six separate wings, one for each arm of the galaxy. Passengers used to board these trains to get from one wing to the next.
Rumbling along at no more than ten miles per hour, we passed by boarding zones for one wing after another, the platforms were all dark. When we reached the wing for Scutum-Crux—the farthest arm of the galaxy—the train slowed and switched tracks, entering a tunnel that led us uphill and through a set of airtight doors.
“The Corps of Engineers just finished this new track a few weeks ago,” said one of the corporals. He wasn’t speaking to anyone in particular, just enjoying the audience of recruits.
When the outer door opened, I saw the Martian landscape. I had flown over this planet many times but never looked across the landscape at ground level. The land was flat and ugly, a featureless desert with rocks and sand and no signs of life.
“Are these cars sealed to hold air?” one of the recruits asked.
“They weren’t before the Corps of Engineers got ahold of them,” the soldier replied. “But don’t you worry your white head over that. They’re sure as shit airtight now.”
Looking at the old-man recruit and corporal leading us was like looking at multiple generations of the same family. All of the men standing in this car stood just under six feet, though many of the older ones were slumped with age. Those recalled soldiers who were still young enough to have color in their hair had brown hair. I did see one or two old fellows who had tried to dye their hair with blond hair dye. Everyone had the same color of brown in their eyes, the same exact cleft in their chins, and the same bridge in their noses.
“I wouldn’t worry about the poisonous air,” our second corporal /guide said. “Hell, it’s so cold out there you’d freeze to death.”
Ah, hazing the recruits, a time-honored tradition in the military. Battle-wary veterans scaring new recruits was a tradition that might even be as ancient as the MREs they served us on the transport. On the other hand, the tradition took on a strange twist in this train car, where the veterans were in their thirties and the naive victims were in their fifties.
The train took us thirty miles across the surface of Mars to Citadel Air Force Base. There were no roads or fences around this glowing geodesic dome, just a dun-colored building that rose out of the ground like a five-story blister. Rings of blue-white light shone about the foot and cornice of the building.
The tracks led through another air lock and into a tube that took a sharp dive under the wall of the dome. We emerged from the tube in an underground train station. Aluminum ventilation shafts snaked along the red rock wall twenty feet overhead. Bright arc lights shone down on the platform from ten feet above. The ceiling of the station was a slab of rough-hewn red rock.
The door to our train car opened, and frozen air rushed in.
“You want to hurry it up, boys,” one of the corporals yelled as he pushed his way out to the platform. “The air is a few degrees south of zero.” His breath formed a cloud around his mouth.
Soldiers in heated environmental suits ushered us toward the far end of the platform as we left the train. Feeling the cold air burning deep in my lungs, I trotted to the front of the herd and entered another air lock at the far end of the platform. The old men around me remained mostly quiet in the cold, though a few moaned. I suspect the men in the environmental suits enjoyed watching them suffer. I could hear muffled laughter through their masks, and why not—they wore electronically insulated jackets.
So much for Ava Gardner movies and all-you-can-eat MREs; now we were back in the real military.
“We should’a just stayed in the spaceport,” one of the old men said as he stepped into the air lock. Everyone around him agreed. I could have pointed out that enormous as it was, the unshielded spaceport would collapse if hit by a single missile. The Citadel had shielded walls, batteries of defensive missiles, several cannons, and squadrons of fighters protecting it.
Warm air circulated through this tunnel. As soldiers piled in behind me, I followed the tunnel to an escalator that led upward. Two soldiers waited for us at the top.
“Well,” one of them yelled, “hurry it up.”
The automatic stairs took us 150 feet up at a seventy-degree angle. The soldiers that met us at the top of the stairs pointed toward yet another corridor and rushed everyone along. Finally, we passed through one last set of doors and entered the admin area.
The Citadel reminded me of office buildings everywhere. Rows of bright fluorescent light fixtures shone from the ceilings to the endless plains of white, shiny flooring spread beneath our feet. We passed cubicles and small offices, conference rooms and cafeterias.
The building was crowded with servicemen from all branches. Walking past a break room, I saw officers in blue, green, and white sitting at a table drinking coffee. The guards along the wall wore olive drab service uniforms. This was an air base, but with all the branches represented, it felt more like the Pentagon.
One of the recruits paused and asked a soldier, “Where are the billets?”
“Other side of the building,” the soldier grunted, not even bothering to look at the man.
“Are we staying here tonight?” the old recruit asked.
“Not here. We’ll have you back on your transport in a couple of hours.”
We stopped in front of a large auditorium. A group of soldiers met us by the door and waited for us to form a group. “Anyone who served in the Army, fall in on the right. Air Force, front and center. Marines, you fall in on the left.”
“What if I was Navy?” a man called from the back. There was a group of retired sailors, fifty or sixty of them.
The soldier smiled as if this was a great joke. “You’re in the Army now,” he said. This raised a groan from the seamen.
Of the first two hundred recruits to walk off of the transport, I was the only Marine. I stood in a one-man queue.
“You, young blood,” one of the guides called to me. “What’s your name?”
“Harris,” I said.
He looked at his clipboard, then over to the other guide. “Yup, he’s the one. Harris, we have special orders for you.”
Somebody yelled, “He’s a specking Liberator.” I did not need to look back to know it was Glen.
The guide saluted me. “Lieutenant Harris, I’ve been instructed to take you to a special briefing. Would you follow me, sir?” he asked.
I nodded, and we left.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“Officer country.”
As we moved deeper into the Citadel, the base population switched from servicemen of all description to administrative airmen. Men in blue sweaters and blue pants rushed down corridors, carrying files and boxes. Men in blue uniforms sat behind desks studying computers. These men worked quietly, efficiently. They had direction.
“Who else is coming to this briefing?” I asked.
“As far as I know, you’re it, sir,” the corporal said.
“Aren’t there any other Marines?” I asked, remembering the way we had grouped.
“Other Marines, yes; but you’re the only officer,” he said.
We came to a door marked “Conference Room.” A small red light flashed beside the door to show that the room was in use. “This is your stop, sir,” the soldier said. He saluted and left.
I let myself in.
“You’re just in time, Lieutenant,” the admiral said as I entered. “They’re about to start.”
There were no guards in the room. Admiral Alden Brocius sat at the head of a ten-foot-long table, looking frail and old. He’d lost at least fifty pounds since the last time I saw him. I could see the shape of his skull under his cheeks. Age and tension had added new wrinkles to his face.
“Admiral Brocius.” I could not help but sneer as I said the name. He commanded the Central Cygnus Fleet. At some point in recent years he had become the highest-ranking man in the Navy; but as far as I knew, he never made the jump from fleet commander to Secretary of the Navy.
“You will show me proper respect, Lieutenant,” Brocius said, trying to stay in command of what he knew to be
