To escape from Mars, all Clayton had to do was the impossible. Break out of a crack-proof exile camp--get onto a ship that couldn't be boarded--smash through an impenetrable wall of steel. Perhaps he could do all these things, but he discovered that Mars did evil things to men; that he wasn't even Clayton any more. He was only
General David Walker looked up again at the seamed face of the Chief of Staff, General Marcus Meriwether. "This could be serious," he said slowly, with a sick sense of the statement's inadequacy. An old tic suddenly returned, tugging at the left corner of his mouth. The deadly, unsmiling expression on Meriwether's face did not change as he slid more tightly into his chair. "You know as well as I that it means the Interplanetary Confederation is ready to go to war with us."
How could a human body be found actually splintered--broken into sharp fragments like a shattered glass! Once again Dr. Bird probes deep into an amazing mystery.
A world had collapsed around this man--a world that would never shout his praises again. The burned-out cities were still and dead, the twisted bodies and twisted souls giving him their last salute in death. And now he was alone, alone surrounded by memories, alone and waiting.