Telepath curled his ears partway and said, "You must not improvise anything. Just once through, doing one thing. Please."
"All right."
Weapons Officer was contemplating images of the monarch and viceroy butterflies. The viceroy was decidedly more refined, less baroque. On the other hand, the monarch was no good to eat, which was a matter of personal dignity.
He was somewhat distracted by the sudden opening of the door of his quarters. He had stunner and w'tsai out at once, but the human-the smaller one-who ran in never came near him; she just ran around the entryway twice, shouting, "Bats! Bats! Bats!" and waving her hands overhead until she ran out again.
Well, this was the kind of thing you had to expect from hunters who cremate their prey. He went over to the door, made sure it was locked, and went back to his screen, shaking his head. Bats. What were bats?
He looked them up.
In the corridor, Richard and Telepath were about equally worried. They tried to pass the time with talk, but it was no distraction:
"I have sometimes wondered what having a sapient mate would be like," Telepath remarked. "Traveling with you I have learned a great deal."
"Good or bad?"
"I am not sure I can answer that yet."
Gay came out and flung her hands about as if chasing something away from her, then stopped and looked at the door in some surprise.
"Weapons Officer just locked his door," Telepath said as Gay was entering the security code.
Richard had to be given a little shake to keep him from hysterics.
There had to be a better way.
There was.
Somewhat, anyway.
Second Flyer was amusing himself, tying knots in his pressure suit and watching them untie themselves, when he was distracted by the sound of a tiny bell. He looked around to see a little fuzzy knot of something bouncing along, jingling as it moved. He turned his body slowly, and pounced-and it jumped out of reach! This did not deter him, nor even slow him: He kept after it, bounding off walls at corners, until he had cornered it in his quarters.
Then he ate it.
One by one, Second Engineer, First Trooper, Third Trooper, and First Engineer had much the same experience.
After the first couple of times, Richard had gotten the knack of switching off the camera in a twine-wrapped medical-exploration robot before it disappeared down a kzin's incredibly toothy maw, but he was still pretty ragged. "You want to bathe?" said Telepath. "Or eat a potato? That calms humans."
"It does?" Richard said.
"Well, humans who have run out of potatoes are supposed to be very excitable, so I'm assuming the complement."
"I can do the next one," Gay offered again, and again Richard shook his head.
"It won't work on the others anyway," Telepath said. "First Flyer likes Intelligence novels and would assume a trick, and Second Trooper has adopted concealment."
"I keep thinking of that old joke about the Herrenmann who decided to import some tigers," Richard said weakly. "A zoologist who'd just come from Plateau wanted to be paid for advising him about the habits of big cats."
"What do mountaineers know about big cats?" Telepath wondered.
"I guess he'd read a lot. He advised the Herrenmann to have his people wear little bells on their clothing when dealing with any big cat, so it would hear them approach and not be startled into attacking, and to carry pepper spray in case the cat became hostile. All cats should react pretty much the same way. A few weeks later the Herrenmann sent him back a message that said they'd tried the advice, and the zoologist's information on big cats was incomplete: The droppings of tigers, for example, smelled like ammonia and were smooth, while the droppings of kzinti smelled like pepper and had little bells in them."
The question of whether they were being routinely read was settled at once: Telepath literally fell down laughing.
After they'd watched him roll around for a while, Richard said, "It's all very well for you. You haven't been getting the bell's-eye view."
"We should be able to get the smell out of the ship now," Gay said encouragingly.
That turned out not to be the case.
Not entirely, anyway. The ship's design considered the possibility of boarding, and gas, so the walls were highly resistant to adsorption of volatiles; but a single molecule can be enough to trigger a conditioned response without actually being perceived on a conscious level.
All of which went a long way to explain why, even after all detectable roots had been spaced and the corridors had been through basic decontamination, Telepath kept having sudden fits of the earwiggles.
At least Richard didn't need to wear a pressure suit to keep from getting ill.
And Telepath could function.
First Flyer was gradually getting the idea that something was wrong. The bridge was empty-aside from what looked like a kzintosh's first unsupervised experience with packing foam-and the controls were locked, and nobody else seemed to be around. He was headed blearily back to his quarters to do a remote systems check when he saw Telepath rolling down the corridor.
Telepath was hanging on to a huge hairy sphere, about a third his own volume, and acting like he was trying to gut it.
Aliens!
First Flyer screamed and leapt, w'tsai plunging into the sphere in sure, swift strokes.
After fifteen stabs there was still no blood.
Telepath was staring at him over the edge of the sphere. His ears were spread very wide, in a position of astonishment.
The sphere appeared to be wound from some kind of stiff cellulose-based cord.
Incensed, First Flyer knotted his ears.
Telepath immediately leapt to his feet and came to attention.
First Flyer stood, looked at Telepath, looked at the huge toy Telepath had made for himself, and growled, "Go to your quarters."
"Sir!" said Telepath, and leapt away down the corridor.
The hairy thing had loose strands sticking out all over it now.
It did look like fun.
When he got near his own quarters with it he noticed the humans leaning against a wall. Their bodies were together, faces touching. Probably checking one another for parasites or something. They took no notice as he dragged the thing in and sealed the door.
Richard got to the keypad first. "Just one now," he said.
"We can ignore Second Trooper," said Telepath from three feet away, causing them both to leap into the air. He stared at them for a moment, then reached up and actually held onto his ears as he continued, "He'll be staying out of the way."
"Slaverexpert, then," Gay said, breathing hard.
"Are you tired?" said Telepath.
"No."
"Oh." He thought. "Good diversion."
As they got to Slaverexpert's quarters, Richard said, "We shouldn't stand close to him."
"Good idea," said Telepath. "We can move all his stuff onto lower shelves, too."
Richard stopped in his tracks as he tried to figure that out. "How would that make it safer to wake him up?" he finally asked.
"Oh. I thought you wanted him to think the drug had made him taller."
Richard shook his head, said nothing, and walked on.
As he passed, Telepath said mildly, "That wasn't called for."
Slaverexpert heard movement and opened his eyes to see Telepath. "You again," he said in Hero. "I told you to let me sleep."
"That was three days ago," said Telepath.
"Oh." Slaverexpert considered. "Then I really am this hungry." He established a coherent pattern of behavior, rolled off his fooch, scooped the fabric into the recycler, and punched for something not too drippy and a gallon of lager. Then he noticed the humans. "Good day, Richard and Gay Guthlac," he said in Interworld. "On reflection I believe the polymer roots we found should not be admitted into general use."
After perhaps half a minute watching two humans lean against one another laughing insanely, Slaverexpert turned to Telepath and said, "I gather there have been developments."
"Oh yes."