Young soldiers had a lot of expectations and fantasies about how it would be and what they would do and feel. Invariably wrong, those expectations. - Steve Perry

The rules are different for rich men," he said. "Always have been.

Any type of violence initiated by one intelligent being against another was wrong. Killing violence was worse than any other kind. How could it be condoned? In his brief moment of cosmic bliss, Khadaji had seen the value of intelligent life. Man and his self-created mues were alone in the galaxy as evolved intelligence. Certainly, there were artificials—computers and genetically altered animals—but no aliens had been discovered above the level of an unaltered dog. It was a big galaxy, plenty of room for every human or neo-human, it wasn’t necessary to kill any of them!

Droc was not particularly religious himself. If the gods responded to entreaties, they had never demonstrated it to him. Better his time was spent doing something that might work.