ally must be
worried._

"Aside from those orders, which were decided on by the Service Command,
you'll be under the direct orders of Colonel Nels Petersen. Colonel
Petersen."

Petersen was a tall, hard-faced man with a touch of gray at his temples.
He stepped forward and stared intently at the assembled crew.

* * * * *

"Our job is to make the preliminary preparations for getting D-N
beryllium out of the crust of Fomalhaut V. We're supposed to stay alive
while we do it. Therefore, our secondary job is to find out what it was
that killed the scouting expedition of the _Mavis_. There are sixty of
us going aboard the _Lord Nelson_ tomorrow, and I'd like to have sixty
aboard when we come back. Got that?"

He leaned forward, stretched upward on his toes, and smiled
mechanically. "Fine. Now, you all know your jobs, but we're going to
have to work together as a team. We're going to have to correlate our
work so that we'll know what we're doing. So don't think we won't have
anything to do during the two weeks it will take us to get to Fomalhaut
V. We're going to work it as though it were a shakedown cruise. If
anyone doesn't work out, he'll be replaced, even if we have to turn
around and come back to Earth. On a planet which has wiped out a whole
scouting expedition, we can't afford to have any slip-ups. And that
means we can't afford to have anyone aboard who doesn't know what he's
doing or doesn't care. Is that clear?"

It was.

"All right," said the colonel. "Let's go out and get acquainted with the
_Lord Nelson_."

* * * * *

The briefing session broke up well past midnight, and the group that
shortly would become the crew of the _Lord Nelson_ filtered out of the
building and into the cool spring air. Each man had a fairly good idea
of his job and each man knew the dangers involved. No one had backed
out.

"What d'ye think of it, Pete?" Sherri James asked, as they left
together. "Sounds pretty mean."

"I wish we knew what the answers were beforehand," Wayne said. He
glanced down at Sherri. The moon was full, and its rays glinted brightly
off her golden hair. "It's a risky deal, as Petersen said. Nine men go
out, and eight die--of what? Just dead, that's all."

"It's the way the game goes," Sherri said. "You knew that when you
joined the corps." They turned down the main road of the IES compound
and headed for the snack bar.

Wayne nodded. "I k