The Barsoom Project dp-2

by Larry Niven

  Chapter Twelve

  BREAKFAST EGGS

  Warm in the foil/foam sandwich of her sleeping bag, Gwen rolled onto her side and pressed herself back against Ollie. Her sigh of satisfaction, quite appropriately, sounded much like an old-fashioned kettle venting steam. Exhausted, surrounded by berserk Gamers and mad Actors, she and Ollie had managed to attain a little madness of their own. Sly, very sly he had been… wiggling up behind her “for warmth.” Heh-heh. Then came the stealthy linking of the bags, and much suppressed giggling and jouncing about while the Gamers around them slept. Or pretended to sleep. Frankly, my dears, she didn’t give a damn.

  The air was warm, the dome above them covered with fluffy Dream Park clouds. She snuck a peek at her watch: eight o’clock. Unfortunate. Not enough time to get in a quicky with Ollie. Fair enough. It was the long slowies she liked best, anyway.

  There was a crackling sound behind her. Gwen craned her head and saw Trianna standing just beyond the circle of heat-reflective cocoons, dressed in some kind of pink leotard, going through a slow, dancelike stretch routine. With surprising grace for so bulky a woman, Trianna torqued and twisted her body a joint at a time, working out the morning kinks. Behind her stretched a jagged, misty, whitecapped stand of iron-gray mountains, the object of the day’s exercise.

  A low crinkling sound from behind caught her attention. Francis Hebert, dark face soft with fascination, was watching Trianna. She was lovely, Gwen conceded. There was a woman of tremendous sensuality hiding in that lumpy body. Every twist and turn was a scream to be touched. Kevin and Hebert were both interested.

  What did Trianna want? Hebert had much the better body “Arrrgh!” The voice was right behind her. She rolled over and got up on her elbows, amused as Johnny Welsh fought toward consciousness. “Mother,” he moaned, “what has become of your little boy?”

  The crackle of his foam and foil sleeping envelope was enough to rouse Robin Bowles, who sat up suddenly, not yet completely awake. Bowles looked around with eyes that seemed still focused on the last dream. His gray beard was ragged, his hair mussed, and he wore a ridiculous pair of red and black flannel pajamas. For all of that, he carried himself with immense dignity.

  Bowles’s wandering eyes fell on Welsh, and the flickering smile which had raised feminine pulses for three decades curled his lips. “Well, Jonathan. Are you determined to subject us to another litany of woe?”

  Welsh smiled sheepishly. “Oh, don’t pay any attention to me… ”

  “You may rely upon it.”

  “I know I need this. I saw the tapes from my last concert. Those close-ups were the worst. I had more chins than the Taiwan telephone directory.”

  “Jeez.” Max Sands hoisted himself up on an elbow. “It’s too early for this shit.” All around the campsite, the Gamers were stirring to life.

  Gwen reached down into her sleeping bag, found the torn remnants of her body stocking (Ollie, you beast!), and slipped it on. Jumpsuit on top of that, and then she reached around until she found her costume, pulled it down inside the bag, and began to dress.

  She felt pretty good about the Fimbulwinter Game so far. The group had started pulling as a unit by the end of the first day, and judging by her mildly urgent hunger, the Dream Park magicians had been up to their standard tricks in the night. Usually she wanted crescent rolls, oatmeal with cream and sugar, eggs, sausage, and biscuits for breakfast. For some reason, all she wanted right now was fresh fruit.

  And… she wanted answers, and didn’t have them. The National Guardsman was a few feet away. He had slept in a makeshift bag formed out of two emergency thermal blankets. He was sitting cross-legged, glaring out at the world. His name was Yarnall, and the problem was that he had no Game personality at all. Like the pilot and copilot and stewardess, his part was over; he was to have been killed out.

  Trailing his sleeping bag like a snake half out of its skin, Yarnall wiggled over to the center of the campsite. Breakfast had magically appeared during the night.

  “Small mercies,” he muttered. He was in his late thirties, a light-skinned black man with a good-humored face that made it difficult to take his grumbling seriously. “I can’t believe this.”

  “Screw-up still gets to ya, huh?” Kevin Titus stood and stretched, the bones of his ribcage like barrel bands under his skin. He was startlingly thin and pale. “Just relax and enjoy it. What’cha makin’ now? Time and a haff?”

  “Double time.”

  “So what’s your beef?”

  “I’m tired. I thought I was going to sleep in a bed last night. I want a scotch and water. If I can’t have that, leave out the water. Worst of all, I ain’t got no script.”

  “Join the crowd,” Kevin said, yawning. “When they fix the screw-up, the first thing they’ll try to do is kill you out. The longer you can keep ‘em from doing that, the more money you make.”

  Yarnall thought about that for a minute. “By… by the Implementors! If they give me a direct order to throw myself in front of a spear I suppose I’ll have to do it…” He raised his voice until it was almost a shout. “Of course, since it wasn’t my fault, maybe the Gods will give me a fighting chance to stay in the Game.”

  He waited and stared up at the sky, and then shrugged. “Good thought, though.”

  The clouds above them shimmered and twisted themselves into a fleecy Cheshire cat grin. A thunderous reverberation rolled across the space of Gaming B:

  “Are you… a gambling man, Mr. Yarnall?”

  “Bet your ass. Who speaks?”

  “Subdeity Welles. Kindly restrain your language. There are cherubim listening. As you must know, I have a discretionary budget. I would be willing to bet you, say… triple time against zip that I can kill you out before the end of the day, without bending any rules. What do you say?”

  Yarnall realized that he suddenly had an audience. Gwen was fascinated-you could hear the gears churning in his head. “No cheating?”

  “Gods don’t need to cheat. We know what fools you mortals be.”

  “If I lose?”

  “You forfeit yesterday’s salary.”

  Yarnall looked around him. All of the Gamers were awake now, gazing up at that ethereal grin, waiting for the National Guardsman’s answer. He slapped his leg. “All right, Welles, you son of a bitch! You’re on!”

  The cloud-smile transmuted into a ten-foot hand and snaked down from the heavens. It hovered just above Yarnall, and then the Actor reached up and shook it. The Gamers broke into cheers as the hand dissolved, and Yarnall looked around sheepishly.

  Johnny Welsh was in stitches, tears rolling down his face. He slapped Yarnall on the back. “Let’s see ‘em top that in Vegas!”

  Ollie’s arms came around Gwen from behind, gave her a little squeeze good morning. “Let’s get going,” he whispered.

  “All right!” she called. “Forty-five minutes to Game time. Men’s showers in the gully, women’s in that stand of trees. Breakfast is on the table. Hurry up, people! We have a big day today.”

  Yarnall still stood silently, staring up at the dissipating clouds. Gwen was overwhelmed with admiration: Welles had taken a bad situation and turned it into a day at the circus.

  Belatedly, she wondered if she could have gotten the same deal.

  They had been on the march for an hour, and now Max Sands could make out more detail on the mountains ahead. He and his brother Orson walked abreast, and to Max’s satisfaction, Orson was humming softly.

  Kevin Titus had been looking at him oddly since breakfast, as if trying to place that face and body. Oh, well…

  He could understand that feeling. He had been staring at Robin Bowles, memories of countless B-movies flooding through his mind. He found it vastly amusing that before Bowles got his first major roles he had played low-budget quickies. If memory served him right, before the two Oscars had come a Golden Turkey award for his portrayal of Abdul Alhazred in the musical comedy version of The Fungi From Yuggoth.

  Yarnall carried his rifl
e/club at port arms, scanning in every direction for trouble. He expected something to drop from the sky, pop out of the ground, materialize from thin air… So far, nothing had happened. Too soon, Max thought. Welles would wait and wear him down.

  Up in the mountains were the nests of the Tin-mi-uk-puks, or Thunderbirds, fabulous creatures which Snow Goose said could take them closer to Sedna… if they had enough magic to command the creatures. Snow Goose wasn’t sure. If not, they might just as well paint themselves with mustard, lie down, and be lunch.

  Minus Eviane, there were nine Gamers and three Actors. It should have been ten and two by now, and even that felt a little sparse. How could they run so expensive a Game with so few players? Certainly not on the fees Max had been charged-though steep, they couldn’t pay for all of this. The Actors outnumbered the Gamers!

  Snow Goose had explained it to him just after breakfast. “Dream Park has most of the bugs out of the program now. They’re going to monitor our progress. If everything goes as planned, home marketing follows. They’ll sell a cassette, see? A tougher Game. Your average player would have to run it a dozen times before he gets all the way through. They figure that much interactive role playing in a Total Environment room can affect a major behavior shift. Sixty-three percent of Americans have TEs available to them. Could be a major sideline.”

  The slopes had begun to get steeper, and his legs ached a little. Max looked back down the mountain, and was surprised: they had climbed close to a thousand feet. The campsite was far below them. Looking down he could see the lake, and the floor of a gentle valley that swept away to a snow-crested horizon. It was difficult to believe that anything ugly could be hiding in this world. Around them the mountains stretched endlessly, and although the going was increasingly steep, he found that he enjoyed the effort. The breath came harshly in his throat. He was sweating. He liked the sharp heat of exertion. The air was very clean, bracing, cold enough to make him feel totally awake and alive.

  Beside him, brother Orson was having a harder time of it, sweating and gasping but gritting his teeth and gamely humming a tune. Max listened long enough to pick it up, and then started humming along.

  Trianna was right behind him. Her breathing, though labored, was as evenly paced as his. “What’s that song?”

  “Ah… I’m not sure. Ask Orson.”

  “Orson?” She called out.

  “Yes-, ma’am?”

  “What are you humming?”

  Orson grimaced. “The Ballad of Eskimo Nell.”

  “Can you sing it for me?”

  Orson started to blush. “It… I… well, the truth is that I don’t know the words. Do you, Max?”

  “Never learned ‘em,” he said, rolling his eyes soulfully. “I was deprived as a child.”

  “Oh,” she said, dejected.

  Orson breathed a sigh of relief when a squeaking voice cried out, “I know it! I know it!”

  “I might have known, Kevin. Now keep it to yourself, would you?”

  Trianna turned and grabbed Kevin’s arm. “Oh, come on. Singing always makes a hike more fun. Give us a verse.”

  “Maybe the little shit’s too winded to sing,” Orson hissed hopefully.

  No such luck. Kevin’s eyes glowed at Trianna’s contact. “Where are you? Let’s see. ‘ So Dead-Eye Dick and Mexican Pete… Dah de dah de dah… ”He inhaled deeply, trying to remember. “ And as they blazed their randy way no man their path withstood. And many a bride, her husband’s pride, knew pregnant widowhood.’ De dah de dah…”

  “That’s enough, Kevin,” Orson commanded.

  “No, I’m trying to get to the good stuff.”

  “Kevin, I will pitch you off this mountain.”

  Max looked down, and damned if it didn’t look like they were halfway up Everest. The campside lake was barely visible.

  Clouds veiled most of the valley, diffusing the morning sun into aweak yellow splotch.

  “ Now Dead-Eye Dick, he bangs ‘em quick-he cast the first aside,

  “ And made a dart at the second tart, when the swing doors opened wide.

  “ Then entered into that hall of sin, into that harlot’s hell,

  “ Walked a lusty maid who was unafraid, and her name was Eskimo Nell…”

  Orson’s ears were getting red. “Kevin. Kevin, me boyo. Don’t do this. I’ll make it worth your while.”

  “What’ja have in mind?”

  “My next dessert.”

  Max choked. “Is that all it takes? Hey-anybody ever heard ‘Kafoozalem’? ‘ Hi-ho Kafoozalem, harlot of Jerusalem. Prostitute of ill-repute and daughter of a Rabbi-”

  Orson’s scream echoed up and down the mountain.

  They heard the sound before they saw anything. The group was far above the clouds now, and the mountain trail was little more than ribbon-wide. Robin Bowles actually lost his footing once. He should have fallen but bounced back onto the ledge, propelled by he knew not what. A hidden net? Author control? They were in the midst of clouds, barely able to see more than a few feet. Nets would make sense.

  The first sound they heard was a tittering, scraping sound, followed by a dull crack.

  Snow Goose crept up to the front of the line, to where the trail dead-ended against a ridge of rocks. She stealthily climbed up, and peered over. Within moments she returned, shuddering. “I… I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  Orson’s embarrassment evaporated in a flare of curiosity. “Max? Let’s take a look.” He hefted his mutated spear as if he meant business. Maybe he did. He and Francis Hebert were the first to the top of the ridge: Hebert moved like an Indian scout. Max puffed as he climbed the last few feet, and then gaped at what he saw.

  In a saucer-shaped stone depression thirty feet across lay a nest, a nest for birds the size of rocs. The parents were gone, and there had been six eggs in the nest. Two of the eggs had been shattered, the chicks within dragged out and brutally hacked apart.

  Attackers were at work on a third egg. They might have been barrels covered with black hair… or obscenely fat, four-limbed spiders. Their fingernails were immense and crusted with filth, and grew out of the fingers like knives stuck on the ends of sausages. They chortled as a third Thunderbird chick, a wet, yellow-feathered infant the size of a plump turkey, struggled sluggishly for life. They tore it to pieces with their fingernails and consumed it raw. Each of the six monstrosities was larger than a man.

  Orson ducked back beneath the ridge of rock. His breathing was asthmatically harsh.

  “Do you know what that is?” Hebert’s little eyes were wide with excitement.

  “ Yes, I know what that is!” Orson said. “The book calls them mountain trolls. Flesh-eaters, man. We don’t want to mess with them. I don’t remember anything about how to survive an encounter.

  Hebert checked the action on his rifle, one of the few that hadn’t been converted. “Bull. We can’t let them kill the Thunderbird chicks. This is our chance to look good to the birds!”

  Johnny Welsh and Hippogryph had joined them. Without peering up over the edge of the basin, everyone seemed to know exactly what would have to be.

  “All right,” Hebert said. “Are we together on this?”

  Snow Goose gulped. Yarnall gave the sky a dirty look. “No cheating,” he muttered.

  “Then-let’s DO IT!”

  Hippogryph and Hebert began firing. Hebert’s Remington was unimpaired by magic, but Hippogryph had to pause to add powder and shot with every blast from the flintlock.

  The trolls screamed, their misshapen barrel bodies shuddering with the shock. A monster’s flat, hideous face dissolved to a smear of red light. It fell back twitching.

  But the others charged, howling their rage.

  With gibbonlike agility they scampered over the rocks, mouths dripping with Thunderchick blood and yolk, impossibly long arms sweeping out like scythes.

  Fear froze him for a moment. Then Max broke free, ducked under the sweeping black arms, and thrust upward with his harpoon. The creatu
re swatted the spear aside, and grabbed him by the arm. Not a hologram! Its other hand almost lovingly displayed the foot-long nails, traced them lightly across his neck, and then hissed and drew back-

  Yarnall! The Guardsman smashed into it with his war club.

  The troll squealed and released Max. Max hit the ground, heart triphammering.

  All around him were scuffles, and screaming, and the sound of rocks sliding beneath climbing, running feet.

  His hands searched until he found the harpoon. He grabbed it in the middle and turned as the troll advanced on Yarnall. Screaming, he raised the spear. It plunged deep into the furred back and-

  (For just a moment, he wondered if he had seen correctly. In other circumstances he would have sworn he saw the head of the spear retract, and the flesh around the “wound” actually close in to grasp the haft. Ah, well…)

  — the troll gasped in pain, blood flowing from its mouth. It turned and ran. Max wrenched his spear from its back as it plunged over the side of the cliff and disappeared into the clouds below.

  Max and Yarnall slapped hands, then whooped and searched for fresh meat.

  There, Trianna stood her ground, firing into an advancing hulk. Although its blood drizzled onto the rocky ground, still it plodded another step forward, and another.

  Johnny Welsh and Max got there at the same time. Max, Unable to contain his exuberance, performed “Mr. Mountain’s Avalanche.” He sprang into the air, knees flexing to chest, feet hammering out, slowing down at the last minute so that his partner wouldn’t be hurt-

  Oops.

  The monster slammed into the ground, and Max heard it say “Ow, goddamn!” as it tried to crawl away.

  Johnny Welsh was staring at him. “Well, I’ll be. Mr. Mountain! I watched you wrestle last month against Skinhead Slade!”

  Max groaned. “Not so loud. I’ll tell you about it later. Let’s finish this up.”

  “Pleasure!”

  Nearby, a troll was being clubbed and speared into a glowing mess. The knifelike projections of its nails scratched blindly at the rock. The other trolls were either dead or in retreat. The Adventurers screamed challenge at them, and whooped with bloodthirsty joy.