Blitzkrieg gashed his teeth. “I could deal with that, if it weren’t that imbecile Jester and his gang of incompetents who were getting all the publicity,” he said. “Jester’s idiots have managed to convince the media that they’re the best outfit in the Legion. Are those galactic newstapers blind? Or just terminally stupid?“

“It wouldn’t surprise me if it’s a fair amount of both,” said Sparrowhawk. Then an evil smile lit up her face, and her voice dripped acid as she said, “Or, considering that Jennie Higgins and Captain Jester seem to be a very definite item, maybe it’s just another case of nasty little hormones at work.”

“I wouldn’t put it past them,” said Blitzkrieg, pacing. “The hell of it is, I’ve tried half a dozen ways to crush Jester-the despicable little snot-but he keeps bouncing back as if nothing important had happened. Part of it has to be his money-there are plenty of fools who’ll suck up to any jackanapes that’s got enough money, and Jester qualifies for that, hands down.”

“Yes, sir,” said Sparrowhawk, who actually had a great deal of respect for money, especially money sitting in one of her own stock accounts. She wished Blitzkrieg would finish his rant so she could pay proper attention to those very accounts, but she knew from bitter experience that it might take all morning for him to run through his list of gripes. She’d have to stay at the desk straight through her lunch break if she wanted to catch up.

“I’ve just about given up expecting the media to notice what an utter disaster Jester’s made of his company,” continued Blitzkrieg. “Why, if I didn’t have a hundred better things to do, I’d go out to Zenobia myself. If I watch him like a hawk, sooner or later the impertinent pup’s going to screw up so badly that not even his money can protect him. And then I can cashier him the way I should’ve done when he first came up for court-martial, instead of letting those other softheaded short-timers argue me out of it.”

Major Sparrowhawk sat upright behind her desk. “Well, sir, why don’t you?” she asked brightly.

“Eh? I don’t get you,” said the general.

“Why don’t you just go out to Zenobia and wait for him to screw up?” asked the adjutant. “You said it yourself, he’s bound to do it, especially if you’re there breathing down his neck with every move. And then you’ll be rid of him, and all your troubles will be over.”

“Rid of him,” said Blitzkrieg, in a dreamlike voice. Then his eyes lit up, and he smacked a fist into his open hand. “Rid of him. All my troubles will be over... Yes, you’re dead right, Major! All I have to do is wait for Jester to screw up, and if I’m right there, the poor little rich boy won’t have a chance to cover it up with all his money before I can bust him for it. What a brilliant idea! I’m surprised I didn’t think of it myself!”

“Don’t worry, you will,” muttered Sparrowhawk, who was long accustomed to having her best ideas appropriated by her superior.

But the general was already off and running. “Let’s see…” he said. “I’ll have to find someone to cover for me in the staff meeting. That’s no big problem, they never talk about anything important. Colonel Caisson can handle that. And I’ll need a substitute in the Scotch foursome on Tuesday afternoons. Caisson won’t do-that duck hook of his will have him out of bounds the whole back nine. Can’t be anybody too good, though, or they’re likely to want to keep him. Hmmm…” He wandered through the door into his private office, his mind happily occupied with rearranging the details of his social life.

Major Sparrowhawk gave a deep sigh of relief and turned to her investment portfolio.

Journal #764-

Standing back a respectful distance, as specified by safety regulations, the Legion party watched the landing shuttle’s approach. The little ship dropped from the sky deceptively slowly, like a flattened rock through some ultradense liquid. Only when it reached the lower atmosphere did its true speed-still a significant fraction of the orbital velocity of its mother ship-become apparent. But even as it fell, it continued to shed velocity, and as it came within a few meters of the ground, it reached a virtual standstill, hovering gently on its jets as it dropped the tiny remaining distance to touch down in a cloud of dust and flying debris-dead center in the ten-meter landing zone defined by four radar beacons.

Even as the noise of the engines fell to silence, the Legion party was closing in. For while safety regulations ordered ground crews to keep their distance, the implacable laws of shuttle economics made it important to unload and return to orbit as quickly as possible. Interstellar freight companies’ stock-in-trade was speed; and since any given starship was about as fast as any other at superluminal velocities, time at sublight velocities-especially from orbit to surface and back-was critical. A wasted hour on the ground could make the difference between a timely delivery and a blown schedule.

Moments after the external doors came open, Beeker was standing beside the shuttle. Phule suppressed a grin- the butler had put on a very respectable burst of speed, considering that he was by a wide margin the oldest human on the planet. As the dust settled, a slim figure in a black Legion jumpsuit emerged into the Zenobian air, looked around, eyes adjusting to the light, and then fixed its gaze on Beeker. “You’re here!” said a woman’s low voice, and the next thing anyone knew, she had thrown herself into the butler’s arms.

“Laverna!” said Beeker. “There are people watching!” The butler’s voice sounded shocked. But nobody watching had any doubt that he was pleased. And he made no effort to push away the new arrival.

The woman leaned back and looked around at the onlookers, most of whom were doing an excellent job of keeping a straight face. “Screw ‘em,” she said, with a dry laugh. Then she turned back and looked Beeker in the eye. “Besides, there’s no such animule as Laverna anymore- the name is Nightingale. Remember that, Beeker.”

The tableau was interrupted by a shuttle crewman who stuck his head out the door. “We’ve got your luggage, Legionnaire Nightingale, and a sack of personal parcels for the Legion outpost-and then we’ve gotta get off. You all ready?”

A pair of legionnaires stepped forward to take off the mail and luggage, and then Phule said, “That’s it, then. Let’s move off so this fellow can get back to orbit!”

“You got it, Captain,” said Double-X, who’d taken charge of the mail sack. “Come on, suckers, let’s give the shuttle some room, like the captain said.” The Legion party quickly complied, and within moments, the shuttle had leapt from the ground and quickly begun its graceful ascent toward the scattered clouds high above the desert floor.

The Legion party stood and watched the takeoff for a moment, then climbed aboard the hovertruck that would take them back to Zenobia Base.

“Well, then, we are partners,” said Mahatma, peering at Thumper with a bemused air. The two of them sat at a table in the Legion Club, adjacent to the mess hall in the specially built Modular Base Unit that served as Omega Company’s headquarters for its stay on Zenobia. The Lepoid was reputedly the first of his species to join the Space Legion, although a few others had enlisted in Starfleet. Small beings, who bore a striking resemblance to an Old Earth species called “bunnies,” they made up in speed and agility what they lacked in brute strength.