"Zevi Avedis, Artillery." And the music stopped. And we stood in formation. And the Minister of Defense walked toward the podium. He shook hands with our Principal and addressed the crowd.
"People of Mars. These are our guardians!" There was a general murmur in the crowd, followed by a smattering of clapping.
"These young men have dedicated their lives to serving our new world. They have been purified through calamity, strengthened through personal loss. All of them have suffered at the fangs of dog attacks. They have lost mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers. They have lost their own arms. And they have sworn to protect the rest of Mars from the hideous destruction they have suffered." Again, a general sense of uneasiness and confusion filled the stadium. The crowd didn't seemed scared as much as confused. They had never seen the likes of us and didn't know how to react. There was a tense energy above us all.
"My sojourners, my pilgrims, my Martians; we will be safe again! No more will we have to live in fear of creatures outside of our control. We will subdue and cultivate the land as we were commissioned to do so long ago. We will make this world beautiful and full of hope. Not terror and fear! Rejoice with me, my friends. We are free to dream again!"
Finally, the crowd released itself from doubt and poured out applause. It was the grandest thing I had witnessed. My body tingled. I remembered the vector plates spinning around me. I felt the same exhiliration. The crowd noise died down.

"Sons of Mars, introduce yourselves!" The Minister of Defense said.
We moved in formation, stood center stage toward the crowd, saluted in unison, raised our arms and yelled, "For the glory of Mars!" And discharged our pulse beams into the brittle sky. I was used to the sight of multiple pulse beams. They made a loudish sucking hiss noise when fired. The effect, when multiple beams were fired at once, was one of a large aircraft engine gaining velocity. We fired on cue. I was impressed with our accuracy and synchronisity. I looked down to see the reaction to our precision from the audience and the crowd was in turmoil. Their mouths were opened in unison. Many let out terrified screams. I looked up again to see if something terribly wrong had happened. The sky was empty again of our light show. I looked behind me. The Minister of Defense was staring ahead, hands clasped to the corners of the podium. I turned back. Many of us were showing signs of confusion. Everything happened as it should.

And all of a sudden, as if we had promised them riches, the crowd let out a giant roar. It was so sudden I jumped and positioned myself for defense. Their faces, in the crowd, had changed. They were jubilant. They were raucaus. They were cheering madly. I looked around. My classmates were smiling. The people did understand. They really did want us. I felt a great relief. I grabbed the nearest shoulder and shook it. Balthasar looked back at me with a grin. He let out that tearing laugh and shook his hand in the air. That moment, surrounded by such great human noise, acting like an immense semi-conductor of joy and delight, that moment of pure intentions, gratitude, and hope shook something inside of me. It was as if a secret dial had turned somewhere deep in my soul. And I had no idea to what purpose. I felt different, but I did not know how. I felt hope, but I didn't know for what. My heart was a large and golden room filled with light. I stopped cheering and stared straight ahead. I let the noise, like a martian windstorm, sweep over me. I let my emotions get the best of me. It was loud and I was happy and scared and hopeful. Beneath the gust of noise and gail of emotions--I was a little boy. I let out a sob that was lost in the din.

The noise began to ebb and the voice of our field marshal rose above it. "Sons of Mars, attention!" The rest of us had been smiling and holding hands and laughing. We instantly fell into position. He motioned to follow and exited the stage. The music began again and the crowd again cheered. They sent us off with glory. We were ushered into a large banquet hall. A representative from each specialist school had been chosen previously to answer questions from the media. We were all to be seated in the room with each representative at a large long desk facing the crowd of media.

We had a few minutes to prepare before the media came. Our principal reminded us of our training and told us how proud he was of us. I don't remember much of what he was saying. I was still halfway in another place. He was happy and nervous like a new father, that was evident. He kept clapping his hands together and fidgeting with the table clothe and chairs. The Minister of Defense came into the room and conferred with our principal. He nodded and they both sat down at the middle of the table. A man I had never seen before took a podium in front and to the side of the table and adjusted the microphone. He nodded to men standing beside the entry doors. They opened them and a stream of people filed excitedly into the room. They all had writing devices and microphones and big eyes. They all tried to sit in the front row. The men at the doors had to seat them. When they were all inside, the man at the podium talked.

"Good afternoon. Thank you all for coming. We are going to open this up to a question and answer session for the guardians and for the Minister of Defense and Merrill Lever, Principal Steward of the Mars Children of Strength Orphanage. There is a representative from each specialist training group from the school that would be happy to answer your questions. For the sake of brevity, we will limit the questions to these representatives only. Thank you again for coming, and we are excited to answer your questions. Now, Charlie, if you'd like to begin?" The questions came pouring out. These people were so eager to know about us. I'd never heard so many questions before in my life. About everything we did.
"What do you eat for dinner?"
"Ah. Whatever we have at the cafeteria."
"Do you ever miss your real arm?"
"This is better than my real arm, actually."
"Do you have to take it off?"
"No, it works just like yours. It only gets removed during upgrade overhauls?"
"What are upgrade overhauls?"
"When we get new upgrades for our arms. Things like that."
"Have you ever seen a woman before today?"
"Yes, we get to watch movies on the weekends."
"Do you like girls?"
"I guess so."
"How come you can grab things without any fingers?"
"Um. That's complicated. Ask someone in the knowledge class."
"Oakes, how come you can grab things without any fingers?"
"I don't think we have time for that question."
"What classes do you take?"
"I can answer that. Don, our curriculum is the same as an advanced preparation class in any top prep school back on earth. We tailor the teaching to challenge our students on a daily basis. We want our children to not only be exceptional guardians, but exceptional men." Said our principal.
"What is your training?"
"We train with our field specialists every day."
"We give them advance scout training similar to what a special ops team would recieve in the military back on Earth. I don't want to give away too much, but suffice to say that they are very well trained."
"Parrish, do you miss your family?"
"This is my family. These are my brothers."
"Does it ever hurt?"
"No, it feels just like the rest of me."
"Has anyone ever been injured?"
"Our children suffer minor bumps and bruises and the occasional break. Just as anyone training for combat will. But we have exceptional physicians on staff that care for any emergency that arises. Our facility and our children's enhanced arms are equiped with a safety device that allows for combat training only in combat training facilities. Every function besides remedial motions are turned off in the rest of the compound. It is highly unlikely that any of our children would be injured outside of the combat zone besides moments of clumsiness or accidental occurances."
"What's it like living with all boys."
"Its okay. They're my family."
"How come your names are so funny?"
"It's my name."
"Are you excited to see the rest of Mars."
"Yes!" The crowd of reporters chuckled at Maeron's enthusiasm.
"Well, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. There's much more to see than one park in Roanoke."

We finished with the questions and were escorted back to the orphanage.