_Out on the ice-buried planet, Commander Red Stone led his Free
Companions to almost certain death. They died for a dangerous dream
that had only one chance in a thousand trillion to come true. Is
there a better reason for dying?_
_... although the most recent star to die, RNAC 89778 in the distant
Menelaus galaxy (common name, Menelaus XII), had eight inhabited
planets, only some one thousand people of the fifth planet escaped and
survived as a result of a computer error which miscalculated the exact
time by two years. Due to basic psycho-philo maladjustments the refugees
of Menelaus XII-5 are classified as anti-social-types-B-6 and must be
considered unstable. All anti-social-types-B-6 are barred from
responsible positions in United Galaxies by order of the Inter-Galactic
Council._
--Short History of The United Galaxies
* * * * *
Yuan Saltario started it. He was serving in my Company and he was one of
them. A Menelaus XII-5 "unstable," and don't ever call that damned
little planet by its number if you meet one of them. They call it
Nova-Maurania. But you won't meet one of them. Or maybe you will, maybe
they did make it. I like to think they did.
There were a lot of them in the Companies in 3078. Restless men. The
Companies were the logical place for them. We're still classified
anti-social-B-6, too. Every year it's harder to get recruits, but we
still have to be careful who we take in. We took Yuan Saltario. There
was something about him from the very start.
"Why do you want to join a Free Company?" He was a short, humanoid type
with deep black eyes and a thin, lipless mouth that never smiled.
"I'm an anti-social. I like to fight. I want to fight."
"A misfit joining the misfits? A grudge against the Council? It's not
good enough, mister, we live on the Council. Try again."
Saltario's black eyes stared without a flicker. "You're Red Stone,
Commander of the Red Company. You hate the Council and I hate the
Council. You're the ..." Saltario stopped.
I said, "The Traitor of the Glorious War of Survival. You can say it,
Saltario."
The lipless mouth was rigid. "I don't think of it that way. I think of a
man with personal integrity," Saltario said.
I suppose I should have seen it then, the rock he carried deep inside
him. It might have saved thirty thousand good men. But I was thinking of
myself. Commander Red Stone of the Red Company, Earthmen. Only we're not
all Earthmen now, every year there are fewer recruits, and it won't be
long before we die out and the Council will have the last laugh. Old Red
Stone, the Traitor of the War of Survival, the little finger of my left
hand still missing and telling the Universe I was a very old soldier of
the outlawed Free Companies hanging onto life on a rocky planet of the
distant Salaman galaxy. Back at the old stand because United Galaxies
still need us. In a way it's a big joke. Two years after Rajay-Ben and I
had a bellyfull of the Glorious War of Survival and they chased us all
the way out here, they turned right around and made the peace. A joke on
me, but sometimes I like to think that our runout was the thing that
made them think and make peace. When you've been a soldier for
thirty-five years you like to win battles, but you like to feel you
helped bring peace, too.
* * * * *
I said, "Personal integrity. That sounds pretty good, doesn't it? So you
like personal integrity? All right, Saltario, are you sure you know what
you're getting into? We're 60 million light years from Galaxy Center, 10
million from the nearest United Galaxy city. We've got no comforts, no
future, nothing to do but fight. A woman in her right mind won't look at
us, if they see you in uniform they'll spit on you, if they catch you
out of uniform they'll kill you."
Saltario shrugged. "I like to eat. I've got nowhere to go. All I've got
is myself and a big piece of ice I called home."
I nodded. "Okay. We fight small wars for good profits. It's not Earth
out here, but we've got four nice suns, plenty of Lukanian whisky
Rajay-Ben taught the locals to make, and we're our own masters. The
United Galaxies leaves us pretty much alone unless they need us. You do
your job, and your job is what I tell you to do, period. You got that
straight?"