"That," Harding said thoughtfully, "is the question."
"Maise, you're the Exec," Spender commented. "It's up to you to work us a replacement."
"Didn't you see his orders?" I snapped. "They're dated from Central Command Authority itself. Even if I did know somebody here in Mars Command—which I don't—it wouldn't do any good."
"He's right," Harding grumbled. "Everybody knows that once they've assigned a sickman, the only people who can get him reassigned are the sickmen themselves. Maise couldn't do anything about it unless he was a member of the Corps himself. But that settles it, though—his orders being from Central, I mean. Nobody but a sickman would have his orders cut at Central for a puny little ship like ours. It proves what we thought about him, anyway."
"I don't think it proves anything," I retorted angrily. "I don't think the question is whether or not Frendon is a sick—now you've got me saying it—a Psi Corps man. The question is whether we're going to settle down and stop whining just because we got a new CO we don't like, and that we can't do anything about. We're not running this war. They're running it back on Earth."
"We're fighting it," Spender commented, chewing on a big, raw knuckle.
Harding looked at me skeptically. "How much space-combat have you seen, Maise?"
"Six years, more or less," I told him. "I've seen plenty of the stuff. I'd just as soon let somebody else do it from now on in, but nobody asked me."
Harding grunted: "Well, tell me, have you ever served under a sick skipper?"
"No."