CHAPTER 30


   The guy was not exactly someone Bob had expected to see up here but, after a little reflection, he might could understand it. After all, Ian Balfour's main concern seemed to be getting back into Kalean-Erc and that is exactly where Bob was headed. Bob offered the man some coffee and then corrected himself, “or is your drink, Tea?”
Balfour walked up to the command post map table and joined Bob and Ceascu. He easily responded with, “I can make due with American Coffee.”
As it turned out, Bob was not the only one surprised to see Balfour. Ceascu even seemed rather put off by Ian's presence and said as much. Never one to turn  down an exchange of insults with an elf, Ian responded to the commander of the Noveus-Faeyu, “well I knew you guys were trying to clear the roads into Kalean-Erc.” Balfour then pointed to Bob and continued with, “I thought he might actually be able to do it.”
Quintescau pretended as if his professional competency had not just been questioned and replied with, “in fact, we already have cleared the roads all the way to the outskirts of town. My infantry will be moving in and clearing the city in short order.”
Balfour seemed less than impressed with the Elf but, he was a bit confused by what he had just been told. He took the coffee handed him by an American soldier and then he looked to Bob for answers, “how in the hell did you manage that so fast? Every word I got was that there were a lot of Orcs between here and there.”
Bob saw something in Balfour's eyes. He realized something about the man that he had not before. Bob's oversight probably had to do with his basic estimations of Balfour's worth. That basically boiled down to the man being a scum sucking, drug running, ass wipe. Now, Bob realized, Ian Balfour was far from inexperienced when it came to military matters. Bob decided to test that theory. “I threw them a bone.”
Balfour almost laughed before asking, “you did what?”
Bob explained, “They expected us to attack Kaean-Erc so most of their defenses were centered there. I wasn't about to go head to head with that. I needed a meeting engagement so we could use our advantages. That's why I made it look like our main objective was RAF Merlin. Then I left some of our assets hanging in the wind. The Orcs were so busy trying to redeploy and take advantage of our mistake, they walked right over our kill zones and we slaughtered them for it.”
Balfour seemed amused, “you baited them.”
“And got them out in the open where the range and speed of our armor was everything,” Bob shot back in an almost semi hostile tone.
The tone of the American General was interesting to Ian, “so why do you not sound pleased, if I may ask. You just handed those egg suckers the worst spanking they've had in generations.”
“Cause I'm not pleased,” Bob told him point blank. “This trap would have never worked if they were just the stupid animals you people led us to believe.”
“Don't look at me General,” Ian replied in a sarcastic tone, “I never bought  into that shit ether.”
“Whatever,” Bob replied. “It's worse than some racial prejudice here. They know. Their intelligence is better than we could have ever believed.”
That actually broke Quintescau's outward shell and he suddenly became concerned, “I am afraid I do not follow you General Isaacs. How can you possibly deduce that?”
“They've never been this gullible before,” Bob exploded with. “The only reason this worked is because there are Americans under siege at Merlin. They know the troops attacking them are Americans. It was believable that we'd abandon Erc for that. Guys, they know something about our politics. I can only figure out one way they would.”
Balfour noted the evil eye he was getting from the elf and he did not like it, “what? You think I'd sell out my interests? You might take note here Quint, I'm getting bent over and fucked by all this. All cause you ass holes can't see a big attack that's right under your fucking ears.”
“Hey,” Bob growled at his guests, “if we live through this then we can all kill each other like civilized beings. Till then we need to focus.” Bob then assured Ian, “nobody is accusing you of anything. This isn't a case of some flunky selling out a few positions with his secret decoder ring. No matter how the Orcs are gathering intelligence, the point is they understand it. They seem to know a hell of a lot more about us than we do them. We can't have that.”
Ceascu sounded almost humbled when he asked, “so what do we do about it?”
“I'm working on it,” Bob replied. He lied. Bob had no idea how to handle this new revelation and even wondered if it was possible too. He was thinking about that on his flight back to NIKA. The ideas swimming in his head only managed to do one thing, put him to sleep. Bob did not wake up till Patterson was shaking him in his seat and harness.
“Welcome back to NIKA sir,” Sharon told her boss. Then she said, “we have the briefings and the schedule is....”
The words ran through Bob's ears and sounded as unintelligible as someone speaking Fey. Most of the briefings did and, Bob was certain he had nodded off more than once. Then a single word, a name, woke him up so he looked to Sharon and asked, “is Arbuckle here, right now?”
Sharon was a little surprised. The guy was not only a disgusting lush, that stared at her ass too much but, he was also just a footnote on her report. She had debriefed the guy when he was flown down from the north but, he had not reported much of anything that she had not found from other sources. She just shrugged, “yes sir, he is. All he really had to tell us was about what happened at the consulate and...”
“He's above your pay grade captain,” Bob snapped. “Where is he?”
Patterson offered to find out but Bob stopped her. He had a pretty good idea and without so much as a 'dismissed,' to his intelligence staff, he left the briefing room and sought out NIKA's Officer's Club. Sure enough, Bruce Arbuckle was sitting at the bar and nursing a bourbon.
Arbuckle almost laughed at Bob before he took another swig and said, “heard you were banging that reporter chick these days. Glad I wasn't around when Mary found out.”
“It's none of your damn business Bruce,” Bob replied. “I'm not here to talk about my ex, or any of my personal life with you.”
“Surprising,” Arbuckle said as if it were a joke and, Bob supposed, it probably was. Where Phil never sounded like he was telling a joke, even when he was, Arbuckle was the exact opposite. Of course, what Arbuckle said next was not taken as a joke, in even a small way, “is she around? I am assuming that little miss Walsh is safe, with you here to guard her and everything.”
That got Bob's eye brow raised, “what's that supposed to mean? She should have been back home before the Dell got blown.”
“I seriously doubt that Bob,” the NSA officer replied, “I saw her at Phvengs not twelve hours before everything went to shit.” It suddenly dawned on Bruce and  now it was his turn to be surprised, “you didn't even know she was in country, did you?”
Bob was grumbling beneath his breath but, it was not a conversation he wanted to have with this guy. He changed the subject, “I need to redirect some assets.”
Bruce snickered, “so what are you coming to me for? I kind of figured there was no love lost between you and Hammond but.. hey, he's the guy with all the toys here.”
Bob said one word, “flatbed.”
Bruce spit his drink back in his glass, “what the fuck Bob! You know better than to...” When Bob did not respond, Bruce dropped his voice and said, “that's codeword shit. Look, I can't do anything about that. I need authorization to change that mission and where am I supposed to get that now?”
Now, Bob felt like slapping the guy. “Dumbass, who do you think signed off on that op?”
“Uh,” Bruce suddenly realized, “oh yeah, that's right, you're like the National Security Adviser now, right?”
“I might not command much in this universe Bruce,” Bob replied, “but that does fall in my backyard so I can change it's orders all I want.”
Bruce surrendered but, he did point out, “those guys are not going to be too happy about it. They haven't exactly been all that cooperative with me.”
“Try brushing your teeth sometime,” Bob shot back. “In the mean time, get your ass over to the ops center. I have some new targets for you to take up there.”
Bruce tried to point out, “you know I wasn't planning on going anywhere near Uea-Au, anytime soon and...”
Bob was already gone.