Isolation by Dan Wells

ZUOQUAN CITY, SHANXI PROVINCE, CHINA
    June 2, 2060
    A rtillery pounded the city, fiercer and closer than before. Mei Hao stopped at the window in her rush, seeing plumes of smoke and gouts of flame amid the Chinese half of the city. The fires, too, were closer. The Partials were pressing forward, and the Chinese headquarters were no longer safe. Mei left the window and ran down the hall, a stack of maps in one arm and the army’s satbox in the other. She could already hear the two generals arguing.
    “We have to move our headquarters,” said General Wu. Mei was his assistant, and it was no surprise to hear him arguing for retreat. He had proven himself a coward since the day she’d met him. She hurried into the room and laid the maps on the table; he spread them out without acknowledging her, and she opened the satbox while he examined them. “The devil army has held this line for weeks,” he said, pointing at a vague line scrawled through the center of the city with a red wax pencil; the line was vague by necessity, for there was no easy way to tell exactly which buildings were held by which army at any given moment. “Now they are pushing past it,” General Wu continued, “at least to here, and likely even farther.” He thumped the map with finality, as if pointing at his estimates had made it so. “Either way we are no longer safe here.”
    General Bao considered carefully before answering, though Mei had learned from experience that this was most likely tact rather than hesitance. Bao was the opposite of Wu in many ways: young where Wu was old, tall and handsome where Wu was round and ugly, brave where Wu was cowardly. He chafed against the older man’s caution and cowardice, but Wu was the senior general, and Bao was always very politic with his counsel. “We cannot run forever,” he said at last. “We have been tasked with the defense of this city, though as the invasion wears on we are defending less and less of it every day. We do not have the strength, as you say, to drive the BioSynths back, but a stand must be taken somewhere.”
    “Bah,” said Wu, dismissing him with a cursory wave of his hand. He had none of Bao’s tact. “You would stand and die. The civilian section of the city is of secondary concern to us—our only true objective is to defend the munitions factory.” He thumped the factory’s off-center location on the map with his thick forefinger. “That is what we cannot lose, and retreating today would put us in a better position to defend it.”
    An aide rushed into the room, bowed to both generals in turn, and held out a gently glowing tablet. “General Bao Xu Quin, a message from the tower.”
    Bao glanced at Wu and took the tablet, reading it quickly as he tabbed through the photos with his finger.
    “Ill news, no doubt,” said Wu. “How close are they now, schoolboy, five miles? One?”
    “They are three miles from our position,” said Bao, staring at the tablet, and Mei could just see the movement that held his attention. He was watching a video of the battle, probably a live feed, and from the look on his face, it was not going well for the defenders. “They are advancing quickly. Perhaps it is time to move our headquarters.” He glanced at Mei, and she dropped her eyes demurely. “For the safety of the staff, at least.”
    “Now you speak reason,” said Wu, “even if you mask it as concern. The question now is where.” He studied the map. “The enemy cannot pierce a heart it cannot find. Our headquarters will be best hidden in the university, here; they will have no reason to look for us there, and even fewer opportunities to find us in the labyrinth of the campus.”
    “If we could reach it,” said General Bao, gesturing at the map. “With the BioSynth army crawling up the boulevard here, and the canal beside it here, I think the university will be too soon cut off.” He mused a moment, then pointed at another section of the city. “If you must leave your