"If you have any questions, your PDA can port into the Henry Hudson information system and use the AI interface to assist you; just use your stylus to write the question or speak it into your PDA's microphone. You will also find Colonial Union staff on each stateroom deck; please don't hesitate to ask them for assistance. Based on your personal information, our medical staff is already aware of any issues or needs you may have, and may have made appointments to see you this evening in your staterooms. Check your PDA. You may also visit sick bay at your convenience. This mess hall will be open all night tonight, but will begin normal operating hours as of tomorrow. Again, check your PDA for times and menus. Finally, as of tomorrow you should all be wearing CDF recruit gear; it is now being delivered to your staterooms."
Campbell stopped for a second and gave us all what I think he thought was a significant stare. "On behalf of the Colonial Union and the Colonial Defense Forces, I welcome you as new citizens and our newest defenders. God bless you all and keep you safe in what's to come.
"Incidentally, if you want to watch while we break orbit, we will be porting the video into our observation deck theater. The theater is quite large and can accommodate all recruits, so don't worry about seating. The Henry Hudson makes excellent speed, so by breakfast tomorrow the Earth will be a very small disk, and by dinner, nothing more than a bright point in the sky. This will probably be your last chance to see what was your homeworld. If that means something to you, I suggest you drop by."
"So, how is your new roommate?" Harry asked me, taking the seat next to me in the observation deck theater.
"I really don't want to talk about it," I said. I had used my PDA to navigate to my stateroom, where I found my roommate already stowing his belongings: Leon Deak. He glanced over, said, "Oh, look, it's the Bible freak," and then studiously ignored me, which took some doing in a room that was ten by ten. Leon had already taken the bottom bunk (which, to seventy-five-year-old knees at least, is the desirable bunk); I threw my carry-on onto the top bunk, took my PDA and went to get Jesse, who was on the same deck. Her roommate, a nice lady by the name of Maggie, bowed out of watching the Henry Hudson break orbit. I told Jesse who my roommate was; she just laughed.
She laughed again when she related the story to Harry, who sympathetically patted me on the shoulder. "Don't feel too bad. It's only until we get to Beta Pyxis."
"Wherever that is," I said. "How is your roommate?"
"I couldn't tell you," Harry said. "He was already asleep when I got there. Took the bottom bunk, too, the bastard."
"My roommate was simply lovely," Jesse said. "She offered me a homemade cookie when I met her. Said her granddaughter had made them as a going-away gift."
"She didn't offer me a cookie," I said.
"Well, she doesn't have to live with you, now does she."
"How was the cookie?" Harry asked.
"It was like an oatmeal rock," Jesse said. "But that's not the point. The point is, I have the best roommate of us all. I'm special. Look, there's the Earth." She pointed as the theater's tremendous video screen flickered to life. The Earth hung there in astounding fidelity; whoever built the video screen had done a bang-up job.
"I wish I had this screen in my living room," Harry said. "I'd have had the most popular Super Bowl parties on the block."
"Just look at it," I said. "All our lives, it's the only place we've ever been. Everyone we ever knew or loved was there. And now we're leaving it. Doesn't that make you feel something?"
"Excited," Jesse said. "And sad. But not too sad."
"Definitely not too sad," Harry said. "There was nothing left to do there but get older and die."
"You can still die, you know," I said. "You are joining the military."
"Yeah, but I'm not going to die old," Harry said. "I'm going to have a second chance to die young and leave a beautiful corpse. It makes up for missing out on it the first time."
"You're just a romantic that way," Jesse said, deadpan.
"Damn right," Harry said.
"Listen," I said. "We've begun pulling out."
The speakers of the theater broadcast the chatter between the Henry Hudson and Colonial Station as they negotiated the terms of the Henry Hudson's departure. Then came a low thrum and the slightest of vibrations, which we could barely feel through our seats.
"Engines," Harry said. Jesse and I nodded.
And then the Earth slowly began to shrink in the video screen, still massive, and still brilliant blue and white, but clearly, inexorably, beginning to take up a smaller portion of the screen. We silently watched it shrink, all of the several hundred recruits who came to look. I looked over to Harry, who, despite his earlier blustering, was quiet and reflective. Jesse had a tear on her cheek.
"Hey," I said, and gripped her hand. "Not too sad, remember?"
She smiled at me and gripped my hand. "No," she said hoarsely. "Not too sad. But even still. Even still."
We sat there some more and watched everything we ever knew shrink in the viewscreen.
I had my PDA set to wake me up at 0600, which it did by gently piping music through its little speakers and gradually increasing the volume until I woke. I turned off the music, quietly lowered myself off the top bunk and then rooted for a towel in the wardrobe, flicking on the small light in the wardrobe to see. In the wardrobe hung my and Leon's recruit suits: two sets each of Colonial light blue sweat tops and bottoms, two light blue T-shirts, two pairs blue chino-style drawstring pants, two pairs white socks and briefs-style underwear, and blue sneakers. Apparently we'd have no need for formal dress between now and Beta Pyxis. I slipped on a pair of sweat bottoms and a T-shirt, grabbed one of the towels that was also hanging in the wardrobe, and padded down the hall for a shower.
When I returned, the lights were glowing on full but Leon was still in his bunk—the lights must have come on automatically. I put a sweat top over my T-shirt and added socks and sneakers to my ensemble; I was ready to jog or, well, whatever else I had to do that day. Now for some breakfast. On the way out, I gave Leon a little nudge. He was a schmuck, but even schmucks might not want to sleep through food. I asked him if he wanted to get some breakfast.
"What?" he said, groggily. "No. Leave me alone."
"You sure, Leon?" I asked. "You know what they say about breakfast. It's the most important meal of the day, and all that. Come on. You need your energy."
Leon actually growled. "My mother's been dead for thirty years and as far I know, she hasn't been brought back in your body. So get the hell out of here and let me sleep."
It was nice to see Leon hadn't gone soft on me. "Fine," I said. "I'll be back after breakfast."
Leon grunted and rolled back over. I went to breakfast.
Breakfast was amazing, and I say that having been married to a woman who could make a breakfast spread that would have made Gandhi stop a fast. I had two Belgian waffles that were golden, crisp and light, wallowing in powdered sugar and syrup that tasted like real Vermont maple (and if you think you can't tell when you have Vermont maple syrup, you've never had it) and with a scoop of creamery butter that was artfully melting to fill the deep wells of the waffle squares. Add over-easy eggs that were actually over easy, four slices of thick, brown sugar–cured bacon, orange juice from fruit that apparently hadn't realized it had been squeezed, and a mug of coffee that was fresh off the burro.