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Rab was exercising with an android. Well, not really exercising. They were beating the pulp out of one another. The android was slender, fast and, of course, incredibly strong. Rab’s head snapped back as a pale blue fist – as quick as blue lightning in a Florida hurricane – swept within an inch of his nose. Rab’s kick was blocked and knocked away. A blue leg swung around, but Rab jumped over it. While in the air, his kick bounced off the android’s chest, knocking him off balance. He recovered quickly – androids do that – and slammed a fist into Rab’s gut.
Rab grunted, whirled as fast as a tornado and grabbed the blue arm, lifted the android and tossed him over his shoulder to the ground. The crash to the floor would have stunned any man, but not the alloys the android was made of. He bounced up... or tried to. As he turned and lifted his head, Rab’s huge military boot smashed his face. The blow stunned the blue opponent for two seconds – which was all the time Rab needed to lift the android and slam him to the ground again. As hefty as he was, Rab made a NFL punter kick that lifted the android from the ground. He rolled over and, amazingly, didn’t jump up as quickly. He was a millisecond slow. When he stood up, Rab drop-kicked him. Rab dived, but the android rolled away. His kick missed the android’s jaw by a half-inch. They both jumped up and circled each other. Then Rab saw me and raised his hand. The android straightened and stepped back.
“A fine match. You are getting better,” the android said.
Rab nodded. “Yes, it was a good match, Andy. You never slow down. Wish I could say the same for humans.”
Rab walked over and smiled. The cragged face had some nicks. The hair had some gray in it, but the mustache was all black. He had seen events almost incomprehensible to the average man, but the dark eyes still had a flash of humor and merriment in them. The humor showed when the gray-uniformed courier from the Federation walked into the gym.
“Are you Master Sergeant Rabelais?” he said.
“I am. There’s only one in the universe, son, and it’s me.”
“We need to proceed immediately to Nassau Mountain.”
“The headquarters of Ms. Morganthal. She likes mountains, but doesn’t care much for the beach.”
“Yes, sir. Your squad is waiting for you.”
“When you say ‘my squad’ you mean Ryvenbark’s Raiders, the finest military unit in all of space?”
“Yes, sir. We’ve tried other methods of contacting you, sir, but you were not available.”
“No, I was hiking. Two weeks in the wild with no electronic equipment. No ringing, no buzzes, no noise whatsoever. It’s a very peaceful existence. Often, a time of peace and quiet does you good. You get to contemplate nature and meditate upon the finer things of life.”
“We need to leave now, sir.”
Rab gave a wry frown. “Enough with the contemplation. Guess I need to get back to killing people.”
The young courier did not smile at what Rab thought was a funny line.
When Clint Lamour saddled in, boots and all, he gave a huge Texas yell. When Clint talks, sometimes you need earplugs. I was surprised he wasn’t wearing spurs as his boots clamored on the floor.
“Howdy, major. Been a month of Sundays since I’ve seen you.”
When I shook his hand I flinched. Some people have nerves of steel. Clint has hands and arms of steel. Flesh and blood, but they feel like steel. Charisma and dynamism flow from him like water over Niagara. When he gets wounded he just yells at the blood cells not to bleed and they obey him. He has dark green eyes, a huge smile and tough, brown, leathery skin. Linage goes back to the sixteen hundreds in the Lone Star State — which means one side of his family came from the Apaches and the other side from tough men who wore the gray during the Civil War. The grit can make you forget he is an expert in engineering and weapons.
“Good to see you again, Clint.”
“We have a little mission?”
“That we do.” I pointed to the screen with the sphere. “We have to take care of that.”
“Doesn’t look too hard. Just blow the dang thing up. Pick up the pieces and shout hooray!”
“It will be more difficult than it looks. Speaking of hard, the thing is a lot harder than it looks.”
“I figured it must be. Didn’t think you’d call me in on an easy mission.”
“The easy ones anyone can achieve. For the tough ones we need Texas and especially one Texan named Lamour.”
He showed his huge smile. “I enjoy flattery, major. I don’t believe a word of it, but I enjoy it. Makes me feel like a Bluetick Hound after a possum.”
I laughed. In our high-tech culture, many people don’t know what a Bluetick Hound is. They are hunting dogs with very amiable, friendly personalities and are also very intelligent. The ‘tick’ is not an insect parasite but the ‘ticking’ black coloration on most of the breed which, on a white hair background, can give the impression of navy blue. Back on Earth Clint owns a few of them, which is one reason he has picked up the name ‘hound dog’. A few people might not consider that a compliment, but Clint does.
He blinked with interest and lowered his voice to a hurricane yell. “Have a read out?”
I hit a couple of buttons on my computer and the sphere disappeared from the screen; in its place were black numbers and blue equations. Clint took about ten seconds to scan the screen.
“So bombs and lasers won’t work. Doesn’t appear any of our weapons will damage it. An interesting piece of rubble,” he said. “Did I see two ships around it?”
“You did. But I don’t know why they are flying protection, because the sphere doesn’t need any.”
“Any opening in it?”
“Doesn’t appear to be.”
“Background?”
I hit a few keys again and the little history we had on the sphere came up on the screen. Clint shook his head.
“A planet killer,” he said.
“Yes, and somehow we have to stop it. I’d like you to work with our scientific team. The current theory of Federation scientists is we have to get into the sphere to blow it up, but we don’t know yet how to get inside.”
“In times like this any current theory is useless. We need a lot more information.”
I smiled. “Which is one reason I wanted you to come with us. I figured you might help in that task.”
His laughter bounced off the ceiling. “That’s what I like about the Raiders. There’s never a dull moment... Is Lt. Alvarez coming with us in this trip?”
“I’m about to go see her right now.”
“She’s as cute as a speckled hound, and down in Texas that’s cute.”
Carli Alvarez, in non-Texas slang, is a lovely woman. When I saw her, she was grunting on an exercise machine. Sweat formed on her tan skin. Her brown hair was tied into a pigtail. The long legs moved back the weights in time with the grunts. I picked up a towel and wiped two beads of sweat that rolled toward her eyes.
“By the way,” I told her, “you’re as cute as a speckled hound.”
She roared with laughter. “Some women might be puzzled about that, but I know it’s a compliment. Clint must be coming along with us.”
“Yes, he is. And he asked about you.”
“I’m glad he remembered me.”
Like most men, he could never forget you, I thought. She pushed the weights back one more time.
“Getting in shape for the mission?” I asked.
“Yes. I read your report. Usually we fight living, breathing adversaries. Never fought a rock before, even if it is a big rock.”
“A first time for everything,” I said.
“You have a plan yet?”
“Not a plan to take out the sphere. Still muddling that one over.”
She did one last bench press, then sat up and grabbed a towel. “I read all the background material — not that there was much of it — and it seems there’s very little for a military unit to do. This is more of an aerial battle. You blow up the sphere and you have accomplished your mission. No ground troops are needed for that. So why do you want me to sign up?”
“I always like to be prepared, although I concede your point. But there are too many unknowns on this assignment. There may be a place for troops on the ground, or in a sphere as the case may be. And if we do well, the Federation will be forever in our debt.”
“No way. I don’t want the Federation in our debt. I want to be paid. No outstanding balances.”
“I'm sure that can be worked out.”
“I assume we’re charging our usual rates.”
“Yes. Our fee won’t bankrupt the Federation but, if we succeed and survive, the mission will be very profitable.”