Whatever else the vision might have been, it was an orientation film aimed at the new recruit—me—as well as a call to duty and an urgent warning that the secret war could soon erupt into conflict on a greater scale, perhaps evolving into Armageddon. My sense was that if I didn’t answer the call to battle, the war would come to me anyway. This was a matter of destiny. If I gave destiny the finger and walked away, that wouldn’t be the end of it. What would have happened would still happen. The malevolent beings that I’d had a chance to stand up against would crush me without resistance. That was
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