There was a huge flash of light. When it cleared, the thousands of Wuhses marching and chanting in the courtyard had vanished without a trace. The street was silent.
I groaned, overwhelmed with grief at the tragic and unnecessary loss of life.
'They're back."
NINETEEN
"You say you want a revolution?"
"That's it!" Vergetta howled, dropping the hands of the two Pervects on either side of her. "I can't stand it any longer! I did not need this on top of just getting out of jail. Everyone's grounded. No exceptions!"
"What the hell brought that on?" Niki wondered, taking a quick glance out of the window. The spell had worked. The street was empty of life.
"You're the ones who let the place go to hell while we were gone," Paldine accused her. "Why don't you tell us."
Niki gawked at her. "We let it go to hell? Did it really take all eight of you to find out that you'd laid an egg in that other dimension? A few of you could have stayed here and helped keep order. But no-o-ooo. You left two of us—two of us—having to play hall monitor for an entire country, and now look what we had to do!"
"Those intruders must have been watching us," Tenobia grunted. "Look how they knew to come in with us to avoid being toasted by the barrier spell. They've been planning this for a while."
Loorna kicked a pile of papers that had been cast to the floor by the invaders. "This place is a mess! It doesn't look like they have dusted in here in days."
"Well, sure," Niki snarled defensively, "I could have been cleaning up in here, if I didn't have to oversee the distribution of merchandise in the morning, monitor factory operations all day, and still have time to work on special projects. That's why we have all those janitors!"
"Did it ever occur to you you're complaining about the color of the dragon's nail polish just before the paw comes down and smashes your worthless carcass into a grease stain? Those janitors just facilitated an attempted palace coup," Tenobia reminded them.
"That's right, girls," Nedira soothed, trying to make peace. "We have bigger problems than dusty bookshelves."
'This is totally lame," Caitlin snorted, sitting down at her computer and tapping in the data off the sheet Oshleen handed her. "I mean, you didn't make a single gold piece on the whole Scamaroni enterprise. You lost all of our investment!"
"Give your elders more respect, dear," Nedira corrected her. "We were up against unfair opposition."
"Yes, the Klahdish wizard," Vergetta grumbled. 'The one who really escaped."
"Did anyone get his name?" Tenobia asked. Oshleen reached down into her cleavage and pulled out a sheaf of papers.
"I always knew you stuffed. What's that?"
"The court docket," the accountant replied, with a haughty stare. "They wouldn't let Paldine see it. We'll send it back when we're through with it."
"I can't read this merde," Loorna sneered. "It's in Scammie."
"Ugh," Oshleen groaned. "I knew we should have bribed the bailiff. He could have read it to us." Caitlin waved an imperious hand. "Give it to me. I'll run it through the translator." The smallest Pervect spread the papers out in front of her screen and typed in a command. The computer started humming. In a moment a huge rectangle projected itself upon the wall. "There."
"Smee, Smee," Niki mused, running down the names that appeared in the document during the target dates. "There's a Glee here, a Skeeve, and a Paneer."
"Cheesy," smirked Tenobia.
"Save the cheap jokes. So, which one is our wizard?"
"We heard of a Skeeve when we were on Deva," Vergetta offered. "But we heard he's retired. What would he be doing on Scamaroni?"
"No idea," Loorna rejoined. "What the hell, we're out of there now. We'll just have to pick up where we left off, pay our suppliers and start over." Niki snorted. "What?"
"You have no idea what's been going on since you left," the scientist growled.
"I notice that this place is a mess," Charilor taunted.
"Eat a bomb. We can't pay our suppliers. While you were out the stupid sheep have been in and out of this place every damned day, sneaking out money and goods. They've been on a buying spree that you would not believe."
"Oh, now what have they brought back this time?" Nedira groaned.
"You name it," Caitlin innumerated, having her computer flash more pictures up on the wall. "One day a clothing fad: genuine fur socks. Poorly tanned, I might add. They'll start stinking any time now, maybe even before the novelty wears off. Then, the very next day everybody had to have shutterbug viewers. And today Niki's been confiscating flight candy. If there was anything more annoying than Wuhses, flying Wuhses is it."
Vergetta nodded. "And they've been ripping us off to pay for them."
"All but today," Niki replied. "I finally took what was left of the treasury and stuffed it in the safe." Paldine sneered. "You should have done that the first time."
"No, I should not have done that the first time," Niki disagreed. "You know what goes in that safe never goes away. You can always get it back again by reaching in to where you put it. Whoever invented it was a Pollyanna who believed everybody in the universe was honest. If the Wuhses knew that this chunk of change could be resurrected every single time it was spent they'd be committing grand larceny all over the dimensions, and I won't be responsible for that."
Vergetta sighed. "I can't disagree with you. So, now what? We're further in the hole than we were before. We don't want debt collectors showing up looking for payment we can't give them. Like it or not we are responsible for setting these fools straight, finding another source of cash, and stopping up the holes once and for all."
"Now will you believe me when I say we need to get that D-hopper away from them?" Loorna asked.
The elder held up her hands in mock surrender. "All right, all right! You were right and I was wrong. Get it."
Loorna grinned. "That will be my pleasure."
"Anyone have any ideas for our next business venture?" Vergetta asked the room.
"Oh, come on!" Paldine protested. "We just got out of jail! Who can innovate under those circumstances?"
"Honey, we've got to hit the ground running," the elder female urged. "We've had setbacks, sure, but I don't want to be stuck here forever."
"Besides," Niki smirked, "I wasn't in jail. I have been working. What do you think of this?"
With a flourish she reached under the big table and produced a palm-wide cylinder with a plunger on top.
"Signature chop?" Monishone asked.
"Half right," Niki grinned, hitting the knob on the top. Businesslike little blades dropped out of a concealed mid-section. "It chops. It purees. It mixes. Put it down on top of raw food and it makes a meal out of it. Automatic safety doors so idiots can't stick their fingers in the blades or the heating element."
"Technology?" Monishone snorted.
"Don't knock it. I think it'd sell in more places than your stupid toy. It doesn't use electricity, it doesn't need magikal energy to run. All power is provided by piezoelectric contacts. It's very simple technology. Even a moderately smart monkey can operate it."
"So the Wuhses will have no trouble making them?" Charilor said, pointedly.
"The one thing I can't fault these sheep on is manual dexterity," Niki assured them. "We've got the capacity for mass production. I've already had our concealed shop stop making the glasses. Crom knows what we'll do with six thousand unsold units. We can't break them down en mass. The magik released would probably blow up the castle. We were lucky there were no accidents on Scamaroni."