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The Navy has located a shipment of stolen arms on the planet Amazoon, and the Commando unit has been sent to retrieve it. Misfortune shadows the mission. Their transport crashes, killing all the on-world support troops, and the five must make their way through Amazoon's dense and deadly jungle alone if they are to fulfill their assignment. Sogan's ability to control and/or influence nonhuman life forms is tried to the breaking point as they encounter myriads of leeches, stinging wasps and other insects, and voracious frenzy-feeding fish.
The unit struggles against a variety of navigational problems on the rivers that are their highway to their goal. When they finally reach their target, they find the raiders, whose affiliation is still unknown, are already loading the arms into their starships. Sogan faces a terrible decision: Let the ships lift with the munitions, dooming the population of some innocent planet to the horrors of a full military assault from space, or strike them down in a manner that will damn him forever in his own and in his comrades' eyes.
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