"Do I look alright?" Juana asked nervously, tugging at her blue sundress.

I took a minute to appreciate my wife. "You look hot."

"That's not what I mean.” She rolled her eyes but smiled at me.

We stood at the foot of the space elevator, just below the steps leading down off the platform. The column of thickened air leading skyward shimmered just a little with a subtle blue light. I craned my neck to see the capsule carrying the first of the Joint Task Force Ganymede personnel descending, getting bigger by the second. A moment later, it landed. The pod walls vanished, leaving 30 people standing there. A woman stepped down first. I recognized her as Air Marshall Hatfield, our new head I saluted. She returned our salute, and I let my hand drop back to my side.

The new arrivals descended the six steps to the streets of Threshold, looking around with expressions of wonder. Threshold was pretty impressive the first time you see it. We’d kept the two main streets, running north-south and east-west from the elevator platform, wide and open. From here you could catch glimpses of the ring of portals surrounding the inner town. There were several dozen people here turned out to welcome the new arrivals, including most of the town council, me and some of my trusted friends, and Mama Grace. Not to mention our existing military leader, who stepped forward and cleared his throat.

"Welcome, Air Marshall,” Colonel Ames said. "We're glad to have you here. This is Captain Williams and Captain Barkley." He introduced the other ranking Joint Task Force Ganymede member currently on Threshold. "For the civilian side, Councilors Lopez-Williams, Chen, Fletcher, and Nguyen are here to welcome you."

"Pleased to meet you all," Air Marshall Hatfield said briskly. “You’re just who I wanted to speak to. I have 3,000 troops and dependents cycling down here in the next couple of hours. I hope you’re ready for them.”

“Preparations have been made for them." Juana stepped forward. "We have temporary housing set up for everyone. It's getting a little tight, but we'll manage. I've gone over the roster you sent and have delegates set up to help me run orientation for the dependents. Service members will go through the standard induction here." She gestured to me. "Captain Williams has been running most of those."

"Yes, so I've heard," Air Marshall Hatfield said. "One of our first orders of business, Williams, will be for you to get my staff up on running the inductions. Also, I see you've been working a bunch of the civilian inductions as well."

I nodded. "Yes, ma'am, especially for the mercy cases. They need a little more supervision than the average induction squad."

"Agreed. But we're going to want to work out some strict chains of command here. I don't like having our people running everything. We need more civilian buy-in."

I liked the sound of that.

"If you'll permit us," Colonel Ames said, "we'd like to get you and your staff inducted right away."

Air Marshall Hatfield shook her head. "My technical support staff and I will not be inducted into the reality engine."

I was taken aback by that. Sure, some of the civilians coming up were refusing to be inducted, but the new JTF commander?

Colonel Ames' face was a pleasant mask. "Ma'am, may I ask why?"

"We wish to remain independent from the impacts that the reality engine entity known as Kronos has," Air Marshall Hatfield said. "To that end, I will not be submitting ourselves to Ethereum dependency."

I managed to keep my mouth shut. This was definitely not a time for Shad to put his foot in his mouth.

"In that case, ma'am, I'm going to need to make some changes to our plans," Colonel Ames said. "We'll need to requisition a headquarters building here in Threshold. Space is a bit tight, so you'll have to make do with what I can come up with."

The woman looked surprised. "I don't understand. You've known we were coming for months now."

"Yes, ma'am, and we've been working with Kronos to stabilize a zone specifically for our use," Colonel Ames said. "Similar to the educational facilities we were setting up. However, zones are only accessible to those who have integrated with the reality engine."

Air Marshall Hatfield considered this and then nodded. "Take care of the arrangements. I do have a squad of security personnel who will be integrating, as well as my second-in-commander, Major Armstrong. I would appreciate it if you would run them through, Captain Williams, and then report to me. Colonel Ames, you will accompany me and help get me up to speed here."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Five officers and eight enlisted men, from three different militaries, presented themselves to me. “Right this way, gentlemen,” I said, and led the contingent of officers to our integration level.

As we walked, I asked for the names of everyone I'd be inducting. Three of the officers ranked higher than me, and they were all annoyed. I heard a pair of majors behind me muttering to each other. "Commander exempts herself and her personal aides from integration but is making us do it. I was thinking about retirement in a few years.”

“Everyone who gets inducted is going to be in this for the long haul. If they try to ship me off to Alpha Centauri or something, I'm going to give them hell.” I pretended not to hear.

We met my team outside the level. I introduced Morgan, Hester, and Will. The officers gave them a suspicious look-over.

“Hester’s second-in-command here. I need you to listen to what she has to say,” I told them.

“Civilians?” Major Armstrong said. “Really? Do we need their help?”

I hesitated. I'd asked Kronos to give us a nice straightforward scenario. He apparently couldn’t just make life easy for us by giving us a field full of sheep to slaughter for soul coins. I'd asked why, and he hadn't answered. The aliens claimed it was a sign of just how ornery our reality engine was—that a properly tamed reality engine would never act this way.

“The goal here is to get you all soul coins. It’s straightforward enough. I can have the contractors on stand-by if you prefer to take charge, Major.”

“Yes, I do.” Armstrong glared around.

“All right, you three go in and take up a perimeter. The Major will shout if you’re needed,” I instructed. My team nodded and leapt through the portal. Some of the to-be-inducted Earthers boggled after them. “We’ll be presented with enemies to kill,” I explained. “Could be anything from zombies to giant toads. Kill them and take a soul coin. That will let you integrated with the system.”

“Clear enough,” Armstrong said. “Everyone fall in!”

I stepped through the portal and I found myself in freezing snow. The wind howled and bit, snow driving into our faces.

"Ah, shit," I said. "Excuse me. Sorry, guys."

Kronos was clearly trying to send a message here. I had cold weather gear in my inventory, but not enough to outfit everyone here. Since they weren't integrated yet, they couldn't dial in the comfort levels. I surreptitiously adjusted my own personal environmental restrictions, so I wasn't freezing.

Morgan sent a message. We have overwatch but I’m not going to intervene unless you ask. Have fun with the assholes.

"All right," I shouted over the wind. "Sorry about this. Listen, as soon as you're integrated, this will improve. We've got to look for—"

One of the officers pointed behind me. I whirled, Quick-Drawing my gun as an enormous polar bear reared up on its hind legs, slashing at me. I shot it full of lead, six slugs right to the center of mass. The bear roared and collapsed, bleeding everywhere. I pointed to the closest in our party. "Grab the soul coin!”

The enlisted man scrambled forward. He seized it and was enveloped in a glow of yellow light.

"Excuse me," Captain Jones snarled. "What do you mean, inducting a sergeant first?”

Damn, I had not been around brass in a long time. Colonel Ames and Grandpa didn't count.

"Sorry," I said, scrambling forward. "Watch out for—"

Another monster loomed over me. This was no polar bear. It was something even bigger, huge, white, and shaggy. I reloaded my gun with a spell-bullet and blasted at it. The creature, which my HUD helpfully identified as an Abominable Snowman, stumbled back, roared, then charged right past me at the cowering group of officers. I shot again. It collapsed atop of Major Armstrong, knocking him down into the snow as its blood pooled everywhere, melting the top layer of ice. He shouted furiously as two of the others tried to free him.

"Grab the soul coin!" I yelled as I turned to face the next attacker. I slew another polar bear. As it fell, the men behind me started shrieking. I turned, expecting to see another yeti tearing at them. Instead, an ensign was on the ground, covered in a horde of penguins, all angrily pecking at him with their beaks. I choked back a laugh and rushed in, shooting as I went.

"Gimme a hand!" I barked. "Anyone have a sidearm? These things die easy!”

"Insubordination!" the captain who had just finished binding a soul coin said. He looked warmer already.

I didn't have time for this. I thought about calling in Hester and the others. Instead I put my head down and shot one penguin after another. By the time I was done, blood was everywhere on the ice, but I had enough soul coins for all of the new recruits.

Armstrong was the last to take a coin. At last, when everyone had a soul coin, I queued my leader's interface, selected all of us, then ordered us transported to one of the usual intake facilities. This one was in the form of a very nice club, with little round tables with five or six seats at each, facing a stage. The officers materialized in chairs. I appeared on the stage. I holstered my pistol and sighed. "Right. Sorry about that. All of you are now successfully inducted in the reality engine. I would suggest for future groups we allow the civilian contractors to take part, but now you’ve had a chance to see just how real this engine is.”

"I am not going to let my wife undergo anything like this," Major Armstrong snapped. There was a chorus of agreement around the room. I kept my tongue in my head. Though most of our enlisted recruits were either unmarried or partnered with other service members, I knew several of the officers had civilian dependents: wives, husbands, children. The new base housing was inside a stabilized level. I'd been proud of earning enough ethereum to see that everyone was going to have comfortable quarters. Now, though, that was a problem.

"I will ensure that I have a full staff on hand before I assist any dependents with integration," I said stiffly.

"We'll be letting Air Marshall Hatfield know about this," Major Armstrong said.

I pulled back on an angry retort. I'd been doing things on my own, or with a group that I trusted, for much too long. Now I needed to be able to give and take orders, and I wasn't used to that. This was going to be a challenge, but I wanted Grandpa to be proud of me, so I kept a civil tongue in my head.

"Let me give you the quick briefing," I said. "Then we can get on to class selection. I have an expert on standby if you have any questions about what some of your options mean." I would not be subjecting Arjun to these people. I had Allison ready to come in, and she could relay questions to Arjun if necessary. I took a deep breath. "All right, let's get started."