Tim didn't have anything else to recommend him; he was as coldly vicious as a guillotine. But Jock had some slight awareness of right and wrong, or he wouldn't have tried to justify himself. You might say he was just weak.
But I don't hold with the idea that to understand all is to forgive all; you follow that and first thing you know you're sentimental over murderers and rapists and kidnappers and forgetting their victims. That's wrong. I'll weep over the likes of Peewee, not over criminals whose victims they are. I missed Jock's talk but if there were some way to drown such creatures at birth, I'd take my turn as executioner. That goes double for Tim.
If they ended up as soup for hobgoblins, I couldn't honestly be sorry- even though it might be my turn tomorrow.
As soup, they probably had their finest hour.
Chapter 8
I was jarred out of useless brain-cudgeling by an explosion, a sharp crack -a bass rumble-then a whoosh! of reduced pressure. I bounced to my feet-anyone who has ever depended on a space suit is never again indifferent to a drop in pressure.
I gasped, "What the deuce!"
Then I added, "Whoever is on watch had better get on the ball-or we'll all be breathing thin cold stuff." No oxygen outside, I was sure-or rather the astronomers were and I didn't want to test it.
Then I said, "Somebody bombing us? I hope.
"Or was it an earthquake?"
This was not an idle remark. That Scientific American article concerning "summer" on Pluto had predicted "sharp isostatic readjustments" as the temperature rose-which is a polite way of saying, "Hold your hats! Here comes the chimney!"
I was in an earthquake once, in Santa Barbara; I didn't need a booster shot to remember what every Californian knows and others learn in one lesson: when the ground does a jig, get outdoors!
Only I couldn't.
I spent two minutes checking whether adrenalin had given me the strength to jump eighteen feet instead of twelve. It hadn't. That was all I did for a half-hour, if you don't count nail biting.
Then I heard my name! "Kip! Oh, Kip!"
"Peewee!" I screamed. "Here! Peewee!"
Silence for an eternity of three heartbeats- "Kip?"
"Down HERE!"
"Kip? Are you down this hole?"
"Yes! Can't you see me?" I saw her head against the light above.
"Uh, I can now. Oh, Kip, I'm so glad!"
"Then why are you crying? So am I!"
"I'm not crying," she blubbered. "Oh Kip ... Kip."
"Can you get me out?"
"Uh-" She surveyed that drop. "Stay where you are."
"Don't go ‘way!" She already had.
She wasn't gone two minutes; it merely seemed like a week. Then she was back and the darling had a nylon rope!
"Grab on!" she shrilled.
"Wait a sec. How is it fastened?"
"I'll pull you up."
"No, you won't-or we'll both be down here. Find somewhere to belay it."
"I can lift you."
"Belay it! Hurry!"
She left again, leaving an end in my hands. Shortly I heard very faintly:
"On belay!"
I shouted, "Testing!" and took up the slack. I put my weight on it-it held. "Climbing!" I yelled, and followed the final "g" up the hole and caught it.
She flung herself on me, an arm around my neck, one around Madame Pompadour, and both of mine around her. She was even smaller and skinnier than I remembered. "Oh, Kip, it's been just awful."
I patted her bony shoulder blades. "Yeah, I know. What do we do now? Where's W-"
I started to say, "Where's Wormface?" but she burst into tears.
"Kip-I think she's dead!"
My mind skidded-I was a bit stir-crazy anyhow. "Huh? Who?"
She looked as amazed as I was confused. "Why, the Mother Thing."
"Oh." I felt a flood of sorrow. "But, honey, are you sure? She was talking to me all right up to the last-and I didn't die."
"What in the world are you talk- Oh. I don't mean then. Kip; I mean now."
"Huh? She was here?"
"Of course. Where else?"
Now that's a silly question, it's a big universe. I had decided long ago that the Mother Thing couldn't be here-because Jock had brushed off the subject. I reasoned that Jock would either have said that she was here or have invented an elaborate lie, for the pleasure of lying. Therefore she wasn't on his list-perhaps he had never seen her save as a bulge under my suit.
I was so sure of my "logic" that it took a long moment to throw off prejudice and accept fact. "Peewee," I said, gulping, "I feel like I'd lost my own mother. Are you sure?"
" ‘Feel as if,' " she said automatically. "I'm not sure sure ... but she's outside-so she must be dead."
"Wait a minute. If she's outside, she's wearing a space suit? Isn't she?"
"No, no! She hasn't had one-not since they destroyed her ship."
I was getting more confused. "How did they bring her in here?"
"They just sacked her and sealed her and carried her in. Kip-what do we do now?"
I knew several answers, all of them wrong-I had already considered them during my stretch in jail. "Where is Wormface? Where are all the wormfaces?"
"Oh. All dead. I think."
"I hope you're right." I looked around for a weapon and never saw a hallway so bare. My toy dagger was only eighteen feet away but I didn't feel like going back down for it. "What makes you think so?"
Peewee had reason to think so. The Mother Thing didn't look strong enough to tear paper but what she lacked in beef she made up in brains. She had done what I had tried to do: reasoned out a way to take them all on. She had not been able to hurry because her plan had many factors all of which had to mesh at once and many of them she could not influence; she had to wait for the breaks.
First, she needed a time when there were few wormfaces around. The base was indeed a large supply dump and space port and transfer point, but it did not need a large staff. It had been unusually crowded the few moments I had seen it, because our ship was in.
Second, it also had to be when no ships were in because she couldn't cope with a ship-she couldn't get at it.
Third, H-Hour had to be while the wormfaces were feeding. They all ate together when there were few enough not to have to use their mess hall in relays-crowded around one big tub and sopping it up, I gathered -a scene out of Dante. That would place all her enemies on one target, except possibly one or two on engineering or communication watches.
"Wait a minute!" I interrupted. "You said they were all dead?"
"Well ... I don't know. I haven't seen any."
"Hold everything until I find something to fight with."
"But-"
"First things first, Peewee."
Saying that I was going to find a weapon wasn't finding one. That corridor had nothing but more holes like the one I had been down- which was why Peewee had looked for me there; it was one of the few places where she had not been allowed to wander at will. Jock had been correct on one point: Peewee-and the Mother Thing-had been star prisoners, allowed all privileges except freedom... whereas Jock and Tim and myself had been third-class prisoners and/or soup bones. It fitted the theory that Peewee and the Mother Thing were hostages rather than ordinary P.W.s.
I didn't explore those holes after I looked down one and saw a human skeleton-maybe they got tired of tossing food to him. When I straightened up Peewee said, "What are you shaking about?"
"Nothing. Come on."
"I want to see."
"Peewee, every second counts and we've done nothing but yak. Come on. Stay behind me."