"Oh now, don't give me that liberal-defeatist crap. That song and dance may work on a congressman-but you're talking to Alan Wise here, and you know your mother doesn't hang out with dummies."
"Mmm, if you say so."
"Listen, I know how the game is played. The military has to make the war look serious to justify all those heavyweight appropriations. Read your history, son! The more money they want, the worse the war gets. It's all about John Q. Taxpayer and his hardearned Labor Standard Kilocalorie banknotes. The truth is, this is a terrific time for a smart man who knows how to read a newspaper."
"I beg your pardon?"
"I'm talking big money, son. Corporations. Licenses, Federal grants. I want you to know, there's an incredible opportunity here!"
"Huh-?"
"It's raining soup!" he said. "It's time to grab your bucket! I'm in the Reclamation Industry-and people are making fortunes every day! It's all there for the taking. There are huge areas still waiting to be reopened-whole cities. Somebody's got to go in and do the job-and whoever does it is going to get rich. Very rich. The government knows this. The army knows it. But all this war-scare stuff is keeping people from seeing the real problemthat big government has got its hands in our pockets again. And it's a very good excuse for the army to go in and nationalize the unclaimed property. You pay attention, son-read the papers! Not just that K'torran stuff. You'll see what's going on."
My mother gave his arm a squeeze and said, "Alan works so hard-" She looked across at me with an expression that said, Don't start an argument.
"Mr. Wise-" I said.
"Alan," he corrected.
I ignored it. "-Mr. Wise, I am a lieutenant in the United States Army, Special Forces Warrant Agency. We take care of those special challenges that are beyond the duties of the regular army. As such," I explained, "we are under the direct command of the President of the United States. The Special Forces is currently assigned to one task and one task only: the eradication of all Chtorran gastropedes-we call them worms-from the continental United States and Alaska. Hawaii is not presently infested.
"In the course of my duties, I have come in contact with over a hundred of the monsters. I have been personally responsible for the deaths of fifteen of them. I have one of the highest kill ratios in the Special Forces. If we had such classifications, I would be considered an ace. So I will tell you this about the worms-"
"Jim-" my mother interrupted. "I don't think this is the time or place for war stories."
I caught myself. I looked at my mother, and at Alan Wise. And realized something. They were both a little red-faced and happy-looking. They were both drunk. I couldn't tell about Mr. Takahara. He was a silent enigma.
What was it Duke had told me once? When a drunk and a fool get into an argument, you can't tell which is which. You have to wait until the drunk sobers up. The other one is the fool. How do you know when a drunk and a fool are in an argument? Easy. Anyone who argues with a drunk is automatically a fool.
Right.
"No, no, hon. Let him talk. I want to hear-" Alan Wise turned and nuzzled my mother's cheek, her neck-he nibbled her ear. She squealed and protested, but she didn't push him away.
I said, "Actually, I don't think we can have this conversation at all-"
"Eh?" He looked up at me.
"-because you really don't know what you're talking about, Mr. Wise. When you've done your research properly, then we can talk." I stood up. Their faces were gaping. "If you'll excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom."
THIRTY-THREE
MY MOTHER was waiting for me when I came out of the bathroom. I'd have been disappointed in her if she hadn't.
"What is the matter with you!" she whispered angrily. "All I wanted was a quiet little evening with the two men in my life! Is that too much to ask! Do you have to ruin everything? Now, I want you to go back in there and apologize-"
I headed for the front door instead.
Her voice went up an octave. "Where are you going?"
"Back to the military-industrial complex for a little more brainwashing," I growled.
Alan Wise of the hearty handshake was leaning up against the front door. I guess he thought that would stop me.
"Son," he said.
"I am not your son-" I warned.
"Whether you apologize to me or not is unimportant. But I certainly think you owe an apology to your mother. You're being rude in her house."
A half dozen possible replies flashed through my head, most of them having to do with the inhabitants of my mother's bedroom. I discarded all of them as being unworthy.
I opened my mouth. I closed it. I realized that whatever I said would only make it worse. The situation was a zero-sum game. I could apologize and be wrong, or I could remove Mr. Wise from the door and leave-and be wrong. It was a question of how wrong I wanted to be. I knew I sure as hell wasn't going to apologize. I only apologized to people I liked.
I started to turn away. The hell with it. I turned back. I said, "Listen-I didn't mean to infer that you don't know anything. You may know quite a bit about your field-but you don't know anything about my field. I know the Chtorran ecology. I just spent three days buried up to my ass in it and three weeks in a hospital recovering. I know what we're up against. You can tell me anything you want about anything else, but I've seen the worms. I've seen what they can do. I've seen-"
And stopped in the middle of my tirade. And realized something.
Three days buried in pink dust-and I hadn't seen the most obvious thing!
Those worms-every single one of them-from the first worm that Duke and I encountered to the congregation that clustered around the chopper to worship the blimp-those worms were the first ones I'd ever seen that had not immediately attacked a human being on sight.
I turned away from Alan Wise and my mother and my anger and walked out onto the terrace again. I held up my hand as a signal for them to leave me alone.
What if he was right-?
Not about all that political crap-but what if he was right about the worms? What if the truth was, they were not hostile?
I picked up my beer and carried it to the balcony rail. I looked out toward the Santa Cruz mountains. Were there worms up there? I wondered.
Look-I told myself-every worm I've ever encountered, I've had a torch in my hands and I've burned it. And that was because all the worms I'd ever seen-until the episode in the dust-had been hostile.
But then-I'd always had a torch in my hands. The episode in the dust was the first time I hadn't. And that was the first time I saw nonhostile worms.
Could it be that the worms were somehow sensing and reacting to my own hostility-?
It was a fascinating idea.
-If I could meet a worm in a situation with no hostility in it, would it still attack?
There was no way to test it. No, check that. There was no safe way to test it.
We'd made up our minds that the worms were a threat-so we were burning them. What if the worms were only a threat to us because we were a threat to them?
The other factor in that equation, of course, was the bunnydogs. Based on the evidence I'd seen so far, you could make a very good case that the bunnydogs controlled the worms. If so, then we knew that the worms could be controlled. Now if we could find out how
I needed to talk about this with Dr. Fletcher. "Jim-" That was my mother. "Are you all right?"
I turned around. Alan Wise was standing behind her. They both looked concerned. Mr. Takahara had discreetly absented himself. I nodded. "I'm fine. I really am. It's just-I just realized something very important." I looked past her to Alan Wise. "You were the catalyst. Something you said. It triggered an idea. Thank you. And-" What the hell, Lizard said it was the one thing I was good at. "-I'm sorry I flew off the handle, I really am-"