Fiben had only been allowed two weeks to study schematics and remember enough Galactiscript to read the instruments. Fortunately, designs changed slowly in the aeons-old Galactic culture, and there were basics most spacecraft shared in common.

One thing was certain, Galactic technology was impressive. Humanity’s best ships were still bought, riot Earth-made. And although this old tub was creaky and cranky, it would probably outlive him, this day.

All around Fiben bright fields of stars glittered, except where the inky blackness of the Spoon Nebula blotted out the thick band of the galactic disk. That was the direction where Earth lay, the homeworld Fiben had never seen, and now probably never would.

Garth, on the other hand, was a bright green spark only three million kilometers behind him. Her tiny fleet was too small to cover the distant hyperspacial transfer points, or even the inner system. Their ragged array of scouts, meteor-oid miners, and converted freighters — plus three modern corvettes — was hardly adequate to cover the planet itself.

Fortunately, Fiben wasn’t in command, so he did not have to keep his mind on the forlorn state of their prospects. He had only to do his duty and wait. Contemplating annihilation was not how he planned to spend the time.

He tried to divert himself by thinking about the Throop family, the small sharing-clan on Quintana Island that had recently invited him to join in their group marriage. For a modern chim it was a serious decision, like when two or three human beings decided to marry and raise a family. He had been pondering the choice for weeks.

The Throop Clan did have a nice, rambling house, good grooming habits, and respectable professions. The adults were attractive and interesting chims, all with green genetic clearances. Socially, it would be a very good move.

But there were disadvantages, as well. For one thing, he would have to move from Port Helenia back out to the islands, where most of the chim and human settlers still lived. Fiben wasn’t sure he was ready to do that. He liked the open spaces of the mainland, the freedom of mountains and wild Garth countryside.

And there was another important consideration. Fiben had to wonder whether the Throops wanted him because they really liked him, or because the Neo-Chimpanzee Uplift Board had granted him a blue card — an open breeding clearance.

Only a white card was higher. Blue status meant he could join any marriage group and father children with only minimal genetic counseling. It couldn’t help but have influenced the Throop Clan’s decision.

“Oh, quit kiddin’ yourself,” he muttered at last. The matter was moot, anyway. Right now he wouldn’t take long odds on his chances of ever even seeing home again alive.

“Fiben? You still there, kid?”

“Yeah, Simon. What’cha got?”

There was a pause.

“I just got a call from Major Forthness. He said he has an uneasy feeling about that gap in the fourth dodecant.”

Fiben yawned. “Humans are always gettin’ uneasy feelings. Alia time worryin’. That’s what it’s like being big-time patron types.”

His partner laughed. On Garth it was fashionable even for well-educated chims to “talk grunt” at times. Most of the better humans took the ribbing with good humor; and those who didn’t could go chase themselves.

“Tell you what,” he told Simon. “I’ll drift over to the ol’ fourth dodecant and give it a lookover for the Major.”

“We aren’t supposed to split up,” the voice in his headphones protested weakly. Still, they both knew having a wingman would hardly make any difference in the kind of fight they were about to face.

“I’ll be back in a jiffy,” Fiben assured his friend. “Save me some of the bananas.”

He engaged the stasis and gravity fields gradually, treating the ancient machine like a virgin chimmie on her first pink. Smoothly, the scout built up acceleration.

Their defense plan had been carefully worked out bearing in mind normally conservative Galactic psychology. The Earthlings’ forces were laid out in a mesh with the larger ships held in reserve. The scheme relied on scouts like him reporting the enemy’s approach in time for the others to coordinate a timed response.

Problem was that there were too few spouts to maintain anywhere near complete coverage.

Fiben felt the powerful thrum of engines through his seat. Soon he was hurtling across the star-field. Got to give the Galactics their due, he thought. Their culture was stodgy and intolerant — sometimes almost fascistic — but they did build well.

Fiben itched inside his suit. Not for the first time, he wished some human pilots had been small enough to qualify for duty in these tiny Xatinni scouts. It would serve them right to have to smell themselves after three days in space.

Often, in his more pensive moods, Fiben wondered if it had really been such a good idea for humans to meddle so, making engineers and poets and part-time starfighters out of apes who might have been just as happy to stay in the forest. Where would he be now, it they refrained? He’d have been dirty perhaps, and ignorant. But at least he’d be free to scratch an itch whenever he damn well pleased!

He missed his local Grooming Club. Ah, for the glory of being curried and brushed by a truly sensitive chen or chimmie, lazing in the shade and gossiping about nothing at all…

A pink light appeared in his detection tank. He reached forward and slapped the display, but the reading would not go away. In fact, as he approached his destination it grew, then split, and divided again.

Fiben felt cold. “Ifni’s incontinence …” He swore, and grabbed for the code-broadcast switch. “Scoutship Proconsul to all units. They’re behind us! Three … no, four battlecruiser squadrons, emerging from B-level hyperspace in the fourth dodecant!”

He blinked as a fifth flotilla appeared as if out of nowhere, the blips shimmering as starships emerged into real-time and leaked excess hyperprobability into the real-space vacuum. Even at this distance he could tell that the cruisers were large.

His headphones brought a static of consternation.

“My Uncle Hairy’s twice-bent manhood] How did they know there was a hole in our line there?”

“… Fiben, are you sure? Why did they pick that particular …”

“… Who th’ hell are they? Can you… ?”

The chatter shut down at once as Major Forthness broke in -on the command channel.

“Message received. Proconsul. We’re on our way. Please switch on your repeater, Fiben.”

Fiben slapped his helmet. It had been years since his militia training, and a guy tended to forget things. He switched over to telemetry so the others could share everything his instruments picked up.

Of course broadcasting all that data made him an easy target, but that hardly mattered. Clearly their foe had known where the defenders were, perhaps down to the last ship. Already he detected seeker missiles streaking toward him.

So much for steakh and surprise as the advantages of the weak. As he sped toward the enemy — whoever the devils were — Fiben noticed that the emerging invasion armada stood almost directly between him and the bright green sparkle of Garth.

“Great,” he snorted. “At least when they blast me I’ll be headed for home. Maybe a few hanks of fur will even get there ahead of the Eatees.

“If anyone wishes on a shooting star, tomorrow night, I hope they get whatever th’fuk they ask for.”

He increased the ancient scout’s acceleration and felt a rearward push even through the straining stasis fields. The moan of engines rose in pitch. And as the little ship leaped forward it seemed to Fiben that it sang a song of battle that sounded almost joyful.