Capitán Joan-Paolo Guinsales was charged with his own little five-kilometer slice of this heaven. The border troops were a little more concentrated here as it was close to one of the few roads connecting North and South. The road was wide enough for trucks with their cargoes to come and go, but not quite suited as a route of ingress for an invading army. You could never be too careful, though.

Tempting as it was to stay holed up in the relative comfort of the company bunker until his two-year tour was over, Capitán Guinsales would run the circuit of his area of responsibility once a day unless he had more pressing duties to attend to. It was going a bit overboard, yes, but he was aiming for a promotion at the end of this so he would never have to worry about being assigned to this sort of post again. He would never stop by at the same time two days in a row so as to keep the men on their toes. They might as well be performing at the level where they end up with promotions and tickets out of here, too.

A two-meter berm was built up along the defensive line to keep troops and vehicles going up and down the circuit out of direct fire. Pillboxes were built into this berm every couple hundred meters to provide a covered position for overlapping fire should the need ever arise. Each pillbox could house an entire squad, but ordinarily they lacked the manpower and any reason to pack them full. A two-man team on a 14-hour rotation was more than sufficient for everyday duty.

Much as Capitán Guinsales would patrol the company's area of responsibility, his platoon leaders would do the same for their smaller AORs. Here in Second Platoon's AOR, Teniente Eduardes happened to be at the current pillbox the Capitán was inspecting.

Upon noticing Capitán Guinsales' arrival, Teniente Eduardes said, "Atten-shun."

He did not raise his voice, nor did he salute, as the border was treated as an active combat zone regardless of the current state of hostilities. It would take a truly eagle-eyed sniper to notice here inside the pillbox, but laxity has a way of snowballing, so the fact that Teniente Eduardes was so on point was a good sign for the health of the unit.

The Teniente had only been assigned to the unit for a few months, so he did not have nearly as much weariness in his answer as those who had been here a year or more.

This was something that had been argued ever since King Seleuceus declared the formation of the Free Miravel Coalition. Publicly, La Doña condemned both the Palatinian attack on the Imperial diplomats and the Imperials' indiscriminate bombing of Palatinian cities while calling for a diplomatic solution to the conflict. President Bustamante in the North made similarly neutral statements, but who knew what was really going on behind the scenes?

The way a major power like Byrandia so quickly capitulated to these Imperials and spearheaded the effort to bring the whole world in line was simply baffling. Capitán Guinsales fancied himself as something of a student of history. Byrandia had scarcely ever ceded a single sench to anyone in over 200 years and now suddenly she was an obedient lapdog to this foreign power that claimed to be from another world. There was so little information about these Imperials that was released to the public. Capitán Guinsales did not know what to make of it.

The Capitán's thoughts were disturbed by a whining, buzzing sound in the distance. Capitán Guinsales went to the loophole of the pillbox to look outside and saw a small single engine plane from the North coming their way. Just as there were only a few avenues connecting the North and South by land, air travel was tightly restricted and they were nowhere near one of the approved lanes.

The plane was too small, too noisy, and flying too low to be a spyplane, but it could be that the Norteños were probing their defenses. Maybe they were trying to provoke a response in order to drum up a casus belli. Air defenses were outside Capitán Guinsales' authority, so if the plane was to be shot down, it would not be his decision.

The plane crossed the border, so shooting it down would have been fully justified, but the commander of the anti-air battery held his fire. As it was directly overhead, the plane turned and started going down the defensive line. Capitán Guinsales moved to stick his head out the loophole to get a better look, but he felt a hand take hold of his collar and pull him back. It was Teniente Eduardes.

The Teniente was referring to Capitán Guinsales' executive officer, who would assume command if something were to happen to him. The threat was near zero, but trying to stick your head out of a pillbox like that was still a stupid thing to do, Capitán Guinsales had to admit.

The air was filled with flyers fluttering to the ground like fall leaves.

He returned shortly thereafter with one of the flyers in hand, offering it to Teniente Eduardes. The Teniente gave it a once-over before handing it to Capitán Guinsales. The message was printed in large block letters.

At the bottom of the page was a cartoon illustrating the two choices. One was a scene of carnage overseen by a grinning devil, while the other had a Norteño tank roll by on a clear road with the smiling tank commander waving at an unarmed Sureño soldier holding up a flower, all while a little angel looked on approvingly. This was psyops at its most elementary, but the threat could not be ignored.

The pillboxes were connected to the company bunker via a simple party line. Capitán Guinsales snatched up the receiver and dialed his office.

His bored secretary picked up the phone and said, "Company HQ, how may I help you?"

Correa managed to figure it out rather quickly after that.

If the flyer was right about the ten minutes, they did not have a moment to spare. The Capitán only hoped Correa did not fumble about operating the switchboard.

Correa came back on the line to say, "Sir?"

There was a click as the line switched over. The operator on the other end said, "Battalion HQ. How may I help you, sir?"

Only at this point did the operator seem to truly appreciate the gravity of the situation, exclaiming, "Ah! Ye, yes, sir! Just a minute, sir!"

They did not have a minute, but any more shouting would not accomplish anything. All the Capitán could do was look uneasily at his watch as he waited for the operator to come back on the line.

That was not all that helpful, but orders are orders.

He hung up the phone, then dialed for everyone on the line to pick up.

There was a pause.

Still nothing.

And on down the line to Four-Six with three not reporting in. Capitán Guinsales would deal with that later.

With that done, the Capitán Guinsales turned to leave, telling Teniente Eduardes, "I'm heading back to HQ. Take care of things here."

Teniente Eduardes caught his arm before he could go.

As if on cue, there was the sound of cannonfire from the North's side. It sounded like they fired every piece of artillery they had. Then the shells came screeching in. They say you never hear the one that gets you, but that did not seem to be true at all.