It was the most fun he had had in weeks!
A detached part of him realized that he had tipped over into a strange state of mind. The tension of the past two weeks had burst, and the persona best able to cope—the eager scientist—had come to the fore, to the exclusion of almost everything else. For well or ill, it was his way of dealing with too much alienness all at once.
Dennis got down on all fours and squinted close to the tiny sled in its trough. As the sled moved slowly forward, he let out a small cry of surprise. A clear liquid oozed from beneath the little ski as it slid along. The fluid disappeared quickly, seeping almost instantly into the bottom of the trough.
He touched the bead of wetness that followed the skid, and rubbed the drop between finger and thumb. Almost at once it spread over them in a glossy sheen. He found he couldn’t press the fingertips together without their slipping aside. They barely even felt each other.
The fluid was the perfect lubricant! After a moment’s delighted stupefaction, Dennis clawed through one of his thigh pouches for a plastic sampling vial. He had to hold the tube in his left hand, while he vainly tried to wipe his right to get rid of the layer of slipperiness. He pulled the stopper with his teeth.
Crawling along behind the slowly moving sled, he pushed the vial up behind the ski, catching some of the slippery, elusive fluid. Soon he had twenty-five milliliters or so, almost enough to analyze…
His head bumped into the sled as it stopped suddenly. A small rain of cherrylike fruits fell over him from the overloaded wagon.
There were new voices from up ahead. Someone spoke loudly, and the crowd began backing away.
In his exalted state of mind, Dennis refused to be distracted. Drunk on the delight of discovery, he stayed crouched over, hoping the sled would start moving again so he could collect just a bit more of the lubricant.
A hand dropped onto his shoulder. Dennis motioned it away. “Just a minute,” he urged. “I’ll be with you in a sec.”
The brawny hand gripped harder, turning him completely around. Dennis looked up, blinking.
A very large man stood over him, dressed unmistakably in some sort of uniform. On the fellow’s face was an expression that strangely combined puzzlement with incipient rage.
Three other soldiers stood nearby, grinning. One laughed, “Tha’s right, Gil’m. Let’m be! Cantcha see he’s busy?” Another guard, who had been drinking from a tall ale-stein, coughed and sputtered brew as he guffawed.
“Gil’m” glowered. He clutched the bunched fabric of Dennis’s bush jacket and lifted him to his feet. In his right hand the big guard held something like a two-meter quarterstaff with a shining halberd blade at one end. Dennis’s gaze was drawn to the gleaming edge. It looked sharp enough to slice paper or bone with equal facility.
Gil’m called to one of the jokesters without turning or taking his eyes from Dennis. “Fed’r,” he rumbled. “Come an’ hold my thenner. I don’ wanna mess up its practice by killin’ nothin’ too mushy. This one I’ll take care of by han’.”
A grinning guard came up and took the tall weapon from Gil’m. The giant flexed fingers like sausages and tightened his grip on Dennis’s jacket.
Uh-oh. Dennis at last shook himself partially free of the bemused trance. He began to recognize the harm he just might have done himself.
For one thing, he might have lost his opportunity to recite the speech he had carefully prepared for his first encounter with authorities. Hurriedly, he sought to correct the mistake.
“Your pardon, esteemed sir! I had no idea I was already at the gate of your lovely city! You see, I am a stranger from a faraway land. I’ve come to meet with your country’s philosophers, and hopefully discuss many things of great importance with them. This marvelous lubricant of yours, for instance. Did you know that… Ak!”
The soldier’s face had begun to purple strangely as Dennis spoke. No doubt that meant this was not the right approach after all. Dennis barely ducked beneath a meaty fist that passed through the spot where his nose had lately been.
The guard’s face was hardly a foot from his. The fellow’s breath was something to write home about.
“Aw, c’mon, Gil’m! Can’t you hit a little Zusliker?” Almost the entire complement of guards had come up to watch the fun, leaving their post at the gate a dozen yards away. They were laughing, and Dennis heard one man offer a bet on how far the Gremmie’s head would travel when Gil’m corrected his aim.
The civilians in the caravan backed away, looking on fearfully.
“Hold still, Gremmie,” Gil’m growled. He cocked his fist back, this time aiming carefully, savoring the moment. His face took on a patient, almost beatific expression of anticipation.
This just may be serious, Dennis thought.
He looked at the guard… at the burly hand clutching his jacket. There wasn’t time to grab his needler—as if it would help any, starting his visit by slaying members of the local constabulary.
But Dennis realized he was holding a small open sample bottle in his left hand.
Hardly thinking, he poured the contents over the meaty paw holding his jacket.
The giant paused and looked at him, amazed by the unprecedented offense. After a moment’s thought, Gil’m decided he didn’t like it much. He growled again and struck out… as Dennis slipped from his hand like a pat of butter The northman’s fist whistled overhead, mussing Dennis’s hair with its wake.
Gil’m stared at his now empty left hand, shimmering with a thin coating of bright fluid. “Hey!” he complained. He turned barely in time to see the gremmie vanish through the gateway into town.
4
Dennis would have decidedly preferred a more leisurely first tour of a Coylian city.
Back at the gate there was a mass of confusion. The initial hilarity of the people in the caravan dissolved into shouts and screams as the guards stepped in with truncheons.
Dennis didn’t hang around to watch the melee. He pounded across a beautiful, ornate bridge that arched over a canal. Pedestrians stared as he wove among gaily painted market stalls, dodging vendors and their customers. The guards’ hue and cry followed only a little behind him as he fled. Luckily, most of the citizens quickly turned away in order not to get involved.
Dennis leaped past a street-corner juggler and ducked the falling pins to dive into an alley behind a pastry stall.
He heard boots pounding on the bridge not far behind him. There were yells as the guards tripped over the hapless juggler and his pins. Dennis continued dodging through the twisting streets and alleys.
The buildings of Zuslik were ziggurat high-rises, some over a dozen stories tall. All had the same wedding cake type of design. The narrow lanes were as serpentine as interdepartmental politics back at Sahara Tech.
In a deserted alley he paused to wait out a stitch in his side. All this running wasn’t easy with a heavy pack on his back. At last he was about to go on when suddenly, just ahead, he heard a newly familiar voice cursing.
“... like to burn this whole damn town to the groun’! You mean none of you saw that gremmie? Or those thieves who snuck in our guardhouse while we weren’t lookin’? Nobody saw nothin’? Damn Zuslikersl You’re all a buncha thieves! It’s funny how a stripe or two can jog a memory!”
Dennis backed into the alley. One thing was certain, he’d have to ditch his pack. He found a dim corner, unbuckled the belt, and let it slide to the ground. He knelt and pulled out his emergency pouch, which he slung onto his Sam Browne belt. Then he looked around for a place to stash the pack.