Star Strike. Ian Douglas

Aye, aye, sir!”

      Garroway dropped again and began cranking out the push-ups. He’d worked out a lot over the past couple of years, knowing that this sort of thing would be routine. He’d also spent a lot of time recently working in the Recovery Projects back on Earth. There he massed a full 85 kilos, so he had a bit of an advantage of some of the other kids in the line. On Mars, he only weighed 32 kilos, compared to the 60 kilos he carried at his home level in the Ring.

      So right now he weighed half what he normally did, and was feeling pretty strong, even competent. The push-ups came swiftly and easily as Warhurst continued to parade up and down the line of recruits, finding fault everywhere, screaming invectives at the other recruits. Before long, Garroway wasn’t the only one doing push-ups. He completed his count and stood at attention once more, surprised to find he was breathing harder, now. In fact, his chest was burning.

      The Martian air was painfully thin, despite the nanochelates in his lungs that incrçased the efficiency of his breathing. The terraformers had been reshaping Mars for almost four centuries, now, hammering it with icebergs to begin with, but more recently using massive infusions of nanodecouplers to free oxygen from the planet-wide rust and restore the ancient Martian atmosphere. For the past two centuries, the air had been breathable, at least with nanotechnic augmentation, but it was still thin, cold, and carried a harsh taste of sand and chemicals.

      Abruptly, as if at the throw of a switch, Gunnery Sergeant Warhurst’s fury was gone. Instead, he seemed relaxed, almost paternal. “Very well, children,” he said, standing before them with his hands on his hips. “You have just had your first fifteen minutes of Marine indoctrination and training … an ancient and hallowed tradition we refer to as ‘boot camp.’ Each of you has volunteered for this. Presumably, that means each of you wants to be here. I certainly understand that desire. The Marines are the best there are, no question about it.

      “However, I want each and every one of you to take a moment and think very hard about this decision you’ve made. Behind you is the shuttle that brought you down from the Arean Ring. If for any reason you are having second thoughts, I want you to turn around right now and plant your ass back on board that shuttle. You will be flown back up to the Arean Ring, where you can retrieve your civilian clothing, have a nice hot meal, and make arrangements to go home. No questions asked. No one will think the less of you.” He paused. “How about it? Any takers?”

      Out of the corner of his eye, Garroway sensed movement down the line to his left. Someone was wavering … and then he heard the sound of footsteps in the sand, moving toward the rear. He didn’t dare look, however. The formation was still at attention, and he had a feeling that if he turned his head to look, Warhurst’s sudden nice-guy persona would vanish as abruptly as it had begun.

      “Smart boy,” Warhurst said, nodding. “Anybody else? This will be your last chance. If you miss that shuttle … then for the next sixteen weeks you will be mine.”

      Garroway thought he heard someone else leave the line, but he wasn’t sure. He knew he wasn’t going to quit, not now. He was going to be a Marine. …

      “Handley!” Warhurst snapped, addressing one of the recruits. “Eyes front!”

      “Sir! Aye, aye, sir!”

      A long silence passed. Warhurst stood before them, his head down, as if he were listening to something. Then he looked up. “I want each of you to open your primary inputs. Full immersion.”

      Garroway did so. His neurocranial link implants opened to a local feed coming down from the Martian Ring. It was coded, but each had received the appropriate clearances up at the receiving station.

      There was a moment’s mental static, followed by the always odd feeling of standing in two places at once …

      … and then Garroway was standing on another world.

      It was night there, as it was at Noctis Labyrinthus. It was also raining, though the link was not transmitting the feel of the rain on his skin, or the bluster of the wind.

      He could see, however, a formation of Marine landing vehicles skimming in a few meters above the surf and spray of a beach, their black hulls shimmering as they phased into full solidity, their variform shells unfolding into landing configuration. Lightning flared … or perhaps it was a plasma bolt fired from the shore. It was tough sorting out exactly what was happening, because there was a great deal of noise and movement.

      One of the landing vehicles crumpled with nightmare suddenness in midair, flame engulfing its gull-winged form, the wreckage tumbling out of the sky and slamming into the surf in a crashing fountain of spray and steam. Plasma bolt, Garroway thought. An instant later, a beam of dazzling incandescence struck down out of the black overcast, a white flash starkly illuminating the beach and the incoming formation as it lanced the squat building from which the plasma bolt had been fired. The explosion further lit the night, as the first of the shape-shifting landing craft began touching down.

      In his mind, Garroway turned, watching as other craft passed overhead. There was a city behind the beach … and what looked like a large and sprawling spaceport. Beams of light continued to spear out of the angry heavens, vaporizing enemy hardpoints.

      And now, individual Marines were appearing in their cumbersome combat armor, bounding through flame and smoldering wreckage and sand dunes to close with the enemy.

      “This,” Warhurst’s voice said in Garroway’s head, “is taking place on a world called Alighan, about four hundred light-years from where you’re standing right now. There’s a slight delay in the feed, but, within the uncertainties imposed by the physics of FTL simultaneity and the time lag down from the Arean Ring, it is happening more or less as you see it. The image is being relayed from our battlefleet straight back to HQ USMC. Colonel Peters thought you should see this.”

      More Marines surged across the beach, sweeping toward the outer Alighan beach defenses. Other landing craft had passed over those bunkers and gun emplacements and were settling to ground on the spaceport itself. Fire continued to lance out of the sky, pinpoint bombardments called down by Marine spotters. Garroway found he could hear some of the chatter in the background, a babble of call signs, orders, and acknowledgments.

      “The Islamic Theocracy,” Warhurst went on, “has blocked several key trade routes into their territory. Worse, they have supported terrorist incursions into Commonwealth Space, seized Commonwealth vessels, and are suspected of holding Commonwealth citizens as slaves.

      “As you should know by now, the sole purpose of the U.S. Marine Corps is to protect Commonwealth worlds and Commonwealth citizens. To that end, a naval battlefleet and a Marine Expeditionary Force have been dispatched to effect a change in the Theocrat government. Their first step is to capture the spaceport you see in the distance, so that Army troops can land and occupy the planet.

      “The politics of the situation are unimportant, however. Marines go where they’re sent. They do what they’re told to do. They do so at the behest of the United Star Commonwealth, and the Commonwealth Command Authority. All very nice, neat, and clean. …

      “But this, children, is what modern combat really is.”

      The scene around Garroway was rapidly becoming a burning nightmare out of some primitive religion’s hell. With a mental command, his point of view drifted up from the beach toward the spaceport, where the heaviest fighting was now taking place. The landing craft all were down now—those that had survived the approach. Upon touching down, their fuselages had broken into sections, becoming automated mobile gun platforms; the wing, cockpit, and spine assemblies then each had lifted off once more, becoming airborne gunships that darted across the scene like immense, spindly insects, spewing plasma bolts and blazing streams of autocannon fire. And individual Marines, forty-eight to each LV, fanned out across the flame-tortured landscape, hunting down the enemy one gun position or hardpoint at a time. Overhead, Marine A-90 Cutlass sky-support attack craft darted and swooped like hideously visaged black hornets, locking in on ground targets and blasting them with devastating fire.