Just one more mission, they told me. Or I think that’s what I heard. The music of war had muffled my ears and it was getting harder to interpret. I had to look at mouths, eyes, facial muscles.

They sat me in the middle of a battlefield, the Martian landscape red with ancient ores and recent spilled blood. Earth commanders would be on one side, Mars on the other.

Once we were all the same. But years turned to decades and words changed, intentions, the subtleties, all became different. Mars became another country. Interpreters were needed now to avoid misunderstandings.

Earth seemed to be winning and my job was to negotiate surrender.

But then top brass commanded me to lie. To interpret a certain way.

“We want to explain to you what the Martians are going to offer,” they said, from their cozy war room on Earth, far far away from me. “So there are no misunderstandings.”

“What if they don’t say it this way?”

“They would be lying. You will interpret the message as we say it. Is that understood? Your loyalty is needed more now than ever.”

So there I was on that battlefield and the message was not what the Earth brass said. I was so tired. I interpreted as ordered. Victory would be ours and we could go home.

They gave me the response to the Martians.

The Martians left.

And then we switched sides and the war continued.

I have delivered the same two messages for 20 years now. We have switched sides 20 times.

I have decided that it’s time for someone new to fo this job. I cannot understand anything anyone says anymore.