"Nothing to it," I told Peet. "Just another job. Easy as whacking an insect."

I adjusted the variable equalizer while giving Peet my standard alpha male spiel. The equalizer lever stuck. Again. So I gave it a swift kick to get it back into gear. Peet calmed back down and fiddled with the dimensional rods. That's what he liked to call them - rods - until they fairly hummed with resonance. I noticed that the third pilot in our escapade was missing in action.

"Where's Rozco?"

Peet shoved the wad in his mouth to one side. "Oh, hell, you know where he is." Peet got that look about him. So, yeah, I knew where Rozco was. Back on C-Deck, mooning after that ditzy dame that he left on Quayar III. Jerk.

I shook my head and snorted. "Yeah, well, you know what they say about Quayar dames--".

"No. What do they say?"

Rozco's voice was the deepest bass I'd ever heard. Like a fog horn. When he sounded off, not just the hair, but the skin on my back stood at attention. He could scare the living hell out of me and sometimes I wanted to bite my tongue clean off.

"What was that crack about the dames on Quayar III?" Rozco growled.

Peet suddenly decided that he had an errand to do below deck. He uncoupled his belt and slinked down to the hole, the rat snake, leaving me to a dubious fate.

I could feel Rozco breathing down the back of my neck. He was a lumbering giant. Made two of me. He often promised to do that very thing when I got too cocky. Like now. I started to sweat.

When all else fails, I reminded myself, wing it. "Oh, hey, come on, guy! I was only clowning. You know how it is? Long voyage, not enough to do.." I held my breath and turned just enough to catch his eye. I showed my teeth -- all of them -- trying to grin him back into a good humor.

Rozco stared me down for a long moment and then clapped me on the back. "It's okay. I know how it is." Rozco threw his bulk into the co-pilot's ride.

I secretly gulped, relieved that my life would not be ending so soon. Or so violently. Rozco was the roughest pilot I ever met up with. I heard Peet making noise in the hole, a signal that he was coming back topside. Rozco didn't like people to sneak up on him and Peet was very cautious not to rile him. Instead, Peet came up behind me.

"Get a load of this" he said, sticking something in my face. "Bet you never saw a stupider-looking race than these jokers!"

I took the ID chip away from Peet and slid it in the magnifier. A strange image came up on the screen. It was the first time that I'd seen our prey. `Stupid' didn't even cover it. I had to laugh out loud.

"Will you look at that! Look at that frame! Those eyes! What's that junk on the top of his head? Is he for real?" I laughed until I was hoarse. "I told you this would be easy pickings. Who ever said the Almighty didn't have a sense of humor?"

Peet and Rozco guffawed. While we cracked every crude joke we could think of, I piloted the ship into close orbit of the target planet. Rozco re-adjusted the chemical chamber, while Peet keyed in the precise coordinates on the panel. I noticed he was still a bit shaky.

I cut him a sideways glance. "So. You gonna be okay for the drop?"

Peet's face screwed up in agitation. "Of course I'll be okay for the drop, dammit!"

"Okay! Okay! Don't bite my head off! It's been a long time and I just needed to hear you say it."

Peet made a strange noise in his throat when he was irritated with me. Like now. "It ain't been that long."

I shrugged, then nodded to Rozco that we were ready. He took over the controls.

"Okay, then" I said to Peet. "Let's do it." I looked back at the weird image on the screen and blew him a kiss. "Bye-bye, Sweetheart! Don't say we never gave you nothing!"

Rozco chuckled as we made our way to the back of the ship. Peet and I climbed in our dropsuits, double-checked our weapons, and fastened them safely in the suit-holds. It took me no time to get ready for the drop, but Peet was still struggling with the belts and straps. He had a lot more to get in the suit than I did. Me, I was all muscle and brain.

When Peet had suited-up, he turned his back to me so I could check his folds and pull-cord. Then he did the same for me. I gave Rozco the buzz. He put us in low synchronous auto-orbit and lunged back to help us out of the ship.

"Ready?" I asked Peet. He gave me another look, but nodded.

"Okay, Baby," I said, "See you after the fall!"

Rozco pushed me through the portal first, then Peet. I always said that big damn horn in the middle of Rozco's face would come in handy. We plunged into free-fall just long enough to get our wings spread out and fully functional. My pull-cord worked like a charm but I saw Peet's was hanging, so I grabbed ahold of him and ripped the cord for him. By the time we hit the ground, we had our stingers ready to take out the entire butt-ugly race of punies on this planet.

In all my travels, I never saw anything like the lifeforms on this miniature world. Peet and I slithered silently into the thick brush to wreak gleeful havoc on the unsuspecting inhabitants of this tiny, backward world. Even its name was stupid. What the hell did they call it? Earth?***