Have Space Suit - Will Travel

by Robert A. Heinlein

  "Uh, not without standing up."

  ("Don't do that! Try the headlamp again. Maybe your eyes are okay now." )

  I dragged my hand forward against the right side of the helmet. I must have hit the switch, for suddenly I saw a circle of light, blurred and cloudy in the middle. The edge of the walkway sliced it on the left.

  ("Good boy! No, don't get up; you're weak and dizzy and likely to fall. Start crawling. Count 'em. Three hundred ought to do it.")

  I started crawling, counting.

  "It's a long way, Oscar. You think we can make it?"

  ("Of course we can! You think I want to be left out here?")

  "I'd be with you."

  ("Knock off the chatter. You'll make me lose count. Thirty-six... thirty-seven... thirty-eight—")

  We crawled.

  ("That's a hundred. Now we double it. Hundred one... hundred two... hundred three—")

  "I'm feeling better, Oscar. I think it's getting warmer."

  ("WHAT!")

  "I said I m feeling a little warmer."

  ("You're not warmer, you blistering idiot! That's freeze-to-death you're feeling! Crawl faster! Work your chin valve. Get more air. Let me hear that chin valve click!")

  I was too tired to argue; I chinned the valve three or four times, felt a blast blistering my face.

  ("I'm stepping up the stroke. Warmer indeed! Hund'd nine... hund'd ten... hun'leven... hun'twelve —pick it up!")

  At two hundred I said I would just have to rest.

  ("No, you don't!")

  "But I've got to. Just a little while."

  ("Like that, uh? You know what happens. What's Peewee goin' to do? She's in there, waiting. She's already scared because you're late. What's she goin' to do? Answer me!")

  "Uh... she's going to try to wear Tim's suit."

  ("Right! In case of duplicate answers the prize goes to the one postmarked first. How far will she get? You tell me.)

  "Uh... to the mouth of the tunnel, I guess. Then the wind will get her."

  ("My opinion exactly. Then we'll have the whole family together. You, me, the Mother Thing, Peewee. Cozy. A family of stiffs.")

  "But—"

  ("So start slugging, brother. Slug... slug... slug... slug... tw'und'd five... two'und'd six... tw'und'd sev'n'— ) I don't remember falling off. I don't even know what that "snow" felt like. I just remember being glad that the dreadful counting was over and I could rest.

  But Oscar wouldn't let me. ("Kip! Kip! Get up! Climb back on the straight and narrow.")

  "Go 'way."

  ("I can't go away. I wish I could. Right in front of you. Grab the edge and scramble up. It's only a little farther now.)

  I managed to raise my head, saw the edge of the walkway in the light of my headlamp about two feet above my head. I sank back. "It's too high," I said listlessly. "Oscar, I think we've had it."

  He snorted. ("So? Who was it, just the other day, cussed out a little bitty girl who was too tired to get up? 'Commander Comet,' wasn't it? Did I get the name right? The 'Scourge of the Spaceways'... the no-good lazy sky tramp. 'Have Space Suit—Will Travel. Before you go to sleep, Commander, can I have your autograph? I've never met a real live space pirate before... one that goes around hijacking ships and kidnapping little girls.)

  "That's not fair!"

  ("Okay, okay, I know when I'm not wanted. But just one thing before I leave: she's got more guts in her little finger than you have in your whole body—you lying, fat, lazy swine! Good-bye. Don't wait up.")

  "Oscar! Don't leave me!"

  ("Eh? You want help?")

  "Yes!"

  ("Well, if it's too high to reach, grab your hammer and hook it over the edge. Pull yourself up.")

  I blinked. Maybe it would work. I reached down, decided I had the hammer even though I couldn't feel it, got it loose. Using both hands I hooked it over the edge above me. I pulled.

  That silly hammer broke just like the line. Tool steel—and it went to pieces as if it had been cast out of type slugs.

  That made me mad. I heaved myself to a sitting position, got both elbows on the edge, and struggled and groaned and burst into fiery sweat—and rolled over onto the road surface.

  ("That's my boy! Never mind counting, just crawl toward the light!")

  The tunnel wavered in front of me. I couldn't get my breath, so I kicked the chin valve.

  Nothing happened.

  "Oscar! The chin valve is stuck!" I tried again.

  Oscar was very slow in answering. ("No, pal, the valve isn't stuck. Your air hoses have frozen up. I guess that last batch wasn't as dry as it could have been.")

  "I haven't any air!"

  Again he was slow. But he answered firmly, ("Yes, you have. You've got a whole suit full. Plenty for the few feet left." )

  "I'll never make it."

  ("A few feet, only. There s the Mother Thing, right ahead of you. Keep moving.")

  I raised my head and, sure enough, there she was. I kept crawling, while she got bigger and bigger. Finally I said, "Oscar... this is as far as I go."

  ("I'm afraid it is. I've let you down . . . but thanks for not leaving me outside there.")

  "You didn't let me down... you were swell. I just didn't quite make it."

  ("I guess we both didn't quite make it... but we sure let 'em know that we tried! So long, partner.")

  "So long. ¡Hasta la vista, amigo!" I managed to crawl two short steps and collapsed with my head near the Mother Thing's head.

  She was smiling. ("Hello, Kip my son.")

  "I didn't... quite make it, Mother Thing. I'm sorry."

  ("Oh, but you did make it!")

  "Huh?"

  ("Between us, we've both made it.")

  I thought about that for a long time. "And Oscar."

  ("And Oscar, of course.")

  "And Peewee."

  ("And always Peewee. We've all made it. Now we can rest, dear.")

  "G'night... Mother Thing."

  It was a darn short rest. I was just closing my eyes, feeling warm and happy that the Mother Thing thought that I had done all right—when Peewee started shaking my shoulder. She touched helmets. "Kip! Kip! Get up. Please get up."

  "Huh? Why?"

  "Because I can't carry you! I tried, but I can't do it. You're just too big!"

  I considered it. Of course she couldn't carry me—where did she get the silly notion that she could? I was twice her size. I'd carry her... just as soon as I caught my breath.

  "Kip! Please get up." She was crying now, blubbering.

  "Why, sure, honey," I said gently, "if that's what you want." I tried and had a clumsy bad time of it. She almost picked me up, she helped a lot. Once up, she steadied me.

  "Turn around. Walk."

  She almost did carry me. She got her shoulders under my right arm and kept pushing. Every time we came to one of those blown-out panels she either helped me step over, or simply pushed me through and helped me up again.

  At last we were in the lock and she was bleeding air from inside to fill it. She had to let go of me and I sank down. She turned when the inner door opened, started to say something—then got my helmet off in a hurry.

  I took a deep breath and got very dizzy and the lights dimmed.

  She was looking at me. "You all right now?"

  "Me? Sure! Why shouldn't I be?"

  "Let me help you inside."

  I couldn't see why, but she did help and I needed it. She sat me on the floor near the door with my back to the wall—I didn't want to lie down. "Kip, I was so scared!"

  "Why?" I couldn't see what she was worried about Hadn't the Mother Thing said that we had all done all right?

  "Well, I was. I shouldn't have let you go out."

  "But the beacon had to be set."

  "Oh, but—You set it?"

  "Of course. The Mother Thing was pleased."

  "I'm sure she would have been," she said gravely.

  "She was."

  "Can I do anything? Can I help you ou
t of your suit?"

  "Uh... no, not yet. Could you find me a drink of water?"

  "Right away!"

  She came back and held it for me—I wasn't as thirsty as I had thought; it made me a bit ill. She watched me for some time, then said, "Do you mind if I'm gone a little while? Will you be all right?"

  "Me? Certainly." I didn't feel well, I was beginning to hurt, but there wasn't anything she could do.

  "I won't be long." She began clamping her helmet and I noticed with detached interest that she was wearing her own suit—somehow I had had the impression that she had been wearing Tim's.

  I saw her head for the lock and realized where she was going and why. I wanted to tell her that the Mother Thing would rather not be inside here, where she might . . . where she might—I didn't want to say "spoil" even to myself.

  But Peewee was gone.

  I don't think she was away more than five minutes. I had closed my eyes and I am not sure. I noticed the inner door open. Through it stepped Peewee, carrying the Mother Thing in her arms like a long piece of firewood. She didn't bend at all.

  Peewee put the Mother Thing on the floor in the same position I had last seen her, then unclamped her helmet and bawled.

  I couldn't get up. My legs hurt too much. And my arms. "Peewee... please, honey. It doesn't do any good."

  She raised her head. "I'm all through. I won't cry any more."

  And she didn't.

  We sat there a long time. Peewee again offered to help me out of my suit, but when we tried it, I hurt so terribly, especially my hands and my feet, that I had to ask her to stop. She looked worried. "Kip . . . I'm afraid you froze them."

  "Maybe. But there's nothing to do about it now." I winced and changed the subject. "Where did you find your suit?"

  "Oh!" She looked indignant, then almost gay. "You'd never guess. Inside Jock's suit."

  "No, I guess I wouldn't. 'The Purloined Letter.'"

  "The what?"

  "Nothing. I hadn't realized that old Wormface had a sense of humor."

  Shortly after that we had another quake, a bad one. Chandeliers would have jounced if the place had had any and the floor heaved. Peewee squealed. "Oh! That was almost as bad as the last one."

  "A lot worse, I'd say. That first little one wasn't anything."

  "No, I mean the one while you were outside."

  "Was there one then?"

  "Didn't you feel it?"

  "No." I tried to remember. "Maybe that was when I fell off in the snow."

  "You fell off? Kip!"

  "It was all right. Oscar helped me."

  There was another ground shock. I wouldn't have minded, only it shook me up and made me hurt worse. I finally came out of the fog enough to realize that I didn't have to hurt.

  Let's see, medicine pills were on the right and the codeine dispenser was farthest back—"Peewee? Could I trouble you for some water again?"

  "Of course!"

  "I'm going to take codeine. It may make me sleep. Do, you mind?"

  "You ought to sleep if you can. You need it."

  "I suppose so. What time is it?"

  She told me and I couldn't believe it. "You mean it's been more than twelve hours?"

  "Huh? Since what?"

  "Since this started."

  "I don't understand, Kip." She stared at her watch. "It has been exactly an hour and a half since I found you —not quite two hours since the Mother Thing set off the bombs."

  I couldn't believe that, either. But Peewee insisted that she was right.

  The codeine made me feel much better and I was beginning to be drowsy, when Peewee said, "Kip, do you smell anything?"

  I sniffed. "Something like kitchen matches?"

  "That's what I mean. I think the pressure is dropping, too. Kip... I think I had better close your helmet—f you re going to sleep."

  "All right. You close yours, too?"

  "Yes. Uh, I don't think this place is tight any longer."

  "You may be right." Between explosions and quakes, I didn't see how it could be. But, while I knew what that meant, I was too weary and sick—and getting too dreamy from the drug—to worry. Now, or a month from now—hat did it matter? The Mother Thing had said everything was okay.

  Peewee clamped us in, we checked radios, and she sat down facing me and the Mother Thing. She didn't say anything for a long time. Then I heard: "Peewee to Junebug—"

  "I read you, Peewee."

  "Kip? It's been fun, mostly. Hasn't it?"

  "Huh?" I glanced up, saw that the dial said I had about four hours of air left. I had had to reduce pressure twice since we closed up, to match falling pressure in the room. "Yes, Peewee, it's been swell. I wouldn't have missed it for the world."

  She sighed. "I just wanted to be sure you weren't blaming me. Now go to sleep."

  I did almost go to sleep, when I saw Peewee jump up and my phones came to life. "Kip! Something's coming in the door!

  I came wide awake, realized what it meant. Why couldn't they have let us be? A few hours, anyhow? "Peewee. Don't panic. Move to the far side of the door You've got your blue-light gadget?"

  "Yes."

  "Pick them off as they come in."

  "You've got to move, Kip. You're right where they will come!"

  "I can't get up." I hadn't been able to move, not even my arms, for quite a while. "Use low power, then if you brush me, it won't matter. Do what I say! Fast!"

  "Yes, Kip." She got where she could snipe at them sideways, raised her projector and waited.

  The inner door opened, a figure came in. I saw Peewee start to nail it—and I called into my radio: "Don't shoot!"

  But she was dropping the projector and running forward even as I shouted.

  They were "mother thing" people.

  It took six of them to carry me, only two to carry the Mother Thing. They sang to me soothingly all the time they were rigging a litter. I swallowed another codeine tablet before they lifted me, as even with their gentleness any movement hurt. It didn't take long to get me into their ship, for they had landed almost at the tunnel mouth, no doubt crushing the walkway—I hoped so.

  Once I was safely inside Peewee opened my helmet and unzipped the front of my suit. "Kip! Aren't they wonderful?"

  "Yes." I was getting dizzier from the drug but was feeling better. "When do we raise ship?"

  "We've already started."

  "They're taking us home?" I'd have to tell Mr. Charton what a big help the codeine was.

  "Huh? Oh, my, no! We're headed for Vega."

  I fainted.

  CHAPTER 9

  I had been dreaming that I was home; this awoke me with a jerk. "Mother Thing!

  ("Good morning, my son. I am happy to see that you are feeling better.")

  "Oh, I feel fine. I've had a good night's rest—" I stared, then blurted: "—you're dead!" I couldn't stop it.

  Her answer sounded warmly, gently humorous, the way you correct a child who has made a natural mistake. ("No, dear, I was merely frozen. I am not as frail as you seem to think me.")

  I blinked and looked again. "Then it wasn't a dream?"

  ("No, it was not a dream.")

  "I thought I was home and—" I tried to sit up, managed only to raise my head. "I am home!" My room! Clothes closet on the left—hall door behind the Mother Thing—my desk on the right, piled with books and with a Centerville High pennant over it—window beyond it, with the old elm almost filling it—sun-speckled leaves stirring in a breeze.

  My slipstick was where I had left it.

  Things started to wobble, then I figured it out. I had dreamed only the silly part at the end. Vega—I had been groggy with codeine. "You brought me home."

  ("We brought you home . . . to your other home. My home.")

  The bed started to sway. I clutched at it but my arms didn't move. The Mother Thing was still singing. ("You needed your own nest. So we prepared it.")

  "Mother Thing, I'm confused."

  ("We know that a bird grows
well faster in its own nest. So we built yours.") "Bird" and "nest" weren't what she sang, but an Unabridged won't give anything closer.

  I took a deep breath to steady down. I understood her—that's what she was best at, making you understand. This wasn't my room and I wasn't home; it simply looked like it. But I was still terribly confused.

  I looked around and wondered how I could have been mistaken.

  The light slanted in the window from a wrong direction. The ceiling didn't have the patch in it from the time I built a hide-out in the attic and knocked plaster down by hammering. It wasn't the right shade, either.

  The books were too neat and clean; they had that candy-box look. I couldn't recognize the bindings. The over-all effect was mighty close, but details were not right.

  ("I like this room,") the Mother Thing was singing. ("It looks like you, Kip.")

  "Mother Thing," I said weakly, "how did you do it?"

  ("We asked you. And Peewee helped.")

  I thought, "But Peewee has never seen my room either," then decided that Peewee had seen enough American homes to be a consulting expert. "Peewee is here?

  ("She'll be in shortly.")

  With Peewee and the Mother Thing around things couldn't be too bad. Except—"Mother Thing, I can't move my arms and legs."

  She put a tiny, warm hand on my forehead and leaned over me until her enormous, lemur-like eyes blanked out everything else. ("You have been damaged. Now you are growing well. Do not worry.")

  When the Mother Thing tells you not to worry, you don't. I didn't want to do handstands anyhow; I was satisfied to look into her eyes. You could sink into them, you could have dived in and swum around. "All right Mother Thing." I remembered something else. "Say... you were frozen? Weren't you?"

  ("Yes.")

  "But—Look, when water freezes it ruptures living cells. Or so they say."

  She answered primly, ("My body would never permit that!")

  "Well—" I thought about it. "Just don't dunk me in liquid air! I'm not built for it."

  Again her song held roguish, indulgent humour. ("We shall endeavour not to hurt you.") She straightened up and grew a little, swaying like a willow. ("I sense Peewee.")

  There was a knock—another discrepancy; it didn't sound like a knock on a light-weight interior door—and Peewee called out, "May I come in?" She didn't wait (I wondered if she ever did) but came on in. The bit I could see past her looked like our upper hall; they'd done a thorough job.