Poor little Peewee! Too bad she hadn't drawn and quartered him! But the story sounded true, for it was the way Peewee would behave-sure of herself, afraid of no one, unable to resist any "educational" experience.
Jock went on, "It wasn't the brat he wanted. He wanted her old man. Had some swindle to get him to the Moon, didn't work." Jock grinned sourly. "That was a bad time, things ain't good when he don't have his own way. But he had to settle for the brat. Tim here pointed out to him he could trade."
Tim chucked in one word which I took as a general denial. Jock raised his eyebrows. "Listen to vinegar puss. Nice manners, ain't he?"
Maybe I should have kept quiet since I was digging for facts, not philosophy. But I've got Peewee's failing myself; when I don't understand, I have an unbearable itch to know why. I didn't (and don't) understand what made Jock tick. "Jock? Why did you do it?"
"Huh?"
"Look, you're a human being." (At least he looked like one.) "As you pointed out, we humans had better stick together. How could you bring yourself to kidnap a little girl-and turn her over to him?"
"Are you crazy, boy?"
"I don't think so."
"You talk crazy. Have you ever tried not doing something he wanted? Try it some time."
I saw his point. Refusing Wormface would be like a rabbit spitting in a snake's eye-as I knew too well. Jock went on, "You got to understand the other man's viewpoint. Live and let live, I always say. We got grabbed while we were messin' around, lookin' for carnotite-and after that, we never stood no chance. You can't fight City Hall, that gets you nowhere. So we made a dicker-we run his errands, he pays us in uranium."
My faint sympathy vanished. I wanted to throw up. "And you got paid?"
"Well... you might say we got time on the books."
I looked around our cell. "You made a bad deal."
Jock grimaced, looking like a sulky baby. "Maybe so. But be reasonable, kid. You got to cooperate with the inevitable. These boys are moving in-they got what it takes. You seen that yourself. Well, a man's got to look out for number one, don't he? It's a cinch nobody else will. Now I seen a case like this when I was no older than you and it taught me a lesson. Our town had run quietly for years, but the Big Fellow was getting old and losing his grip... whereupon some boys from St. Louis moved in. Things were confused for a while. A man had to know which way to jump-else he woke up wearing a wooden overcoat, like as not. Those that seen the handwriting made out; those that didn't... well, it don't do no good to buck the current, I always say. That makes sense, don't it?"
I could follow his "logic"-provided you accepted his "live louse" standard. But he had left out a key point. "Even so. Jock, I don't see how you could do that to a little girl."
"Huh? I just explained how we couldn't help it."
"But you could. Even allowing how hard it is to face up to him and refuse orders, you had a perfect chance to duck out."
"Wha' d'you mean?"
"He sent you to Luna City to find her, you said so. You've got a return-fare benefit-I know you have, I know the rules. All you had to do was sit tight, where he couldn't reach you-and take the next ship back to Earth. You didn't have to do his dirty work."
"But-"
I cut him off. "Maybe you couldn't help yourself, out in a lunar desert. Maybe you wouldn't feel safe even inside Tombaugh Station. But when he sent you into Luna City, you had your chance. You didn't have to steal a little girl and turn her over to a-a bug-eyed monster!"
He looked baffled, then answered quickly. "Kip, I like you. You're a good boy. But you ain't smart. You don't understand."
"I think I do!"
"No, you don't." He leaned toward me, started to put a hand on my knee; I drew back. He went on, "There's something I didn't tell you... for fear you'd think I was a-well, a zombie, or something. They operated on us."
"Huh?"
"They operated on us," he went on glibly. "They planted bombs in our heads. Remote control, like a missile. A man gets out of line... he punches a button-blooie! Brains all over the ceiling." He fumbled at the nape of his neck. "See the scar? My hair's getting kind o' long... but if you look close I'm sure you'll see it; it can't ‘ave disappeared entirely. See it?"
I started to look. I might even have been sold on it-I had been forced to believe less probable things lately. Tim cut short my suspended judgment with one explosive word.
Jock flinched, then braced himself and said, "Don't pay any attention to him!"
I shrugged and moved away. Jock didn't talk the rest of that "day." That suited me.
The next "morning" I was roused by Jock's hand on my shoulder. "Wake up, Kip! Wake up!"
I groped for my toy weapon. "It's over there by the wall," Jock said, "but it ain't ever goin' to do you any good now."
I grabbed it. "What do you mean? Where's Tim?"
"You didn't wake up?"
"Huh?"
"This is what I've been scared of. Cripes, boy! I just had to talk to somebody. You slept through it?"
"Through what? And where's Tim?"
Jock was shivering and sweating. "They blue-lighted us, that's what. They took Tim." He shuddered. "I'm glad it was him. I thought-well, maybe you've noticed I'm a little stout... they like fat."
"What do you mean? What have they done with him?"
"Poor old Tim. He had his faults, like anybody, but-He's soup, by now... that's what." He shuddered again. "They like soup-bones and all."
"I don't believe it. You're trying to scare me."
"So?" He looked me up and down. "They'll probably take you next. Son, if you're smart, you'll take that letter opener of yours over to that horse trough and open your veins. It's better that way."
I said, "Why don't you? Here, I'll lend it to you."
He shook his head and shivered. "I ain't smart."
I don't know what became of Tim. I don't know whether the wormfaces ate people, or not. (You can't say "cannibal." We may be mutton, to them.) I wasn't especially scared because I had long since blown all fuses in my "scare" circuits.
What happens to my body after I'm through with it doesn't matter to me. But it did to Jock; he had a phobia about it. I don't think Jock was a coward; cowards don't even try to become prospectors on the Moon. He believed his theory and it shook him. He halfway admitted that he had more reason to believe it than I had known. He had been to Pluto once before, so he said, and other men who had come along, or been dragged, on that trip hadn't come back.
When feeding time came-two cans-he said he wasn't hungry and offered me his rations. That "night" he sat up and kept himself awake. Finally I just had to go to sleep before he did.
I awoke from one of those dreams where you can't move. The dream was correct; sometime not long before, I had surely been blue-lighted.
Jock was gone.
I never saw either of them again.
Somehow I missed them... Jock at least. It was a relief not to have to watch all the time, it was luxurious to bathe. But it gets mighty boring, pacing your cage alone.
I have no illusions about them. There must be well over three billion people I would rather be locked up with. But they were people.