I was looking at the amphibian, who answered for himself. “In most cases, I think, in air.”
“That’s good. I’m worried about shooting the gun underwater. It’s not made for that, and with the resistance of the water, it might blow up in your hand. Try not to do that. Now”-I crossed my fingers-“let’s see how good a shot you are.”
Unsurprisingly, he wasn’t good at all.
The Horch had nothing like a firing range, but Beert produced a wad of some kind of packing material out of the basket; I wadded up some of it and tossed it in the stream for a target. When the amphibian reared up on his front flippers he had just enough clearance to draw the guns and fire them, his tentacles nervously elevated out of the line of fire.
Beert was taking notes, skipping nimbly out of the way when the amphibian’s shots went wildest. Then, when the Wet One reached the point of being maybe able to hit the side of a barn if he were locked inside, I decided he was about as good as he was going to get. I told Beert, “The holster clasp is too tight; you’ll have to ease it up a little. He’ll need reloads, too. Have you got more ammunition?”
It took a moment to make Beert understand that the weapon did not produce its own endless supply of bullets, but then he gave me the head-twist. “We can copy as much as needed.”
“Copy a lot; there isn’t going to be a gun shop where he’s going. And you’ll have to make something for him to carry them in.” I thought for a moment, then, with some reluctance, told the Wet One, “I think you’d better keep the safety off; you might have trouble handling it if you need to shoot in a hurry. Just don’t touch that trigger until you want to fire. Now, let’s see how good you are at reloading.”
He wasn’t good at that, either, but he eventually got the idea, after a fashion. That was as far as we got, because Beert was fidgeting. “I must go back to my laboratory to make these changes in the equipment,” he told the Wet One. Who made no response, except to turn and head for the stream. Just as he was entering the water, he paused, turned ponderously around and spoke to me, in that horrible roaring voice:
“Your metal killing device may be valuable to me, also your instruction in its use. For this I owe you the debt of thanks. If I can repay it, I will.”
Then he slipped into the stream and was gone. A couple of those electric-shock appendages appeared briefly above the water, fluttering in the air almost as though he were saying good-by. Then nothing showed but those two knobby eye sockets and a pair of V-shaped ripples in the water, leaving Beert and me looking after him.
Beert made that hissing sort of sigh. “He is a brave person,” he informed me. I just nodded. I had formed that opinion of the Wet One myself-along with a fair amount of residual envy- and anyway, I had something else on my mind.
Beert wasn’t giving me much chance to bring it up. “As soon as I am finished in the laboratory,” he said happily, “I must go to my cousins to talk to the Greatmother of the Eight Plus Threes, so that we may schedule a time when Mrrranthoghrow may operate the transit machine for him. I will send Pirraghiz to you, Dan.”
I swallowed and took the plunge. “There’s one other thing,” I said.
“Yes?”
“I’ve been thinking about what you said. You were right. So let’s just forget about making that copy of Pat for me,” I told him.
Horch can’t smile, don’t have the facial muscles for it, but I could have sworn he was looking at me in an affectionate way. “It is forgotten, Dan. I am glad.” And he gave my arm a gentle pat before he turned and hurried away.
Listen, I’m only human. Get me depressed enough and you might see a person selfisher than you would have believed. But I didn’t have to stay selfish all the time.
PART SIX
Fighting Back
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
There was another lesson that old drill instructor of mine had taught us, in between the pushups and the ten-kilometer runs. What she said was, “Listen, ass-holes. It’s always better to do something than nothing, you hear me? If it don’t do nothing else, it’ll make you feel better.”
She was right. It did. My situation hadn’t improved a hair in any tangible way, but I felt different. I felt for the first time that I was playing some part, however insignificant, in an action that might cause the Beloved Leaders some aggravation, even if only a little. Morale-wise, that was a big plus. It almost made me feel as though this interminable lonely life that stretched ahead of me might be worth living after all.
So I decided to start looking for other ways to do the Others harm. I don’t know exactly what I was thinking of. Maybe leading a charge of Horch fighting machines into some Beloved Leader stronghold, the way they had taken over the prison-planet base. But whatever I was going to do to the Others, the first step was to get to where the action was.
Beert was the logical person to talk to on that subject, but he wasn’t available. When he wasn’t over in the Horch base to negotiate with the cousins, he was locked up in his workshop, making the changes in the Wet One’s armament. I decided to pester Pirraghiz about it. She was in her room, sterilizing my chamber pot for me, and Mrrranthoghrow was with her.
I hesitated in the doorway. Pirraghiz’s room was no bigger than mine, but she had somehow found time to put in homey touches of her own: some of those tiny flowers in a planter, clothing neatly hung, her own much larger bed. She had turned the room into a very personal habitation and, belatedly, it crossed my mind that they might have preferred being alone in it.
Apparently not. As soon as Pirraghiz saw me she waved me in with a spare arm. “Are you hungry?” she asked at once, but I shook my head. I wasn’t looking for food.
“I want to know about the Wet One,” I said. I
She looked surprised, but recited: “He is being sent back to his own planet, so that-“
“I know that. Tell me how he’s getting there.”
She looked at Mrrranthoghrow, who answered for her. “He will be transmitted on the captured transit machine of the Others, of course.”
“And how does he know how to get there?”
“Ah,” the Doc said, enlightened. “You want to know how the Wet One will find his way to his home. The Horch have been working on such problems ever since they occupied this base. Capturing a transit machine of the Others is very useful to them. Once we had it disassembled, the robots began tracing its channels.”
“That is the one great advantage the Horch have over the Others,” Pirraghiz added. “The Others are very strong, but the Horch have in some cases been able to enter the Others’ channels, while the Others have never been able to enter theirs.”
I mulled that over. I could see the strategic importance of that. “Does that mean there’s a channel direct to the Wet One’s planet?”
“Of course not, Dannerman,” Mrrranthoghrow said. “Not from this outpost. But there are channels to a nexus, which has many channels. One will take the Wet One to his destination.”
He was annoying me. “What is a ‘nexus’?”
“It is a sort of center where many channels come together,” he said patiently. “In this case it is a large installation which also was captured from the Others. Now it belongs to the Horch. There was great damage in the fighting, but much of its equipment is intact-just as is the case here.”
“What kind of installation?”
He gave me one of those massive shrugs. “I had no reason to ask such a question, Dannerman. I only know that it is much larger than this installation here.”
Pirraghiz had been silent, watching me, but then she spoke up. “Dannerman, I think you are jealous of the Wet One. Do you want to go with him?”
I started to shake my head, then decided to admit it. “I think I could help him fight against the Others. I’m a lot better with those guns than he is.”
She made a clucking sound with those thin lips. “You would be discovered at once, Dannerman, and then you would die.”
“It’s my risk to take!”
“And his as well. His only hope is secrecy, Dannerman, and even so, he has very little chance to survive there. In company with someone as conspicuous as you, he would have no chance at all.”