Brendan, Gen. Beck, and Col. Schuler returned to their units and regrouped to defend against the cavalry forces sent by the French Mafia.

"Bring in the Bradleys and set up anti-aircraft weapons," Brendan ordered. Oligarchy troops scrambled around, preparing to battle the French. Apaches returned to the air, and Bradley fighting vehicles moved into defensive positions.

Very soon, a Panther helicopter fired on a group of Bradleys. French AMX-30 tanks moved in on Oligarchy positions. A few tanks were taken out by NLA troops armed with AT-4 antitank weapons before an AMX-30 blew out their fighting position.

Apaches and Panthers began dogfighting overhead, intermittently firing at each other's tanks and ground troops. The Oligarchy choppers were more heavily armed, but the Panthers had the advantage in numbers, and many Apaches were shot out of the sky.

"Oligarchy Command, this is Sandwich One, we need reinforcements immediately, over!" Brendan yelled into his radio.

"Sandwich One, this is Nanorc. I'm on my way."

Brendan's eyes widened. "Ah, shit."

An Apache pilot maneuvered wildly, narrowly avoiding the wrath of two Panthers. The French birds twisted around and prepared to fire again. They had the Oligarchy craft in their sights when suddenly a classic Star Trek-style shuttlecraft appeared out of nowhere, blasting the enemy choppers into spare parts. "The Pocket Shuttlecraft is here," Cronan announced over an open channel, "and I've brought a few friends!"

Several MiG-29 jet fighters soared over the city, bearing the logo of the Microsoft Corp. They immediately began bombing French Mafia strongholds as tanks and helicopters from the Microsoft Militia entered the battle, inflicting massive casualties on the French-AOL alliance.

Cronan pulled off a tricky maneuver by flashing his tractor beam at a nearby Panther, throwing the copter out of its pilot's control and causing it to crash into the ground below. A French tank fired on the Pocket Shuttlecraft, damaging its hull.

"Dammit Jim!" cried Norman the Elf. "The Reality Field (TM) is useless against real military weaponry."

"Ziggy, begin evasive maneuvers," Cronan commanded.

"What's in it for me?" asked Ziggy, the PS's onboard computer.

"If you don't, one of those French fucks are going to shoot us out of the sky, destroying your precious RAM ports once and for all."

"I see. Maneuver alpha-six-tango initiating now."

The Shuttlecraft rolled and dipped, and bullets and missiles whizzed harmlessly past. "Norman, prepare the Dogbertron."

"I'm ready to fire at any time," said the sadistic blue elf.

"Target those Panthers and fire."

Norman fired the powerful Dogbertron weapon at two helicopters. Both pilots were immediately drained of all self-esteem and set a collision course with each other, exploding brilliantly.

Cronan noticed an AOL howitzer firing upon Microsoft tanks in the eastern part of the city. He nosedived the Shuttle and zapped the AOLers into cinders. "Hah! Peep on you, AOL scum!"

"Look," Norman said, looking up from a console. "The French forces are retreating."

The French Mafia's aircraft were departing en masse. Some tanks were hastily slingloaded and airlifted, others were abandoned by their crews.

"Brendan's calling us," said Norman.

Cronan opened up the radio frequencies. "Cronan here."

"I just got a call from Aethel. Microsoft is on its way to France."

Bill Gates had set up a teleconference session between the Microsoft jet and Aethel Castellow, Warden of the Prison-Nation of France.

"Aethel, have your people detected any recent movement of military equipment in France?" asked Matt.

"Yeah, I tried to call Brendan, but he was busy in some sort of meeting in Dulles."

"Where did they take off from?"

"Bordeaux."

"All right, thanks. We're on our way there now."

Brent looked to Gates. "Do you have any way to find out exactly what in Bordeaux we're looking for?"

"I'll run a search through the city's maps, phone books, customs agencies, and stuff like that." Gates typed a few key search words at the Linux prompt and the computer searched for a moment. "Here's a possibility -- 'L'aerochamp Peillot.' That means 'Peillot Airfield.'"

"That must be it," Matt concluded. He made a printout of the information. "Peillot Airfield: the choice of the French for evil operations. Guaranteed safe from meddling Oligarchy-types."

"That guarantee just expired," said Brent. "Let's go."

Several hours later, the Concorde jet arrived in Bordeaux, trailed by several of Microsoft's MiG fighters. "All right," said John Romero, Microsoft's kick ass blow up dude, over the radio to the MiG pilots. "We have the location of this Peillot Airfield. This is the launch site for the French Mafia's offensive in Dulles. We're going to bomb it, crippling the French's home base, and get out before they can retaliate."

The planes cruised over the airfield's location, and the fighters released their guided missiles. Each one hit their target with accuracy. As they prepared to leave, Matt looked out a window at the destroyed target. "Wait a minute. That doesn't look like an airfield. It looks like we bombed some kind of Chinese restaurant!"

Brent and Bill Gates peered out and saw the remains of The Chinese Embassy, a popular restaurant in downtown Bordeaux.

"Damn!" Brent exclaimed. "Call up Aethel again."

"Yes?" Aethel answered a moment later.

"Hey, have you ever heard of the Peillot Airfield?"

"Oh, yeah, that's a small problem we've been having lately. There's no such thing as Peillot Airfield, but it keeps popping up in phone books. Apparently some guy keeps registering ads everywhere just to provoke us. So far we've raided so-called airfields in Marseille, Rouen and Nice."

"Crap. Peillot set us up. Let's get back to the states."

The Concorde refueled and headed for Dulles, where the others were waiting. Despite the troubles in Bordeaux, the enemy forces in Dulles had been crushed and the city was under Oligarchy control. Operation Kick Ass was over, and the AOL War had been won by the World Oligarchy.

OR HAD IT????? Stay tuned for the conclusion of the AOL War series, "Now What?"