Major Barris fixed Rip with a cold eye. "Foster, three orbital turns, then front and center." Rip obediently spun around three times, then walked forward and stood at attention, trying to conceal his grin. "Foster, what does SOS mean?" "Special Order Squadrons, sir." "Right. And what else does it mean?" "It means, ’Help!’ sir." "Right. And what else does it mean?" "Superman or simp, sir." This was a ceremony in which questions and answers never changed. It was supposed to make Planeteer cadets and junior officers feel properly humble, but it didn’t work. By tradition, the Planeteers were the cockiest gang that ever blasted through high vacuum. Major Barris shook his head sadly. "You admit you’re a simp, Foster. The rest of you are simps, too. But you don’t believe it. You’ve finished six years on the platform. You’ve made a few little trips out into space. You’ve landed on the moon a couple times. So now you think you’re seasoned space spooks. Well, you’re not. You’re simps." Rip stopped grinning. He had heard this before. It was part of the routine. But he sensed that this time Joe Barris wasn’t kidding. The major rubbed the radiation scar on his cheek absently as he looked them over. They were like twelve chicks out of the same nest. They were all about the same size, a compact five-feet-eleven inches, 175 pounds. They wore loose black tunics, belted over full trousers which gathered into white cruiser boots. The comfortable uniforms concealed any slight differences in build. The twelve were all lean of face, with hair cropped to the regulation half inch. Rip was the only redhead among them. "Sit down," Barris commanded. "I’m going to make a farewell speech." Rip pulled a plastic stool toward him. The others did the same. Major Barris remained standing. "Well," he began soberly, "you are now officers of the Special Order Squadrons. You’re Planeteers. You are lieutenants by order of the Space Council, Federation of Free Governments. And—space protect you!—to yourselves, you’re supermen. But never forget this: to ordinary spacemen, you’re just plain simps. You’re trouble in a black tunic. They have about as much use for you as they have for leaks in their air locks. Some of the spacemen have been high-vacking for twenty years or more, and they’re tough. They’re as nasty as a Callistan _teekal_. They like to eat Planeteer junior officers for breakfast." Lieutenant Felipe "Flip" Villa asked, "With salt, Joe?" Major Barris sighed. "No use trying to tell you space-chicks anything. You’re lieutenants now, and a lieutenant has the thickest skull of any rank, no matter what service he belongs to." Rip realized that Barris had not been joking, no matter how flippant his speech. "Go ahead," he urged. "Finish what you were going to say."