sullen, solitary worlds. Kriegshauser is curled in a fetal ball, facing the wall. They're all here. All but the paterfamilias.

"Shit. This fucking war."

You cheated me, my friend, you never did come in out of the bushes. You didn't shed your warpaint and reveal the man behind. Maybe now you're so well hidden no one will see you again. If so, goodbye. We loved you well. I wish you'd given us the chance to understand.

This goddamned war.

That evil-mouthed Laramie is humming the "Outward Bound." One by one, with malign grins, the others take it up.

What the hell? Here's up yours, Fred Tannian. "Hmm-hmm-de-dum..."

Epilog

Twenty years have fled since Clara Barton carried the crew of 53-B from the Canaan System. The hospital was the last ship out, given safe passage by the other firm. Admiral Frederick Minh- Tannian died with weapon in hand twelve days later, as TerVeen finally fell. He lived and died the role he demanded of his command.

His death was his great triumph. Historians now mark it as the watershed of the war.

We who served him, for one mission or many, and survived, can neither forget nor forgive. Yet the man was a genius. He established a goal, and fulfilled it. One stubborn mongrel nipping at the enemy's hamstrings, he broke Ulant's inexorable stride. After that the war was won. Numbers and production were our advantages, though blunt instruments slow to hammer out the armistice.

They were heroes, the people of Climber Fleet One. They were everything Tannian claimed. In the aggregate. However, we were individuals, frightened men and women trapped in the crucible of war.

True heroes seldom picture themselves as heroes. True heroes just stick to their jobs in the teeth of the dragon winds of heart and hell.

Twenty years have flown. Only now has the bitterness waned enough to permit this true tale to be told. There was no effort to censor me, back when. Civilians decided the public was not ready for this. Even now, those who bring you this are afraid of the furor it may raise-----

For all he seemed shattered and lost, my friend recovered with his confidence redeemed and renewed. Six years later he commanded the Task Group that reclaimed Canaan.

Yanevich, Westhause, and Bradley likewise prospered. The first and last are still in, and Admirals today. Westhause is a math professor on Canaan.

Piniaz perished his second mission after they gave him his own Climber. Diekereide was his Engineer. What became of Varese no one knows.

Of the enlisted men of 53-B, six survived the war. Of those, two have survived the peace. The price of the Climbers, and of victory, continues to be paid. Sometimes it seems Ulant came out better than we did.