All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved. – Sun Tzu

Chapter Twelve: Interlude – From Orléans to Patay

Gen. Jacob Berenson, CO AFFR Sixth Army attached to the Indomitable Battlegroup

"Welcome to the Exemplar. I'm General Berenson. Come with me." The Andalites all looked at each other in confusion as I told them this. Obviously, they would be looking towards their Princes to tell them if they should. Likely, there would be a lot of thought-speak flying about to which I wouldn't be privy to. Calait and Aximili took the lead, however, ending all debate. I led the assorted officers to a conference room. The flag officers in the fleet – Admirals and Generals – were already present and seated around banks upon banks of tables arrayed facing an open center. An area towards the rear of the room was open space in case of alien body types that did not sit. Enlisted Navy stewards showed the Andalite officers and their entourages to their places.

I knew the Andalites were prideful, but I needed a no-bullshit answer. "Ax, what's happened?"

To his credit, he was very straightforward with his answer. {The Yeerks entered into an alliance with a new race a while back. We've been conducting a holding operation ever since. We just didn't have the resources to fight them both off no matter how well we fought.}

That got the Andalites talking. Pretty soon, the rest of the officers were inputting their own observations and knowledge. The advanced Andalites were able to call for some pretty detailed maps of the galactic situation. They had Yeerk territory fully mapped, as well as a good chunk of Kelbrid territory.

{We've mapped all of the Kelbrid territory in the Scutum-Centaurus Arm. However, their homeworld lays somewhere further coreward.} Ax's astrogation officer informed us. From my own briefings with naval stellar cartographers, I was at least somewhat familiar with the basic concepts of astronomy. The structure of our galaxy, as it is, is like an octopus. The tentacles of the octopus, called "arms" are lengths of denser star concentrations spiraling outward from the galactic core. As a matter of probability, there are more civilizations based in these "arms" than in the less dense space in-between. Sol, or Earth's home system, is based in the "Orion Spur", a subset of these "arms". From one end to the other, the Milky Way was a little over one-hundred thousand light-years in diameter if you ignore the Z-axis. We were only ten-thousand light-years from Earth and this was the extent to which we had traveled. Our fight, looking at the map, would take us closer to thirty-thousand light-years from Earth. That's with the assumption that the Kelbrid homeworld was somewhere on the Norma Arm. If it was on the other side of the galactic core, it would take decades to find and invade, in all likelihood.

"We know where the Yeerks are, at least. We should focus on them first." I rendered my opinion.

{But Prince Jake, the Kelbrid are the greater threat.} Ax said.

There was a smattering of amused chuckles. "Please, Ax, call me General. You know prince is a royal title, not a military rank in Earth terms."

{Force of habit.} He muttered indignantly. I think he rather enjoys calling me "prince".

"You can always call me prince in private. Anyways, the Kelbrid might still be out there, but it will be some time before they can attack. They've had plenty of chances to make use of any strategic reserve if they had one to begin with. That means we have some time before they're back in the game. In the meantime, we can hit the Yeerks and avoid fighting a war on two fronts."

{What are you suggesting?} The other War-Prince, Calait, asked me.

"I suggest we take out the Yeerks once and for all. We brought three battlegroups with us. The Excalibur battlegroup will stay here to defend the Andalite homeworld while you recoup some losses. I'll take the Indomitable and Theodore Roosevelt battlegroups to hit Hork-Bajir. The Tatsumaki and Han Long battlegroups will hit Taxxa. After we've consolidated the bulk of Yeerk territory, we'll hit the Yeerk homeworld in a three-pronged attack."

As I trailed off, Admiral Shirokov reminded me of some more sanguine points. Ax was an old friend, but only for me. This was a completely unprecedented alliance in both our histories. "Now that we have located you, Earth will be sending along an ambassador and diplomatic staff. Also, these assaults will not be possible if we do not find an amenable means to combine our command structure." I had to acknowledge this was true. Stepping on each others' toes could be dangerous in war.

The temperature in the room seemed to drop a few degrees. Combining command structures was something the Andalites had never even considered before. I was not unaware of the prideful nature of the Andalite military.

Fortunately, Ax delivered. {This would be helpful. The advantages to strategic and tactical coordination are far too valuable to ignore. When your diplomats arrive, we will have the electorate ready to make decisions concerning our new alliance.}

After a series of somewhat less substantial discussions, the meeting broke up into smaller committees charged with laying the groundwork for such integration upon the agreement of our respective civilian governments. The Exemplar was a space-based command vessel crewed by civilians, thus was replete with office space for them to use. This left just Ax and I in the conference room.

"So how have to been, Ax-man?" I asked casually.

{Busy.} His reply was flat and sardonic even by thought-speak terms.

"Yeah, I saw." Truthfully, I was impressed. We came expecting the usual Yeerk-Andalite stalemate. They must have done something right for the Yeerks to go crying for help.

{I appreciate what you did for us today, but you have no idea the extent the Kelbrid's influence extends. I can see you are getting astonishing performance from your machines through typical human ingenuity, but it won't be enough. You saw on the map how massive the Kelbrid are.}

"That just means you need us even more." I told him. "Yeah, it seems like the Kelbrid are sitting on an endless stockpile of resources, but it's got to be limited somewhere. The way they fight, they're gonna need all of it."

{True, they don't seem to care how many ships or lives they spend. Doesn't that worry you?} He seemed to be pleading. I was deeply touched at his concern for me and my own people, but we were all soldiers. I didn't bring along a bunch of girl scouts.

"Of course it's a concern, but we've been in impossible situations before. Don't you remember? Besides which, we're probably a little more prepared then you give us credit for."

{What do you mean?}

"I know we're new to the space-faring community, but you of all people should expect the type of expansion we have planned. We've scouted most of the star systems within sixty light-years of Earth. We didn't slag down our ocean-going ships or strip-mine our planet to build these fleets. We mine asteroids for minerals, get gases from Jovian planets, and so on. We have over eight billion people now. We can double the number of ships you've seen here in a few years. We'll see if the Kelbrid can keep up with us."

{They've still been at it much longer than you have.}

I shrugged. "Maybe, but we won't know until we fight it out."