went on. "Never mind
how, just take it for granted. _I know it._ I'm here for the ride. For a
special reason I wouldn't care to have you know. I'll get my training
and then pull out."

He took a step forward, his face a mask of bitterness.

"So from now on, you two guys leave me alone. You bore me to death with
your emotional childish allegiance to this--this"--he paused and spit
the last out cynically--"space kindergarten!"

CHAPTER 3

"I just can't understand it, Joan," said Captain Steve Strong, tossing
the paper on his circular desk. "The psychographs of Corbett, Manning
and Astro fit together like gears. And yet--"

The Solar Guard officer suddenly rose and walked over to a huge window
that filled the entire north wall of his office, a solid sheet of glass
that extended from the high domed ceiling to the translucent flooring.
Through the window, he stared down moodily toward the grassy quadrangle,
where at the moment several hundred cadets were marching in formation
under a hot sun.

"--And yet," continued Strong, "every morning for the last three weeks
I've got a report from McKenny about some sort of friction between
them!"

"I think it'll work out, Steve," answered the pretty girl in the uniform
of the Solar Guard, seated in an easy chair on the other side of the
desk.

Joan Dale held the distinction of being the first woman ever admitted
into the Solar Guard, in a capacity other than administrative work. Her
experiments in atomic fissionables was the subject of a recent
scientific symposium held on Mars. Over fifty of the leading scientists
of the Solar Alliance had gathered to study her latest theory on
hyperdrive, and had unanimously declared her ideas valid. She had been
offered the chair as Master of Physics at the Academy as a result,
giving her access to the finest laboratory in the tri-planet society.

Now facing the problem of personality adjustment in Unit 42-D, she sat
across the desk from her childhood friend, Steve Strong, and frowned.

"What's happened this time?"

"Manning." He paused. "It seems to be all Manning!"

"You mean he's the more aggressive of the three?"

"No--not necessarily. Corbett shows signs of being a number-one
spaceman. And that big cadet, Astro"--Strong flashed a white smile that
contrasted with his deep space tan--"I don't think he could make a
manual mistake on the power deck if he tried. You know, I actually saw
him put an auxiliary rocket motor toge