[djo]

(from the archives of the BSC)

"Straighten up, son," says the colonel, "You've got a proud tradition to uphold", and it's weird, because he's a human, not one of us. But he's a good man, and I look up to him, not just literally. I'm the only bakemono-sho on his staff. Sure, I'm just the company clerk, but I stay by him on the battlefield anyway. Just like the dai bakemono officers.

The sitrep we've been waiting for comes in mid-morning. The courier salutes and delivers his message at speed: "Contact 5 klicks south, estimate reinforced battalion strength, marching double-time; no outriders."

"F$@#ing savages," mutters Col. Karel, from the saddle of his own horse. "Wish we had cavalry." But we don't, so he's in charge of Easy company, 12th regiment--light archers. My company, now part of the Homeland Defense Force.

They come over the hill, two companies of warriors and two companies of jaguars. They don't have any cavalry, or any archers, or any heavy infantry, or much armor at all, for that matter. I frown. The colonel reads my mind. "Remember, son, with jaguars, you have to kill them twice." I know that. We all know that. We've been training for days. "Kill the rat, kill the cat", we chant, because some bakemono can't remember anything unless it rhymes.

"Sir...are they carrying...slings?"

He shakes his head. "They never understood the value of superior firepower. We'll show them." And it begins. Their pagan priest-king howls out some kind of prayer over his troops, and they advance.

G company from the 17th takes their initial charge. It's awful. They're our shock infantry, but they're understrength, and the jags walk all over them, avoiding our blows with uncanny fortune, while their fiery obsidian blades cut down the O bakemono. I almost can't bear to watch. But I hear the colonel yell "Fire!", and two companies of archers let fly. Bolts of fire pass overhead from the artillery somewhere behind us. General Fusamasa leads a battalion of bakemono-sho into battle, and they hold. Arrows rain down, and fire, and the men turn into cats, and the cats die.

But not fast enough. Alpha company eventually breaks, then Bravo, and Charlie, and they're on top of us. Easy gets overrun, and most of them head for the castle. Fire is still pouring in from Dog company and battery B. The jaguars are too stupid to notice they're flanked, and that gives time for a few more to die. I'm standing stock-still, horrified, but the colonel is still beside me firing his bow. I'm trying to get my yari pointed in the right direction when I'm yanked off my feet and dragged to the rear by a big dai bakemono, who beats off one of the cats with his nodachi in his other hand.

Later I learn it was General Kiyomune. He promotes me for standing by the colonel, who went and bought himself a plot of farmland. "A good battle," he tells me. "We stung them. With Snake and the First BEF on their tails, the war may have already turned."

Hard to believe it. They overran us, chased us back through the artillery park into the fortress. You see their campfires out every window of the castle. But maybe there's a moral here. They came at us without arms or armor, nothing but their god's blessing protecting them. We met them with arms, armor, and magic, and just about held out. And our god's just over the next hill. We'll see which one wins out.