The mantis cyborgs insectlike cruel & determined to wipe humanity from the face of the galaxy The Fleet is humanity&s last chance a multi-world multi-national task force assembled to hold the line against the aliens& overwhelming technology & firepower Enter Harrison Barlow who like so many young men of wars past simply wants to serve his people & partake of the grand adventure of military life Only Harrison is not a hot pilot nor a crack shot with a rifle What good is a Chaplain&s Assistant in the interstellar battles which will decide the fate of all? More than he thinks Because while the mantis insectoids are determined to eliminate the human threat to mantis supremacy they remember the errors of their past Is there the slightest chance that humans might have value? & so Barlow embarks upon an improbable gambit determined to alter the course of the entire war!