Semper Mars. Ian Douglas

Poly’s been around her circuit two and a half times, now, and she hasn’t been attacked by space pirates once!”

      On the screen, Lloyd was grinning at the Marines with what could only be described as sadistic anticipation. “All right, people. Since you keep falling asleep at this evolution, we’ll try to make it a little bit more challenging. We’ll do it again!” Suddenly, the screen went black. “In the dark! Ready…begin!”

      The sound of clicking and snapping clattered from the speaker, until Reiner dialed down the gain once more.

      Garroway thought about replying to the astronaut’s jibe, something about discipline under pressure, or even about needing to learn how to work in the cumbersome armor without letting it turn you clumsy…but decided at last that it wasn’t worth it. Reiner was Navy, and there were some things a squid just couldn’t understand.

      The fact was that Reiner had hit pretty close to the mark, talking about drills evolved from combat necessities centuries old. There’d been a lot of talk lately about the US Marines becoming obsolete, and scuttlebutt aplenty about the reason for this deployment. Garroway was pretty sure the MMEF was a political chip in some unseen, high-stakes game, a means, possibly, of keeping the Corps alive when a number of very powerful people and organizations wanted to kill it. And it was true that President Markham was beating the drum pretty loudly during his reelection campaign this year—“our brave young men and women, serving America’s interests far from this blue Earth….” The United States was increasingly isolated in a hostile world, and her citizens were clinging tightly to symbols of American might, tradition, and security.

      None of which addressed the real question. Was the Corps obsolete? Didn’t the Marines simply duplicate functions now handled by the Army?

      Well, maybe they did. What of it? Garroway was mildly surprised to find that he didn’t really care, one way or the other, what became of the Corps.

      It wasn’t that he disliked the Marines. Quite the opposite, in fact. The Marines had introduced him to advanced electronics, paid for an outstanding college education, and let him work on some absolutely fascinating projects, from communications software to advanced AI. The trouble was that he’d pretty much reached the end of the opportunities that the Corps could provide. How, he often joked with his daughter, could the Corps possibly top a trip to Mars? In fact, he’d been passed over for promotion twice now, a sure sign that he was never gonna make it to light colonel. He was at the top of his field inside the Corps, but there was no place else to go. To realize his true potential, he’d have to reenter the world of civilians. His background would land him a position at Pittsburgh’s Moravec Institute easily—he’d worked there for a time on a government-sponsored AI project, five years ago, and he knew some people who could pull some strings—but right now he was less interested in continuing with AI communications software than he was in the Bahamas…specifically in opening a charter hydrofoil and submarine tour boat service for rich vacationers. That was the extent of his ambition at the moment, a dream that had very little to do with the Corps.

      More than one of the people he’d worked with over the past few years, people including Colonel Lloyd, had accused him of going ROAD—Retired On Active Duty—marking time, in other words, until he was a civilian once more.

      Well, maybe that was true, in a way. It was a bit ironic, actually, that he should find himself a member of the MMEF, occupying a billet that a few thousand other Marines would have given their teeth for, and he didn’t really want to be here. Two more years—a planned fifteen-month deployment on Mars, followed by a seven-month transit home aboard the cycler Columbus—and he’d be out of the Corps. With all the military cutbacks lately, he shouldn’t have any trouble resigning his commission, and a month or two after that he’d be on the beach at Nassau, alternately soaking up the sun and soaking the rich tourists.

      “Well,” he said at last, after a long silence had passed, “all the routine traffic is up-to-date. I guess I’ll head back to the hab.” He stretched. “I still have five minutes’ shower credit left over from last month, and I think I’m gonna luxuriate.”

      “Enjoy,” Reiner replied. “And thanks for your help. I don’t know what we’ll do if the cameras go out in the shelter again on the Earth-bound leg.”

      “Oh, you’ll manage, I’m sure.” He jerked a thumb at the monitor. “You won’t have so many passengers on board. Maybe the romantic ones can use their cubicles, like normal folks.”

      “Nah,” Reiner said, shaking his head. “Zero G is too much fun.”

      “Oh? How would you know?”

      “Classified information, Major. I’ll never tell.”

      Garroway caught a transport pod and took it down to the hab-mod level, where the spin gravity now measured .38 Gs, the same as on the surface of Mars. There were two hab modules attached to the outermost rack of the cycler’s A-arm. His quarters were in Hab One, which was reserved for officers, female Marines, and civilian passengers. The twenty-two enlisted male Marines were quartered together in Hab Two’s tiny open dorm. Crowding was bad in both habs—worse in Two than in One. At least the Marine officers were quartered two to a compartment. He shared his semiprivate, closet-sized quarters with the MMEF’s supply officer, Captain Gregory Barnes.

      As he stepped through the lock module into Hab One’s small rec lounge, he nearly collided with Mireille Joubert. “Major! Hallo. I wanted to thank you for your, ah, timely warning.”

      “It was nothing.” He’d not meant for his voice to sound cold, but it did anyway.

      “It would have been most embarrassing….”

      “Excuse me, Miss Joubert—”

      “It is Doctor Joubert, but I wish you would call me Mireille.” She cocked her head to the left. “We have made this voyage all the way from Earth, seven months, now, and we have not had much opportunity to get to know one another. Perhaps it is time we did so.”

      Garroway raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think that would be such a good idea, ma’am,” he said, a little stiffly.

      “Why? Because I work for the UN?”

      “Isn’t that enough?”

      “I am not one of Colonel Bergerac’s thugs,” she said, lifting her chin. “I am a scientist, an archeologist. Whatever differences your nation might have with the UN, they should not affect you and me.”

      “Mmm. To tell you the truth, Dr. Joubert, I feel more kinship with Bergerac’s ‘thugs,’ as you call them, than I do with you and your UN observers. In my opinion, it’s misguided UN policy and the demands being made by your bureau that have created this crisis. Not my government. And not the MMEF.”

      “Did I say that it was?”

      “The opinion the UN has about Marines on this expedition is well enough known, I think. As are the UN’s opinions about American sovereignty.” He gave her a wintry smile. “Funny. I always thought you French would fight to the death to keep your national sovereignty.”

      “And who says we do not, monsieur?” she flared back. “France is still free. Still sovereign…within very broad and liberal boundaries.”

      “If that’s your story, you stick to it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, they warned us back at Vandenberg that we shouldn’t discuss politics with you people.”

      Pushing past her, he entered his cubicle and pulled the accordion-pleated door shut.

      What he didn’t need right now was to be reminded about politics. The political situation on Earth seemed to be worsening almost week by week, with the increasing pressure to cave in to UN demands. Russia and the United States of America were the last two major powers on the planet that had not signed the UN Reorganization Charter of 2025. That document called for the establishment of a United Nations government that would have jurisdiction over the national governments of the world, the gradual abolition of all national militaries, and new international laws and regulations governing the exploitation,