Bott hit the floor, and had enough experience by now to scoot out of the way before looking to see where he’d landed. The most immediate threat was coming down the chute.
“Wheeee-boomps!” shouted Louba, legs spreading left and wide as she tumbled toward the floor. ”Ah…yoo-hah! Wanna watch where ‘em knee bones goes?”
“Felt ‘em?”demanded Bassada, rolling off the expanse of overalls. “Troo all ‘at flab?”
“Got tender flab,” the green replied, rolling to get out of Chlorda’s way and, incidentally, to land on top of her blue companion.
”Git off!” Bassada ordered. “Ain’t heard a gold go splat fer nigh onto a fortni’t.”
As Chlordis landed, aiming unsuccessfully for either of her colleagues. Bott studied this new compartment. They were in a black box, the walls on the left and right punctuated by vast red-framed windows. Thick glass gave a view of red trees. Silver bolts and screwheads formed a double line above the floor on the otherwise blank black wall ahead of them. Behind was a black wall where a circular opening near the ceiling was now closing.
“Spose ‘is’s a doorbell,” said Louba, pressing her thumb on a red button near her elbow.
Bott opened his mouth to object but the screech that followed was not of his making. The red trees in the windows zipped right along toward the entrance end of the chamber.
“Hoo-ha!” The green clapped her hands. “Like to see ‘em akhain ketch us now!”
“Better brace ourselves.” The gold scooted backward to a corner of the back wall. “Wherever we’re going, we’re going to hit hard.”
Bassada sat back, slapping the tops of her thighs. “Sit on me lap, Cap’n! I’ll give ya lotsa cushions!”
Bott frowned, and moved over to a window. “Sumpm?” inquired Bassada.
“Prolly got a whiff o’ yer lap,” Louba told her.
Bott shook his head. He had, in fact, not smelled anything in particular, but now he did. “Smoke,” he said, without alarm.
“Movin’ too fast, ha?” inquired Bassada, crawling to the window. “Burnin’ rubba?”
“Not moving at all.” Bott kicked at a wisp of smoke rising from the floor. “It’s the scenery that’s moving. Another bilstim fake.”
Bassada pointed several not random fingers from Louba to the floor. “Yer the one started it. Fling yerself over ‘em holes.”
Bott moved past them to the fourth wall. “Everybody pick up some tools?”
“Won’t ketch me passin’ up what’s useful an’ free.” The blue took an assortment of implements from about her person. “Let’s try ‘em out!”
Bott frowned from the wrench to the bolts. This had been planned. The tools had been too convenient to the place they’d be needed. But the smoke was building up.
“Tink ya kin get it ‘fore we gits smoked like lumpucks in peco sauce?” the green demanded.
“I can open anything when I’m sober,” the captain replied, waving smoke away from his face. “And I haven’t had a drink in three days.”
“I have small hands,” the gold put in. “Let me have a screwdriver.”
“No time fer that,” Bassada replied. “Gotta use ‘em to get out first.”
There were eight bolts and seven screws holding the door down. Bott felt the door strain as he turned the last screw.
“Grab that!” he shouted, dodging as the sharp metal piece flew free. The panel shot to the ceiling and started back down. Louba threw herself up and under, getting both hands on it before it could slam back down.
“Got it!”
“Can you hold it?” Bott crawled forward to examine the triple row of bolts and screws at the base of the panel waiting a wrenchlength behind the first.
“’Til Blues learn which end ta pray outa, Cap’n.”
“Jes hold that pose.” Bassada came around to kick her.
“Be ready to grab this one, whatever it decides to do.”
What it did was what the first panel had done: shot to the ceiling and then started to plunge back down. Bassada scooted in to catch the descending sheet of metal.
“Minds me o’ me firs’ job,” she said, spreading her legs for support. “Holdin’ a big ol’ bucko lamp fer Empra Drandl whilst he trims his toenails.”
“Whatever became of Emperor Drendel?” asked Chlorida, stepping over Bott as he started on the third panel.
“Dummy choked on one o’ ‘em pearls he useta toss up an’ ketch in his mout’.” Bassada sighed. “We had such a nice plan ta kill him, too.”
The third panel worked like the first two, and gave as little additional space. None of the Klamathans could release their grip without danger of being bounced back into the original chamber. Bott had to work around ankles and shins of assorted colors as he worked on the fasteners at the bottom of the fourth. The gold legs seemed to be trembling. How heavy were these panels? As it happened, the fourth door worked exactly the same way, so he was able to find out.
“We could use a coupla copier o’ yer sweetie,” Louba noted. “Coupla akhain, mebbe.”
“This has to…be the…last one.” Emperors could count. There were no bolts and screws now, which was fortunate, as he lacked a way to turn them. There WAS a pink knob, not coincidentally as the level of Bott’s nose. For lack of anything else to do with his time he took hold of this with his teeth, and pulled.
“Good job, Cap’n,” said Louba, as the door fell away and fresh air rushed into the chamber.
“And now what?” asked Chlorda, shifting under the weight of her door.
“Lemme show yez. Grab ‘is for me, green and globe-shaped. I’ll grab Cap’n’s for him.”
“Well, put me pants in a pot an’ call ‘em supper! Blue brains works!”
A blue hand reached up under Bott’s panel. “Now git ta one side, Cap’n, whilst I jumps troo.”
Bott turned, backing into the flashing lights of the next room, but did not let go of the door. “What about the others?”
Bassada pushed her tongue up inside her left cheek and shrugged.
“Gangway, blue bottom!”
Louba let go of her door and lunged, catching both blue and gold as she came down. The doors came down as well, but she was quicker, and the four refugees rolled together, bounced like a remf ball off the fourth door.
“Yick,” noted Bassada, sitting up. “What I had in mind all along, o’course: a mout’ful o’ beauty mud.”
Bott rose to consider what else they’d fallen into. It was another box, with mirrored walls and a mud floor. Colored lights clashed and combined from lamps in the ceiling to provide light and confusion. A small black box was motionless on the ceiling among these flashing lights.
“Better move,” he said.
“Well, toss a feather over the fire!” Chlorda rose to consider herself in the mirror. “Is this my color, I ask you?”
“Anyting sloppy suits yez,” Bassada replied, reaching up to squeeze several pounds of terrain from her hair. She turned to a corner where she was nodded to by dozens of Bassadas.
“We….” Bott considered the ceiling again. The lights had been flashing randomly. Now, accidentally or on purpose, they were beginning to synchronize.
“Come on, crew,” he called. “The emperor…going to…stick to…what’s the….”
The lights were flashing in unison. When they were all off, there was no light in the room and, apparently, no sound.
“Good f…six years young….” Chlorda arched one leg as she studied her reflections and the reflections of those reflections.
The Klamathans were completely engrossed in the mirrors. Bott watched them appear and disappear as they assumed various poses, and did not realize he had been standing still watching them watch themselves until the head of an akhain joined the scene. The creature stepped…or did it? Dozens of multi-colored Klamathans and akhain stood frozen in assorted aspects as the lights flashed on and off. Were they moving, or were they not?
His money said they were moving. He reached into the satchel and fingers the three remaining grenades. Beneath these, his hands found the plate he’d shoved in there earlier.
“Keep m….” he tried to order. Then he turned and spun the plate toward the ceiling. Each flash showed heads turning to follow it as each flash saw it higher and higher in its arc.
It split the box in a spray of sparks. “Now move!” Bott bellowed. The box had been the timer: all the lights were on now. A hammer hit the mud at his left; Bott ducked under the axe. The akhain fought like the guerillas of Jermockh: one weapon to knock the enemy down, the second to knock him off.
The company of four refugees and six akhain all fought for the use of a tall hill in the mud, at the top of which was a srtaircase with a glowing door at its peak. Bott nodded: those hooves might have an advantage in the mud, but if he could get the mud off them, his feet should be better at stairs.
Clawing his way up through the mud, he found his hand on something white and solid. Not a stair, it was another rack of bones. At the end of the arm was a hand with a gun. “Keep moving!” he shouted, raising the gun toward the akhain. He could handle any weapon when he was sober. He hoped.
The gun had four barrels, three gauges, two buttons, and a trigger. Raising this at the advancing horde, he found three of the barrels pointed at him. He turned it around. Three barrels were still pointing his way.
“Take this!” he roared, and threw it into the face of the foremost akhain, stooping toward a mired Chlorda. Louba grabbed the aristocrat out of the way, and noted “Gack!”
With four loud bangs, the gun broke into eight pieces, spraying out shrapnel that smelled worse than the pits of rotting lumpucks he’d crawled through to escape Gederah. The akhain found this irresistible, clustering around the weapon’s bits.
Turning, Bott found himself shindeep in the mud. The point of this room was obviously to stay in motion. One of the akhain was already down to his haunches as he studied the smoking gun.
“C’mon, Bottsy Cap’n!” Bassada got her hands under his arms and hauled him free of the mud, tossing him onto one shoulder and dealing him what was no doubt meant to be an encouraging pat on the fanny, though the echo bounced around the room. Cheering, all three Klamathas reached the top of the stairs with their captain, and plunged through the door.
“Good…job,” Bott called.
“Are you all right, Captain?” Chlorda inquired, as Bassada deposited him on the floor.
Hs stomach had not been prepared for landing hard on a solid blue shoulder. “Been better,” he said.
“I hope there were no drugs in the food.”
“No, I….”
“Stan’ back, stan’ back.” Louba pushed the aristocrat back. “Took pre-med but they woon’t let a green inta medical exams. I’ll check out our Cap’n. Jus’ bend over an’ I’ll take yer tempercher.”
Bott squinted at her. “Where’s your thermometer?”
“Thermometer?”
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