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now eldest in troop, and senior in rank.

    He returned the salute uncertainly, and sat heavily in the chair beside the tree.

    "Report," he said, not at all wishing to hear the tale.

Five
Trident
Isolation Ward

    THE MED TECH WAS adamant, the while admitting Jela's basic understanding of the theory of contagion.

    Yes, many diseases could be spread— could have been spread already —by the mere passage of an infected person, such as Jela, bearing an infectious object, such as the tree, through the ship.

    That Jela had been escorted by the assistant quartermaster, and welcomed into the temporary wing wardroom was unfortunate. That no one had yet died of some hideous, unknown disease since his return to the ship was not proof positive that no one would .

    More to the point, several standard protocols had been abused and the med tech was voluble in their listing.

    First and foremost, Jela should not have been permitted to land on the planet without a thorough reevaluation of the biological information from the old surveys.

    Secondly, neither Jela nor the tree should have been permitted back into the pick-up ship without disinfection.

    Thirdly and most annoying to the tech, as Jela read it, neither he nor the tree should be aboard now without having been disinfected.

    The tech knew the rules and had the ear of someone on staff; and that someone had been appropriately notified, dignified, and horrified.

    And so it was that the second day of Jela's reign as Acting Wingleader was spent in an isolation tunnel. The double-walled see-through chamber was inflated inside an ordinary infirmary room. The tree, within a double-walled flex-glass cubicle, was isolated all the more within that chamber while various tests were done on the dirt it called its own. At least they'd seen the wisdom of leaving the tree were Jela could watch it—if it turned blue or purple or became infested with bugs in its chamber he'd be right there to see it.

    He hadn't pointed out to the med tech that no one knew exactly how long it might take a scruffy-looking tree of unknown genus to exhibit signs of parasitism, decay, or the like, but he had managed to get the tech to agree to a watering system for the plant so it wouldn't give a "false positive" that might have the fleet isolating the whole ship . . . .

    Luckily, the tech admitted the biotic sanctity of electronic communications, so Jela's small command was able at least to speak with him when required and otherwise keep his comm-screen active with the news and goings-on of the group.

    Things might have been busier had Corporal Bicra also not been in isolation elsewhere, this news brought and left by a smirking Kinto. The corporal had touched the tree, carried her Wingleader's burden—as both proper and prudent!—after all. Bicra being the most organized of the remaining squad, some important details were sure to be missed.

    Jela was inclined to consider Kinto a factor in the isolation as well, since he was known to be a friend of the med tech. What use any of the fooraw could be to Kinto was a mystery worth exploring at a later date; for the moment Under Sergeant Vondahl was too busy overseeing the maintenance and repair of the wing's ships to spend time on a vital-records search.

    The med tech seemed a busybody of the highest order. Jela's three sensor packs reported ably to the room's central console, but the tech remained in the room nonetheless. More, he constantly checked Jela's rate of water intake and—

    "Will you give me ten heartbeats to myself, Tech? You've already got cameras, body sensors, air-intake gauges, and two measurements of my weight. Do you think I'll grow wings and leave you behind if you don't check my color every tenth-shift?"

    Most of Jela's attention was on his porta-comp, where he was following with interest the check on Sergeant Risto's ship. Risto was one of the three who'd died when the primary passage had been laid open to space while they were