'You've got a plan, haven't you?' he said.
'Yes. Sort of.' What are you going to tell them, then?' Masklin picked absently at the tip of his spear. 'The truth. I'm going to tell them they can leave the Store and take it all with them. I think it should be possible.' Gurder rubbed his chin. 'Hmm,' he said. 'I suppose it's possible. If everyone carries as much food and stuff as they can. But it'll soon run out and, anyway, you can't carry electric. It lives in wires, you know.' 'How many Stationeri can read Human?' said Masklin, ignoring him.
'All of us can read a bit, of course,' said Gurder.
'But only four of us are any real good at it, if you must know.' 'I don't think that's going to be enough,' said Masklin.
Well, there's a trick to it, and not everyone can get the hang of it. What are you planning?' 'A way to get everyone, everyone, out. Carrying everything we'll ever need, ever,' said Masklin.
'They'll be squashed under the weight!' 'Not really. Most of what they'll be carrying doesn't weigh anything at all.' Gurder looked worried.
'This isn't some mad scheme of Dorcas's, is it?' he said.
'No.' Masklin felt that he might explode. His head wasn't big enough to hold all the things the Thing had told him.
And he was the only one. Oh, the Abbot had known, and died with his eyes full of stars, but even he didn't understand. The galaxy! The old man thought it was just a great big room outside the Store, just the biggest department ever. Perhaps Gurder wouldn't comprehend, either, He'd lived all his life under a roof. He had no idea of the sort of distances involved.
Masklin felt a slight surge of pride at this. The Store nomes couldn't understand what the Thing was saying, because they had no experiences to draw on. To them, from one end of the Store to the other was the biggest possible distance in the world.
They wouldn't be able to get to grips with the fact that the stars, fr'instance, were much further away. Even if you ran all the way, it'd probably take weeks to reach them.
He'd have to lead up to it gently.
The stars! And a long, long time ago nomes had travelled between them on things that made lorries look tiny - and had been built by nomes. And one of the great ships, exploring around a little star on the edge of nowhere, had sent out a smaller ship to land on the world of the humans.
But something had gone wrong. Masklin hadn't understood that bit, except that the thing that moved the ships was very, very powerful. Hundreds of nomes had survived, though. One of them, searching through the wreckage, had found the Thing. It wasn't any good without electricity to eat, but the nomes had kept it, nevertheless, because it had been the machine that steered the ship.
And the generations had passed by, and the nomes forgot everything except that the Thing was very important.
That was enough for one head to carry, Masklin thought. But it wasn't the most important bit, it wasn't the bit that made his blood fizz and his fingers tingle.
This was the important bit. The big ship, the one that could fly between stars, was still up there somewhere. It was tended by machines like the Thing, patiently waiting for the nomes to come back. Time meant nothing to them. There were machines to sweep the long corridors, and machines that made food and watched the stars and patiently counted the hours and minutes in the long, dark emptiness of the ship.
And they'd wait for ever. They didn't know what Time was, except something to be counted and filed away. They'd wait until the sun went cold and the moon died, carefully repairing the ship and keeping it ready for the nomes to come back.
To take them Home. And while they waited, Masklin thought, we forgot all about them, we forgot everything about ourselves, and lived in holes in the ground.
He knew what he had to do. It was, of course, an impossible task. But he was used to them. Dragging a rat all the way from the wood to the hole had been an impossible task. But it wasn't impossible to drag it a little way, so you did that, and then you had a rest, and then you dragged it a little way again... The way to deal with an impossible task was to chop it down into a number of merely very difficult tasks, and break each one of them into a group of horribly hard tasks, and each one of them into tricky jobs, and each one of them...
Probably the hardest job of all was to make nomes understand what they once were and could be again.
He did have a plan. Well, it had started off as the Thing's plan, but he'd turned it over and over in his mind so much he felt it belonged to him. It was probably an impossible plan. But he'd never know, unless he tried it.
Gurder was still watching him cautiously.
'Er,' Masklin said. 'This plan...' 'Yes?' said Gurder.
'The Abbot told me that the Stationeri have always tried to make nomes work together and stop squabbling,' said Masklin.
'That has always been our desire, yes.' 'This plan will mean they'll have to work together.' 'Good.' 'Only I don't think you're going to like it much,' said Masklin.
That's unfair! How can you make assumptions like that?' 'I think you'll laugh at it,' said Masklin.
'The only way to find out is to tell me,' said Gurder.
Masklin told him. When Gurder was over the shock, he laughed and laughed.
And then he looked at Masklin's face, and stopped.
'You're not serious?' he said.
'Let me put it like this,' said Masklin. 'Have you got a better plan? Will you support me?' 'But how will you - how can nomes is it even possible that we can-?' Gurder began.
We'll find a way,' said Masklin. With Arnold Bros (est. 1905)'s help, of course,' he added diplomatically.
'Oh. Of course,' said Gurder weakly. He pulled himself together.
'Anyway, if I'm to be the new Abbot I have to make a speech,' he said. 'It's expected. General messages of goodwill and so on. We can talk about this later. Reflect upon it at leisure in the sober surroundings of-' Masklin shook his head. Gurder swallowed.
'You mean now? he said.
'Yes. Now. We tell them now.'
8
i. And the leaders of the nornes were Assembled, and the Abbot Gurder said unto them, Harken to the Words of the Outsider; ii. And some waxed wroth, saying, He is an Outsider, wherefore then shall we harken to him? iii. The Abbot Gurder said, Because the old Abbot wished it so. Yea, and because I wish it so, also.
iv. Whereupon they grumbled, but were silent.
v. The Outsider said, Concerning the Rumours of Demolition, I have a Plan.
vi. Let us not go like Woodlice fleeing from an overturned log, but like Brave Free People, at a time of our choosing.
vii. And they interrupted him, saying, What's Woodlice? Whereupon the Outsider said, All right, Rats.
viii. Let us take with us the things that we need to begin our life anew Outside, not in some other Store, but under the sky. Let us take all nomes, the aged and the young, and all the food and materials and information that we need.
ix. And they said, All? And he said, All. And they said unto him, We cannot do this thing...
From The Book of Nome, Third Floor v.I-IX 'Yes, we can,' said Masklin. 'If we steal a lorry.' There was a dead silence.
The Count de Ironmongri raised an eyebrow.
'The big smelly things with wheels at each corner?' he said.