"Why ... I—If you look at it that way, sir—" Kinnison still knew that he was right, but in that form the question answered itself.
"That is the only way it can be looked at," the old man returned, flatly. "No heroics on your part, no maudlin sentimentality. Now, as a Lensman, is it your considered judgment that it is best for the Patrol that you traverse that hyperspatial vortex alone, or with all the resources of the Dauntless at your command?"
Kinnison's face was white and strained. He could not lie to the Port Admiral. Nor could he tell the truth, for the dying agonies of those fiendishly tortured boys still wracked him to the core.
"But I can't order men into any such death as that," he broke out, finally.
"You must," Haynes replied, inexorably. "Either you take the ship as she is or else you call for volunteers—and you know what that would mean."
Kinnison did, too well. The surviving personnel of the two Brittanias, the full present complement of the Dauntless, the crews of every other ship in Base, practically everybody on the Reservation—Haynes himself certainly, even Lacy and old von Hohendorff, everybody, even or especially if they had no business on such a trip as that—would volunteer; and every man jack of them would yell his head off at being left out. Each would have a thousand reasons for going.
"QX, I suppose. You win." Kinnison submitted, although with ill grace, rebelliously. "But I don't like it, nor any part of it. It clogs my jets."
"I know it, Kim," Haynes put a hand upon the boy's shoulder, tightening his fingers. "We all have to do it, it's part of the job. But remember always, Lensman, that the Patrol is not an army of mercenaries or conscripts. Any one of them—just as would you yourself—would go out there, knowing that it meant death in the torture chamber of the Overlords, if in so doing he knew that he could help to end the torture and the slaughter of non-combatant men, women, and children that is now going on."
Kinnison walked slowly back to the Field; silenced, but not convinced. There was something screwy somewhere, but he couldn't—