Scott waved his hands over the controls, trying to get a fix on the blip. 'Jesus, you are so damned close-minded-whoa!' Talk to old man Chigusa with your raping-the-environment complaints.' 'And,' he continued, ignoring Tom, 'and the barge, this ship, the cowboys, and you and me are all owned body and soul by the Corp. We're towing a half-full barge with about fifteen million tons of rendered fish and animal products and the processor that did it to collect more meat on the hoof from the poor suckers on Ryushi, a bunch of shit-kicker cowboys-no, not even cows, they're rhynth boys living on a middle-of-nowhere planet.' The Lector, in case you fell asleep during the orientation session, is a tug. 'I don't recall that I stuck my dick into the dirt anywhere lately,' Scott said. You can't just keep raping virgin planets, stripping them of everything valuable, and leaving the hulks behind.' But I'm telling you, the bill is gonna come due sooner or later. Around them, the stale ship air smelled like a gym locker.

Scott stroked his blond beard and waited for the reply he knew was coming. Tom, whose still-short dark hair had been cropped to his skull before he'd gone into the sleep chamber, was up on his soapbox again, looking kind of like a military-college freshman in free-speak alley. Still a few weeks out from their next port, but it was starting to look like a few years. The others were working the plant or attending to ship routine and the two pilots were alone in the control module, staring into the blackness of the Big Deep. They'd dropped out of hyperspace a week back, were running on the new and improved gravity drives, and the old argument had been lit and burning almost since the crew left the sleep chambers.

Scott smiled to take a little of the sting out, but not that much. Well, not to put too fine a point on it, I still think you're full of crap.'

Prey alien vs predator steve perry