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shot if I kept it up. And
you know what? He did!
    After I got out of the hospital I was kind of afraid to go back
to my platoon, but I found out that the rich kid had deserted by then. I didn’t
go look for him. They said it would be a black mark on my record if I didn’t
find him, but I said I liked black. So that ended that argument.
    After a couple of weeks I had my men trained well enough so
that they would obey my orders to the letter without thinking. This sometimes
resulted in them marching off a cliff, or somehow leaving the planet’s thin
atmosphere. Then I had to ask the Captain for more recruits. He didn’t like
that, and neither one of us liked all the additional paperwork that had to be
done, but I always ended up getting my new recruits. There were plenty of them
available. The war was very popular at this point because no one had gotten
hurt yet.
    Even with all the mistakes I was making - all the unexplained
deaths and clumsy cover-ups, and all the damage I was doing to the army base -
my platoon was progressing while the others in camp were getting worse.
    Respect for authority was on the decline in a lot of the
platoons. The words “Ah shaddap” were frequently heard after an order was
given. The troops thought the officers were “squares”. They had to be taught
that maybe being a “square” was “cool”. They asked how that could be. I said
that I said “MAYBE”. Besides, I told them, maybe it’s “hip” not to ask
questions. Maybe it’s “hip” to do what you’re told. To be obedient. And docile.
To not have a mind of your own. Maybe that’s what’s “hip” these days. Most of
the troops hadn’t thought of that. It was a new and false sounding idea to
them. I think that helped me keep the men in line – talking so crazy like that.
    Since my platoon was plainly the most professional in camp, the
higher-ups promoted me again so I could bring my brand of “Burly Discipline” to
more platoons.
    As my confidence in my leadership abilities grew, I no longer
bothered drilling the men myself. I left that to underlings who knew what they
were doing and could tell their left feet from their neighbor’s left feet,
while I concentrated on the larger issues. I taught the men in my battalion to
be just like the Old Man (me). I taught them to be tenacious, self-absorbed,
single-minded, and tough. And, of course, I inadvertently taught them my
weaknesses: to be petty and obnoxious, to panic in a crisis, to be late for
work, everything I knew.
    I taught my men to go straight towards their objective, over
any obstacle, no matter how high or how easy to go around. (“The Burly
Maneuver”) That way we didn’t need maps or strategy or sense of direction of
any kind. Feet is all we needed. Good old Martian feet. It’s an easy strategy
to remember, and it also saves on map printing costs. When you’ve got an army
to run, you’ve got to worry about everything.
    With each batch of men I successfully trained, I got more men,
and a new promotion.
    On April 30 th at 6 am, I watched proudly as my men marched across the
tarmac, climbing over luggage carts and airport workers, and boarded their
saucers for the invasion. An invasion which was to be commanded by General
Xxpmpt, Air Marshal Rrogyx, and Lance General (recently promoted from Buck
General) Burly – that’s me.
    It was an impressive invasion fleet that was being assembled on
that field. Our saucers not only contained thousands of highly trained fighting
men, their cargo bays were loaded with all kinds of scary sounding battle
machines: Galaxy Smashers, Earth Shatterers, and Life Snuffers. And new wonder
weapons like the Soldier Thrower which could hurl a fully armed soldier two
hundred yards towards the enemy, and the bigger version of the same machine:
the deadly General Launcher.
    As I watched the last Planet Pincher being rolled aboard, I was
surprised to see Arthur Gremlin appear at my side. I hadn’t seen him in a long
time. And