by Rudy Rucker
Abruptly Tagine irised open a hole beneath the lifter beetle. It was all that PhiPhi and Zhak could do to clamber into the beetle’s cargo basket before they all dropped clear of the glowing orange donut.
“Yee haw!” whooped Gibby from the front seat beside Frek. He was fully in control of himself again, reckless and devil-may-care. “I’m lovin’ it, Frek!” They were falling like a stone, the wind whistling past. The Grulloo rose up on his arm-legs and peered into the back. “You two losers grokkin’ this? Ready to splat?”
“Beetle fly!” shouted PhiPhi and, hearing her voice, the kritter flipped up its teal wing-covers and let its wings cut the air. “Fly Stun City,” added PhiPhi.
“I want to find Renata,” said Frek. “I bet she’s with Yessica. Do you know where Yessica is, PhiPhi?”
“No,” said PhiPhi. “My work mostly in Middleville. We land Stun City ask around, maybe we can find her.”
Frek had to wonder if, even with Gov’s uvvy gone and the Orpolese controlling her, PhiPhi was totally on his side. Meanwhile, their flight leveled out. The sun was still near the horizon, flooding the world with kind morning light. Below them was the winding green River Jaya, with the occasional elephruk lumbering along the sandy road beside it. Across the river were the bluffs and the dense Grulloo Woods, gently tossing in the breeze. A second road ran along the top of the bluffs, traversed by a few Grulloos with their own little elephruks.
“Do you want to go home?” Frek asked Gibby. “We could fly you there fast.”
“Negatory, good bud,” said Gibby. “I ain’t gonna miss no revolution. With them Orpolese runnin’ half the town, we’ll romp all over Stun City. We’ll tear up that puffball and get them new genes a-growin’.”
“Yes,” said Frek. “But I wonder what happens after that?”
“You worry too much, kid,” said Gibby, staring over at the Grulloo road atop the bluffs. “It’s a beautiful day. I feel some verses comin’ on.” Gibby tapped out a rhythm on the lifter beetle’s side and sang.
Today I ride a beetle, as buggy as can be.
He wiggles his antennae, and thinks these words to me.
“I just been to Nubbie town, I’m flyin’ toward the puffball,
I hate to beat my wings so long without a decent gut-full.”
“Let’s stop and score some grub,” I cry,
“I’m empty too, and awful dry.”
I turn around and poke the counselor.
“See that elephruk? Let’s pounce on her!”
And with that, Gibby did turn around to prod PhiPhi’s knee and, just as he’d hoped, she sent the beetle sloping across the river to alight beside an elephruk traversing the Grulloo road at the top of the bluffs.
And it wasn’t just any elephruk, it was Gibby’s old Dibble, recognizable by the sour expression on her face. Riding on Dibble’s head was a red-jacketed Grulloo peaceably smoking a pipe. Yes, it was none other than Gibby’s neighbor Jeroon, bringing home a basket of stim cell nuggets from Stun City.
“Kac howdy, Jeroon!” exulted Gibby, rocking across the road on his gnarled pair of arm-legs, keeping his balance by beating his scaly tail. “Don’t worry about them counselors in our lifter beetle. We got ’em under control.”
“The prodigal husband,” said Jeroon, puffing out a cloud of smoke. “You missed my wedding. You and this gang been on a spree? I see you’ve still got that Nubbie boy with you. Hi, Frek!”
Frek called out a greeting. Evidently Jeroon wasn’t being run by an esper, as he didn’t have a halo. Probably the Orpolese gamers were focusing on the people in the cities.
“Paw!” called a piercing voice from the elephruk’s bed. It was red-haired little Bili, showing his sharp yellow teeth in an open-mouthed smile.
Gibby’s joy knew no bounds. “Bili! You lookin’ so good!” In an instant, Gibby had scuttled over and wrapped his limbs around his little son, pressing the tiger-tailed boy against his face. “I never thought I’d made it back to these woods,” said Gibby. “Salla’s okay? And LuHu?”
“They’re fine, Paw,” said Bili, squirming at the tight embrace. “We were wondering about you.” Like Gibby and Jeroon, Bili didn’t have a halo.
“I was wondering, too,” said Gibby. “But now I’m almost home.” He turned his face up to the sky. “Thank you, Gaia, for bringing me this close.” Tears were running down his hard, flat cheeks.
“Salla enlisted me to fetch you and Dibble,” said Jeroon. “I couldn’t stop your lad from tagging along, although I’d expected to find you besotted in the Brindle Cowloon.”
Without missing a beat, Gibby switched from thanking Gaia to yelling at Jeroon.
“Nosin’ into my business and my family life, are you?” he hollered, quickly drying his face. “You shoulda got three times as many nuggets as that. You been suckered by Phamelu. Why ain’t you home with your new wife instead of takin’ over my affairs? You got your eyes on Salla or somethin’?”
“Oh, of course,” said Jeroon sarcastically. “I’ve completely abandoned my bride, Ennie. My highest goal in life is to wear the great Gibby’s mantle. If only I, too, could be a stupid, ill-tempered, unreliable, ungrateful moolk-guzzler. Surely that must be any Grulloo’s fondest dream.”
Gibby glared at Jeroon for a moment without saying anything, and then he recovered his equilibrium. “Don’t mind me,” he said. “I’m just hungry. I been to the center of the galaxy, the edge of the universe and back, Jeroon. I gotta eat some of them stim cell nuggets.”
“Help yourself,” said Jeroon calmly. “That’s a long voyage you’re talking about. If it’s true. Say, Frek, did you find any use for the chameleon mod and the Aaron’s Rod I gave you?”
“They saved me three times,” said Frek. Meanwhile Gibby stuffed a handful of stim cell nuggets in his mouth, passing a few to Bili as well. The lifter beetle was avidly grazing upon the roadside shrubs.
“Eat fast, Gibby,” urged Frek. “I want to get to Stun City and look for Renata.” Something occurred to him then. “Hey, Jeroon, when you were in Stun City, did you notice a really annoying woman named Yessica Sunshine?”
“Most all Nubbies are annoying,” said Jeroon. “What’s this Yessica like?”
“Well—she has long blond hair she wears all tangled. She has small eyes, she frowns a lot, and—oh, yeah—she has three pairs of breasts running down her chest.”
“That woman,” said Jeroon. “Yes, I saw her. She was sitting behind the counter with Phamelu at the Brindle Cowloon, the two of them gossiping and hatching plans like a pair of sisters.”
“Let’s go there,” said Frek to PhiPhi. “I just know Yessica’s got Renata. Get back in the lifter beetle if you’re coming along, Gibby.” Though Frek hated to pull Gibby away from his family, he kind of hoped the Grulloo would come along for the denouement.
“Don’t leave again, Paw,” said Bili.
“Hold on,” called Gibby to Frek. “Don’t be in such a dang rush. And don’t even think of goin’ without me. If you’re gonna use that elixir, you need to bring it inside the Kritterworks. And I’m the fella knows his way in there.”
“Okay,” said Frek tensely.
“I got a powerful hankerin’ to smoke a pipe,” continued Gibby. “How about it, Jeroon? I know you always carry a spare. I lost mine somewheres along the line.”
Jeroon handed Gibby a couple of matchbuds and his spare pipe, already full of tobacco. Gibby seated himself in the road, lit the pipe, and tucked the remaining matchbud into his coat pocket. “That’s more like it,” he said, exhaling a plume of smoke and snuggling Bili against his side.
“Gibby,” implored Frek. “I’m worried about Renata.”
“Me, I’m worried about my son,” said Gibby. “So shut your crack. Looky here, Bili. I brang some stuff home from my trip for you.”
“Yeah, Paw?” said Bili, grinning up at his father.
Comfortably puffing his borrowed pipe, Gibby rooted through his coat pockets, producing five small items. “Souvenirs for you
and LuHu. See this here statue of a guy with a shell for his head? That’s a Unipusker. And this blue pebble, that’s what the ground looks like on Unipusk. This other little rock, the foamy-looking one, that’s a star-cinder I found drifting through space at the galaxy’s core. And this here’s a key what some bad guys used to lock up our friends Bumby and Ulla. And last of all, this shiny disk, that’s a scale from a flying fish name of Aunt Guszti; me and Frek rode on her back. Now you share these with LuHu, son, and wait for me, and I’ll be home tomorrow or the next day to tell all about how I got ’em.”
“Look what my paw gave me,” called Bili to Jeroon, holding up the delicately crafted statuette of the Unipusker.
“Lovely,” said Jeroon.
Gibby gave Bili one more kiss, returned the half-smoked pipe to Jeroon, hand-walked over to the foraging lifter beetle, and hopped back in. “You hurry up and tell Maw I’m almost home,” Gibby called to Bili. “I just gotta look after Frek a little bit longer.” And then the four of them were back in the air again, following the River Jaya to Stun City.
Soon Stun City came into view, its curiously formed buildings rising from lush lanes of house trees and aircoral, everything tinged yellow by the slanting morning sun.
The bulbous torus of the NuBioCom puffball was wholly regenerated; presumably Gov’s new clone was lodged inside like a worm in an apple. Frek studied the round windows, wondering if his enemy knew what was coming.
Closer than the puffball was the cored-out Kritterworks cube on the banks of the River Jaya, two solid walls showing animated billboards. Rather than airing ads for new model kritters, the billboards were displaying pictures of Orpolese donuts flying among a sea of suns. The aliens had lost no time in settling in. The giant firefly hologram at the apex of the Toonsmith cone was showing a twisty green and red Orpolese donut as well.
As always, Frek’s heart rose at the sight of the helical Toonsmithy. Perhaps, once all the dust had settled, things would go back to normal, and Frek could still get a job as a toonsmith. Surely if he could design a game based on this week’s adventures, it would be a hit.
The streets of Stun City were thronged with people, with a general motion toward the city center. PhiPhi guided the lifter beetle to the Brindle Cowloon in its pasture at the near edge of town.
The once-lush pasture beside the inn was blasted and black. Frek recalled how the sky-jelly’s pale red death ray had twitched across the landscape last Saturday.
The floating cowloon bag was still bobbing in back, the bar was manned as usual by the weasel-faced Pede, but no customers were in sight. PhiPhi sloped down past the wildly ornamental shapes upon the inn’s roof and landed by the front door.
Phamelu was sitting behind the Brindle Cowloon counter, watching Da Nha Duc toons on the wall skin. She glanced over at Frek and the others, putting on her disarmingly pleasant smile. A little blue Orpolese halo bobbed above her honey-colored hair.
“Hi, Frek,” she said, a friendly expression crinkling the corners of her eyes. “Or should I still call you Huckle? I see you’ve brought your friends along. Gibby, PhiPhi-Hexatope, and Zhak-Gaga.” Even though Phamelu had the halo, Frek hesitated before answering. An Orpolese alien might not know where to begin when it came to changing this woman’s duplicitous behavior.
“Hi, Phamelu-Wilco,” put in PhiPhi, tacking on what must have been the name of the Orpolese player who was currently gaming the Phamelu body.
“Is Yessica here?” Frek asked Phamelu.
“She left for the puffball,” answered the innkeeper. “She wanted to take your elixir to Gov. For some reason she didn’t get an Orpolese master.”
“Oh no,” said Frek, suddenly remembering what he’d said to Vlan. Leave Gibby and Renata and our families out of it. Buddha, was he dumb.
“I would have tried to stop her,” continued Phamelu, as usual saying what her listener wanted to hear. Her eyes flicked back to the toons. “But with half the town in play, things are getting crazy. I was able to talk my master into letting us stay here and watch over my place. There’s nobody here but me and Pede. Go have a drink of moolk, Gibby, it’s on the house.”
“No thanks,” said Gibby. “Not just now.”
“What about Renata?” pressed Frek.
“Who’s that?” said Phamelu with an innocent smile, but then her face twitched and changed expression. “She’s upstairs,” said Phamelu, unwillingly voicing the words of her Orpolese controller, Wilco. “Unconscious. The real reason I let Phamelu wait here is so I could watch what happens when Frek shows up and finds Renata. This should be tasty. A scene of high emotion.” And then Phamelu’s usual persona took over again. “Wilco’s just kidding. You better head for the puffball.”
“Come on!” Frek called to his three companions, and the four of them went pounding up the stairs with Phamelu close behind. And there, in the very same room where he and Gibby had slept, Frek found Renata, lying motionless on the bed with her face turned toward the wall. It broke Frek’s heart to see his friend brought so low.
“She has an ooey,” came Phamelu-Wilco’s voice. She’d followed them up and was watching avidly from the door. “Yessica installed it when she visited Renata in Middleville the other day. Gov wants to make a deal with you.”
“No deal,” said PhiPhi-Hexatope before Frek could respond. “I can fix her fast.” She produced a tiny silvery whistle and leaned over Renata. The whistle sounded a pure, sweet note.
The skin at the back of Renata’s head rippled. PhiPhi pushed aside Renata’s heavy pigtails and whistled again. A single blood-red ooey tendril broke through the milky white nape of the girlish neck. PhiPhi kept on calling the ooey. More and more tendrils appeared, and soon the whole mass had oozed out through Renata’s skin.
“Gundo geevey,” muttered Gibby.
“Sack it, Zhak,” said PhiPhi.
With a quick motion, Zhak scooped the ooey into his membranous little ooey sack and sealed the top.
“No, Mom,” muttered Renata, twitching her arms. “Don’t.”
“Renata,” said Frek, leaning over her. Though her eyes were open, it took a long, scary minute until she could see him. “Renata,” repeated Frek, kissing her on the cheek. “It’s okay now.”
“Oh, Frek,” said Renata, flinging her arms around him. “Mom made me steal your elixir! Everything’s going wrong.” And then she pushed him away and sat up. “Can we still save it? She’s taking it to Gov.”
“It not too late,” said PhiPhi. “Lots of Orpolese-run people in the street. Orpolese passing the word all over Earth. All the Govs getting torn down.”
“Let’s go,” said Frek.
“Me too,” said Phamelu-Wilco. “I’ll get my lifter beetle.”
“Me and Zhak can ride with her,” said Gibby to Frek. “So you can be with Renata.”
The two beetles buzzed across town toward the puffball. As they flew, Frek thought about the fact that Phamelu spoke of the Orpolese as ‘masters,’ rather than as ‘players.’ Like or not, that was closer to the truth. Where was it all going to end? One thing at a time, Frek told himself. Get the elixir, restore the biome, and then worry about the humanity channel.
And now, yes, below them in the cobblestone-paved puffball square was Yessica, struggling with a young pair of Orpolese-controlled locals.
The man and woman holding Yessica were gently bouncing on sacks of skin that grew from the soles of their bare feet. Their knees bent backward, like bird legs. It was the same couple who’d talked to Frek when he’d been looking for the puffball the week before. Try as Yessica might, she couldn’t get free of them to run the last twenty meters to Gov’s puffball.
Frek would have expected a squadron of counselors to come rushing out to help Yessica. But the counselors and scientists all had Orpolese halos by now. The few who remained inside the puffball were leaning out the windows. They cheered and laughed when Frek and his companions landed, many of them calling Frek’s name.
Gov wasn’t powerless yet. As if to punis
h the employees for defecting, the floors inside the puffball rooms bucked up, pitching the watchers out of the windows. Most of them managed to slide safely down the puffball’s curved wall, but a few crashed heavily to the ground and lay twitching. At the same time, a few dozen tendrils sprouted from the puffball’s cornice. Something bad was going to happen.
Frek sprinted over to Yessica.
“Goggy greetings,” said the woman holding Yessica. Her tongue was green between her lips. “Remember us—Glen and Gillian? We grabbed the grabber for you.”
“She’s got your gaussy gene juice,” said the man, nodding his head toward Yessica. “The godzoon grow-stuff!” His and Gillian’s halos were a light and a dark green.
Frek didn’t even try to talk to Yessica. Her hair was webbed across her face and her mouth was pursed in fury. Dodging her kicking legs, Frek reached into the purse that hung from her shoulder and pulled out, yes, the elixir egg.
“No, Frek,” said Yessica. “You’ll ruin everything Gov’s worked for.” She looked past Frek to Renata. “Don’t let them treat your mother this way, dear. I was only trying to get the best for us.”
“Look out,” bellowed Gibby. A stinking ball of flame bloomed beside them. Gov’s tendrils were throwing firebombs: fatty, phosphorous-laden jelly bags of combustible gas.
“Gleepy!” said Glen, baring his green gums in a grimace. A bit of flaming jelly had landed on one of his backward-folding legs. He released Yessica and slapped at his leg, high-stepping away from the puffball. Yessica twisted free of Gillian and sprinted toward the puffball door. Gillian let her go, and bounded after Glen.
“Come back, Mom!” shouted Renata.
“Let her go,” said Frek. “She’ll be okay. She always is. You have to look out for yourself now.”