Hylozoic (18 page)

The Peng were getting smaller; they were dwindling to spiky globs. The Peng palace was melting away; and the marble McMansion had shrunk to a doghouse.

Chu sensed that Suller was about to teep to Pekka for help. The senior Peng had been too off balance to try before. But now he was readying his plea to send it out through the lazy eight link.

“Help us, Gaia!” cried Chu. “Jam Suller's teep!”

Gaia focused a blast of virtual noise on Suller and Gretta, scrambling their signals. But—oh, no!—off to the side, Kakar managed to teep out a crazed squawk.

On the instant, the rebellion was crushed. Pekka awoke the slumbering Pekklet, who used her quantum entanglement with Jayjay to slam him with a psychic stun-stick. Jayjay keeled over and crashed to the cottage floor like a toppling statue. He no longer had the power to think, let alone to move his limbs.

Thuy screamed and ran to him, kneeling at his side. Chu felt an unworthy twinge of jealousy.

An altered hum crooned from his Jayjay's mouth; his skin was still rough with bumps. He was vibrating at a femtohertz rate as before, but now he was restoring the runic computations that he'd just erased.

Out in the clearing, the atoms' matter waves were once again feeding energy into the spiky auras of Suller, Gretta, and Kakar. The Peng's bodies fluffed and fattened; their legs grew knobby and long. They squawked cheerful reassurances each to each. The outlandish form of the Peng palace humped itself back up, and the marble walls of the gold-roofed mansion grew into place, as dull as before.

Once again, Chu's body felt dim and slow. Should he and
Thuy teleport out of here, taking Jayjay along? Or stay to keep fighting the Peng?

The cabin door swung open and closed as if on its own. The air in the room wavered to reveal Duxy the alien manta ray. She'd snuck in here, only to drop her invisibility shield. Her elegant wings stretched from wall to wall, pulsing with pink spirals.

“Hrull!” squawked Gretta from afar. “Drill the Hrull with a klusper ray, Suller! And fry that crazy little boy!”

“Help me!” Duxy implored Chu. “Teek the two of us to Lusky's hideout before Suller kills us!”

Chu hesitated for a moment, wondering if Duxy were trying to stampede him. Why had she made herself visible here and now, if not to stir up trouble with the Peng?

A lemon-yellow femtoray bored a pencil-thick hole through the cabin door and out the wall on the other side.

“Ow,” teeped the wall.

Wood smoke hung in the air. Luckily, Chu and Duxy had ducked the ray's path. But now Suller was preparing to send another bolt from his beak.

“Run!” Thuy urged Chu. “I'll stay here.”

In a flash, Chu had teleported himself and Duxy to the field of slates where the mothership Hrull had lain. The great manta shape was nowhere to be seen. Instead, a much smaller Hrull was hovering above the stony wasteland: Duxy's father, Wobble, small like Duxy.

“What are you doing here alone, Dad?” teeped Duxy ingenuously. “Where's Mom? I wanted to get in her mouth to fly away from the Peng.”

“On a pusher colony world, it's standard practice for an exploratory party to split up,” said Wobble. “The monkey-men can turn violent in a flash. Duxy, you and I will flap west to the
ocean. It's only a half hour's flight. We'll rest for a couple of days, sleeping in a cove and eating sea life.”

“Yum!” said Duxy brightly.

“What about me?” said Chu.

“Ah,” said Wobble. “You. You'll see quite soon.”

With one of his sinister, gurgling laughs, Wobble flapped off with Duxy trailing him, the two of them shading into invisibility. As they left, something edged out from behind the bluff—and a shadow fell across the field. It was Lusky, vastly airborne, her mighty wings blotting out the red streaks and gold filigree of the dying evening sky.

With a gentle sighing sound, the big Hrull swept toward Chu, her mouth agape. Chu could have teleported away; he could have shot at the giant Hrull with his stonker gun. But stupidly he took off running across the slates, expecting to reach shelter by the cliff. He might have made it, but he tripped over a scarecrow figure lying on the ground: the fresh corpse of a skinny man or boy. Almost spitefully, the unused gun sprang from Chu's pocket and skittered far out of reach.

And then Lusky was upon him, huge and implacable. Chu teeped Thuy a last farewell.

“I'll love you forever.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

J
ayjay
lay on his side, his mouth downcurved in a deathmask grimace, his eyes like glass. Thuy rolled him onto his back so he'd be more comfortable; his head clunked against the floor. He'd wet his pants. She shuddered, thinking of her invalid mother.

The three Peng birds pushed into the cabin. Gretta ventured an exploratory peck at Jayjay's wrist, perhaps meaning to check his pulse, but digging deep enough to draw blood.

Thuy sprang at Gretta and slugged her, puffing dust from her shabby feathers.

Suller aimed his beak and sizzled a warning hole through the floor beside Thuy's feet. Holes in the cabin, holes in her heart, a hole in Jayjay's soul.

The Peng were squawking about wanting to move him
around the country opening more ranches, with Thuy acting as his nurse. Unbearable thought.

Just then Thuy heard Chu's voice in her head, bidding her farewell, saying that he loved her.

Reflexively she teleported toward the boy, guilty about leaving Jayjay's side so soon, but desperate for a chance to catch her breath.

Chu's call had come from the talus field by the cliff where the Hrull mother had been. The manta was airborne, a dark high diamond against the sunset sky all plowed in furrows of gold. A nude body lay on the vast waste of stones—oh no.

Thuy was trembling all over, her world was coming apart. First Mom, then Jayjay, now Chu—

She approached the inert figure. Male—but, no, he wasn't Chu. His skin was a yellowish shade of green, and the center of his forehead bore a third eye. A used-up pusher?

He smelled of sulfur, like some unappetizing vegetable. She took a step back, still studying him. His ribs stuck out; his elbows and knees were knobby lumps. Had the Hrull starved him?

Casting about, Thuy found the blue stonker gun. She tucked it into the waistband of her skirt, hiding the butt under her shirt. And then she teeped after the Hrull ship, wanting to contact Chu. But his access was blocked. Gone for good? Not likely. Chu would want to see her again, what with his big crush. That had been a sweet kiss.

For now, there was nothing to do but return to her disabled husband—still lying on the living room floor. The three Peng were so busy making plans that they'd barely noticed Thuy's brief absence. She stashed the stonker in the bedroom, then bent over Jayjay and removed his soiled trousers. She cleaned him up and teeked a box of adult diapers from a San Francisco
drugstore where she had an account. Just like for her mother. How horrible.

Suddenly it crossed Thuy's mind that if she could teleport Jayjay somewhere far away from Yolla Bolly he might become her cheerful, healthy husband again. Of course! She poised herself for the jump, already growing translucent, but—

“We're not letting up on him now,” cawed Gretta, reading Thuy's mind. “Don't forget that the Pekklet has full control of your husband's body. She'd sooner stop his heart than let him go free. So don't try any ratty little tricks.”

“Okay,” said Thuy, steeling herself. She'd wait them out. Sooner or later the Pekklet would sleep again.

“We need your man to open more Peng ranches,” repeated Suller, his voice slurred from the mead. Pekka had reconstructed him exactly as he'd been just before the humans' failed attack. “You'll teleport Jayjay and nurse him for us, right?”

Thuy only nodded, waiting to see what came next.

“Eventually we'll open more California ranches, but the wife's got an attitude about that,” continued Suller. “So first we hit the South. Lots of worms and beetles there, could be a draw. I've found a great spot to kick off our campaign. The Crown of Creation Worship Center in Killeville, Virginia.”

“That's—that's a right-wing fundamentalist group,” said Thuy, surprised at his choice. “They're idiots. They're against omnividence, telepathy, intelligence amplification, and the silps. They want to roll everything back.”

“I've got a hunch they'll make good Peng partners,” said Suller. “My family and I can't leave our ranch, seeing as how we're tulpas, but I picked a couple of human Realtors to help you, I happen to like their names. You four will make good money and we'll all be friends. Come on up to our patio and help us drink the rest of that mead.”

Thuy begged off and laid Jayjay under a blanket on the couch. And then she started thinking about how to feed him. But something else was nagging her. It was her duty to tell Ond about his missing son. She put in an encrypted teep call.

“Chu did
what
?” said Ond distractedly. With so much going on, he hadn't noticed Chu's disappearance. He, Nektar, Kittie, Jil, and Jil's kids were out in the night together, looking for a place to stay in Santa Cruz—which lay south of the San Francisco Peng ranch.

Evidently the funky beach town was a madhouse of Bay Area refugees. Just now Ond was being threatened with a baseball bat by one of the always irascible Cruz locals. What with all the motels full, Ond's family had dared teleporting into a dark and empty beach house. But the owner had been teep-watching his property from a few blocks away, and had hopped in at the first sparkle of their teleportation dots, a weapon at the ready.

While Thuy watched from afar, Ond calmed the property owner by giving him some cash, and by promising him a cut of this evening's
Founders
royalties. Suddenly the owner was happy. He was hosting celebs. He wanted to seal the deal by smoking a joint.

“Just so I know you're good people,” said the Cruzan, lighting up.

“Run that by me again, Thuy,” teeped Ond, ignoring the landlord.

“I said Chu's joined the crew of a Hrull mothership,” repeated Thuy. “A giant alien manta ray. She carries her passengers inside her body, and she conscripts humanoids to help her teleport. The Hrull call them pushers.”

Ond began speed-scanning through Thuy's memories of her day, and she didn't have the heart to block him out. “What's that dead body I'm seeing?” he demanded, growing very agitated.

“I think that's the pusher who Chu's replacing,” said Thuy. “So far as I know, Chu went of his own free will. He'll make his way back to us. I—I'm quite sure of that.”

“He loves you?” exclaimed Ond, skipping from Chu's farewell words to the afternoon kiss. “And you led him on? He's a fragile boy, Thuy! How could you!”

“I was teaching him how to be with girls,” said Thuy. Up till now, she'd been thinking of her flirtation with Chu as a harmless game, or even as a generous gesture. But now she began feeling ashamed.

“It's thanks to you he left on this crazy adventure,” teeped Ond grimly. “And it's thanks to your husband the aliens are here at all.” He paused, waving off the stoner landlord. “About Jayjay,” he continued. “For the good of Earth, have you considered—”

“Killing him?” snapped Thuy.

Even as they talked, Thuy was teeking food into Jayjay's empty stomach: milk and apple sauce. Like stuffing a chicken. Jayjay seemed to sense the food appearing in his belly; the severe downward curve of his lips had lessened somewhat. It was doing Thuy good to be helping him.

“I could never hurt him,” she teeped Ond. “We'll find another way. I'm thinking the Hrull can still help us. They're enemies of the Peng from way back. I know a special whistle for calling the Hrull. I bet Chu and the mothership are still around.”

“I sure hope so,” said Ond grimly. “Hop down to Cruz right now and give the whistle a try. It'll be better to do it outside the Peng's influence zone. Come on and bring Jayjay along. I can help you teek him if he's too heavy. Those Peng birds aren't watching you right now. They're passed-out drunk.”

Sure enough, the three Peng were nestled in a fluffy heap on their mound of straw, gently snoring.

“I'd love to escape,” said Thuy. “I feel so alone. But Pekka's local agent is hiding down in the subdimensions, watching Jayjay. The Pekklet. We have to wait for her to take a break again.”

Ond was losing his focus. Some other refugees had just teleported into their newly rented house, an extended family of fourteen from the Mission district. Jil was in mother-hen mode, defending her two kids' beds. The house's owner reappeared to collect more money. And now Chu's mother, Nektar, tuned in on Thuy's bad news and began floridly freaking out.

“Get Jayjay into a quantum-mirrored room, and that should shield him from his link to the Pekklet,” teeped Ond hurriedly. “The quantum mirrors work against quantum entanglement. I can get you into a room like that at Seven Wiggle Labs. I know the owners—Jayson and Stefan. Go there now! Then you can whistle for the Hrull and get Chu! You owe me that, Thuy. This is all your fault.”