On its surface this story by H. Beam Piper seems like a simple science fiction action story set in the Paratime construct that Piper developed so well and with the main character used so thoroughly within it.
But this story tackles several ideas that are greater ideas.
This story tackles the ideas of ultimate capitalism versus ultimate socialism. It tackles the idea of hereditary control of wealth and power. It tackles the idea of the soul. It even touches on the idea of race in a passive-aggressive manner that gets your subconscious contemplating it.
It outlines a probably consequence of atomic proliferation and how resulting conflicts might change the way in which humans build their homes.
It even touches on some more abstract concepts such as the level of attrition that will occur if there is a singular guild of people who provide security, offense and defense to private individuals.
This story merely reinforces my lamentation that I had not heard of H. Beam Piper until recently and my desire to acquire everything he has written and consume it voraciously.
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