She let go of the ladder halfway down and dropped to the deck beside him, pulling off her flight helmet to reveal a grin. "Score's twenty now, Colonel," she said. "Davie'll have his escort soon enough."

"Only if you're flying, Lieutenant," he said, his voice low but harsh. "And I'm not sure how long that's going to be, after what I saw out there today."

"But —"

"You talk when I say you can talk, Lieutenant," he cut her off. "First you listen. I gave you a direct order to stay on my wing when I engaged that second Darket. Instead, you went charging after the other one. I expect that kind of attitude from Maniac or even a rookie like Flash but not from the pilot I pick as my wingman."

"But, Colonel, you didn't need me to deal with a Darket," she protested, looking stricken, "and I was able to make it a clean sweep."

"A clean sweep," he repeated. "That's what it was, all right. Of course, if there had been one survivor running for cover we might have been able to lie back at extreme sensor range and track him back to his mother ship. Maybe we'd find the whole damned Kilrathi fleet. But a clean sweep . . . that's certainly worth passing up a result like that for, isn't it?"

She took a step back. "Oh, God . . . Colonel, I never thought . . ."

"No, you didn't," he said. "You never thought. Well, Lieutenant, think about this. Intelligence thinks the cats are planning an all-out attack on Locanda Four, not just a raid but something big and nasty. And if we don t find their fleet and pinpoint it pretty damned soon they will have a clear shot. So when your pretty purple skies are filled with Kilrathi missiles, you think about whether we could have nailed them today if you had just obeyed orders instead of playing your little revenge game."

She looked down. "I . . . I don't know what to say, sir," she said slowly. "I'm sorry. Were you serious . . . about yanking my flight status, I mean?"

He didn't answer right away. "I don't want to," Blair finally told her. "You're a damned good pilot, Flint, and you know how to make that Thunderbolt dance. But I told you before that I need a wingman I can trust." He paused. "Consider this a final warning. You screw up again, Flint, and I'll have your wings. You get me?"

"Yes, sir." She met his angry eyes. "And. . . thanks, Colonel, for giving me a second chance."

As she turned and walked slowly away, Blair hoped he wouldn't regret the decision later.

Blair paused at the entrance to the rec room and glanced around. This evening the lounge was fairly busy, the Gold Squadron particularly well represented. Vagabond, Maniac, Beast Jaeger, and Blue Squadron's Amazon Mbuto were playing cards. Judging from the stack of chips in front of Lieutenant Chang, he was ahead. Vaquero was alone at another table with headphones over his ears, his eyes closed, and his hands tapping out a beat as he blissed out on his rockero music. Hobbes and Flash were talking earnestly at a table by the viewport, and Sandman was sharing drinks with a blonde from the carrier's weaponry division.

Lieutenant Buckley, alone at the bar with a drink in her hand and a half-empty bottle on the counter in front of her, looked up at Blair. She stood with exaggerated care and walked over to him.

"I hear you're down on Flint," she said, the words slurring a little. "What's the matter, Colonel, you only like pilots who've got fur?"

He looked at her coldly. "You've had too much to drink Lieutenant," he said. "I think you'd better head back to your quarters and get some rest."

"Or what? You'll ground me? Like you threatened Flint?" She jabbed a finger at him. "You save your high-and-mighty Colonel act for the flight deck or the firing line. I'm on down-time now . . ."

He grabbed her shoulder as she staggered, steering her back to the bar. "I don't know what set you off, Lieutenant, but. . ."

"What set me off? I'll tell you what set me off, Colonel, sir. Flint's one of the best damned pilots on this tub, and you treat her like dirt. Just like you treat all the pilots, except your furball buddy over there. After she came off the flight deck this afternoon, she was ready to find an airlock and cycle herself into space. I spent the whole damned afternoon trying to straighten out the damage you created, chewing her out that way."

"She screwed up," Blair said softly. "And we can't afford any mistakes."

"Can t you let her be human once in a while? Do you have any idea what kind of strain Flint's under? This is her home system, you know . . . and everybody's talkin' about the cats planning to use bioweapons here."

"There have been stories about bioweapons," he said guardedly. Inwardly he wondered who had been talking. Probably not Rollins; he'd sounded sincere when he promised not to spread the story. But everyone at the squadron commanders' briefing knew about the rumors now, and some of them — Maniac, for example — wouldn't think twice before sharing the stories with the rest of the crew. "Right now they're just that: stories. Whoever's been circulating them probably wouldn't know a bioweapon from a biosphere."

"Oh, come off it, Colonel," Cobra said. "The cats've been working on these kinds of weapons for years. They use human test subjects from their slave camps. They've tried their bugs out on other human planets already. It's only a matter of time before they start using them routinely. If the grapevine says it'll be here, I wouldn't argue with it.

"You know a hell of a lot about what the Kilrathi are doing, Lieutenant," Blair said "Maybe you should spend more of your time talking to Intell, and a little less on telling me how to run my Wing."

"Intell! I've had enough of Intell people and their questions!" She shook her head. "Anyway, you're just trying to change the subject. The simple fact is, Colonel, that there are some damn fine people on this ship who deserve better than what you're givin' them. Flint's jus' the worst case. But if I was you, I'd start treating people right, or you just might find out what friendly fire's all about sometime —" She broke off and started to stagger to another seat but ended up sitting down heavily where she was and putting her head down on the bar next to her bottle.

"Should I call Security to give her an escort to her quarters, sir?" Rostov asked from behind the bar. Blair wasn't sure how long he'd been there.

He shook his head. "Let's keep this in the family," he said, looking around. He caught Flash's eye and summoned him with a wave. "Major, I need a favor. Could you help lieutenant Buckley back to her quarters please? She's had a little too much to drink . . ."

"Sure, Colonel," Flash said with a grin. "I was starting to wonder how much booze she was going to be able to put away before she pulled a crash-and-burn." He helped Cobra to her feet, wrapped one of her arms around his shoulders. "Come on, Cobra, let's get you home."

Blair watched them leave, then let out a sigh. "Give me a drink, Rosty," he said, feeling suddenly weary. "A double anything. It's been that kind of a day."

He took the glass from the one-armed bartender, but didn't drink it right away. Instead he stared into the amber liquid, his mind a whirl of conflicting emotions. From the very start he was an outsider here, unable to pass the barriers his pilots held against him. Sometimes it felt as if he was flailing the air. Most of these pilots had been through a lot together and felt the same type of comradeship he had shared with the men and women of the Concordia. They resented him, resisted him, and everything Blair did only seemed to make things worse.