Book excerpt: The year is 2108, and the North American Commonwealth is bursting at the seams. For welfare rats like Andrew Grayson, there are only two ways out of the crime-ridden and filthy welfare tenements: You can hope to win the lottery and draw a ticket on a colony ship settling off-world, or you can join the service. Andrew chooses to enlist in the armed forces. But as he starts a career of supposed privilege, he soon learns that good food and decent health care come at a steep price.