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rumored – quietly - that a different speech code applied to the
Growers, that they could get away with saying things that would get
anyone else sent to a reeducation camp. Whether or not there were
actually any such formal directives, there was some truth to the
innuendo. You could occasionally get something like a little
privacy on a farm.
    The tradeoff was hard work. Goddamned hard.
Not many small farms could afford much automation, not with the
heavy taxation and the need to bribe at least a dozen government
officials to avoid crippling harassment. UN Central wanted the
Growers producing the fresh food the privileged classes demanded…it
just didn’t want them getting rich doing it. Crop prices were set
by the government, and they were usually too low to allow much
beyond basic sustenance for the farmers, especially with operating
costs so high. It wasn’t just the equipment; it was the fuel to run
it that was really expensive.
    Taylor had never particularly liked farming,
though he hadn’t realized before how much he enjoyed the perk of
eating real food rather than the artificially-engineered products
that fed most of the population. It had been hard for him to adapt
to army rations. He’d grown up on apples from the orchard, fresh
bread baked from newly-milled grains, and the other bounty from the
farm. Now he subsisted on things like chemically-enhanced algae
protein bars. It was months before he could choke one down without
retching.
    He’d been born on the farm, and he’d expected
to spend the rest of his life working it. But what Jake Taylor had
really wanted to do was write. He knew that opportunities to earn a
living that way were scarce, but even if he had to work in the
fields all day, he still felt the urge to sit at his keyboard
nights and create something. Even though he knew he’d probably
never earn anything from it.
    Writing was dangerous too. It was just about
the most regulated trade, and it was easy to run afoul of the
myriad rules and guidelines. There were more writers in the
reeducation facilities than just about any other profession.
    After he got to Erastus, Jake realized how
fortunate he’d been to be born on the farm…and how little he’d
appreciated it at the time. Soldiers in UNFE tended to come from
the lower classes, and the stories of the violent freezones and
decaying suburbs made him reconsider his memories of childhood in
what he now considered the idyllic countryside.
    Tony Black wasn’t the first city rat Jake had
met and befriended, but he was the one who came from the worst
shithole. The Central Philly Core was a decent urban sanctuary, but
everything outside its guarded gates was a nightmare. The place was
notorious as one of the worst freezones, a vast slum where violence
and lawlessness were rampant and social services in short supply.
People died every day in Philly. It was considered a good night
when only a dozen or so bodies were in the streets come
morning.
    Black had gotten into some kind of trouble
back home, which is why he was on Erastus. He never told anybody
what it was, except for once when he got really drunk. Taylor had
gotten half the story that night, but he’d never shared a word of
it with anybody. Black and Taylor were best friends and, despite
the difference in their ranks and backgrounds, they had come to
trust each other completely.
    Black…and Bear Samuels, Karl Young,
Longbow…they had become a very tight group, even more than usual
among the fighting men on Erastus. Taylor had been onplanet for
five years, and he’d had friends before, but these guys were
something different…something special. Denny Parker had been part
of that group too, and they were all still mourning him. Taylor
wasn’t sure it was smart to get so close to guys who were only
going to die anyway. And they were going to die; he was sure of
that. Everyone died on Gehenna.

Chapter 4
     
    From the Journal of Jake Taylor:
     
    My father was a vet. It was
something I never