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more, to face the future.
    The court-martial was a joke. The prosecution paraded its entire line of witnesses before the judge and members of the court, while Mathers had only Foster, himself, to put on the stand. She had done her best, cross-examining each witness and watching them squirm on the stand as she piled on all the pressure she could to try to break their stories, but they had obviously been well rehearsed. She could make them nervous, but she couldn’t make them crack.
    When it came time for the defense to make its case, she put Foster on the stand and simply let him tell the story in his own words. To her, they were the first words that sounded even slightly believable in the entire proceeding, but the prosecution turned his cross-examination into one of the most vitriolic attacks she had ever seen in a court.
    Still, Foster could not be rattled. He kept his cool, never once becoming upset or angry, calmly answering every question. Some of them he answered over and over, always with the same response, until at last even the judge and panel got tired of hearing it all repeated. After, she rested her case, knowing she had done all of the little she could do, and knowing full well that it wasn’t going to be enough.
    “Sergeant Foster,” she began, as the members of the court filed out to begin their deliberations. “I’ve been thinking, and—well, I want you to know that you won’t be forgotten. We may still have a chance to save you on appeal, but no matter what happens, I want you to know that I’m not going to let this be swept under the rug. I’ve copied all of my notes in your case; I’ve got hours and hours of recordings from where you and I talked it over, so I know the whole story. We might not have a chance to win here in this court, but there’s another court. I’m going to write a book about you and this case, so that people learn what really happened, and just how corrupt our system really is.”
    Foster sat there at the defense table and smiled at her. She knew, of course, that the smile was merely an affectation, that he had practiced it over and over until he could make it look genuine, but it still made her feel good.
    “Lieutenant Mathers, I appreciate that. But do yourself a favor, and wait until Congressman Gibson retires.”
    The members of the court returned after only twenty-four minutes of deliberations, and their foreman stood to read the verdict. Noah was convicted on all counts, just as he had told her he would be.
    “Sergeant Noah Foster,” intoned the presiding officer, as Noah stood to hear the official pronouncement of the verdict. “The members of this court have found you guilty of multiple counts of murder and sedition. This court will now move to the sentencing phase, unless the defendant is in need of a recess.”
    Noah kept his eyes on the eyes of the judge. “I don’t need a recess, Sir,” he said. “I’d like to proceed.”
    Mathers leaned over and whispered into his ear. “Foster, are you sure? We can take a break, reconvene tomorrow.”
    Noah shook his head. “All that would do is give me one more day to second-guess what we could’ve done. Let’s just get this over with. There’s actually a lot of books I want to read before I die, so the sooner I get started, the better the chance I’ll get to finish at least some of them.”
    Mathers looked up at the judge. “Defense is ready to proceed, Sir,” she said.
    Just like the court-martial itself, the sentencing phase was a farce. The presiding officer listened to statements about Foster’s character from his commanding officer and several of the men who had already testified against him, painting him as a dangerous and psychotic individual. When it was her turn, she put Foster back on the stand and let him talk about his childhood, the things that had happened to him. She asked him about his psychological problems, and was quickly shut down by the judge. By the time she finished, she was standing