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themselves but slowly and were critical to the management of the planet. Even at that, Class Twos didn't get the full treatment and could only be expected to live about two and a half centuries. Class Ones? Not one who had received the full treatment had yet died to natural causes.
    Wallenstein was only a Class Two, something she also hoped to rectify with this trip.
    Tall, generally slender and even svelte, Marguerite Wallenstein, Captain and Admiral pro tem , fell just shy of true physical beauty, with a nose a bit too large and eyes that, while of a very lovely blue, were just slightly too small. Despite these minor flaws, however, she managed to exude an earthy sensuality that, coupled with a willingness to use her body to get ahead, had seen her through difficult times in the UEPF. Indeed, that eager willingness had seen her to her present, exalted, permanent rank.
    For any superiors who might have been less than enchanted with her nose or eyes, Wallenstein's breasts were simply magnificent, which magnificence had been considerably aided by low, shipboard gravity. Hard work and genetic predisposition had seen to the maintenance of a narrow waist and shapely rear, ship's gravity notwithstanding. For that matter, she could have had her nose and eyes surgically altered. Why she hadn't remained a mystery even to herself. Perhaps it was simple pride.
    A speaker mounted to the wall of the observation deck announced, "Incoming intelligence update, Admiral."
    Unseen by the officer, Wallenstein nodded and said, "Record for my later review."
    She doubted the update contained anything new. Mentally Wallenstein ticked off the areas lost that she knew of. Southern South America . . . lost . . . Buenos Aires sacked and burned and the new front line of civilization is Montevideo. Canada, at least most of it, is under glaciers. The Great Plains between the Rockies and the Mississippi? Held by horse riding nomads ethnically mixed between what used to be called "Native Americans," blacks, Asians, and whites, but culturally more similar to Genghis Khan's Mongols . . . those, or Attila's Huns. Southeastern Asia has revolted, restored Roman Catholicism, and massacred the punitive force the Consensus dispatched. And outside of Cape Town, Southern Africa is in anarchy. Northern Europe is ice. Revolts brewing in Central America . . .
    She almost shivered in anticipation. It was pretty clear at this point that the Consensus did not intend to space her. The bastards need me now, all right. I wonder if I could get away with . . .
    Wallenstein's reveries were interrupted by a call from the observation deck's speaker, "Final approach run impending . . . shorten sail . . . stand by for braking . . . Admiral to the bridge . . ."

Balboa, Terra Nova
    On the surface of a different world than the one approached by Wallenstein's Spirit of Peace , in a small and normally fairly insignificant country, a huge bridge, the Bridge of the Columbias, was packed on both sides, with traffic slowed to a crawl where it wasn't halted outright. Stuck in that traffic, with the tropical sun beating on the roof of his vehicle and threatening to overwhelm the air conditioning, Legate Xavier Jimenez, 4th Legion, Commanding, fumed.
    I hate driving through the Transitway Area .
    Jimenez was a physical oddity. Hair and features, but for color, were basically Caucasian, and more than handsome Caucasian, at that. His skin, though, was a high gloss anthracite. The coloration and the good looks ran in the family. So did a great many less genetic attributes, notable among these a fierce patriotism.
    It's not bad enough that, after nearly a century of colonialist occupation, the old government brought in a different group of colonialists to secure their own persons at the expense of the country. Oh, no, to add injury to insult, the Tauran Union troops, nearly twelve thousand of them, who provide that security, sometimes, and for no obvious reason, cut off