Cobra Alliance

to the practice range when you were ready. Are you?'

Grimacing, Jonny nodded. 'I suppose so. Might as well get it over with.'

'What, facing Bai?' Deutsch asked as they set off down the hall. 'Don't worry; he understands what that was all about. So do Parr and Druma, for that matter.'

'I wish I did,' Jonny shook his head. 'What has Viljo got against me, anyway?'

Halloran glanced at him, and Jonny caught the other's frown. 'You really don't know?'

'I just said that, didn't I? What, he doesn't like anyone who was born more than ten light-years from Earth?'

'He likes them fine... as long as they don't show they're better at anything than he is.'

Jonny stopped abruptly. 'What are you talking about? I never did anything like that.'

Halloran sighed. 'Maybe not in your books, but a person like Rolon does his accounting differently. Look, remember our very first orientation meeting, the one he showed up late at? Who was it Bai used to pop his excuse?'

'Well... me. But that was only because I was the last to arrive before him.'

'Probably,' Halloran conceded. 'But Rolon didn't know that. And then the first evening of our actual training you tore the stuffing out of all of us in that game of King's Bluff. People from Earth have a long history of being successful gamers, and I suspect that really put the icing on the cake as far as Rolon was concerned.'

Jonny shook his head in bewilderment. 'But I didn't mean to beat him—'

'Of course you did—everyone 'means' to win in a game,' Deutsch said. 'You didn't mean to humiliate him, of course, but in a way that actually makes it worse. For someone with Rolon's competitive streak, being clobbered by a perceived social inferior who wasn't even trying to do so was more than he could take.'

'So what am I supposed to do—roll over and play dead for him?'

'No, you're supposed to just continue doing as well as you can and to hell with his ego,' Deutsch said grimly. 'Maybe maneuvering you into Mendro's kennel will satisfy his lopsided sense of personal honor. If not—' He hesitated. 'Well, if he can't learn to work with you, I don't think we're going to want him on Adirondack.'

Jonny gave him a quick look. For a brief moment Deutsch's air of calm humor had vanished, showing something much darker beneath it. 'You know,' Jonny said, striving to sound casual, 'a lot of times you don't seem very concerned about what's happening on your world.'

'You mean because I laugh and joke around?' Deutsch asked. 'Or because I opted to spend a couple of months hanging around Asgard instead of grabbing a laser and rushing back to help?'

'Um... when you put it that way—'

'I care a lot about Adirondack, Jonny, but I don't see any advantage in tying myself in knots worrying about what the Trofts might be doing to my family and friends. Right now I can help them most by becoming the very best Cobra I can be—and by nudging the rest of you into doing the same.'

'I think that's a hint we should get back to practice,' Halloran said with a smile.

'Can't fool a psychologically trained mind,' Deutsch replied wryly; and with that the momentary glimpse into his deeper self was over. But it was enough, and for the first time Jonny had a real understanding of the kind of men the Army had chosen for this unit.

The kind of men he'd been deemed worthy to join.

And it put the whole thing with Viljo into a final perspective. To risk washing out of the Cobras over what were essentially emotional fly bites would be the absolute depth of stupidity. From now on, he resolved, he would consider Viljo's gibes to be nothing more than practice in developing patience. If Deutsch could bear up under an invasion of his world, Jonny could surely put up with Viljo.

They'd reached an exit now, and Halloran led them outside. 'Wait a second—we're on the wrong side of the building,' Jonny said, stopping and looking around. 'The practice field's that way, isn't it?'

'Yep,' Halloran nodded cheerfully. 'But for Cobras cross-country's faster than all those hallways.'

'Cross-country as in around?' Jonny asked, peering down the eight-story structure heading halfway to infinity in both directions.

'As in over,' Halloran corrected. Facing the wall, he flexed his knees. 'Last one to the top's a gum-bumbler—and any windows you break come out of your pay.'

The second week passed as the first had, with long days of Cobra exercises and equally long—or so it seemed—evenings of military theory. Every day or two they received new neckwrap computer modules, each one allowing a new weapon in their arsenals to be brought into play. Jonny learned how to use his sonic weapons and how to retune them in the event that the Trofts turned out to be particularly susceptible to specific frequencies; learned how to trigger his arcthrower, a blast of high voltage traveling down the ionization path burned by his right fingertip laser, and how to efficiently fry electronic gear with it; and, finally, learned now to handle the antiarmor laser in his left calf, simultaneously the most powerful and most awkward of his weapons. Pointing downward along the tibia, its beam was guided through his ankle by optical fibers to emerge through a flexible focusing lens in the bottom of his heel. Special boots were handed out with the computer modules that day, and as he tried to learn how to shoot while standing on one leg, Jonny joined the rest of the trainees in roundly cursing the idiot who'd been responsible for that particular design. Bai claimed they'd find out how versatile the laser was once they had their programmed reflexes, but no one seriously believed him.

But through all the work, practice, and memorization—through the physical and mental fatigue—two unexpected observations managed to penetrate Jonny's consciousness. First, that Viljo's taunts disappeared almost entirely after the mess hall incident, though the other remained cool toward him; and second, that Bai really did tend to single Jonny out for special notice.

The latter bothered him more than he cared to admit. Viljo's suggestion that the Moreau family had somehow bribed the instructor was absurd, of course... but at least some of the other trainees must have overheard the allegation, and if Jonny could pick up on Bai's pattern so could they. What did they think about it? Did they imagine