The Xathpyroid's Tale

7 

The Xathpyroid’s Tale 

 

    Reconvening after lunch in the bar, the company urged BrTl to tell a story.

    “Uh—” There was still no sign of Didg. “I had thought of a story with quite a lot of fighting in it,” he said on a wistful note.

    The Nblyterian had rejoined them at lunchtime, with the Meanker Space Patroller she’d met earlier. “That sounds like my sort of story!” she said with her deep laugh.

    “Yeah,” grunted the Meanker. “Tell it, xathpyroid cognate.”

    Don’t tell it!

    BrTl jumped ten IG fluh. “Oh, there you are, Trff,” he said lamely. “Have a nice snooze?”

    “Yes, thanks.” Don’t tell that one, that Meanker’s in Space Patrol, does you-it want to end up head-first down a Vvlvanian magma pit with a brace of rr’trrs tied to your-its tail?

    It was feeling refreshed, all right. “Um, well, um—let me think of a good one,” he produced lamely.

    While he was making up his mind blndreL and the Space Patroller took the opportunity to go off and see if they could get some counter service. The bar was rather full this afternoon, and the servo-mechs were very busy: two freighters had just docked, plus a troop ship full of thirsty spacers and NCOs.

    “Are they always like that, BrTl?” asked Dohra in a lowered voice.

    “Y—Uh—Oh, Meankers!” he said, realising with some relief that they weren’t back to the topic of stories about flowing internal fluids, after all. “Well, pretty much, Dohra. Um—oh, the single emerald eye? That’s standard.”

    “Meankers from Gheaudarraine all have an emerald eye,” said Forty-Four placidly. “But if they’re from Mongarry or L’Pont’che, they have a bright blue one: rather the shade of the best sort of Faindorgean glass. –Quoted at five thousand and forty-two point one zero nine eight super-igs per IG ounce on the Commodities Exchange,” it murmured.

    “Suh-super-igs?” stuttered Dohra. One super-ig was fifty igs!

    “Mm? Oh: yes. Beings such as the Meagraw of Gr’mmeaya think nothing of paying that sort of price, Dohra.”

    Dohra swallowed hard.

    “They are very similar to humanoids,” noted Trff helpfully. “Internally as well, Dohra.”

    “What?” she said, jumping. “Oh: Meankers. Yes. Um, but that isn’t a nose, is it?”

    If any being had been in any doubt that the it-being was reading her, which BrTl didn’t think, really, any being in their group had been, down to the Flppu, the doubt would have been resolved instantly. “No,” it said promptly. “It supposes it does look rather like a humanoid nose, Dohra, but it hasn’t got two tubes.”—BrTl twitched slightly, and it added: It keeps telling you-it, you-it isn’t that dissimilar to Jhl inside! She-it only looks as if she-it’s got one nose. Dohra’s the same.—“It’s a mouth.”

    “Yes,” she agreed. The ovoid, pointed face wasn’t at all unattractive, once you got used to it, though you couldn’t have said a Meanker was a charming-looking being in the way a Ballunder was. The skin was a darkish grey, rather like that of humanoids from Vamminy IV. Like humanoids, Nblyterians and Friyrians, Meankers were bipedal and plantigrade, and they had two arms, but also two auxiliary flexible tubes, rather in the style of Wynonian Buglers. Dohra wasn’t absolutely sure what the tubes were for but certainly the Meankers she’d seen seemed to use them like extra arms. They tended to be taller than most humanoids, and very broad-shouldered: in fact this one was even broader in the shoulders than blndreL was. She was aware that she was betraying her ignorance, but after all, if you didn’t ask you didn’t learn, did you? So she stuck out her chin and said: “But how does he breathe, Trff?”

    “In the usual way,” it said kindly.

    “Sorry,” said BrTl. “I should’ve seen that one coming. Meankers are o-breathers, like you,”—Dohra looked at him dubiously: it was an o-breather level of the spaceport, so of course they would be—“but they haven’t got noses or neck-hair to breathe with”—she looked from his noses to his neck-hair in bewilderment—“they’ve got—uh— Vvlvanian curses, gone again,” he muttered. “I know! Like Friyrians!”

    Dohra went very red but she looked him firmly in the eye and said: “That must be wrong, BrTl. I looked at his neck and he definitely hasn’t got gills.”

    “Gills!” he said pleasedly. “That’s it!”

    “He hasn’t,” she said, more flushed than ever.

    “Yes—Oh, right: considered bad form to look at them, is it? But only on Friyria, isn’t it?”

    “Sorry, that was S-Fl’Chuyilleea!” chorused its masters apologetically.

    “Oh, so it was. Wouldn’t let it worry you, S-Fl’Chuyilleea,” he said kindly to the s-being. “We’re not on Friyria now, you know.”

    “No! Praise be to the Great United Being who brought united beingness to Home Planet!” it agreed fervently.

    “I’m with you on that one, S-Fl’Chuyilleea!” agreed BrTl with feeling. “In quintupled 5-D triangles! –Where was I?”

    “You-it was about to describe the Meanker’s gills to Dohra,” said his ship-companion helpfully.

    “Thanks, Trff, so I was. Well, you can’t see them because he’s got his helmet on, but if he took it off you’d see them. I mean, they’re on his head,” he said feebly, sending her a picture.

    “Oh!” she cried. “They look feathery! Like singing fish!”

    “External gills, yes,” said the Thwurbullerian placidly. “Quite different from Friyrians: they draw in air through their nose and their neck-gills.” It waggled its frontal lobes kindly at Dohra. “I dare say he will take his helmet off, once he sits down with his drink.” –And I really don’t think that story would be advisable, BrTl, though it does sound exciting.

     No, he agreed glumly.

    The one about how Jhl and BrTl and Trff went to Friyria and almost ended up head-first down a Vvlvanian magma—No, Trff conceded regretfully. But it’s a good story.

    There must be some stories that I know that haven’t got IG-illegal bits in them!

    Nothing…

    It’s looking at them, it assured him.

    BrTl cringed.

    The Nblyterian and the Meanker had returned and were amiably distributing drinks and handing jing-jing nuts and fried Willunian moth wings (the Meanker’s choice), when Trff finally said: “Why not tell a Lost Cause story, BrTl?”

    “I do a bit of Lost Cause Guiding when I’m on leave,” BrTl explained.

    “Oh, Lost Cause Guiding! Very acceptable!” approved Forty-Four.

    “I booked for a Lost Cause once!” chorused One and Two brightly.

    “Did you go?” asked BrTl.

    “No,” they said. “The being that was going to do the guiding suffered an unfortunate fate just before I was due to go.”

    “That can happen,” he acknowledged.

    “Help, what was it?” gasped Dohra.

    “Clapped up. Three IG years. Hard labour. Xrillion mines on the second moon of Lhurghistania,” said the Meanker laconically, removing his helmet. “Thanks, humanoid,” he said to Dohra’s emanations of excited admiration as the feathery pale grey gills were revealed.

    “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to emanate!” she gasped.

    “Emanate all ya like,” he said on a smug note. “See, blndreL? I told ya the humanoid females all admire me!”

    “Yeah, you’re a piece of perfection, Lu Rullan!” she said with a grin.

    To the stupefaction of most of them the burly Meanker then produced a pretty little hand-mirror from one of the many blue-trimmed pockets on his white Space Patrol uniform and proceeded to admire his refection, fluffing up the gills a little.

    “Wkli shell, is it?” asked BrTl with interest.

    “Yeah; IG-legal, too, xathpyroid cognate. You gonna tell us a story or not?”

    BrTl took a precautionary gulp of qwlot. “I suppose I am, yeah.”

    “Tell them its name, BrTl,” prompted Trff.

    It doesn't have to have a—What’s the use? “All right, this story is called ‘The Lost Cause of Mooghanurdrangyea.’”

    “I've been there,” noted Lu Rullan.

    “Then you’ll know why they run Lost Causes there, Meanker,” replied BrTl heavily. “Shall I go on?”

    Unfortunately his audience all urged him eagerly to go on, so he did. 

 

    It’s pretty generally recognised in the Known Universe that, if the third moon of Pkqwrd’s possibly the most boring place in the Known Universe, then Mooghanurdrangyea runs it a close second. Dust worlds apart. –And the rest of you beings can either stop disagreeing with me, or tell this story yourselves!

    I was on leave for two whole IG months because the ship was—never mind that. Anyway, we were all on leave. So after a quick trip home, where Bossy Elderly Cognate BrFv was really on form in the Haranguing All Cognates For No Good Reason Stakes, I shook the intergalactic dust and signed on for a bit of Lost Cause Guiding. And they assigned me to Mooghanurdrangyea, Federation alone knows why. –Trff’s metabolism won’t cope with those crispy moth wings, Meanker, so don’t waste them on it, it’s only being polite, it’ll just park them until it can dispose of them, and if you’d bother to lower your shades you might possibly be able to tell—Right.

    So there I was on Mooghanurdrangyea, just me and my FW pack and my translator—yeah, all right, blndreL, and my blaster—and a pack of mangy, smelly FWs of tourists, not to be anything-ist, all decked out in unlikely Lost Cause clothing unsuited to the physique, the physiology, the Lost Cause, and the climate. Pretty standard stuff, in fact.

    I won’t mention the species, and anyway they were the usual lot, but let’s just say there was Fat Being, we’ll call him a “he”: he had the greatest difficulty getting onto his skimmer and even more difficulty steering it; and Thin Being, a tallish, very superior being—not a Friyrian, S-Fl’Chuyilleea, so calm down: we’ll call him a “he”, too: he imagined he was in charge of the whole Lost Cause and kept giving the other beings orders—needless to say the wrong orders; and Fluffy Being—not a Flppu or an it-being, for those who haven’t already read the fact—let’s call the being a “she”: she couldn’t get onto her skimmer without help and was even worse at steering than Fat Being, and just to make it even better, when she couldn't do anything, which was most of the time, she kept doing the Fluffy Being equivalent of water-from-the-eyes. Not what you need on a Lost Cause. Let’s see: that’s Fat Being, Thin Being, Fluffy Being— Right.

    Then there was a pair of beings—no, One and Two, you’re right, definitely not Feeny-Argyllians. Let’s call them the Bond-Partners. They appeared to think the whole thing was jolly fun, at least they certainly kept telling everyone it was, and kept taking sim-images and accusing other beings of pinching their sim-blobs.—Possibly they had, blndreL, yeah, but the accusations got very boring very quickly.—The Bond-Partners had five times as much kit with them as any two other beings put together and sixteen times more than Hopeless Being. We’ll call it an “it”. About ten IG seconds after meeting it the rest of the party had started wondering why in Federation it had decided to come. It was even worse at getting on or off its skimmer than Fat Being or Fluffy Being and couldn’t steer it at all, had no proper kit, had an FW pack that was so Special Offer it was barely coping with the Mooghanurdrangyean atmosphere—not suited to the metabolisms of many beings in the Known Universe, I’ll grant you that, Meanker—and in spite of the explicit instructions issued in Intergalactic and every language of every participant before we started, hadn’t brought the recommended weapon or any weapon.

    Ya do always get one of those on every Lost Cause: yeah, Meanker. And you’re right, Dohra, this probably is starting to sound very like your trip to Mount Whatever-It-Was. Any group of tourists is the same all over the Known Universe, whether they're on home-world lifters without hygiene cabinets or Lost Causes on Mooghanurdrangyea. In fact, do I need to mention Officiously Competent Being? No, I know I don't need to, to you-it, Trff, but— All right, I will, then, Dohra.

    Officiously Competent Being can be called a “she”. Her weapon was more expensive and much shiner than any other beings’. She had exactly the right kit plus several extra little bits and pieces, I use the word “little” loosely. Just in case some other being’s FW pack might not be working properly she’d brought along a spare, overlooking the fact that possibly no other beings on the Lost Cause might be the same species as her, which turned out to be the case. She had two maps of Mooghanurdrangyea. She had an extra blob in case any being’s skimmer blob gave out. She could have guided the whole Lost Cause with all appendages tied behind her and all three eyes shut, and was even more irritating than Thin Being. True, she did immediately take charge of Hopeless Being, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough to occupy her vast reserves of energy.

    Let’s see, how many’s that? Fat Being, Thin Being, Fluffy Being with water coming out of the eyes, the Bond-Partners, Hopeless Being, Officiously Competent Being—yeah, that’s it. More than enough. The one bright spot was that if we had to sacrifice one of the company, as has been known to happen on Lost Causes—there’s an indemnity clause in the IG-legal agreement they all have to sign, Forty-Four—Hopeless Being was a species suited to the metabolisms of all but Thin Being, and frankly he was so superior that no being gave a cptt-rvvr’s fart about him. –All right, then, S-Fl’Chuyilleea, you think of him as a plasmo-blasted Friyrian, if that’s what’ll blob you up!

    It took some time, but at last all beings were on their skimmers, Hopeless Being blob-locked to its with that handy spare blob of Officiously Competent Being’s, too bad if it capsized the thing and buried itself in the seeping sands of Mooghanurdrangyea.

    And we set off across the seeping sands of Mooghanurdrangyea towards the High Blue Mountain Range. –Yeah, that's right, Meanker, in that part of the world. 

 

    “To each Lost Cause its object”, as they say, so the object of this Lost Cause was to take the Fort of Ishpant and de-activate the plasma-bomb hidden in its vaults. Meanwhile avoiding any Crazed Patriots or Escaped Vvlvanian Convicts or Local Bandits that might be lurking in the area. Or in the case of the Crazed Patriots, guarding the Fort of Ishpant. Officiously Competent Being’s idea was that we’d just zip on over the seeping sands and blast the plasmo-blasted Fort to the Third Galaxy, but mine wasn’t, given that plasma-bomb. –Eh? Yes, of course it was a real one, Dohra, that’s what Lost Causes are all about! Only a small one, though, given that the owners of Mooghanurdrangyea didn’t actually want their entire planet disintegrated. –Eh? Uh—not sure, Forty-Four: think they’re a Mklontian Limited Company, though you couldn’t smell anything except the stinky-sedge of Mooghanurdrangyea. Not that that wasn’t bad enough, and Fluffy Being had thrown up from the smell five times before we’d travelled a thousand glps. –What? Well, no, Dohra, because then Officiously Competent Being insisted on stopping while she got her Oononian Med-Emergency Blob Kit to mix up a remedy. It did seem to fix the being, as far as the violent chucking-up was concerned. Meanwhile Thin Being, in fact let’s call him Thin Superior Being, not to be anything-ist, was complaining loudly about nuisance-beings that ruined Lost Causes for other beings, and the Bond-Partners were using some of their huge supply of chemo-blobs to brew up soothing cups of some vegetable beverage. Yeah, I think it was feverfew tea, actually, S-Fl’Chuyilleea. So we all drank some and it seemed to do Fluffy Being some good. Well, put it like this: the muck stayed down and Officiously Competent Being said the Bond-Partners had done good.

    And after Officiously Competent Being had righted Hopeless Being and its skimmer, it was Ho! for the High Blue Mountains of Mooghanurdrangyea again!

    We were within about fifty glps of the foothills when a being was espied peering at us from behind a rocky ridge, and Wham! Bam! Before any being could blink, or, as it were, lower its shades, Officiously Competent Being had blasted it to the Third Galaxy!

    Don’t cheer, Dohra, or you, S-Fl’Chuyilleea, because as it happened the peering being wasn’t a Crazed Patriot or an Escaped Vvlvanian Convict or a Local Bandit, it was the Friendly Local Guide that one of us had been expecting. –Not Officiously Competent Being, no, S-Fl’Chuyilleea.

    So I said: “Oops. That was our Friendly Local Guide. I see you’ve never heard of shades,” and that shut her up for the next few hundred glps.

    We were in the foothills, where the blue shadows were already lengthening, well, enough to reduce Fluffy Being to more of the water-from-the-eyes stuff and wishing that she’d never come, when Thin Superior Being spied another being peering at us! Immediately throwing himself to the ground in the blue shadow of his skimmer, he sent a mind-message to it! Identify yourself!

    Nothing happened, except for other members of the group prudently throwing themselves to the ground in the blue shadows of their skimmers. Not Hopeless Being, no, it was still blob-locked to its. But as it was upside-down again the being was fairly well protected, not that any being gave a cptt-rvvr’s fart about it. Even Officiously Competent Being was focussing her attention and her Grade-A, Super-Maxi-Galaxy Fizzo-Blaster Model IV.C on the peering being. –I know Fizzos are intergalactic trash, thanks, Meanker, that’s part of my point. But they do cost megarafts of super-igs. Also part of my point—yeah.

    After some time it dawned on the rest of them that I wasn’t flat on the ground in the shadow of my skimmer so, kindly passing Fluffy Being a bunch of the zillions of extra senso-tissues they’d brought with them, one of the Bond-Partners asked: “Is it safe, Leader BrTl? Is that another Friendly Native Guide?” Prudently in a very lowered voice.

    “No!” hissed Thin Superior Being. “Get down!”

    “Look out!” gasped Officiously Competent Being, as the peering being popped up for a split IG microsecond. Oddly enough she didn’t blaze away, though.

    So I said: “Actually, that isn’t another Friendly Native Guide.”

    Fluffy Being did more of that water-out-of-the-eyes stuff and wailed: “Get down, Leader BrTl! We’re all going to be killed!” And Thin Superior Being hissed: “It’s a Crazed Patriot! Everybody draw your blasters!”

     So I said: “Actually, it isn’t a Crazed Patriot.”

    Officiously Competent Being hissed: “I knew it! It’s a Local Bandit! Blob-lock your essential possessions, everybody, and aim low!”

    So I said: “Actually, it isn’t a Local Bandit.”

    Fluffy Being did more of that water-from-the-eyes stuff and wailed: “What is it, Leader BrTl? We’re all going to be killed!”

    Before I could reply—not that I was trying very hard—Fat Being said: “Supper.”

    Immediately Thin Superior Being and Officiously Competent Being withered him utterly with searingly scornful mind-messages. Thin Superior Being then hissing: “Federation! It must be an Escaped Vvlvanian Convict! Set your blasters at ‘KILL’!”

    While the Bond-Partners were still resetting their blasters and wondering if they’d have to pay extra for that because they were almost completely sure Escaped Vvlvanian Convicts weren’t on their tickets and while Officiously Competent Being was still shushing them angrily, I said: “Actually, it isn’t an Escaped Vvlvanian Convict. Though your tickets do include one.”

    “An Unknown Assailant!” hissed Thin Superior Being gleefully, raising his blaster and getting off a good one at an inoffensive rock.

    “No. That’s not included in your tickets. Stop wasting blob power, Thin Superior Being,” I said tiredly. “Fat Being’s right: that being’s supper. I should say, it was supper, because all this hissing and shushing and throwing physiologies to the ground and fumbling around with blaster holsters has long since scared it off.”

    “I knew it!” cried Fat Being, getting up and doing a short dance of triumph.

    “Yeah,” I agreed, getting off a blast just over the being’s right shoulder. He screamed, and fell down. “But that one was a Local Bandit, and if you beings want to see any sport at all, keep alert! We’d better break out the space rations for supper, unless maybe you’d like to hunt that supper-being, like you’re broadcasting, Officiously Competent Being?”—Misguidedly she agreed she would.—“I’ll take that as an official Volunteered Statement, as in your Lost Cause Agreement Para 65, sub-para (b). Off you go, you’re on your own.”

    A certain amount of angry consulting of Lost Cause Agreements resulted from this, as you can imagine, and she decided she wouldn’t go after all, but I just got on with breaking out the space rations and forcing the Bond-Partners not to break out their extra space rations or to unlock Hopeless Being but to keep watch. Thin Superior Being had long since taken the hint and already was. Admittedly broadcasting superiority while he did it.

    So that was that, and we settled down to space rations and feverfew tea, as the green-yellow sun went down behind the High Blue Mountains of Mooghanurdrangyea and the first moon rose.—Yes, the blue one, Meanker.—Naturally they all fell asleep well before the green moon had risen but of course I was expecting that. Our camp was only invaded by three wandering drffos and a Mooghanurdrangyean snr-cat during the night, so I didn’t bother to wake them up. 

 

    BrTl sat back and refreshed himself with a stiff belt of qwlot, what time Dohra gasped: “A snr-cat? But they’re dangerous!”

    “Meat-eaters, yes,” he agreed calmly. “So are drffos, come to that, but smaller. Quite fierce, though.”

    “But what did you do?” she gasped.

    “Well, I didn’t stun them with my blaster and drag them behind a rock for a nice surprise for the tourists in the morning, Dohra.”

    The Meanker produced three loud hoos: “Hoo, hoo, hoo!” The meankoid equivalent of loud appreciative laughter.

    “Thanks, Meanker,” the xathpyroid acknowledged.

    “Call me Lu Rullan,” the being replied with a certain relish.

    “Thanks. Call me BrTl. Have another nnru juice.”

    Once all beings had appropriate refreshment in their appendages, this time on the Feeny-Argyllians, the xathpyroid went on with his story, since the beings seemed to be expecting him to. 

 

    Breakfast next morning was enlivened by one of the Bond-Partners zapping a clump of Mooghanurdrangyean stinky-sedge that had incautiously moved in the wind, and by Thin Superior Being zapping a Mooghanurdrangyean pucker-snake that had incautiously come out of its hole to sniff the space rations. –Well, yes, Dohra, they are poisonous, but not to all species, in fact only to Hopeless Being’s species and a couple of others that weren’t represented, so it was a waste of blob power. Even though it was very dead, in fact disintegrated, Fluffy Being did the water-coming-out-of-the-eyes stuff with some screaming as well.—Hysterics? Thanks, Dohra.—In humanoid terms, she had hysterics, what a convenient word!

    And once Officiously Competent Being had competently revived Hopeless Being and Fluffy Being with a good sniff of Oononian chemo-blob—it wasn’t just the hysterics, it was the stink from the dead stinky-sedge as well—we got going on the Lost Cause of Mooghanurdrangyea again.

    Fifty glps later we had to park the skimmers and hide them under bunches of stinky-sedge and piles of sand, because the terrain had got too rough to use them any more. –I’m picking up what you’re all broadcasting, and you’re right. But I was being paid quite well, so I didn't mind all that much. And there was nothing in my contract that said we had to actually get to the Fort or de-activate the plasma-bomb. So we set off again on foot, or on whatever was used. After a bit Officiously Competent Being thought I ought to give Fluffy Being and Hopeless Being a ride on my back, but I thought I ought not to, because—“Look OUT!” Zap! “That was a Local Bandit! Weapons, everybody!”

    And with several internal-fluid-curdling shrieks, the Local Bandits were upon us! Plasmo-blasts from the blasters beamed to and fro. The Local Bandits were throwing primitive local weapons as well, and a spear got Hopeless Being, who wasn’t ducking at the time, square in an upper appendage. Internal fluid oozed from it, but even Officiously Competent Being and the Bond-Partners didn’t have time to slap an Oononian chemo-blob on it, the fire was so fast and furious!

    And eventually we were overcome, and surrendered our weapons, and the Local Bandit Leader ordered us led off to his Bandit Camp! 

 

    Dohra had dissolved in mammalian sobs, so the xathpyroid stopped.

    “Don’t do the water-from-the-eyes, Dohra. That’s what was meant to happen. That’s what Lost Causes are all about! Thrills for the tourists, geddit?”

    “Yeah,” confirmed the Meanker laconically, handing her the bowl of moth-wing crisps.

    “I believe that is right,” allowed Forty-Four, more practically sending her a bunch of senso-tissues.

    Dohra blew her nose loudly. “Meant to happen?” she faltered.

    “Yes,” confirmed BrTl.—“Yes,” agreed Trff.

    The Flppu was also upset, and though it didn’t have the physiology to produce water from the eyes, it grabbed an appendageful of senso-tissues anyway. “Does it turn out all right in the end, Great Leader BrTl?” it quavered.

    “Yes, of course!” Then he realised that several beings were reading him. “Uh—pretty much all right. Depending on your definition of all right. Well, certainly within the terms of the beings’ Lost Cause Agreements.”

    “That’s all right, then,” said the Thwurbullerian placidly.

    “Buh-but what about Hopeless Being?” stuttered Dohra.

    “Er—then or later, Dohra?” replied BrTl cautiously.

    “Then. I mean, it was wounded!”

    “Serve it right,” noted blndreL. “Shouldn’t’ve been there in the first place.”

    “Yeah!” grunted Lu Rullan, passing her the moth wings.

    “Well, um, it couldn’t help being hopeless, I suppose,” said Dohra, looking pleadingly at BrTl.

    Given that this isn’t a Thwurbullerian story, you-it could change this part of it, noted his ship-companion.

    I could, but I’m not gonna, I’ll lose track! he replied crossly. “Hopeless Being was all right. But I could stop now, if you like, Dohra.”

    “No, please go on!” she urged.

    “Yes, please go on!”—“Yes, please go on!”

    “Yes, please do go on, BrTl,” urged Forty-Four. But if you could remember that some beings don’t care for the flowing internal fluids, some of us would be grateful.

    BrTl took a deep breath. Then he took a precautionary gulp of qwlot. Then he took another deep breath, and, bearing in mind that reference to flowing internal fluids should be avoided as much as possible, and also that too much stress on wounded hopeless beings, or any wounded beings, or any zapped beings, even pucker-snakes, was undesirable, he got on with it as best he could. 

 

    The Bandit Camp was pretty much like any Local Bandit Camp in the two galaxies. “Dirty” would probably be the best word. What? Well, exciting to tourist-beings, yeah. Local Bandits lounging round the place in varying states of grime from filthy to utterly filthy—that sort of thing. Of course loaded with weaponry, some of it pretty well unrecognisable to those beings not well acquainted with customs of worlds beyond the Outer Rim, some of it recycled Space Issue blasters, IG-illegally re-blobbed.—Wearing filthy rags, mainly, Dohra.

    Fluffy Being was in those screaming things again. Hysterics: right. So was one of the Bond-Partners, something to do with the quog bracelet it had misguidedly secreted in an inner pocket. Something to do with bond-partnering customs on their world, if any being’s interested. And they had all been told, in several languages, not to bring any valuables that they didn’t want to lose.—And that there was no insurer in the two galaxies that’d cover them for any valuables brought along on a Lost Cause, yes, Forty-Four.

    The other Bond-Partner was trying to remember if this was included in the price of their tickets while it took sim-images. Fat Being was wondering if we were all going to be eaten. Thin Superior Being was working out the probable lowest ransom he could get away with paying whilst simultaneously threatening the Local Bandit Leader with an IG lawsuit unto the fourth and fifth generations for kidnapping, assault upon the person, grievous bodily harm, malicious wounding, and use of a proscribed weapon. Actually the Leader had used at least three, but the being hadn’t realised that.

    Officiously Competent Being was ordering the Leader to let us all go at once, whilst simultaneously threatening the entire band of Local Bandits with an IG lawsuit for contravention of the Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act if she wasn’t immediately allowed to succour Hopeless Being’s wound. Also simultaneously wondering if a smallish and very dirty Local Bandit clutching something that was possibly a musical instrument might be persuaded to perform music on it later round the campfire, and please don’t blame me, I’m just telling it like it was!

    Of course the Local Bandit Leader completely ignored all of this. First off it peeled that elaborate Lost Cause garment of Bond-Partner’s off it—yes, smothered in pockets, Dohra, you’ve got the picture—and grabbed that bracelet the being was imagining it had hidden. It was a pinkish shade of quog, so it’d fetch a very good price anywhere in the two galaxies. Next it removed all other valuables including, thank the Federation, sim-blobs, from all other beings. Certain misguided beings had brought along some very valuable space junk indeed, so that cheered it up so much it let Officiously Competent Being tend Hopeless Being’s wound. By that time it had oozed rather a lot of—Never mind that. The Oononian whatever-it-was-blob fixed it up in no time and the being felt much better.

    So then the Leader decided that Officiously Competent Being could plasmo-blasted-well fix up all the wounds on the Local Bandits, serve her right. Well, you do get used to bad smells when you go flat-worlding a lot, but this lot of FWs lived on a planet infested with stinky-sedge. Plus and the not-washing, yes, Trff, thanks for reminding me.

    Eventually a satisfactory ransom was negotiated. By then it was so late the blue moon was up and even Fluffy Being had given up on the water-from-the-eyes and was wondering about supper. The Local Bandit Leader whipped out the appropriate blobs and everyone signed their ransom approvals, and once it had verified the right number of credits had been transferred to the Local Bandit account, it unlocked the blob-locks it had put on us, and quite genially, for a Local Bandit Leader, asked if we wanted to stay for supper. Of course they all did, so we stayed. Yeah, the smallish, very dirty one did play on its musical instrument and it was a really horrible noise. The recipe was good, though: Mooghanurdrangyean walking-chicken meat stewed up with some vegetables and a few puffing-frogs to make it go further. Puffing-frog’s really good, Dohra! And walking-chickens are a bit like grqwaries, but with longer necks. You don’t usually eat the necks, though, they’re stringy. 

 

    Local Bandits don’t tend to go in for pudding, much, so there wasn’t any. But the local Mooghanurdrangyean ale isn't bad, so we finished off the meal with that.

    During the night one Local Bandit tried to abduct Fluffy Being but I zapped it in time, and one Local Bandit tried to slit Thin Superior Being’s throat but I forced myself to stop it in time, too. Though I definitely didn’t notice until too late that it had pinched his Grade-A, super-duper, maxi-galaxy, Lost Cause-type grpplybeast leather boots.

    In the morning it was discovered, along with the fact that Thin Superior Being was lacking a set of hugely expensive boots acquired from a boutique on Playfair Two, that the Local Bandit food hadn’t really agreed with Hopeless Being’s metabolism. But there wasn’t much point in threatening the Local Bandits with a lawsuit, because by then they’d packed up their camp and disappeared. Though that didn’t stop Officiously Competent Being. And when Hopeless Being had finished the up-chucking and had a drink of the Bond-Partners’ feverfew tea and a good sniff of one of Officiously Competent Being’s Med-Emergency Blob Kit chemo-blobs and another good sniff of one of the Bond-Partners’ chemo-blobs and was almost completely out of it, we were ready, make that almost ready, to set off again on the Lost Cause.

    The beings were very surprised to find that the Local Bandits had left my blaster and Officiously Superior Being’s Fizzo behind, but on the whole I wasn’t, given that Fizzos are intergalactic space junk and that I’d mind-locked my one’s blob before handing it over. Thin Superior Being was really annoyed that his blaster, a Whammer-Bammer Mark VI from Whtyll Armoury Company Limited, had been taken, but given the quality of Whtyllian blasters, not to say what they fetch on the black market or beyond the Outer Rim, I wasn’t. The only other useful belonging of ours they’d left was Hopeless Being’s chrono-blob but just as Thin Superior Being was deciding it wasn’t going to be of any use to it, so he’d use it, it croaked. However, they had left a quantity of primitive weaponry, now pretty clearly surplus to their requirements, so after a bit of coaching in which way up to hold it without maiming the physical person, we actually got going.

    About ten very slow glps further on, largely in the direction of up, it was noticed that Fluffy Being was doing that water-out-of-the-eyes thing again, something to do with internal fluids leaking from the feet—don’t look at me, thanks, I didn’t do anything to cause it and she hadn’t been hit by anything the day before. And that blast last night had completely missed her, I’m not that bad a shot, Meanker!

    Just when Officiously Competent Being was insisting I’d have to carry Fluffy Being on my back alongside the zonked-out Hopeless Being, Thin Superior Being shouted: “Look out!” and hurled himself to the ground in the shadow of a boulder. And a blast shattered the top of the boulder just about where his head had been two microseconds before.

    All beings threw themselves to the ground in the shadows of the boulders, weapons at the ready or, in the case of the Bond-Partners, pointing at soft parts of the anatomy. But after I’d sent Point that Chzhwkiian three-barrelled splinterer the OTHER WAY! several times, they got it, and turned it round.

    “Crazed Patriots!” gasped Officiously Competent Being as a Bonzo Bomb (a product of Oononian Trans-Galaxy Inc.) shattered a boulder and a portion of mountain behind her.

    She was right, actually. A short fight ensued, resulting in victory to our side: even with the Bond-Partners arguing over how to work it and what to aim it at, that three-barrelled splinterer did a pretty good job. Added to which there were only two Crazed Patriots and they were both rotten shots, and I still had my blaster. At the close of play, sorry, battle, Vvlvanian-cursed Thin Superior Being threatened to bring a lawsuit against me because with all the sim-blobs gone there was no way his image could be recorded for posterity standing over the very dead Crazed Patriots, but fortunately it was in my contract and his Agreement that he couldn’t. Fluffy Being had been having a go at some of the chemo-blobs while the Bond-Partners and Fat Being were arguing furiously over who had really killed one of the Crazed Patriots, and she offered brightly to paint a picture of them all with the prey.—Uh, victims, if some beings prefer to look at it that way.—But as she'd forgotten to bring her painting stuff that couldn’t happen.

    What with the lack of boots and the sore appendages and the ground being largely in the direction of up, it had taken some time to get to where we were, so we made camp there and while Officiously Competent Being and Thin Superior Being wrangled over the best way to make a campfire and get the igno-blobs to heat up the space rations, I just sat back and kept watch for more Crazed Patriots or an Escaped Vvlvanian Convict. One of the Bond-Partners reported that Hopeless Being seemed to have passed out but on the whole, that was all to the good.

    In spite of the feet, Thin Superior Being was very annoyed that certain other beings weren’t keen to press on towards the Fort during the night, but as none of them had anything approaching night vision and the rest of them, except of course for Officiously Competent Being, were very tired, we just ate the rations and posted a watch. And in the case of some, went to sleep. Well, in the case of the watch, too, so it was just as well, given the approach of a small pack of drffos, that I hadn’t completely dropped off, wasn’t it? Fat Being woke up at the sound of the blaster going off and wondered if they might be edible, those space rations were sufficient but not exactly generous; but the smell was more than enough to put him off. 

 

    Next morning there were certain grumbles about more space rations but as that was all there was, they had to have them or go without. Then one of the Bond-Partners thought that Thin Superior Being might like to try a set of boots that had been brought along as spares for the other Bond-Partner, and after a lot of bitter-sounding shouting, more than loud enough to disturb any Crazed Patriots or Escaped Vvlvanian Convicts that might be lurking in the neighbourhood, he put them on. They were old, but, or so the Bond-Partner they belonged to claimed, more comfortable than the ones it was wearing. There was a lot more shouting but they didn't exchange boots, don’t ask me why not, and then the Bond-Partner that had offered Thin Superior Being the boots took his appendage instead of its Bond-Partner’s, and we all set off again. By this time I’d given in and was letting Hopeless Being, still zonked out, and Fluffy Being, now pretty much the same way, ride on my back. –No, Dohra, they weren’t heavy, that wasn’t the point.

    The going was even steeper today and there were even more complaints about sore appendages. But just when Fat Being was declaring he couldn’t go another step and we’d have to stop for lunch now, there was a BLAST! And Fat Being and the piece of mountain he’d been standing on were blasted into a megazillion pieces of intergalactic dust. –Yeah, you’re right, blndreL, it did serve him right for making all that racket in a danger zone. –Eh? Yes, blasted as in dead, Dohra, didn’t I say at the outset that this was a Lost Cause? Oh, Vvlvanian curses, don’t do that! 

 

    There was a short interlude while other beings helped Dohra to mop the water coming out of the eyes and Forty-Four, though admitting it had been enjoying the story, sent BrTl some minatory mind-messages, and while he absorbed qwlot.

    “I won’t go on,” he decided glumly.

    “Ya can’t stop now, swiller!” said a deep humanoid voice with a laugh in it, and Didg came up to them, grinning. “Oy, you’re not bawling over a Lost Cause, Sweet Cheese, are ya?”

    “Oh, there you are,” said BrTl feebly. “Um, did you hear that?”

    “Think the whole room did: you were broadcasting, ya know.”

    BrTl blinked, and looked around him. Sure enough, a fair proportion of those beings not wholly engaged with glasses of intoxicants or Pleasure Beings were looking towards him hopefully. And emanations of Go on! surrounded him.

    “It’s very sad, Didg,” said Dohra tearfully.

    “Yeah,” he said, brazenly pulling up a chair beside her. “Didn’t you understand? That’s the nature of Lost Causes. No being forces these rich play-beings to go on ’em, ya know.”

    “You—you mean he was a rich play-being?” she faltered. “Fat Being?”

    “’Course he was—wasn’t he, swiller?”

    “Yes, of course,” agreed BrTl, sending for another basin of qwlot. “He was a rich Federation Reppo that owned a nirvana garden on Playfair Two. Bought with all those pay-offs he’d been slipped by Whtyllian-Mklontian consortiums and the like to get IG Regs passed or repealed or to get IG Committees to approve things or look the other way—standard stuff.”

    “Yeah. They get to the point,” said Didg, patting Dohra’s knee, “where there’s nothing else left to try—they’ve been everywhere, done everything that even looks like fun—so they sign on for a Lost Cause.”

    “I see…” she said slowly. “Not the Bond-Partners, too?”

    “Sure! What were they, BrTl, swiller?”

    “Full Surgeons from the Full College. Worked on Mullgon’ya itself.”

    “Ugh!” cried those in his immediate party. Ugh! came the broadcasts from all round the room.

    “Yeah. Deserved all they got and more,” BrTl conceded, taking a handful of jing-jing nuts.

    More n’nk salt!—More n’nk salt! the paired beings ordered immediately.

    Thanks, One and Two, just what I need.

    “Makes a difference, doesn’t it?” said Didg, patting Dohra’s knee again.

    “Um, yes, actually,” she admitted, very flushed. “It shouldn’t, but it does.”

    Sure it does! came the sympathetic broadcasts from all round the room.

    “Yeah,” agreed blndreL, taking a handful of nuts and dipping one in the n’nk salt. “Any being that signs up for a Lost Cause does it in the full recognition that its chances of being blasted are about four to one.”

    “Five point zero, zero, zero three repeating to one,” corrected Trff.

    “There you are,” said the Nblyterian, swallowing a mammalian grin along with a jing-jing nut.

    “Hoo!” choked the Meanker, hurriedly taking a mouthful of qwlot.

    “Go on, BrTl,” urged Didg. “Finish the story.”

    Finish the story! Finish the story! came the emanations from all round the room.

    “Yes,” said Dohra, blowing her nose hard and absent-mindedly tucking the senso-tissues in a pocket of her Durocloth coveralls. She stuck out her chin. “Finish the story, BrTl: I’d like to see if you managed to save the rest of those silly beings from themselves!”

    “Um, well, all right. Where was I?”

    “In the middle of a fight, BrTl!” said the Meanker with a smothered hoo.

    “Oh, yes, so I was. It went like this:” 

 

    Blasters seemed to be popping and flashing all over the show, but after eliminating the flashes from that plasmo-blasted Fizzo of Officiously Competent Being’s and the inability of the Bond-Partner that was now by itself to aim that three-barrelled splinterer, it was pretty clear that there was only one being out there. It was a Vvlvanian-cursed good shot, though. Soon Thin Superior Being, not the sort of being that could ever be told, had emptied the magazine of the quaxx he’d inherited from the Local Bandits, and as the thing had no blob, because quaxxes don’t have blobs, there was no way of recharging it. That left him with a pretty ordinary-looking spear. No blobs in it—right, S-Fl’Chuyilleea. His new friend, Boot-Donating Bond-Partner, had a blobbed out mini-popper that had had one good shot left in it that the being had wasted on a moving cloud shadow on a boulder. True, it had efficiently removed the boulder, making less cover for the enemy, should it wish to move in that direction. Hopeless Being and Fluffy Being were still zonked out, not that they’d have been any use. That left me and my blaster. It was a Vvlvanian-cursed pity that Officiously Competent Being wasn’t a better shot, Fizzo or not.

    After lying flat for a while behind his boulder Thin Superior Being managed to slither over to me and hiss: “He must be running low on blob-power!”

    There was no proof either that the being was a “he” or that it was low on blob-power, or certainly none that Thin Superior Being was aware of. So I just replied: Stop that hissing, it’ll draw a bead on you, you silly being! Sure enough, a blast immediately disintegrated a piece of boulder just above his head, the silly being. Missing him, unfortunately.

    Then Officiously Competent Being sent: I’ll draw his fire! Then you zap him, BrTl!

    And before I could send: A megazillion to one the being’s picking you up, you silly being, she had risen to all of her feet and was running out into a clear space between two boulders, firing the Fizzo madly.

    Well, what would you have done? No, well, I was tempted to do that, Lu Rullan, yeah. Or that, blndreL. But that would’ve been in contravention of my contract. So I popped up from behind my boulder for a split IG microsecond and blasted the enemy to the Third Galaxy.—Well, thank you all, assorted beings, but it was a worthy opponent, an IG second or two’s silence might be a more appropriate response than those cheers.

    …Thank you. Yes, that’s right, S-Fl’Chuyilleea, give Dohra some more senso-tissues.

    Thin Superior Being was about to rush out to inspect the spot where the enemy had been but I stopped him quite gently. And after he’d finished moaning we waited a while to be sure that there were no more of them. Which there weren’t, or at least I didn't sense any. So we came out from behind our boulders. And Thin Superior Being threw his spear at the spot fiercely, don't ask me why, but that is the sort of thing that silly beings that go on Lost Causes tend to do, and said: “What was he, anyway?”

    No being answered so I admitted: “An Escaped Vvlvanian Convict.”

    “What?” he shouted. “I wanted to have a go at him!”

    “You did,” pointed out Officiously Competent Being sourly. “Several goes. Missing him every time.”

    “My ticket states that I’m authorised to shoot one Escaped Vvlvanian Convict!” he shouted.

    “It doesn’t state that you’re a good enough shot to do it, though,” noted Lone Bond-Partner sourly. –Uh, no, One and Two, calm down, it was nothing like that, the separation was only very, very temporary.

    “Yeah,” Officiously Competent Being was agreeing sourly. “I think there’s something wrong with this plasmo-blasted Fizzo,” she added sourly.

    “It disintegrated our Guide, all right!” retorted Boot-Donating Bond-Partner swiftly.

    “Yes,” agreed Thin Superior Being nastily. “What a pity, given it’s the only decent weapon we’ve got left apart from the Leader’s blaster, that you can’t manage to aim it at beings more than five hundred fluh away and narrower than a fully-grown Mklontian.”

    “You were closer than me and you missed every shot!” she screamed.

    At this point I just sat down and dumped Fluffy Being and Hopeless Being on the ground and leant my back against a convenient piece of boulder. It went on for some time. Beings often get like that when the Lost Cause doesn't go the way they’d imagined it was going to. 

 

    Eventually they realised that I'd had my lunch so they stopped shouting and ate some space rations. Then Officiously Competent Being decided that we had to hold a memorial service for Fat Being. None of them knew what beliefs he’d had or what funeral customs, if any, his species adhered to, and in any case there weren’t any remains to—um, well, many rites would have been impossible. But they argued over it anyway. In the end Officiously Competent Being had her way and they all stood round, well, apart from Hopeless Being, though they managed to get Fluffy Being onto her feet, and Guess Who made a speech? Then Guess Who Else had to make a speech, too? After that the Bond-Partners—yes, together again, One and Two—read a completely different speech out of a little text-blob of theirs that the Local Bandits hadn't bothered to steal. Then Fluffy Being did some of the water-coming-out-of-the-eyes and sprinkled some sand on what she imagined was the spot, though it wasn't. And Officiously Competent Being revived her with a chemo-blob, though I’m pretty sure that wasn’t part of the rites.

    Then they all started arguing over who was going to make the feverfew tea, so I just left them to it, since there were no other unfriendly beings in the neighbour­hood—well, there was a mountain b’x behind a large boulder about five hundred IG fluh away but as it didn't have b’x fever and was a vegetarian, and as I didn’t think, on the whole, that it deserved the fate of becoming supper for a load of smelly FWs, I didn’t point it out. And I went over to the real spot and said a few words in my Slaetho-Xathpyrian dialect, even though Fat Being of course hadn’t been a xathpyroid. None of them seemed to care about the fallen enemy so I went over to that spot and said a few words, too. It’d been a worthy opponent.

    They made two lots of feverfew tea, having divided into two opposing camps, speaking almost literally as well as figuratively. Thin Superior Being had joined up with the Bond-Partners, I think because he hated Officiously Competent Being most. So her group only had her and the semi-revived Fluffy Being and the comatose Hopeless Being in it, but in case any being was thinking that made the two groups unequal, it didn't. By no means. Thin Superior Being’s group thought we should push on this afternoon and capture the Fort and finish the Lost Cause! Officiously Competent Being thought we shouldn’t, it was already almost supper time and we’d only get lost in the dark. By the time they’d finished putting their points of view it was supper time. On the other appendage, the moons’d be up. So we took a vote. Well, work it out. True, Officiously Competent Being held up Fluffy Being’s appendage for her while the being giggled like crazy, but they were still outnumbered. Especially as I refused to vote. So we had supper, loaded Fluffy Being and Hopeless Being onto my back again—the contracts are rather clear about leaving beings behind that haven’t volunteered to be left—and set off under the blue moon.

    They made enough noise for a deaf Crazed Patriot to have heard them from a megazillion glps away, but given all that popping and flashing earlier in the day, I wasn’t in much doubt that we’d been spotted long since. But there was no opposition, and pretty soon we were at the Fort. Nothing much was going on in their minds so after a moment I implanted the idea: Ambush.

    So several of them warned me: It’s an ambush!

    Well, if nothing else had warned the deaf Crazed Patriots we were here, that sure would’ve: none of those beings had heard of mind-shields, apparently. Full Surgeons or not. Thin Superior Being was sending thoughts about a frontal assault. With what, unspecified. Officiously Competent Being was sending thoughts about drawing them off. The Bond-Partners were having an argument between themselves, something about boots yet again.

    So I sent: Shut up! And they all shut up.

    Listen, I ordered. We all listened. I couldn’t sense anything, so either these deaf Crazed Patriots had plasmo-blasted good shields, or there weren’t any in there. Maybe it was too draughty even for Crazed Patriots: it was pretty broken-down.

    After a bit more listening I asked: Volunteers? All four of the non-comatose ones volunteered immediately: had any being thought they wouldn't?

    So I selected Officiously Competent Being on the score she had the best weapon. No being could argue with that, though Thin Superior Being tried to point out that she wasn’t the best shot.

    Creep up to it, try to get a look inside, and report back, I told her.

    Right, Leader! And off she slithered, though I hadn't told her to slither. Oh, well.

    We waited…

    Here she comes! they sent, about ten IG minutes after I’d picked her up coming back.

    “There’s—no-one—there!” she panted, dropping down beside us.

    “It is an ambush!” hissed Thin Superior Being. “They’re out there somewhere!”

    “Ssh! What could you see?” I whispered. I already knew, actually: she’d been broadcasting deafeningly all the time she was over there.

    “Nothing much! It’s all very broken-down! It looks as if there was a fire in there!”

    I was only getting blankness from the others, and enough’s enough: we were due to finish the plasmo-blasted Lost Cause this evening, though that apparently hadn't dawned on them. So I stood up and said: “I think it’s safe. All right, Thin Superior Being, keep that spear of yours at the ready if you must. Come on.”

    And off we went to the Fort. It was broken-down, all right. If Officiously Competent Being had had better night-sight we’d have resolved the mystery quite some time earlier. Because as we penetrated to the centre of the quite deep hole that was the interior of the Fort we noticed a heavy stone down there, and on it a message-blob. As we came up to it, it broadcast: Hard nymbo cheese, Lost Causers. We’ve taken out the Crazed Patriots and dismantled the plasma-bomb, and for good measure, given the Fort a few blasts. Signed, Lost Cause of Mooghanurdrangyea Number 2472.

    “It’s a trap!” shouted Thin Superior Being, jumping around, spear levelled.

    “It’s a pretty funny trap, how’d the Crazed Patriots know we’re Lost Cause of Mooghanurdrangyea Number 2473?” retorted Boot-Donating Bond-Partner smartly.

    “How, indeed?” sneered its Bond-Partner.

    “Could they have read it?” asked Officiously Competent Being, for once in her existence asking instead of telling.

    “If they could have read it, I would have read them reading it,” I said. “And I have to admit the assumption was that you beings would all have been able to, too. If you’ll consult your Agreements, you’ll see that this message-blob does constitute an official Termination of Lost Cause.”

    “I demand my money back!” shouted Thin Superior Being. “I spent IG months learning how to dismantle a plasma-bomb!”

    “So did we!” shouted both Bond-Partners furiously.

    “I paid a real Crazed Patriot to teach me!” screamed Officiously Competent Being, apparently deciding to throw in her lot with them. “We demand our money back!”

    Somehow the Local Bandits had overlooked a certain light-blob of mine, possibly because I’d told it to look like a pocket on my coveralls, so I got it out and told it: On. Immediately the interior of the destroyed Fort was flooded with light and they could all see that a blast or two must have been set off in here. And read the lumo-spray message on what was left of the wall. It wasn’t a polite message, but it was in Intergalactic. And it did confirm that the previous Lost Cause had brought it off. Even Thin Superior Being couldn’t maintain convincingly that Crazed Patriots of Mooghanurdrangyea could write, not to say spell, that well in Intergalactic.

    “Right. Lost Cause terminated,” I said into the comm-blob that had been pretending to be another pocket. “Lifter, please.”

    Fluffy Being must have been more awake than I’d thought, because she cried: “You mean we can go back to the Tourist Hotel in a lifter? We don’t have to walk? Oh, thank the Federation!”

    And that was that. A pretty typical Lost Cause, really.