World Of Ptavvs   ::   Нивен Ларри

But suppose the reward didn't satisfy him? If he were any kind of thrint he would take the map as soon as he saw it. After all, there was no law against it. Kzanol had better memorize the map.

But there was a better answer.

Yes! Kzanol hurried to the locker and pulled out the second suit. He stuffed the map into one arm. He was elated with his discovery. There was plenty of room left in the empty suit. Briskly he moved about the cabin collecting his treasures. The amplifier helmet, universal symbol of power and of royalty, which had once belonged to his grandfather. It was a light but bulky instrument which could amplify the thrint's native Power to control twenty to thirty non-thrints into the ability, to control an entire planet. His brother's farewell present, a disintegrator with a hand-carved handle. He had a thought which made him put it aside. His statues of Ptul and Myxylomat. May they never meet! But both females would be dead before he saw them again, unless some friend put them in stasis against his return. His diamond-geared, hulifab-cased watch with the cryogenic gears, which always ran slow no matter how many times it was fixed. He couldn't wear it to F124; it was for formal events only. He wrapped each valuable in one of his extra robes before inserting it into the suit.

There was room left over.

In a what-the-hell mood he called the little racarliw slave over from the storage locker and made it get in. Then he screwed the helmet down and pushed the panic button.

The suit looked like a crazy mirror. All the wrinkles remained, but the suit was suddenly more rigid than diamond or hulifab. He propped it in a corner, patted it fondly on the head, and left it.

"Cancel present course to F124," he typed. "Compute and follow fastest course to F124 using only half of remaining power, completing all necessary power maneuvers within the next day."

A day later, Kzanol was suffering mild gnal withdrawal symptoms. He was doing everything he could think of to keep himself busy so that he wouldn't have to think about how much he wanted a gnal.

He had, in fact, just finished an experiment. He had turned off the field in the second suit, placed the disintegrator in its glove, and turned on the field again. The stasis field had followed its metal surface. The digging instrument had gone into stasis along with the suit.

Then the drive went off. Feeling considerable relief, Kzanol went to the board and typed: "Compute fastest course to eighth planet of F124 system. Wait one-half day, then follow course." He put on his suit, picked up the disintegrator and some wire line, and went out the airlock. He used the line to stop his drift until he was motionless with respect to the ship.

Any last thoughts?

He'd done the best he could for himself. He was falling toward F124. The ship would reach the unwatched, uninhabitable eighth planet years before Kzanol hit the third. It should make a nice, big crater, easy to find. Not that he'd need it.

There was a risk, he thought, that the rescue switch might be set off by reentry heat. If that happened he would wake up underground, for it took time for the field to die. But he could dig his way out with the disintegrator.

Kzanol poised a thick, clumsy finger over the panic button. Last thoughts?

Regrettably, there were none.

Kzanol pushed the panic button.

Larry Greenberg climbed out of the contact field and stood up. His footsteps echoed in the big dolphin tank room. There were no disorientation effects this time, no trouble with his breathing and no urge to wiggle nonexistent flippers and tail. Which was natural enough, since the «message» had gone the other way.

The dolphin named Charley was lying on the bottom of the tank. He had sunk from under his own specially designed contact helmet. Larry walked around to where Charley could see him through the glass, but Charley's eyes weren't looking at anything. The dolphin was twitching, all over. Larry watched with concern, aware that the two marine biologists had come up beside him and were looking just as worried. Then Charley stopped twitching and surfaced.

"That wasss willd," said Charley in his best Donald Duck accent.

"Are you all right?" one of the seadocs asked anxiously. "We kept the field at lowest power."

"Sssure, Billl, I'mm ffine. But that was wild. I feel like I sshould have arms and legs and a long nose overhanging my teeth insstead of a hole in my head." Whatever accent Charley had, there was nothing wrong with his vocabulary. "And I havvv thiss terrible urge to make love to Larry's wife."

"Me, too," said Doctor Bill Slater, but under his breath.

Larry laughed. "You lecherous fish! Don't you dare! I'll steal your cows!"

"We trade wives?" Charley buzzed like an MG taking off, then flipped wildly around the tank. Dolphin laughter. He ended the performance by jetting straight out of the water and landing on his belly. "Has my accent improved?"

Larry decided there was no point in trying to brush off the water. It had soaked through to his skin. "Come to think of it, yes, it has. It's much better."

Charley switched to dolphinese, or to pidgin dolphinese, which is dolphinese scaled down to the human range of hearing. The rest of his conversation came in a chorus of squeaks, grunts, ear-splitting whistles, and other extremely rude noises. "When's our next session, mind buddy?"

Larry was busy squeezing water out of his hair. "I don't know, exactly, Charley. Probably a few weeks. I've been asked to take on another assignment. You'll have time to talk to your colleagues, pass on whatever you've learned about us walkers from reading my mind."

"You sure you want me to do that? Seriously, Larrry, there's something I'd like to discuss with you."

"Squeak on."

Charley deliberately speeded up his delivery. Nobody but Larry Greenberg could have followed the rapid chorus of barnyard sounds. "What's chances of a dolphin getting aboard the Lazy Eight III?"

"Huh? To Jinx? Jinx's ocean is a foot deep in scum!"

"Oh, that's right. Well, some other world, then."

"Why would a dolphin be interested in space travel?"

"Why would a walker? No, that's not an honorable question. I think the truth is you've given me the space bug, Larrry;"

A slow grin spread across Larry's urchin face. He found it curiously hard to answer. "It's a damn contagious disease, and hard to get rid of."

"Yes."

"I'll think about it, Charley. Eventually you'll have to contact the UN about it, but give me time first. We'd have to carry a lot of water, you know. Much heavier than air."

"So I've been told."

"Give me some time. I've got to go practically right now."

"But-"

"Sorry, Charley. Duty calls. Dr.