Chapter 6

A horde of gaily dressed mammals surrounded me, their faces and bodies oddly fuzzy and distorted. Edith’s voice was equally fuzzy. There was something wrong with her centers. I tapped the helmet and checked the controller just in case it was on our end, but they were functioning perfectly. There was nothing wrong--merely the fact that ethanol was disturbing the biocircuits I had implanted in her brain. I swore a few choice expletives of Low Thalassan and tried to get through by increasing the power. It did no good.

“I c’n still feel that li’l lizard in m’ head,” Edith announced. “Gimme another drink. I wanna wash her out. Darn li’l lizard makes me do things I dowanna do. It wants me to quit, but I wanna get drunk.”

“Take it easy,” a fuzzy male face said. “You’re loaded. Why does a nice chick like you hafta be loaded? Whyncha get outa here? I gotta nice place over in Santa Monica where--”

The face disappeared.

“Hey! Alice! Golly, I almos’ din’t reckanize you. Howya doin?”

“Better than you, Edith. You’re drunk. And from the looks of you, you’re going to be sick if you don’t get some fresh air.”

“Gotta go spit in the eye of my li’l lizard,” Edith said. “Y’wanna come with me? I got Don’s car. We c’n get outa here an’ get some fresh air--an’ I c’n tell that li’l lizard what I think of her.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You wanna see my li’l lizard. She’s got yella eyes, and a li’l tail, and she turns all kindsa colors, and she lives in a rock with a door in it, an she makes me do things I dowanna do. It ain’t so bad though. Mosta the time I like it. Not alla time though. That’s why I wanna spit in her eye. She c’n tell me all she wants--but she’s gotta leave me’n Don alone. I love that guy.” Edith started sobbing--why, I couldn’t understand.

“She’s maudlin,” I said to Ven. “No one’s going to believe a thing she is saying. But this should be a warning to us. We’ll have to put in a block against drinking ethanol. I didn’t realize how badly it can affect the biocircuits.” I handed the helmet back to Ven. “You can watch this mess if you want to. I’m going to our quarters.”

I slipped out of the control chair and walked across the room.

I was stronger now, more accustomed to the gravity, and it didn’t bother me unless I had to stand for long periods of time. I turned in the doorway to look at Ven. She had the helmet on again and her aura was a crackling red. I shook my head. Edith was due for a bad time when the effects of that hydrocarbon wore off.

I had hardly fallen into light estivation when Ven’s projection crashed through my antennae.

“Eu! Get up! Come here quickly!”

With a groan I came slowly back to full facility and ran to the control room. Ven’s face was filled with panic.

“They’re coming up here,” she said. “A whole carful of them!”

“Who?”

“Edith’s drunken friends! Somehow she’s collected six of them and they’re driving up here to spit in my eye!”

Despite myself, I laughed. Ven looked so outraged I couldn’t help it.

“We can close the airlock,” I said, “and they can’t tell us from a rock.”

“I won’t! I’m going to teach that girl a lesson she won’t forget in a hurry! I’ve listened to myself being insulted for two hours--and she’s still going strong. When she gets up here I’ll show her whose eye she’ll spit in!”

Ven was raging. I’d never seen her so emotional before. Her aura swelled and ebbed in ruddy shades as her breath came and went in short gasps.

“And how do you propose to do that?” I asked.

“I’ll stat her!” Ven raged. “I’ll stat every one of them!”

I blinked. “I wouldn’t do that,” I said mildly. “What can we do with them? The two we have are bad enough. And if you stat them, we’ll have to kill or condition them. We couldn’t let them go home with a story like the one they’d tell.”

“I don’t care,” Ven said. “You can do what you like about the rest of them, but that Edith is going to learn a lesson.” She was being emotional and quite unwilling to listen to reason--and she was larger and stronger than I. Despite my protests, she jerked a stat projector from the rack and strode toward the open airlock.

“Thalassa!” she exclaimed. “They’re coming through the gate! They’ll be here in a minute.”

I could hear the roar of a protesting engine groaning up the trail to the lower meadow as I hurried after Ven. As I reached the airlock, the gray body of Donald’s station wagon poked its nose around the trees below our ship.

Ven stood rigidly in the airlock, waiting, her lips tight and her eyes narrow. She took a firmer grip on the stat as the car stopped and the giggling, half-sober humans tumbled out. I was in a quandary. I didn’t want Ven to shoot, but I couldn’t close the airlock with her inside it. So I stood, hesitating while the group of gaily dressed mammals came toward us through the trees, their high voices loud in the stillness.

“Gotta find that li’l lizard an tell her to stop meddling with my life,” Edith’s voice came to my ears.

Ven stiffened beside me as the group broke out of the trees in front of the ship.

“Why, Edie, it’s beautiful!” a voice said. “It’s a fairy glen! No wonder you’d never tell us where you got that suntan! And that big rock--it’s just like you said--And--uh!” The voice never finished as Ven pressed the trigger.

I looked down at the six crumpled mammalian bodies and the lone standing figure that looked stupidly up at us.

“Well,” I said. “You’ve done it this time. Now are you satisfied?

“No,” Ven said. “Not half.” Her voice was tight with anger. She looked down at Edith. “Come here!” she said.

“Dowanna,” Edith replied uncertainly. “You’ve made Don leave me. I don’t like you.” But habit was stronger than alcohol and under the furious lash of Ven’s voice she came unsteadily forward.

“Do you understand me, you little sarf!” Ven snapped icily. “I said come here!” She took the control box from her waist and viciously twisted the intensity dial to maximum. At this range its force was irresistible, even with alcohol-deadened synapses. Edith shuddered and moved toward us, her hands clumsily tearing at the fabric that covered her.

“I’m comin’! You don’ hafta shout. I ain’t deaf. I ain’t done nothin’!” She sat down beside the airlock and struggled out of her clothing, ripping the thin fabric under the last of Ven’s anger until she was completely naked. Then she stood up and reached her hands toward Ven.

“You’re not going to try to ride her while she’s in that condition?” I said.

“This is my affair,” Ven replied grimly. “I’m going to get this settled.”

I shrugged.

There was no sense reasoning with her while she was in that mood. And if she wanted to kill herself that was her concern. I watched her drop onto Edith’s shoulders, wind one hand viciously into the mammal’s long blonde hair and guide the gross body into a shambling walk toward the meadow. Edith swayed dangerously, but somehow she managed to stay on her feet as they disappeared into the trees.

I walked over to the six bodies, gave each of them a light stat to make sure they would remain quiet and sat down beside the nearest one to think.

Ven’s anger had left me a sizeable problem. What on earth could I do with six human females? I needed them like I needed a broken digit. Time passed and the sun rose toward the zenith, and finally I came to a decision. Since we had them on our hands, we might as well make use of them. Killing would be too dangerous.

And presently Edith came through the trees, a sick, tired, sober Edith whose face was dirty and tear streaked, carrying a grim Ven whose aura smoldered a reddish brown.

“What did you do to her?” I asked.

“None of your business,” Ven snapped. “She’s all right now. Aren’t you, Edith?”

“Yes, Ven--and I won’t do it again. Honest I won’t.”

“You’d better not,” Ven said grimly. “Now I suppose we have some work to do.”

“You certainly have,” I said. “If it wasn’t for your temper we wouldn’t have this mess on our hands. Now get moving! Have Edith carry these girls to the ship.” I gestured at the prone bodies. “And you, get inside and bring out the control equipment and connect the leads to the computer.” I was angry, too. Under the force of my superior will, the two females scurried to obey. “I’m disgusted with you, Ven,” I said angrily. “Just because your pet went to a party, you don’t have to act childish. Did you expect she’d behave like a Thalassan?”

“I trusted her,” Ven said.