Sals
First appears in Chapter I
The man the book follows. A soldier of San Juan, good at the work and not especially interested in what the work is for, which is the state most people are in when something starts. He is not chosen for a quality he already has. That is the part the title is doing, and the part most readers get wrong on the first chapter: he is ordinary in every measurable way, and the book is extremely careful about that. What separates him from the men he trains beside is not strength or courage or even curiosity. It is that when something arrives that does not fit, he does not look away from it — and looking away is what almost everybody does, almost always, because it costs nothing and nothing visibly happens. The book is named for him and is not flattering about him.
No card. No account. Nothing to type.
Also in The World