“W-what do you think you’re doing?” he gasped, trying hard to speak without moving his chin. “You can’t …”
He broke off speaking as the pressure under his chin increased sharply.
“The captain tell me, he say ‘Escrima, I want you to help remove the obstacles.’ Here, you are the obstacle … yes? I remove you by capturing. You want, I kill you instead.”
Reviewing his options quickly, for the sergeant was unwilling to bet his life that the Legionnaire was joking-or bluffing-Spengler opted to lie quietly where he was. This did not, of course, keep him from seething inwardly as he watched wire cutters clear the barbed wire from his position, and, scant seconds later, the entire company sweep by this supposedly challenging obstacle without breaking stride.
“You can’t mean you’re going to let them get away with it … sir. “
Sprawled in one of the “guest rooms” of the Space Legion’s incredible facilities which had been assigned to them for use during the competition, Major O’Donnel favored his master sergeant with a scowl.
“I didn’t say we were going to let them get away with it,” he said tightly. “I said I wasn’t going to lodge a protest.”
“But they didn’t run the confidence course … they totaled it!”
“And we could have, too … if we thought of it,” the major snapped back. “We had the equipment in our packs, and it was declared as combat conditions. It’s what we would have done in combat. We just got trapped into conventional thinking, is all.”
“Well, what they did sure wasn’t regulation,” the sergeant growled.