Ship Commander, Captain Martin Hawkins of the Perimeter Patrol is on the planet Rondos, where the patrol is based. He is being reprimanded by Commandant Luther Mynot. Mynot was treated roughly as a subordinate to Captain Hawkins's father, and now plans to put Martin through the fire. On the trip, Groll is striken with "space sickness" and goes insane. It is standard procedure to set a sufferer of space sickness adrift in a "life rocket", leaving them to die.