Seto picks up a large roll of paper from the ground and spreads it out against the table, weighing down the corners with various objects to prevent it from rolling back upon itself. Adam sees that it's a map of the territories covered by the Packs, which includes the Squid's territory. His stomach clenches as he sees the Squid's name over the land that his Army used to take care of.

"The best place for a battle is obviously on a plain," Mitch is saying, standing up from his chair so that he can point to the Squid's territory. "We have a lot more warriors than they do and so we can overwhelm them with numbers. Their main base is here, at the Capital, which is right near a large plain. We'd want to draw them out of it before attacking."

"But it's near the water," Adam points out. "The two places where the Squids' battle tactics are strongest is near the water and on a vast plain. If you want to attack them, you'd want it in a small space with something preventing them from getting behind you. And their army would have grown over the 12 years the Sky Army last fought them, so your forces might only be twice as big as theirs."

"Forests would be good," Jerome says. "It'll reduce their mobility but my Baccas would be fine."

"Except that our archers would be useless in a forest," Vikk replies. "And there's no large forests in their territory that we can attack them in."

"If we pick a plain and then create defences at our sides and back, that should sort out the problem," Robert says.

"But we won't be able to retreat," Seto mentions. "And why do we need to face them head on at all? If we get them bit by bit, starting with the villages, we can reduce their force while we head to the Capital. By then, either they will come out and meet us or we'll put them under siege."

"I don't like sieges, they take too long," Mitch says. "And too many things can happen that you have no control over."

"And I don't have any dead cows to throw over the walls," Preston adds.

"What do you think Adam?" Lachlan asks. "You've fought them before, you know what they're weak against."

Adam frowns and stares at the map as he thinks back to his old battle plans against the squids. "Seto's idea is good. The Squids work as one unit and they're horrible without clear direction. If we attack them in groups, we'll have a greater chance of catching them off-guard and reducing their force. Can't say I've ever put them under siege though, so I'm not sure how they'll be able to handle that."

"What tactics do they use on the field?" Preston asks, leaning forward so that his head is resting on his fists.

"They normally start with a head-on attack," Adam replies. "Test your strength, find your weakest side. When they find it, they send a small group around to your strongest side, to distract you. While they're attacking, their strongest troupes hit the weak side and cripple it. They keep doing that until your forces are worn down from running around all over the field."

"Then what?" Vikk asks.

"I've never let them reach that point. By then I've already sent out my attack and forced them to change tactics. They use different coloured flags to signal their army, so they can have multiple groups around the field all moving in coordination, as long as they can see the flags."

"What about the last battle you had against them?" Jerome asks. "That was about 12 years ago, right? What did they do?"

Adam gives Jerome a hard glare, his mouth closed, jaw tense. His arms had been crossed on the table and he took them off, his hands squeezing themselves into fists.

"We don't need to know all the details," Lachlan quickly says, noting Adam's sudden shift in body language. "Just the Squids' tactics at the beginning of the battle."

"But if we know how they defeated the Sky Army, then we can prevent the same from happening to us," Preston mentions.

"The Pack armies combined are much bigger than the Sky Army ever was, Preston," Vikk says. "The Squids won't be able to take us on like they did to the Sky Army."

"But they might do something similar."

"Guys, enough," Mitch interrupts. He has noticed Adam's tightly squeezed hands were shaking slightly in his lap and the fact that his eyes are locked hard on the table top. "We don't need to know what happened back then. All we need to know is how the Squids fight. We know one of their main tactics, so let's figure out how we combat that one before hearing the other tactics."

The look that General Mitchell gives the other Generals is enough to convince them to let the topic drop. Seto is the first one to react, shifting the map slightly so that he can see better.

"When the squids do their head-on attack, they won't know that we know about it," he reasons. "We can arrange our forces purposely so that the strongest is on one side and the weakest on the other, and then when they hit the weaker side, we can bring out a special strike force and cut out a large portion of their army."

"Sounds good," Robert says.

"The Baccas and the Benjas are probably the strongest armies we've got," Vikk says. "As for the weakest..."

"We all know it's my army," Seto sighs. "We're more long-ranged attackers than hand-to-hand combat oriented. But their first attack is when we're going to be able to cut out the most of their forces, so we'll cover one of the wings."

"Robert's Wolves are probably the best for a sneak attack," Mitch says, "so we can position them behind the Sorcerers and they can pounce out when the Squid's strongest hit them."

Preston gets up from his seat and points to a certain part of the map in the Squid's territory. "If we went into battle here, we would be able to hide the Wolves behind this ridge here. That would probably be better."

"But the Squids know the territory better so they would probably utilize it before we can," Lachlan mentions.

"I think it would be smarter to develop general plans now and then iron out the details closer to the battle," Vikk says, leaning forward and resting his forearms on the table.

"We can use our basic rotating technique," Jerome says. "Robert, Lachlan and I on one rotation and Mitch, Vikk and Preston on the other. The Sky Army can be part of Mitch's army since you're already working together."

"True, that woul-"

"We won't be any help against the Squids. Not now."

All the Generals become instantly silent and look at Adam, shaken by not only the words that he has just uttered but also by his tone. He sounded like he was trying to be strong, but the dispiritedness and sadness comes through his voice anyway. His eyes are still looking at the table but the tension has gone out of him and his shoulders droop.

"What do you mean?" Mitch asks quietly as Preston slowly sinks back down into his seat.

Adam doesn't answer straight away. When he does, his tone sounds lost. "All you need to do is look at us, how we carry ourselves. We've lost our fire, our spirit. If we fight the Squids again, we'll just break. If we can even bring ourselves to get that far."

"Why can't you?" Lachlan asks softly.

This time Adam doesn't answer. Mitch notices that Adam's hands are shaking slightly as he presses them against his legs like he is trying to hold himself together. Jerome goes to speak but Mitch silently holds up his hand and gives him a look that says 'Just wait'. He feels that Adam is going to say something, he's just having to force himself to say it. And finally, Adam does speak.

"It was supposed to be simple," he says quietly. "Just a battle like any other. The entire Sky Army and all the Squids had lined up on either side of a field, with a marsh on one side and the woods on the other. We knew that this was our best chance at attacking the Squids. We could never get rid of them forever, but we could put a massive dent in their army that would take them years to recover from. It would cost us a lot of lives, but we all knew it was worth it."

"What happened?" Vikk asks.

Adam shakes his head slightly. "I don't know," he says bitterly. "For 12 years I've been replaying the battle in my head, trying to figure out what happened, why everything turned out the way it did but.... I just don't know. One minute we were winning and everything was going smoothly. Our tactics were working, the Squids were falling back. But then, hundreds of us were dying all of a sudden. The Squids had us surrounded in an instant, cutting off any chance we had of retreating as an army. We couldn't surrender because they would kill us, or torture us and then kill us. They've done it to recruits before."

There is a horrified silence at the table. It is a situation that every General has nightmares about. "What did you do?" Robert whispers.

"What could I have done?" Adam asks. He raises his head for the first time, his expression anguished as he recalls the past. "There was nothing to do. I gave the order that everyone should get away if they could, meet up at Kay's Anchor when it was safe. But too many of us were stuck." He pauses and drops his head again, his eyes filling with moisture. He started speaking again, his voice little more than a whisper.

"Too many people died. There were only about 400 of us when I got to Kay's Anchor compared to the several million we had been when we set out. Too many of us were badly hurt. We didn't have any supplies with us and we had lost the... our weapons. The Squids had won the war. We couldn't fight. I told everyone to split up, go underground and survive. But in reality... all I was trying to do was keep them alive as long as I could. I owed them that. There was no way we could become what we were, and that chance has only gone down over the past 12 years. We can't fight the Squids. I'm sorry, but we can't help."

With that final whispered statement, Adam stands up and leaves the room, his head still down and his shoulders sagged.

End Part 2

Don't forget to vote! And comment something that will make me laugh.