“Do you know what a Forlorn Hope was, private?”

I look over at the young lieutenant, trim and shiny and all-knowing, just trying to make a little conversation with a poor private who must be feeling out of his depth and all squirmy inside just to be in an officer’s presence like this, riding in the same shuttle, and hey, if the officer can educate poor little me while putting my mind at ease, then who is he to deny me that?

It makes me wish someone had smacked me across the face six years ag...