost no survivors. While there were no public displays of celebration at the end of the hated oppressors, there was no mourning, either.

The captain of the Yamato and his crew were very experienced, and had even trained in the tight confines of fjords without a scratch on their hull, but after leaving the tramp steamers down the coast, they continued north until they had entered the Chesapeake Bay cautiously, watching for submarines, surface ships, and anything else, especially hostile actions. Once in position, they turned about, then slowly lowered themselves into the mud of the bay and tried to be as quiet as possible.

They had about a day to wait, time Major Serebryakov spent with her team refreshing the plan, checking uniforms and equipment, as well as very rehearsed dialogue. Everyone in her team were Russy mages, and very skilled at close armed and unarmed combat. By now they had even gotten used to the idea of calling their official leader General Popov, though Visha was clearly in charge.

When night had set in, the sent up a floating radio antenna and waited for the signal. Within a minute of the appointed time, they got the message.

"Cry 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war." To which they responded "Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once." Message received, mission starts.

The Yamato surfaced. A team of very determined, very deadly flight mages emerged, then as soon as they were assembled, "General Popov" gave a hand signal and they took off. Departure confirmed, the Yamato again submerged and made its way out of the bay and then further south past the tramp steamers, pausing there only to pick up some precious cargo. The mages made a beeline to the Green House, about 32 miles away.

The place was surprisingly quiet. President Olfrank forbade the usual large staff from "prowling around at night", and the security personnel that remained were used to strange noises, even gunshots, that they ignored unless summoned. The late wife of the President had died in an accident he had ordered some years before, and he had no problem with using that tragedy to advance his ambitions. So young children were provided to him so he could satisfy his beastly urges. They were expendable and discarded after to avoid scandal. But this night, even the thought of that made his headache worse, so he told his bed companion to get out. She knew at that point that her life was forfeit.

As the half nude girl clutching her shirt then tried to leave his bed, President Olfrank yelled "traitor!" and pulled a gun from a bedside table, before firing a shot that would have likely killed her except his wrist was suddenly jerked upright with the sound of the bones in his wrist breaking, so the bullet went wide of its mark. The girl then darted out of the room before anyone could think to stop her.

The President of the Unified States then gave off an undignified scream, and a second scream after a very large man in a military uniform, still clutching his broken wrist in his hand, appeared beside him and said something he didn't understand. Then a girl, also in a military uniform, appeared on his other side and translated, with a heavy accent. "President Olfrank, you are now our prisoner. Please do not resist."

"Like hell I won't," he yelled, though his struggles were short lived, as other men appeared, artfully bound his wrists, ankles and legs, and gagged his mouth. Visha left the room before speaking into a radio set provided by one of the men. Her message was simply, "Veni, vidi, vici." The voice on the other end said, "Fly not. Stand still. Ambition's debt is paid."

This told her several things. First that no alarm had been given, so they likely had several more hours before they had to leave. The last phrase meant that "Operation Grand Slam" was continuing on schedule. She returned the radio then reentered the room. General Popov then asked her what the next course of action should be?, and she replied that all was well, to order that he be given the injection of sedative.

After struggling hard on seeing the syringe, which had ended so many lives on his order, President Olfrank was then expected to sleep for the next day. However, after the mages left, the little girl who had run away in fear for her life returned, holding a large kitchen knife.

After having left the Green House as discreetly as they had entered, they landed in a quiet section of the city where a bus was waiting for them. After loading their gear in boxes in the storage compartment, they enjoyed a night drive some 200 miles south for the next phase of the operation to begin. After having some snacks, Visha was so comfortable in the padded seats that she took a long nap.