Seqiro had a suggestion: the horse could pull him along on a rope. They experimented with ropes, and it helped; Burgess could float on a slope if held in place by the rope. When the horse pulled, Burgess traveled along. He held on to the rope by sucking on a ball at its end; when he wished to let it go, he merely stopped sucking. They practiced and got better. It was easier than using a wagon, and faster, because they didn’t need to take time to grow the wagon to size. It wasn’t perfect, but would do. Now Burgess could travel with somewhat greater independence.
By the time Darius and Colene returned, they had it working fairly well. Colene was pleased when she learned; she kissed him on an eye stalk. She was supposed to be an unhappy creature, but he was learning joy from her.
In due course they returned to the Virtual Mode. Burgess moved along better than before, because of the path. Because it was one continuous piece, formed from the material of an anchor world, it extended across the Mode boundaries when pushed through the boundary. It was there, beyond, but disappeared, looking as if it had been abruptly cut off, because their vision was limited to whatever Mode they were in. When they came to a hill, Nona fastened the length of rope to Seqiro’s harness, and it too extended invisibly across the boundaries but remained firm. Then Burgess floated on up the slope, balancing on his air as the rope provided forward motion. Nona, following, picked up the path as he left it, and stepped ahead to put it down in front. She popped out of view as she went ahead, then reappeared as he caught up to the next joining.
The process became automatic, and they moved along well.
Then they came to a broad marshy plain. The feet of the humans and horse sank down in the muck, making progress difficult for them, while Burgess floated along without trouble. Now the situation was reversed; they were the ones who required assistance.
They considered, and decided to make a kind of sledge without runners, that would rest on the surface of the swamp. It would not be exactly a boat, but would serve similarly. They did this, growing a craft large enough to hold the four of them. But when they tried to move it, it wedged in the muck and advanced only so grudgingly that it was evident it would be useless for traveling.
“I wish we could float across, the way Burgess does,” Nona remarked.
“Say, maybe we can,” Colene said, her mind taking hold. “He floats on a thin cushion of air, never actually touching the gook below. If we could get air like that, we wouldn’t bog down either.”
“But he is constructed to pump air,” Darius said. “We are not.”
“But maybe if we had an air pump, we could do it. Force air down below the sledge, so it bubbles out around, making a cushion. Maybe it wouldn’t exactly float, but those bubbles would sure be less restrictive than this muck. Then maybe we could pole it along at a decent crawl.”
“But we don’t have anything to pump air,” Darius pointed out. “That’s not the kind of magic I do, and Nona doesn’t either. We don’t know enough of your science to make such a device.”
Then Colene fixed on Burgess. “Maybe we could use you, Burg. How much air could you pump, if you had to?”
There was no answer for that. Burgess moved all the air he needed to, to float.
“I mean, suppose we tied you down over a hole in the sledge, and you pumped air down through that, so it came out around the edges? It might take a lot of pressure. Would that wear you out, or suffocate you or something?”
Suffocate on air? He was learning enough of their concept of humor to know that was funny.
They tried it. They fashioned the sledge with a hole in the center, covered by netting, so that air could pass through while the muck was restrained. They made a kind of enclosure so that Burgess could rest within it, and the outflow of air around his canopy would be blocked. They put ropes over him so that when he pumped air he would not rise. It all seemed complicated and ineffective, but he was willing to try what they wanted, especially when Colene requested it.
He pumped air. There was some resistance, so he pumped harder. This forced the air down under the sledge and along its bottom. The air began to bubble out around the edges.
But it didn’t bubble evenly. It made a few channels, and burped out through them, leaving the sledge mired.
“Hm,” Colene said. “We need to make that air more viscous, so it forms a sheet supporting the sledge. Only problem is, how do we do that?”
No one knew. It looked as if they would simply have to slog slowly through the muck for the days or weeks it would take to reach solid land again, or else retreat and look for some other route through the Virtual Mode.
“This is no good,” Colene said. “We have to keep moving. For one thing, suppose that mind predator spies me again? I’m not using my bit of telepathy at all, on the Virtual Mode, so as to keep a low profile, but it might make a routine check and find me. I need to be able to get to an anchor in a hurry, if that happens. And the rest of you don’t want to be bogged down in muck forever, or going back over familiar ground.”
“Those may nevertheless be our choices,” Darius said.
“I don’t accept those choices!” she flared. “We need new choices!”
He shrugged, which was a kind of stretching and relaxation of his upper body in a manner not available to Burgess. “How do we get new choices?”
“Maybe we should brainstorm,” she said.
The others were not familiar with the concept, and she had to clarify it: all members of the hive thinking new thoughts at a rapid rate, without regard to reasonableness. It was hoped that from such a deluge would come something useful. Possibly something which at first seemed impossible.
They tried it. The three humans touched Burgess’ contact points, and the horse strengthened their ability to communicate, making the hive fully current. “Remember, anything at all can be suggested,” Colene said. “And we take it seriously. We consider it, and if then it doesn’t work out, we go on to the next. Like, I’ll suggest we all sprout wings and fly across. What do the rest of you say to that?”
“I don’t need wings to fly,” Nona said. “I can levitate myself or others, but I lack the strength to lift us all.”
“I don’t fly, I conjure,” Darius said. “But it’s not safe to conjure blind, or across Mode boundaries. Otherwise I could move us across this bog.”
Burgess didn’t fly, he floated; he could not rise more than a trace above the ground.
“You’re all being too negative,” Colene protested. “Don’t tell us what you can’t do, tell us what we maybe can do.”
But the rest of them lacked Colene’s ready intelligence and initiative. They could not have ideas the way she could.
“Burgess is right,” Nona said. “We need to have Colene’s mind, to do this well.”
Darius could multiply joy and other emotions. Could he multiply intelligence? If so, he could give them all Colene’s smartness for a while.
“Yes, what about that?” Nona asked. “Burgess has another interesting idea. Can you multiply Colene’s mind, Darius?”
“I doubt—”
“Nuh-uh, diaper worshiper!” Colene said. “Have you ever tried it?”
“Intelligence is not the same as mood or emotion.”
“How do you know?” Nona asked. “Perhaps Colene is smart because she feels smart, just as she is depressed because she feels depressed.”
Perhaps Colene was smart because she was depressed.
Nona laughed. “Then I don’t want to be smart!”
“I can multiply her emotion,” Darius said. “But that will bring her depression. If, however, that enables the rest of us to think more clearly—”
“Can you reverse it, after we get an idea?” Nona asked.