A Phule and His Money

6

Journal #307

My employer was confident that a focus on the company's military priorities would allow his people to forget about the external problems, which would then more or less resolve themselves. As I had feared, this belief turned out to be over-optimistic. In fact, the problems remained on the edge of everyone's awareness, putting the entire command cadre into a constant state of anxiety that something would boil over into an outright crisis.

The only two who seemed unaffected by the ongoing crises were Flight Leftenant Qual, who went around the hotel observing and making enigmatic comments; and Chaplain Rev, who despite Do-Wop's public refusal of his offer to pay off gambling debts, seemed to be winning a fair number of converts. For the rest, it was chaos as usual...

"OK, rookies, fall in," shouted Brandy. The new recruits hastily assembled themselves into a formation-most with a helter-skelter clumsiness she hoped they'd soon outgrow, but the Gambolts flowed into position like water running downhill. Brandy had to admit, she'd never seen anybody so natural at the things a legionnaire had to do. "Now we're going to have some fun. Today we begin unarmed combat instruction. Sergeant Escrima will assist me."

Standing on the thick gymnastics mat next to Brandy, whose physical bulk more than matched her parade-ground vocal equipment, the mess sergeant looked for all the world like a miniature statue of a human being. That was highly misleading, as the new troops were about to learn.

"OK, I'm going to demonstrate a basic move, and then you'll get a chance to try it for yourselves. Can I have a volunteer?"

The rookies looked at one another nervously-they'd already had occasion to find out how strong Brandy was. A couple of hands went up, tentatively. Brandy ignored them, and pointed to Mahatma. "Here, this isn't hard-why don't you try it first?"

The little round-faced man-his belly had already begun to lose its roundness-came forward onto the mat and Brandy stood facing him. "I'm going to show this to you in slow motion," she said to the troops. "This is a very basic move, one that lots of others are built on. Watch." She stepped closer to Mahatma.

"Now, watch what happens first," she said. Brandy reached out her hand and pushed Mahatma in the center of his chest. He stepped backward, keeping his balance. "OK, Mahatma, tell me what I did and what you did."

"You pushed me, and I stepped away," he said, smiling as always. "Would a battlefield opponent let you push him like that?" It had become almost a joke: Whatever you did to him, Mahatma took it with a smile-and followed up with a question that threatened to undercut the whole exercise.

Brandy temporized. "I'll get to that. For now, the idea is, when I push you, you start to lose your balance. You're falling backward, so you step back to catch your balance again. Sounds easy, when you explain it. But let's try that again, with a little difference."

She stepped up to Mahatma, and again pushed him in the center of the chest. But this time, her foot had snaked out to ensnare his leg before he could catch his balance, and he fell backward onto the mat.

"You see it?" she asked the other recruits. "Keep the opponent from stepping backward, and he's got no place to go. All he can do is fall." She reached down and helped Mahatma to his feet. "Now, you try it on me."

"All right, sarge," said Mahatma. He reached up and pushed Brandy, putting his foot behind her. She fell down, twisting as she fell, and rolled back up to her feet almost as soon as she was down.

"That's the second part of the lesson," she said. "If your opponent knows how to recover, you won't have the advantage for long. So you have to be ready to follow up right away. Now, who else would like to try it?"

This was the point at which she usually got somebody who'd had a little martial arts training as a civilian. One of the new troops-the one who'd had his hand up before, she noticed-had a smirk on his face. "OK, Slammer, your turn."

Stammer swaggered out of the lineup, and took a stance opposite Brandy, his weight evenly balanced on the balls of his feet. He had obviously had training, and he looked to be in better than average physical condition for a recruit. Brandy suppressed a smile, then said, "Aw, let's make it a little bit more of an even contest. I must outweigh you twenty pounds." (It was more like fifty, but nobody had ever called her on that-not to her face.) "Here, Sergeant Escrima is more your size."

Escrima stepped forward to take Brandy's place, his face impassive. Now the recruit had the weight advantage-probably thirty pounds, and several inches in reach. "OK, Stammer, let's see you try the move on Escrima."

As Brandy had anticipated, Slammer grinned broadly and stepped up to Escrima, evidently planning on some spectacular throw instead of the simple technique she'd demonstrated. The recruit grabbed the little sergeant by one arm and began to turn so as to flip him over his hip. What happened next was hard to follow, but it ended with Slammer falling flat on his back from what seemed a considerable height, with an impressive thud. Escrima pounced on him like a hawk, one knee across a biceps, one hand on Stammer's throat, and the other poised in a fist in front of his face.

"Third part of the lesson," Brandy said to the other recruits, who stared in awe at their fallen comrade. "Never take an opponent for granted. You go into combat, there's no such thing as a fair fight. No rules, no refs, no timeouts, and no points for style. Stammer tried to get fancy with Escrima, and look where it got him."

Escrima let Slammer get up, and the recruit returned to his place in the formation, rubbing his biceps where the sergeant had kneeled on it. "OK, now you're going to break up into pairs and try the move I showed you. Stick with the lesson, and we'll show you all more moves as soon as everybody's had a chance to practice this one."

The recruits broke up into pairs, spreading around the mats and trying the technique Brandy had shown them. Inevitably, a few of them had trouble even with something this elementary-and others tried to show off, attempting more complicated moves. It was about as typical a training session as Brandy had ever seen.

Except for the Gambolts. Their feline anatomy put an entirely new twist on everything. Pushed backward, even with a leg confined, they would simply do a backfiip and land back on their feet, quicker than any human athlete. Once again, the Gambolts were simply leagues beyond their human counterparts. The other recruits had noticed by now, and there was muttering among them. When the exercise was finished, there was a distinct look of resignation on a number of the recruits' faces.

As the training session progressed, there were more and more discouraged faces. The Gambolts made everything look easy, and the humans were rapidly coming to realize that they were outclassed by three recruits as fresh out of civilian life as they were. Normally, Brandy would have known what to do with a recruit so clearly superior. After all, a sergeant had the benefit of years of training-and a willingness to play whatever trick was needed to bring a recruit into line. A few quick falls with someone like Escrima, and even a fairly advanced martial arts student would be properly humbled.

But the Gambolts were so good, she wasn't sure even Escrima could put them in their place. It didn't take much foresight to see that this was going to be a real problem...

"Those Renegades are still snooping around, Captain," said Lieutenant Rembrandt. "I'd like to find some way to get rid of them."

"I take it they haven't done anything we can use as grounds for barring them from the casino?" said Phule, tapping a pencil on his desk. For the second or third day in a row, the daily officer's briefing was shaping up as a series of unsolved problems. He didn't like that, but for the moment, the problems remained intractable.

"Not unless we do it for general obnoxiousness," said Lieutenant Armstrong. "That's within our rights. From what I can tell, anything a casino owner wants to do-up to and possibly including outright murder-is legal here on Lorelei. "

"That's one of the few benefits of the mob having made the rules for so long," said Rembrandt, nodding. "We can bar anyone from the Fat Chance for any reason we concoct. But I don't think we can expel them from the station unless we catch them cheating at the tables, or damaging casino property, or running some kind of credit fraud. And the Renegades have been careful not to do that."

"Where are they staying?" asked Beeker. "Perhaps you could call in a favor from one of your fellow casino owners."

"They're at the Tumbling Dice," said Rembrandt, a sour look on her face. "That's Maxine Pruett's home base. Not much chance of calling in a favor from her."

"No indeed," said Phule, glumly. "In fact, it wouldn't surprise me to learn that she had something to do with their discovery that Chocolate Harry was here with us." A frown came over his face. "Interesting that we've had so many outsiders arriving to make trouble for us all at the same time, isn't it?"

"The Renegades, the Yakuza, and the IRS," said Beeker. "There does appear to be a pattern there. At least, young Sushi appears to have deflected the Yakuza for the time being. And I can certify that your personal books are in excellent order-even if the revenue agents are inclined to nitpick, I am confident that you can come out of anything except the most hostile audit with a clean nose."

"Good man, Beeker," said Phule. "I have complete faith in you to handle that end of things. But the Chocolate Harry situation has to be taken care of. Turning his supply depot into a fortified position has kept the Renegades at bay, but the hassle factor is hurting efficiency. When somebody has to go through a security checkpoint to get a can of vacuum grease or a spare battery, they're likely to go without-and that means some piece of equipment won't be working right. On the other hand, if we make C.H. dismantle all his defenses, the Renegades will have an open shot at him."

"Which brings us back to the question of how to neutralize the Renegades," said Armstrong, scowling. He slapped his hand on the arm of his chair and said, "I say we snatch them when they're off their guard, then find some pretext to kick them out of Lorelei. Let Maxie yell about it after they're gone."

"You would risk getting people hurt," Beeker pointed out.

"We'll be in a sad state when the Legion can't handle a few civilian brawlers," said Armstrong. He raised his chin, and his chest swelled. "I expect we'd deal out considerably better than we got, Captain."

"I know our people can take care of themselves, Lieutenant," said Phule. "But we're in an enclosed space full of civilians, and we can't go throwing our weight around every time we feel like it. I'll try your approach if nothing else works, but I want to see what other options we have, first."

"There's another problem with that approach," said Rembrandt. "If Maxine Pruett's causing all this trouble, throwing the Renegades out would be only a temporary solution. She'll find another way to harass us-and I think we can count on her to keep doing it as long as we're here."

"You're right," said Phule. He closed his eyes and massaged the bridge of his nose. "I suspect she is behind most of our recent troubles, though I can't prove it. If she can keep us responding to a hundred minor nuisances, she'll weaken us for responding to a really serious threat from some other quarter. It's classic guerilla tactics."

"Is there any way to go after Pruett directly?" asked Armstrong.

"Not without exceeding our authority," said Phule. "And not without risking civilian casualties. For that kind of direct action against her, we'd need a really blatant provocation-and Maxie's not foolish enough to provide one. Even if she did, General Blitzkrieg would find a way to turn it to our discredit."

"You know, I wonder if this company hasn't outgrown its mission here," said Rembrandt. "Lorelei looked like a plum assignment when we got it, and-all difficulties aside-our stint here has been very rewarding. But casino guard duty isn't exactly what I joined up for, and I'm afraid it's having a negative effect on the company's readiness for its larger mission."

"Hmmm-I'd begun to think something like that myself," said Phule. "The casino doesn't need an elite Legion company to break up bar fights and discourage cheaters. I'm afraid a lot of our people are in danger of losing their edge because nothing they do requires it of them."

"That's how I feel," said Armstrong. "A bunch of civilians could do most of this job as well as we can. If it weren't for Pruett trying to horn in, we could leave our actors-in-uniform behind to stand guard. With a cadre of trained security guards to take care of more serious trouble, the place would be as safe as it is now."

"You're probably right," said Phule, nodding. "The only flaw in that picture is that Maxine Pruett won't go away. Even if she did, some other mobster would step into her shoes."

"Back to square one," said Armstrong. "If the place weren't so profitable, I'd advise you to wash your hands of it."

"Oh, I'd sell in a nanosecond, for the right price," said Phule. "The worst mistake an investor can make is holding on to something past time to sell it."

Beeker nodded approvingly. "Remember, though-it's just as bad to sell something too early, out of panic. Maxie Pruett would love to see you sell the casino too cheaply. She'd have control of it within six months-if not immediately."

"Yeah, I bet she'd be moving in the back door as you went out the front," said Rembrandt.

"Well, for now, I'm standing pat," said Phule. "The right time to move on will come-and when it does, we'll be ready. Until then, we'll make the best of what we have."

"Yes, sir," said Rembrandt and Armstrong. Neither one looked especially happy.

"Too much happening," said Tusk-anini wearily. "Not good-can make one little mistake into very big one."

"I know what you mean," said Super-Gnat. The diminutive legionnaire was freshly off duty, and was still wearing the cocktail waitress costume that allowed her to move among the casino crowds without attracting undue attention-except from those gamblers whose glass was empty. "This company can handle any kind of trouble, as long as we attack it as a team. But now we've got Chocolate Harry holed up because of those outlaw bikers, and it's a major expedition to get into supply depot. And you saw those IRS agents sneaking around for info about the captain. What's worse, it looks like we've got a spy in the company."

"Is method for this in military textbooks," said Tusk-anini. The giant Volton legionnaire had been spending late nights poring through books on every conceivable human subject, especially Lieutenant Armstrong's library of military history texts. "Hold position against one enemy while concentrate strength against another. Defeat in detail, is called. Work good in theory, maybe not so easy in practice."

"Not so easy in practice," repeated Super-Gnat. "That ought to be the Legion motto-at least, the way most of the Legion runs. We're lucky to have a commander who doesn't do things the regular way, you know, Tusk?"

Tusk-anini snorted-it was a very piglike snort, which somebody not used to Voltons might have taken wrong. Super-Gnat knew it was the equivalent of a low chuckle in humans. "Is more than luck," he said. "Captain had to make some bad mistake to get sent to our company. But he no fool-and that no joke, either. He show us we can be best company in Legion, and make us work hard to do it. He got to be best commander in the Legion."

"I'm with you on that one," agreed Super-Gnat. "But remember, he didn't get here without making enemies-and not all of them are outside the Legion. Mother told me that the top brass think the captain's showing them up, and they want to put him in his place. That's bound to mean trouble for the rest of us, too. We've come through everything OK so far, but I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop."

"I no hear shoe drop," said Tusk-anini, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. "When this happen?"

"Uh, that's not meant literally, Tusk," said Super-Gnat. "What I mean is, I keep expecting them to send the company someplace really rotten, like the middle of a war zone or something, to get the captain in trouble."

"That not going to happen, because there no wars going on right now," said Tusk-anini, patiently. "You worry too much, Gnat."

"Maybe I do," said Super-Gnat. "But remember, it hasn't been so long since there was a war-in fact, I hear tell that's where the captain pulled the SNAFU that got him sent here. I don't know whether you were paying attention to the scuttlebutt, but word was that he talked a couple of pilots into strafing an enemy position-except he didn't know that's where the peace talks were going on. And it's a big galaxy-there could be another war breaking out almost anywhere, and we could find ourselves being sent to fight."

"Who we fight?" Tusk-anini looked skeptical-not easy behind his specially fitted dark glasses, worn to protect his sensitive eyes from normal light. "No enemies around to fight-plenty of room for all species, not like old Earth before space flight. No reason for wars."

"So why's there a Space Legion, then?" Super-Gnat put her hands on her hips and stared up belligerently at her big partner. "For that matter, why's there Regular Army or Starfleet? Seems to me the government's paying a lot to keep fighting forces around if there aren't going to be any more wars. But that's not what I'm getting at. Even if' there's not a war, there are ways the brass could try to shaft the captain-and believe you me, Tusk, they'll be trying to find them."

Tusk-anini snorted again. "Captain not alone. Maybe generals find some way to get captain in trouble, but we no let it happen because trouble for captain mean trouble for us."

"You've got the right idea there, Tusk," said Super-Gnat. "But there's one thing you should never forget: Generals usually don't care about whether they get regular troops in trouble. We're warm bodies to throw at a problem until it goes away. That's what makes our captain different-he cares about us because somehow, deep inside, he knows he's like us. So we have to take care of him, too."

"We take care of him," agreed Tusk-anini. "So let other shoe drop-we catch it before it hit the floor."

"That's the right idea," said Super-Gnat. "Now that we've got that much figured out, why don't we go down to the pub and see if we can figure out which foot the other shoe is on?"

The Omega Mob had never formally adopted the Olde English Pub, in the basement of the Fat Chance Casino, as the company watering hole. Nonetheless, at any given hour you could find legionnaires hanging out there-sipping a drink, playing games, or tossing darts, and talking about the things that off-duty military personnel have talked about from time immemorial. The legionnaires didn't keep the civilian casino customers from using the Pub-the captain would have frowned on any attempt at that-but they clearly set its tone.

The Pub was especially noisy tonight, with several groups of legionnaires, in and out of uniform, gathered in different sections. There was a serious game of Tonk going on at one table; Street was the big winner so far, but Double-X had been on a hot steak for several hands, and the banter between the two was getting louder as the stakes got bigger. At the corner table farthest from the blaring trivid set, Doc and Moustache were playing a quieter, if not necessarily calmer, game: blitz chess. Two or three other legionnaires looked on, waiting to play the winner.

In still another corner, Do-Wop was holding forth with a string of stories, most of which were of highly dubious veracity, although he swore up and down that he had been a witness, if not a personal participant, in all of them. The circle of listeners included Dee Dee, between sets on her evening show, Junior, Super-Gnat, and Tusk-anini. The latter, perhaps because of his limited experience of human ways, was the only one who didn't appear downright skeptical of Do-Wop's yarns.

"So then I say to the cop, `Yeah, I'm the owner of this whole building,'" said Do-Wop. "Well, I could tell he wasn't buyin' it..."

"Why you want cop to buy building?" asked Tusk-anini, his eyes riveted on Do-Wop.

"Not the building, Tusk-I wanted him to buy the story, see?" Do-Wop tapped his fingertips on the tabletop. This was not the first interruption from the giant Volton.

Tusk-anini's frown deepened. "You want him to buy story? Was cop magazine editor?"

"Aw, gimme a break, Tusk," said Do-Wop, while the ring of onlookers broke into laughter. "I might as well try sellin' hooch to robots. Just let me finish the story, and then ask your questions, capisce?"

"But I no capisce," said Tusk-anini, who had spent plenty of sessions listening to Do-Wop's stories in the past. "That why I ask questions."

Do-Wop threw up his hands. "Jeez, cool it with the questions for a while, will ya? Now, where was I?"

"Probably about halfway to getting yourself thrown in jail," said a new voice, and Do-Wop looked up to see Sushi, standing there with a broad smile.

"Yo, man, long time no see!" said Do-Wop, jumping to his feet and throwing an arm around his partner. "Last anybody heard, you was kidnapped by the Yazookas."

"Yakuza, and there was only one of them," said Sushi, laughing as he returned Do-Wop's hug. "And the guy didn't kidnap me-we went off to transact some business. Which went exactly the way I wanted it to, I might add."

"Knowin' you, it was some kind of monkey business," said Do-Wop, who'd been a complete stranger to the subtler forms of chicanery before Phule had teamed him with Sushi. "You gonna tell us the story?"

"Hey, you no finish your story!" protested Tusk-anini, as Sushi plopped himself in a vacant chair, signalling for the waitress.

"Later, Tusk, later," said Do-Wop, waving his hand at the Volton. "The man's been runnin' games, and I gotta know the score. Spill, buddy, spill!"

Sushi leaned forward and began, "Well, I guess everybody's heard about the start of it. I was on duty in the casino, in the blackjack section. The dealer spotted a couple of players passing cards..."

"Sssst! Careful what saying, here comes spy!" said Tusk-anini.

"Spy? Where?" Sushi looked puzzled.

"Quiet, he's coming this way," whispered Super-Gnat, putting a hand on Sushi's elbow. "Let us handle him, and we'll tell you what it's about later."

Sushi nodded just as Flight Leftenant Qual came up to the table. Agile as he was when running flat-out, his normal walking gait was a comic waddle. "Greetings, comrades," said the little Zenobian. "May I join your gathering?"

"Guess we can't stop you," muttered Do-Wop.

"Ah, that must be humor!" said Qual. His translator gave out a strange sound somewhere between a hiss and a snarl, which might have been its attempt to render Zenobian laughter into human speech. Whatever the meaning, it did nothing to ingratiate him with the legionnaires.

Qual pulled an empty chair over from a nearby table and seated himself between Tusk-anini and Do-Wop, both of whom cast baleful stares at him. "So, is this how Legion spends evenings?" he asked, looking around the group.

"Who needs to know?" asked Do-Wop. His tone did not invite further discussion.

Qual's translator was not set to make fine distinctions between tones. "Pardon, did I not introduce myself? I am Flight Leftenant Qual," he said, showing his teeth. "Military attaché from Zenobian Empire."

"We know who you are," said Super-Gnat, her voice dripping icicles. "And we know what you're here for, too."

"Excellent," said Qual, slapping the table. "It is to be sympathetic, not so? Let this one purchase the next circle of drinks!"

"No want drink," said Tusk-anini, his eyes narrowed.

"Me neither," said Do-Wop, though his glass was empty. He was not often known to pass up a round when someone else was buying. The others who'd been sitting at the table all indicated their refusal.

The only exception was Sushi. "Well, I just got here, so I'm dry," he said. "If you're buying, I'm drinking."

"Excellent," said Qual, slapping the table again. "I am doleful none of your comrades are thirsty, but perhaps some different time. I like your custom of having one bring the drinks-it makes more time for mingling than when each must go to the pool for itself."

"Assuming you want to mingle," commented Super-Gnat, casting a significant glance toward Qual. "And now that I think of it, I guess I've had all the mingling I want tonight. Tusk, are you ready?"

"Tusk-anini ready," agreed the Volton, rising to his feet.

He nearly brushed the ceiling, towering over the little Zenobian. "Good seeing most of you," he said, and turned to follow Super-Gnat away.

"Time for me to get ready for my third set," said Dee Dee, standing up. One after another, the others at the table also made excuses and exited. Finally only Sushi sat there with Qual, waiting for their drinks to come.

"A shame so many had to leave," said Qual. "I will simply have to get to know them some other time."

"So it would seem," said Sushi. He pulled his chair up closer to Qual. "But there's no reason for us to be strangers. Tell me, Flight Leftenant, what kinds of things are you most interested in finding out about our people?"

"Why, almost everything," said Qual, his teeth gleaming in the flickering barroom lights. "You are much unlike my race in many ways. To begin with..."

The conversation stretched into the late hours.