 Had Wayne actually accomplished his mission given to him by Captain Jack, would he have felt victorious?
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Worlds of If Science Fiction, July 1962. Wayne, unseen, sneered down from the head of the stairs. They were squareheads one and all, marking moron time in a gray dream. One thing—when he was jockeying a rocket to Mars or maybe firing the pants off Asiatic reds in some steamy gone jungle paradise, he'd forget his punkie origins in teeveeland. So he'd waited in his room, and it wasn't easy sweating it out alone waiting for the breakout call from HQ. He was still laughing as he whoomed the Olds between the pale dead glow of houses and roared up the ramp onto the Freeway. He strode under a sign reading Public Youth Center No. 947 and walked casually to the reception desk, where a thin man with sergeant's stripes and a pansy haircut looked out of a pile of paperwork. He wrote on a slip of paper, handed the pass to Wayne. "Thanks, sarge dear," Wayne said and took the elevator up to the Armory. A tired fat corporal with a naked head blinked up at tall Wayne. Finally he said, "So make up your mind, bud. You can get a cat, not a mouse, and some babes are clever hellcats in a dark alley." "A corporal with no hair and still a counterboy. The corporal waddled back with the revolver and the switchblade disguised in a leather comb case. He checked them on a receipt ledger, while Wayne examined the weapons, broke open the revolver, twirled the cylinder and pushed cartridges into the waiting chamber. He slipped the knife from the comb case, flicked open the blade and stared at its gleam in the buttery light as his mouth went dry and the refracted incandescence of it trickled on his brain like melted ice, exciting and scary. He slung the holster under his left armpit and tested the spring clip release several times, feeling the way the serrated butt dropped into his wet palm. Captain Jack moved massively. The big stone-walled office, alive with stuffed lion and tiger and gunracks, seemed to grow smaller. Captain Jack crossed black-booted legs and whacked a cane at the floor. It had a head shaped like a grinning bear. If he didn't watch himself he'd begin feeling like a pea among bowling balls. "Wayne Seton," said Captain Jack as if he were discussing something in a bug collection. His legs seemed sheathed in lead as he bit inwardly at shrinking fear the way a dog snaps at a wound.
 No, because Wayne would not be able to mentally handle the murders.
 No, because Wayne would know that his parents would be disappointed in him.  No, because Wayne would not be able to mentally handle the murders.  Yes, because Wayne had been excited all along about his draft call.  Yes, because Wayne wanted to make Captain Jack proud no matter what.