"Tullie Bascomb here, Captain." came the familiar voice. "We've got-well, not really a problem, but a situation Doc and I think you need to know about."
"Go ahead, Tullie," said Phule. "Is it my father again?"
"Yeah, he's still being a pain in the butt," said Bascomb. "It was bad enough that he wanted to go over the casino's books...".
"You showed them to him, didn't you?" asked Phule.
"Sure, after you told me it was all right," said Bascomb.
"For a while I was worried he might really find something to raise a stink about, but I guess he didn't. But then he decided to stick his nose into the gambling operation."
"That's hardly in character," said Phule, rubbing his chin speculatively. "I never knew him to have any interest in gambling. Where is he now?"
"Playing quantum slots," said Bascomb. "Somehow, he got the idea our jackpots were too big. We tried to tell him about the odds, but he didn't want to listen. So now he's trying to win a big one to prove we're wrong."
Phule chuckled. "Tullie, if my father's determined to throwaway his ill-gotten fortune one token at a time, I'm not about to do anything to stop him. It's just that much more for the Company's retirement fund."
"Well, I'm glad you feel that way about it, Captain," said Tollie. There was a definite note of relief in his voice. "In that case, would you have any problem if we cooked up a way to get even more of his money out of his pockets?"
"Not in principle, I guess," said Phule. "What exactly did you have in mind?"
"Doc came up with the idea of adjusting some of the slots to take really big bets-up to a thousand bucks a pull," said Bascomb. "We'd advertise a monster jackpot, but set the odds so long nobody'd have the ghost of a chance to collect on it. What do you think?"
"I don't see why not," said Phule. He chuckled, then continued, "At a thousand dollars a pull, I doubt anyone but Papa will ever be able to afford to play. And 1 have no compunction whatsoever about taking his money for my troops. Go ahead, and let me know how much he loses before he gives up."
"You got it, Captain," said Bascomb, and closed the connection.
Phule stared for a moment at the wall across from his desk. His father's antics shouldn't really have surprised him, he supposed-it was typical of the old fellow to show up unannounced and try to take charge. But, as usual, he seemed to have come up with a new twist He shook his head. There weren't many people in the galaxy who seemed more out of place in a casino than the old man not that his father would ever let something like that stop him. Well, it was about time somebody taught Victor Phule a lesson. And he couldn't think of anyone who could better afford to pay the tuition. He sighed, then picked up the top sheet on the pile the two legionnaires had brought in, and began reading.
5
Journal #669
When a system is set up to deal with misfits and incompetents, the addition to the mix of someone actually capable may cause a greater disturbance than the addition of a weak cog to a functioning organization. This is certainly the case in most formations of the Space Legion, where incompetence and malfeasance have become a way of life.
Thus, the arrival at the Legion's central training base on Mussina's World of a new recruit who actually had a few qualifications for a military career was almost inevitably a recipe for disaster.
"I don't understand what I did wrong," said Thumper, sullenly. He sat on the edge of his bunk, illuminated by a single handlight in Sharky's hand. The light was shining directly in his face, which made it hard to see the others standing all around him. It wasn't hard to guess who was there, though-everybody else in Recruit Squad Gamma.
"You're acting like an eager beaver, is what you did wrong," said Sharky, exasperated. "It's what you keep doing wrong. Why you got to set a record for the fastest run of the obstacle course?" The other squad members stood in a circle around Thumper, adding their sullen voices to his argument.
"What's wrong with doing the best you can?" Thumper asked. "That's all I did. I like running and climbing over things. Why can't I do that when I have the chance?"
Sharky groaned. "Because now the sergeants are tryin' to make everybody else run the course faster," he explained.
"IF THAT LI1TLE TWERP CAN DO IT, WHAT THE FARK'S WRONG WITH YOUR LAZY STINKIN' ASS?" he said, pretending to shout without raising his voice to a level that might be heard outside the bunkhouse. There were a couple of chuckles in appreciation of the accuracy of Sharky's imitation of Sergeant Pitbull's habitual bellow, but nobody sounded in particularly good humor.
"Well, it seems to me the question is, can you guys run the course better than you've been doing it, or not?" asked Thumper. He turned his head from side to side, not so much looking at his audience as trying to get away from the persistent glare of the handlight.
"Wrong damn question," rumbled a deep voice. Thumper recognized the speaker as Pingpong, the biggest and slowest recruit in the platoon. "What you oughta ask is, should we stomp the shit out of this so-called sophont for making everybody else look bad to the sarge?"
"Hey, easy there, Pingpong," said Sharky, patting the big recruit on the shoulder. "It ain't come to stompin', yet. We're just havin' a friendly talk with good ol' Thumper here, lettin' him know how all his buddies in the squad feel about stuff."
"Oh, yeah," said Pingpong, scratching the thick fur atop his head. "Well, let me know when it's time for stompin, OK?"
"Sure," said Sharky, with a nod.
"I can't believe you guys are threatening me," said Thumper, indignation all over his face. "Just because I want to do my best..."
"Yeah, yeah, doin' your best is triff," said Sharky. "But do you hafta do it when it makes all your buddies look bad? If you'd just save it for when there's a real enemy..."
"We got a real enemy," said another recruit-Spider, this time. "It's all the farkin' sergeants..."
"Damn straight!" said several of the recruits in chorus.
"No, no, no," said Thumper, holding up his forepaws. "Sure, the sergeants are tough on us, but that's because we have to be tough when the death rays start flashing. Really, guys, it's all for our own good..."
"Ain't no damn death rays flashin'," said Pingpong.
"There ain't been a farkin' war since my granddaddy was in the Regular farkin' Army, forty years ago. Who we gonna , fight, anyhow?"
"There was a civil war someplace out in the New Baltimore sector, wasn't there?" said Spider. "The Legion was sent in to settle that one..."
"That was on Landoor," said Sharky, dripping scorn. "And that wasn't any real war-just a bunch of backward colonials gettin' excited. Only real action was when some Legion officer shot up the peace conference. Hope he got him a couple sergeants..."
"Shhh-Pitbull" came a hoarse whisper, but it was too late. "
"YOU GOT YOU A SERGEANT NOW, YOU STUPID FARKIN' CLOWNS!" roared the drill sergeant, throwing open the door to the recruits' bunkroom. The overhead light came on abruptly, catching the circle of recruits standing around Thumper's bunk like greeblers around a sweetbush. They all snapped to attention as the sergeant stomped over to the group. "WHAT THE FARK'S GOIN' ON HERE, AS IF I DIDN'T KNOW?" he bellowed.
"We was just telling old Legion stories, is all, sarge," said Sharky, stepping to the front of the group. "Tryin' to build up the squad's morale, y'know?"
"YEAH, HUH? LIKE YOUR MOTHER BUILDS UP THE ARMY'S MORALE," said Sergeant Pitbull. "YOU FARKERS SHOULDA GOT YOURSELF SOME SLEEP BEFORE NOW, BECAUSE I WAS GONNA COME GIVE YOU A FRIENDLY WARNING, LIKE. JUST A LITTLE BIT OF ADVANCE NOTICE OF THE SURPRISE INSPECTION BY THE BIG BRASS."