Like a character in a Joseph Conrad novel, Nathan Dixon made his way down the divisional structure toward his ultimate goal. At each level he became more aware of how much he stood out from the soldiers around him. It was more than the simple fact that they were in BDUs, faded to perfection from years of field use and repeated washings while he wore his dress greens that were all but bare of ribbons and qualification badges.

There is an easy confidence with which the paratroopers carried themselves. It comes from the knowledge that they have done things which are radically against human nature, such as throwing one’s body out of a perfectly good airplane or the willingness to place oneself in harm’s way on short notice. This self-assurance translates itself into a swagger, a swagger that permeates everything they do, from the manner in which paratroopers walk to the way they talk. It even taints their view of the world, for everyone now falls into one of two handy, well defined categories. Those human beings who had the courage to have trusted their life to a few hundred square feet of nylon and suspension cords were fellow “sky troopers,” men and women who had made the grade. Everyone else would, ever after, be a “leg,” a term applied to anyone who didn’t quite have “the right stuff.” While even the most hard core paratrooper knew that “legs” were necessary, they were tolerated as one would put up with an annoying pet.

It was that cool, devil-may-care attitude which unnerved Nathan. For him, it was like being a Rat at VMI all over again. Memories of being surrounded by upperclassmen screaming in his face kept welling up from that place in his mind where all such nightmares lurk. While his conscious mind kept telling him that the soldiers of the 3rd Battalion of the 517th Airborne had better things to do than point at him and talk about the new spit-shined’cruit lieutenant violating their tight-knit little world, Nathan longed for the opportunity to ditch his greens and slip into a set of BDUs. At least then, Nathan figured, he would be less conspicuous.