"Well, why not? Why not! If they trouble Uncle Sam then knock them out. We don't need anything from these kind of broken-down raggedy people. Now Uncle Sam — Uncle Sap is taking care of the world and the taxpayers footing the bill…"
"Shut up and listen, Private." There was an edge to the captain's voice that Billy had never heard before, and he shut up. "I don't know how you got into the Aid Corps but I do know that you don't belong in it. This is one world and it gets smaller every year. The Eskimos in the Arctic have DDT poisoning from the farms in the Midwest. The strontium ninety from a French atom test in the Pacific gives bone cancer to a child in New York. This is spaceship Earth and we're all aboard it together, trying to stay alive on it.
"The richest countries had better help the poorest — or else. Because it's all the same spaceship. And it's already almost too late. In Vietnam we spent five million dollars a head to kill the citizens of that country, and our profit was the undying hatred of everyone there, both north and south, and the loathing of the civilized world. We've made our mistakes — so it's time now to learn how to profit from them.
"For far less than one thousandth of the cost of killing a man, and making his friends our enemies, we can save a life and make the man our friend. Two hundred bucks a head, that's what this operation costs. We've blown up the well here because it was a cesspit of infection, and we are drilling a new well to bring up pure water from the strata below. We are putting toilets into the houses, and sinks. We are killing the disease-breeding insects. We are running in power lines and bringing in a medical mission to save their lives. We are opening a birth-control clinic so they can have families like people, not breed like rats, pulling the world down with them. They are going to have scientific agriculture so they can eat better. Education as well so they can be more than working animals. We are going to bring them about five percent of the 'benefits' you enjoy in the sovereign state of Alabama and we are doing it from selfish motives. We want to stay alive. But at least we are doing it."
The captain looked at his clenched fist, then slowly opened it. "Sergeant," he called out as he turned away. "Put this man under arrest and see that he is sent back to the camp at once."
A crate of composting toilets thudded to the ground almost at Billy's feet and a thread of hot anger snapped inside of him. Who were these people to get waited on like this? He had grown up in a sharecropper's shack and had never seen a toilet like these until he was more than eight years old. Now he had to help give them away to…
"Niggers, that's what these people are! And we give them everything on a silver platter. It's bleeding hearts like you, Captain, crying your eyes out for these poor helpless people, that are causing the trouble!"
Captain Carter stopped, and slowly turned about. He looked at the young man who stood before him and felt only a terrible feeling of depression.
"No, Private William Truscoe, I don't cry for these people. I don't cry. But if I ever could — I would cry for you."
After that he went away.
The Old Man had that look of intense glee on his face that meant someone was in for a very rough time. Since we were alone, it took no great feat of intelligence to figure it would be me. I talked first, bold attack being the best defense and so forth.
"I quit. Don't bother telling me what dirty job you have cooked up, because I have already quit and you do not want to reveal company secrets to me."
The grin was even wider now and he actually chortled as he thumbed a button on his console. A thick legal document slid out of the delivery slot onto his desk.
"This is your contract," he said. "It tells how and when you will work. A steel-and-vanadium-bound contract that you couldn't crack with a molecular disruptor."
I leaned out quickly, grabbed it and threw it into the air with a single motion. Before it could fall, I had my Solar out and, with a wide-angle shot, burned the contract to ashes.
The Old Man pressed the button again and another contract slid out on his desk. If possible, the smile was still wider now.
"I should have said a duplicate of your contract — like this one here." He made a quick note on his secretary plate. "I have deducted thirteen credits from your salary for the cost of the duplicate — as well as a hundred-credit fine for firing a Solar inside a building."
I slumped, defeated, waiting for the blow to land. The Old Man fondled my contract.
"According to this document, you can't quit. Ever. I therefore have a little job I know you'll enjoy. Repair job. The Procyon beacon has shut down. It's a Mark Three beacon…"
"What kind of beacon?" I asked him. I have repaired hyperspace beacons from one arm of the galaxy to the other and was sure I had worked on every type or model made. But I had never heard of this kind.
