The Ware Tetralogy - Rudy Rucker (popular ebook readers .TXT) 📗

She held up her hand to stave off Onar and the King’s protests. “I think I know why you don’t want Cobb to know. He’s a grandstander, a loudmouth. You’re afraid he’ll whip up a movement against the aliens. You’re afraid everyone will react like Darla—like Darla would if she were still around.” Her voice faltered as she thought of her dead mother. She caught her breath and pressed on. “But remember that Cobb Anderson is an explorer. A radical. The total opposite of those right-wing, moldie-hating Heritagists. If Cobb had a closed mind he wouldn’t have built the boppers in the first place. Cobb loves change. And who knows, maybe his death experiences taught him something about the kind of world where Shimmer comes from.”

“I could have you both silenced,” mused the King. “Thanks to the ID viruses, it’s like you’re not even here.”

“You wouldn’t dare,” said Yoke, deepening her voice and sounding more confident than she felt. “Shimmer would never forgive you. Don’t you think she’s already thought through the consequences of your talking to me? It’s like we’re dustboarding down an extreme slope, Bou-Bou. If you waver now, you’ll fall. The only way to do this is straight and fast.”

“Well said, Yoke!” Onar held up his glass. “A toast to Lady Yoke Starr-Mydol!” And the King toasted along.

“I expected as much from you, Yoke,” said the King presently. “You have spirit. Yes, you’re the one to bring back the realware. And that’s the real reason I had Eleani put out the ID virus on you. Because if and when the news of the realware gets out, everyone’s going to want to find the person who has it.”

Yoke and Onar rode back across the lagoon in a wooden boat propelled by the yellow slug moldie, whose name turned out to be Topo. Topo fastened himself to the underside of the boat and beat the water like a long-tailed eel.

It was a clear, balmy night, with a caressing breeze of sweet fresh air flowing in from the sea. The full moon shone high overhead. Onar pointed out the pinprick of light that was Cappy Jane. Topo’s underwater undulations left a glowing trail, and when Yoke let her hand dip into the smooth black water, it made a phosphorescent wake of tiny green sparkles.

“It’s wonderful to share this with you, Yoke,” said Onar, pulling his arm tight around her. “I love to see you smile.”

“Liar,” said Yoke, leaning against him. “I’m just a pawn in your scheme.”

“Compared to Shimmer, we’re plankton,” said Onar, looking out over the lagoon. “The best we can do is glimmer in her wave. I won’t lie to you again, Yoke. I care much more for you than I expected. You’re so fresh and kind and good.”

Onar kissed her then, and the boat ride turned fully as romantic as Yoke had hoped: the tropical lagoon, the champagne in her veins, and her arms around this handsome, raffish, not-quite-trustworthy man. When they got back to the guest house, Yoke made a snap decision that it would be a good idea to sleep with Onar after all.

But Onar turned out to be a poor lover, certainly the worst of Yoke’s few partners thus far. Onar stinted on the foreplay, made a long messy fuss of his prophylactic preparations, and was up for at most sixty seconds of actual coitus. As a final turn-off, Onar said something British when he came, something like “Cor blimey,” or “Top drawer,” or “Bit of all right”— Yoke’s outraged brain disdained to retain the phrase.

In the night, Yoke had a nightmare about her dead mother Darla, a dream of Darla desperately firing her needier gun at an endless attack wave of softly smiling jellyfish. She woke up in a sweat, feeling cramped in Onar’s bed. She washed her face in the grungy guest house bathroom, then went into her own room to fall back asleep.

February 21

In the morning, Saturday, Yoke woke to the sound of a rooster crowing right outside her window. The first thing she thought about was Darla. And Phil’s father. They’d been eaten by something from a higher dimension. And all of a sudden Yoke could remember what the cyberspace jellyfish thing had said when it came at her yesterday. “You love Onar,” it had been saying. “Do what Onar says.” The jellyfish had been quite thoroughly under Onar’s control. Mr. Olou’s death had been no accident. Onar was a killer. And now she was supposed to let Onar take her to meet Shimmer? What about Shimmer and the four-dimensional things that had eaten Darla and Phil’s father? Was there a connection?

Oh, this was creepy. Yoke pushed on to other thoughts. The fat, polite King in his soap-bubble castle. The romantic ride across lagoon. The unpleasant, selfish groping in Onar’s bed. Too bad she hadn’t come here with Phil Gottner instead. That Kevvie didn’t deserve to keep a boy like Phil. He was the cutest thing she had met on Earth so far. Phil would be perfect, if only he could learn to take hold of life and do something.

Before even getting out of bed, Yoke put on her uvvy, wincing a bit. Her neck was still tender from the jellyfish blast at the Foreign Ministry. She called for Cobb. His signal was faint and weird, so Yoke sent him an extra hard mind jolt. There was a thud right outside her window and then Cobb’s face appeared out there.

“What? I was lying on the roof.”

“Shhh! Come in here.”

Cobb slithered through Yoke’s window to perch on the foot of her sagging bed. He was nothing like so pink and shiny as usual. And he reeked of decay.

“I’m really spun,” said Cobb, sounding satisfied. “Two of the moldies at the Happy Club turned me on to this stuff called ‘betty.’ I rubbed it onto myself and whoah, Nellie. It’s the first time I’ve found a way to use this body to catch a lift. ‘Fine, fine betty,’ my new friends call it. Tashtego and Daggoo. They work for Sea Cuke Divers. Tashtego’s a moldie fakaleiti. I think maybe I had sex with him? Or no, wait, that was another moldie I did it with. A green one. Her name was V-something. She rubbed even more betty on me. Are we diving today?”

“Are you going to be okay, Cobb? You look way kilpy.” Cobb’s normally clean outlines were wavering and irregular, with small ripples darting about upon the surface of his skin. His rosy flesh was shot through with lines of gray.

“A shower would help,” said Cobb. “I could open my pores and let the water flush out the toxins. But—not yet.” He slumped against the wall. “I have too much slack. It feels good to be lifted.” He held his hands up in front of his face, slowly moving them as if watching their motion trails.

“I’m not sure we should dive at all,” mused Yoke. “There’s more to it than you realize. Stop looking at your hands and pay attention! The biggest news is that there’s an alien named Shimmer living down in the Tonga Trench. The King says Shimmer wants me to come see her. She’s been decrypting more aliens out of signals from this Tongan Meta West Link satellite called Cappy Jane. Yesterday Onar killed a Tongan man who’d been trying to stop Shimmer from using Cappy Jane. For some reason Onar and the King don’t want you in on this, Cobb. The King’s a cheeseball by the way; his girlfriend is a moldie named Vaana.”

Cobb stopped wiggling his fingers and looked past them at Yoke. “Killed?” said Cobb, not sounding so happy anymore. His motionless gray-streaked hands were in supplicating claw positions. “Vaana?”

“You better take that shower, Cobb. You want me to help you?”

“Help,” said Cobb, and suddenly slipped off the bed onto the floor. He was more than lifted, he was poisoned.

Yoke dragged the stinking heavy moldie down the hall to the guest house bathroom. Another guest, a German woman, was just vacating it. She gave Yoke a disgusted look as she stepped over the inert Cobb. But she didn’t bother to ask any questions. It was a very cheap guest house.

Yoke wrestled Cobb into the concrete shower stall and turned the controls on all the way, which produced a limp drizzle. The water didn’t seem to be penetrating Cobb fast enough, so Yoke got into the shower and started kneading him with her feet. The shower wasn’t exactly hot, but it wasn’t freezing cold either. Out of reflex, Yoke picked up a stray sliver of soap and started washing herself, all the while jouncing around on the soft moldie flesh of Cobb. As she washed she thought about making love to Onar—which made her wash herself the more thoroughly. Triple _ugh _for Onar. Three _ugh_s and you’re out.

There was a shuddering beneath her feet. Yoke turned her attention back down to Cobb. Thanks to her trampling, the water was squeegeeing in and out of his flesh. The water coming out of Cobb was dark as if with dust or pollen. His eyes were open, glassily staring up at Yoke’s body. She flipped him over with a deft motion of her feet and continued to tread on him.

The bathroom door swung open and in walked Onar, nude, with a morning erection.

“Cheerio, Yoke,” he said. “Care if I join you? Missed you in bed this morning.”

“It’s pretty full in here,” said Yoke. “Someone poisoned Cobb.”

“What a stench!” exclaimed Onar, peering into the shower. “Don’t tell me you’re trying to save him? That’ll never work.”

“Why shouldn’t I try?” snapped Yoke. “Do you want to just let him die? Don’t bother to answer. And stop staring at me.”

“You shouldn’t waste your time,” said Onar. “I’ve seen this kind of thing happen before. An overdose of betty. All of his fungus nodules are bursting out with spores, and the spores are going to poison him. Kiss the old duffer good-bye, Yoke. We’ll find you another dive-moldie. Oofa’s expecting us at nine sharp.”

“Sure she is,” said Yoke. “On the dot. Get out of here. It was a big mistake to sleep with you. Onar the one-minute wonder.”

“Goood morning,” said Onar, and left the room.

More and more of the dark dust, the spores, was coming out of Cobb. Some of the dust wafted up toward Yoke. She put a wet washrag over her face to keep from getting lifted. She kneaded Cobb harder and harder.

Finally the old man’s moldie flesh was pink again. His tissues drew back into the shape of a human. He groaned and got to his feet.

“Man. What a burn.”

“You’re all right now?” asked Yoke. Even though Cobb smelled awful, she hugged him. His flesh was cool and smooth.

“When we go in the ocean I’ll really clean myself out,” said Cobb, hugging her back. “Thank you, dear Yoke. I think you saved my life. That green moldie woman, that Vaana, she smeared much too much betty on me. Crazy. Like there was no tomorrow.”

Yoke got out of the shower and began toweling herself off. “She was trying to kill you, Cobb. She’s the King’s girlfriend. She must have flown straight to the Happy Club after I left the palace.”

Cobb remained in the shower stall, flexing his body to squeeze out a little more of the spore-darkened water. “So the King wants me dead,” he said finally. “Did he mention why?”

“Last night I thought it was because he thought you’d talk too much. Now I’m thinking maybe it’s because he didn’t want you here to protect me when I