and Joe Lofflin couldn't

utside in those gardens – not alone, but holding hands, and marveled at the various insects – local and imported. He'd 'oohed' at the dancing honey bees and 'ahed' at the foot-long stick insects and caterpillars and all manner of beasties that munched their way through the flowerbeds. The sunrises and suns

n of woe. He could almost hear his heart pumping in his ears. No, he could hear it! He shifted his

The Mordrake had, until then, been three months at space, and had had no contacts with any Corsairs until the one it ran into near Horner's World – and that had very nearly been the end of the intrepid crew. The ship's former Captain, Philip Wainwright Blaine, had been eager to score at least one kill before the end of their patrol, when he reluctantly agreed to bring the Mordrake back to Tremaine for some incidental engine

emergency power, and with the entechs doing their level best to repair the engines, the crew – or at least, the survivors – had to be told that there was nothing to be done, and that they were going to die. And it had been he – Joe Lofflin, the then Exo of the Mordrake, who ha

get their own engines working again. They were saved! Of course, it hadn't been quite that simple, but here they were, a week o

went unnoticed. Tension among the locals was high at the time because the Space Fleet had only just sent a small squadron of ships to patrol the area, and the colony remained

sequent promotion to Captain of the Mordrake, or the news that the Corsair home world had been located and a Fleet task force had been sent to wipe it off the star-maps... no

ve, their activities now had been to have a good time, live it up, and make the most of it. Joe Lofflin had done just that. ...But he could only watch so many movies a

s derailed his train of thought. A warm, naked young body press