Battalion 1 landed at the Fort Bastion loading dock. The dock crews moved aside to let the battalion enter the fort.

  Legion personnel crowded the corridors, the concourse, and poured in and out of every department. Fifty ships of every size and make packed the loading dock with crews working on them, around them, and going into and out of them.

  Rhodes and his people entered the station and headed for their barracks, but halfway there, he got an order to report to the lab.

  Fisher usually told Rhodes about these orders. This time, he just knew. The thought materialized in his consciousness without him realizing it.

  The rest of the battalion must have gotten the same order. They all turned off at the concourse.

  None of the surrounding personnel paid any attention to the battalion. No one avoided the battalion or looked away at their approach.

  That should have startled Rhodes into realizing how different this place was from Coleridge Station. Everyone at Coleridge Station went out of their way to pretend the battalion didn’t exist. Walking around Coleridge Station made Rhodes feel like a ghost haunting the halls.

  Walking through Fort Bastion just felt easy, normal, and comfortable. The air of tension, hostility, and even terror didn’t blast from everyone around him.

  A few of the personnel even greeted him, nodded at him, and said, “Captain…” before they went off on their own business.

  This congenial behavior should have bothered Rhodes. Instead, it lulled him into a matching sense of belonging here. He knew where he was and what he was doing here. Everything and everyone here felt familiar and easy.

  The battalion entered the lab. Dr. Rhona Littlejohn and Dr. Edwin Rollins both smiled at Rhodes when he walked in.

  “Outstanding!” Dr. Rollins exclaimed. “We just need to make a few adjustments and you can go back to the barracks. I know General Overstreet wants to debrief you about the Inviria invasion, but that can wait until after you all have a chance to rest and recharge.”

  Rhodes stood still while Dr. Littlejohn did something to the back of his cranial implant. She touched her electrodes to the metal housing.

  Dr. Rollins worked on Lauer and a bunch of other technicians did the same thing to the rest of the battalion.

  The awareness that this wasn’t Coleridge Station drifted farther into the back of Rhodes’s mind. He became even less aware that everything about Fort Bastion was different.

  He felt absolutely no hesitation about letting these doctors work on him. He trusted them in ways he never trusted anyone at Coleridge Station, not even Dr. Osborne.

  He didn’t think twice about meeting up with General Overstreet to discuss the Inviria invasion. What else would Rhodes be doing here if not that?

  Dr. Littlejohn’s device triggered something in Rhodes’s mind. A bunch of memories and sensations from that last battle came rushing back to him.

  He went through the adrenaline surge of barely escaping from that burning ship and then having it land on top of him, but the memory didn’t bring back any of the terror or pain he went through when the Duster crashed on top of him.

  He should have felt that terror and pain. He should have been at least marginally worried about having a ship that big crash on top of him.

  His neural core realigned itself—or rather Dr. Littlejohn realigned it for him. He remembered everything without suffering any emotional distress about it at all.

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  She took the device down, disconnected the electrodes, and stepped in front of him where he could see her. She smiled at him again. “You’re all done. You’re free to go, Captain. Congratulations on another successful battle.”

  He opened his mouth to answer, but at that moment, The Grid adjusted in front of his eyes. Just for a split second, he saw a Mask helmet overlaid over her face. It only happened for an instant. Then she turned back into a normal human woman.

  Not even that bothered him. He already knew she, Dr. Rollins, and General Overstreet were Masks. All the technicians in this lab were Masks working on, experimenting on, and testing Battalion 1 in multiple Grid scenarios.

  He didn’t make the same emotional connection to that the way he would have at Coleridge Station. It no longer bothered him that the Masks were doing this to him.

  He remembered everything. He just didn’t care.

  Oakes was right about the problems with escaping. Even if Rhodes and Fisher found a way to hack The Grid and get the battalion out of this illusion, they still had the problem of escaping from the Masks.

  Leaving this fake world didn’t get the battalion any closer to escaping. If anything, it got them farther away from escaping. At least they were comfortable here.

  The battalion returned to the barracks. Everything looked the same way it did when the battalion left it this morning to go into battle against the Inviria.

  Thackery, Coulter, and Fuentes went to a panel on the wall behind the tables, slid the panel open, and took out huge platters piled with food.

  The three friends laid out all the food on the table. The battalion sat down and started eating, drinking, and talking the way they always did.

  Rhodes stabbed his fork into a giant steak, put it on his plate, and started eating.

  “The Inviria changed the armor composition on their tanks,” Dietz was saying. “They’re armoring their ground vehicles more heavily now. We’ll need to compensate for that.”

  “I’m sure the ground vehicles still aren’t strong enough to stand up to Stonebridge’s cannons,” Oakes replied.

  Rhodes glanced at him. Oakes was in the middle of sipping the head off a frosty glass of beer. The foam stuck to his upper lip and he licked it off before he went back to cutting up his green beans.

  Rhodes put a piece of steak in his mouth. The sensation flooded his mind with a wave of dizzy pleasure. He couldn’t remember ever eating any food as good as this.

  The smell of buttery mashed potatoes, crispy salad, and baked peach cobbler drifted into his nose from all over the table.

  The satisfying clink of silverware against dishes filled the air. The sound, the smells, his subordinates’ voices—it all joined into a sea of happiness that made this place home.

  Rhodes took a gulp from his own beer glass. The cold liquid spread over his scalp and slid down his throat. It gave him a comfortable, satisfied feeling in his stomach. Nothing could ever go wrong with any of this.

  He half-listened to his subordinates talking about the battle. Then the conversation turned back to people they knew in Stonebridge, local happenings, and funny things they’d seen while they lived in the town.

  The SAMs stayed interfaced with the battalion through the whole meal. No one mentioned Dash consorting with prostitutes or Wild shunning society or Fisher living in a house with a wife and children.

  Van and Koenig didn’t talk about Koenig running the local eatery or them being married.

  None of the SAMs looked capable of that now. They returned to their original appearance in The Grid. They couldn’t have been any of those people.

  All of that seemed so far away right now. The happiness of sharing this meal soothed all of Rhodes’s cares—including the part where he cared about any of this.

  He ate and drank as much as he wanted to. He could wait until tomorrow to visit General Overstreet about whatever was going on with the Inviria invasion. Not even that mattered as much as the battalion enjoying themselves after their victory.

  A feeling of deep affection flooded him when he looked around at his people—all of them, including the SAMs.

  They stood by him through the worst and vice versa. He trusted each of them with his life. He never wanted to be anywhere else but right here with them, especially now that they didn’t have to worry about any dangers or problems.

  He caught them all looking back at him with the same wide-open admiration, affection, and connection. Nothing would ever break this bond. The battalion had gone through too much together.

  When they finished eating, they put all the dirty dishes back inside the panel on the wall. Everything magically vanished. No one had to clean up the barracks.

  Rhodes went to his capsule. He could have stayed up talking, drawing, or playing games with his subordinates, but he didn’t feel like it—not tonight.

  He would have plenty more nights just like this one to do all of that. He would come back here every night for the rest of his life.

  Every night would go like this. He would sit with them, talk to them, and share all that time with them. There was no rush to do anything.

  He stretched out in his capsule. The feeling of the prongs locking into his head and body gave him a feeling of deep peace, calm, and relief. He shut his eyes and faded away into his conversion cycle.

  End of Chapter 14.

  ? 2024 by Theo Mann

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