Jay Allan - Marines

My second battalion head was Major Jackson Cantor, who'd been promoted to his position after commanding a company through the Outer Rim, fighting in every battle of the campaign, and ending up as acting battalion-exec.

They all looked good to me on paper, and a few minutes later I got to reinforce that opinion. I'd been thinking a tray of sandwiches for us to eat while we got acquainted, but Lieutenant Delacorte somehow managed to gather up a spread that included a platter of Columbian seafood, a choice of soups, and rare steaks that tasted to me like they were imported from Earth. It seemed my new orderly was a gifted scrounger. That could be very useful.

We ate and discussed the regiment, and by the time the meeting broke up we had begun the transition from a group of officers to a team. The chemistry was good, and I was confident we'd work well as a unit. My only reservation was that Jax was the only one who'd ever taken the field at his current position – the rest had all moved up a notch. Except me; I'd moved up two. And even Jax had been filling in for me as acting CO – this was his first mission as official battalion commander. It wasn’t just at the top. Eight of the regiment's ten captains were newly promoted as well. But ten years of war and long casualty lists had a way of making that the norm.

That first meeting lasted four hours, far longer than I had initially intended, and once they were all gone I found my sleeping platform and just about passed out. It'd been almost 40 hours since I'd slept, and I was out the instant I hit the bed.

I spent the next week reorganizing and restructuring the regiment. I took the general up on his offer to approve my promotions and transfers, and I sent him a pile of them. True to his word, he signed every one without hesitation. I was more or less trying to balance the experience levels of the troops, but I did make a couple exceptions. I picked one company and packed it with veterans. I wanted one elite formation I could call upon in a tough spot, and Jax's 1st company was it.

I'd fought in close quarters a number of times, first on the station at Gliese, then on the moons, and finally on Eridu. That kind of knife fight was a different sort of struggle, and I organized another company consisting mostly of veterans of this kind of battle and had them drill on close quarters combat, including a substantial amount of practice with their blades. If I needed to hit a mine or underground stronghold, I would have a specialist formation to lead the assault.

I reviewed supply manifests, training reports, disciplinary proceedings, and a hundred other bits of administrative drudgery. When did regimental commanders get to fight? Going to war would get in the way of my busy clerical schedule. Being chained to a workstation was not what I'd expected, but to a certain extent it's what I got.

There were 1,402 men and women in the 3rd Regiment, and I was responsible for every one of them. Fourteen hundred suits of armor, thousands of weapons, millions of rounds of ammunition, not to mention food, clothes, medical supplies, and everything else a force that size needs to function. I had to deal with all of it. But I felt good. I had strong officers, even if they were all moving up a rank and handling new responsibilities. The troops were eager, and the general had made sure I Corps was the best equipped force to take the field in Alliance history.

My journey to this point had been an improbable one, but it had been a trip that led me home. I had known that for a long time, and I had gotten all the additional assurance I would ever need enduring several months back on Earth surrounded by maggot politicians, generations of whom had wrecked the place and created the hideous system that had destroyed my first family. But this was my family now, and I wouldn't let anything hurt it. I'd go to hell and back with them, and I knew that they would always be there for me.

The weeks of final preparations went quickly, and the embarkations began. Lifting 45,000 troops, plus weapons, equipment, and supplies into orbit was a monumental task. I stood in the training field and watched the nearly endless stream of shuttles lifting off and returning.

My regiment was assigned to three of the big new assault ships of the Excalibur class, and we were almost the last unit to board. I looked around at the field we were leaving deserted and at Weston in the distance, new construction buzzing everywhere. I glanced back one last time at the ridgeline where I'd come as close to dying as a still living person could.

I arranged to be the last person from 3rd Regiment to board, and with one final look behind me, I walked up into the bay of the shuttle and the ramp closed behind me. Ten minutes later we were airborne; in 30 we were in orbit preparing to dock with our assault ship.

My mind was on the enemy, and my thought was simple and clear. We are coming for you now.

The Western Alliance is a two-level federal republic consisting of the marginally separate but strongly allied nations of the United States, Great Britain, Canada, and Oceania (greater Australia). This commonwealth arrangement is unique among the superpowers. The Alliance also occupies Latin America and administers the area as a resource zone under the supervision of a military governor. The occupied territories are not represented in the Alliance Senate.

Though their governments are a sinkhole of incompetence, authoritarianism, and corruption, the states of the alliance remain, at least in theory, the most democratic on Earth. Superficially a republic, the Alliance is, in effect, an oligarchy controlled by an entrenched political class. Citizens have few freedoms, and speech, travel, and other activities are heavily monitored by the government.

The individual nations maintain their own separate military establishments, both on Earth and in space, though they are commanded by a unified Joint Chiefs of Staff organization and are frequently combined for operations.

The U.S. deep space ground forces consist primarily of the Marine Corps, which operates alongside the British Royal Marines and other Alliance offworld forces. British military organizations continue to carry the designation "Royal" despite the fact that the monarchy was eliminated during the Unification Wars.

The Western Alliance is one of the strongest superpowers, both on Earth and in space. Its terrestrial economy is perpetually bankrupt, and the government is highly dependent on the profitable exploitation of its colony worlds, which are allowed a significant level of independence as long as mandated production quotas are met.

Though the jihad failed to achieve its goal of world domination, the forces of the Caliphate ended the Unification Wars in possession of a vast domain stretching from Western India to the Atlantic coast of Africa.

This vast theocracy is headed by the Caliph, who rules with absolute and unquestioned power. Below the Caliph are several levels of nobility exercising direct control over the larger population, which lives barely above the sustenance level and enjoys almost no comforts or freedoms. Citizens are encouraged to live a simple existence and to practice obedience to their lords and the state. Laws are restrictive, and violators are punished harshly.

The Caliphate’s colonies are organized according to a highly militarized feudal system. The local commanders are lords, and essentially “own” their colonies in return for providing resources and militia units for use on the frontier. By encouraging the use of private resources in colonization efforts, the Caliphate has established one of the largest interstellar empires.