Norton sighed with relief, threw away the bouquet of brambles, took Kiru’s hand, and led her to one of the tables. They sat down, and he poured two overflowing glasses of wine.
“That was Grawl,” said Kiru, swallowing half her wine in a single gulp.
“I know,” said Norton, swallowing three-quarters of his. “We came here in the same escape pod.”
“You were with him all that time?” said Kiru. “Why didn’t you kill him? You knew what he tried to do to me.”
“He saved my life,” said Norton, and he downed the other quarter.
“What kind of pathetic excuse is that? Why didn’t you tell me he was on Caphmiaultrelvossmuaf?”
“I thought he was dead. I didn’t want to upset you.”
“Upset me? Upset me!” Kiru finished her wine.
“He’s gone now,” said Norton, refilling both glasses. “He must have liked you.”
“Liked me! What? He wanted to kill me!”
“No. Not exactly. He didn’t want you dead.”
“He wanted my soul to be dead. He wanted to replace it with the… the essence, the being, of someone else.”
“Yeah,” said Norton. “Someone important to him. And he chose you, chose you to hold the most important person in his life.”
“I should be grateful?”
“I wonder who it was? Someone who loved him.”
“Who could love him?” said Kiru.
“Janesmith,” said Norton. He gazed up, imagining the Algolan warfleet encircling the planet. “How do they know each other?”
“It’s a small galaxy.”
“You’re not curious about whose spirit was in Grawl’s silver pendant?”
“No! I don’t want to think about it.”
“Who would love him?” said Norton. “His mother?”
“Grawl never had a mother,” said Kiru.
There was movement at the next table, the table where Kiru and Norton had originally sat, and where the Galactic Tax Authority representatives were still seated. At exactly the same instant, they all stood up.
“Considering your recent behaviour,” one of them said to Diana, “we may have to renegotiate the terms of our partnership.”
It seemed Diana hadn’t thawed out since being ordered not to move. She was standing in the same place, as if stunned by everything that had happened. All she could do was watch as the seven palefaces started to leave, following each other in a neat line.
But then she opened her violin case and pulled out a gun. As the aliens filed away, Diana took aim.
Watching in disbelief, Norton realised she wasn’t going to give them a warning or tell them to stop. One by one, she was about to shoot them in the back.
Norton leapt to his feet, dashed forward, yelling out an instinctive warcry.
“Geronimo-o-o-o-o!”
Diana’s head turned, then her gun followed.
But she was too late; Norton was on her, deflecting the barrel, grappling with her. She was strong, very strong. He couldn’t hit a woman. Except she wasn’t a woman. Not all the time. He was Colonel Travis. And Norton socked him on the jaw, knocking him to the ground.
Kiru picked up the gun, jerked out the ammo charge, threw the weapon back down.
“Tough stuff, Wayne,” she said, admiringly.
“That’s me,” said Norton. He opened his right fist, wiggling the thumb and three fingers. “I’m just a Stone Age man.”
He watched the delegation from Hideaway. They hadn’t glanced back, hadn’t missed a single step. They disappeared out of the plaza.
“What was that you shouted?” asked Kiru.
“Geronimo,” said Norton. “Not to be confused with Gino and Rico and Pedro.” He looked down at Diana, at Travis. “Does this mean we can’t use the honeymoon suite?”
Diana/Travis rubbed her/his jaw.
“What are you all staring at?” she/he said. “Get everything neat and tidy and put away.”
Norton glanced around, seeing the Caphafer restaurant workers behind him.
“Clean this mess up,” ordered Diana/Travis.
“No,” said one of them.
“No,” said another, then another, then all of them.
“No, no, no, no, no,” they chorused.
Norton felt a drop of water on his head. When he peered up, another drop hit his face. It was beginning to rain. Red rain was again starting to fall on the island.
The Caphafers’ tore off their blue bikinis, throwing them down at Diana/Travis.
Remembering Kiru’s earlier words, Norton glanced away, not wanting to discover what the natives had under the lower halves of their bikinis.
As the amphibious aliens turned and headed for the sea, Kiru watched them and she smiled.
“Are they going on strike?” asked Norton.
“Permanently,” said Kiru. “They’re the Caphmiaultrelvossmuafan Liberation Army. Or maybe Navy. It’s their world. They want it back. Come on.” She reached out and took his hand, leading him away from the square.
“How do you know all this?” asked Norton.
“I’ve made friends with them while I’ve been swimming.”
“Where are we going?”
Norton was becoming suspicious. He slowed down. The route they were taking led only to the ocean.
“Where else can we go?” said Kiru.
By the time they reached the shoreline, it was raining heavily on land as well as sea. Kiru swiftly peeled off her white bikini.
“What are you doing?” Norton asked.
“You can see what I’m doing. This thing isn’t designed for the water, and neither is your suit. Take it off.”
“I’m not going in the water!”
“Wayne, listen to me: Where else are you going to go?”
“Ah…” Norton looked back toward the island, guessing that it might not be such a good idea to return. “… yeah.”
As he gazed at the red ocean, the waves, imagining the unknown depths beneath, Kiru undid his tie, slipped off his jacket, removed his vest, unbuttoned his shirt.
“I can’t go in the sea,” he said. “I can’t swim.”
“You can float, you know that,” Kiru told him. She unfastened his shoes. “There are other islands out there, caverns that can only be reached from under the water, places where we’ll be safe. We’ll be okay. We’ve got friends.” She took off his pants. “I’ve got friends. It’s lucky Diana didn’t thank you in her speech for helping them choose this planet, not that the Caphafers would have known who you were. We all look the same to them.”
Norton stared at the red alien ocean, noticing all the red aliens waiting out there. Waiting for them.
Friends? He hoped so.
Kiru held up her left hand, showing Norton her wedding ring.
“That’s all I need,” she said, taking his right hand in her left.
“You’re all I need,” said Norton, and they kissed.
Countless aeons ago, on a far-away planet, their distant ancestors had crawled out of the primeval sea in their quest for a new life.
Now it was time to return.
As naked as when they were born, Kiru and Wayne Norton waded out into the alien ocean, away from the land and toward the unknown horizon.