Myth Alliances

of a hazard issue the public gets absolutely crazy. The recall has made the talk shows, newspaper headlines, even getting talked up in 'man on the street' interviews. The reinstatement will get a mention in small print in the 'Corrections' page of the newspaper tomorrow morning. No one will notice it. I'm sorry.'

'But why?' Paldine pleaded. 'Everyone was for it! You all like it.'

'I love it,' the rep said frankly. 'I'm keeping mine. It's cool. But this Skeeve guy got a lot of press when he denounced it on television this morning…'

'Skeeve!'

'Yeah. Do you know him? A Klahd.'

Paldine drew her face into a grim set. 'A soon-to-be-dead Klahd. What did he say?'

'Read it for yourself.' He tossed a newspaper across the desk to Paldine. She read the front page story which was embellished with a picture of a really young Klahd male with blond hair. That was the way the Deveels in the Bazaar described Skeeve the Magnificent. This article described him only as Our Confidential Source. Dammit. How could he have found them? Why was he doing this? The Ronkonese rep looked at her questioningly.

'I'll be back,' she informed him. No sense in killing the messenger, no matter how tempting the prospect was. 'Don't box up the merchandise yet. We may still be able to move it. Once this Skeeve is history.' 'I spent hours looking for him, but the reporter who did the original and, it seems, only interview, said he blipped out of there without finishing answering all her questions. She asked if I wanted to offer her an exclusive tell-all. It was all I could do not to reach down her throat and pull her gizzards out.'

'Never mind,' Vergetta soothed her. 'We'll find another place to unload the Pervomatics. Meanwhile, I think we've found our leak.'

She gestured to the 'hot seat,' where a tall, pale-haired Wuhs sat with Tenobia's knee across his thighs.

'An old lady told us that you took a couple of Klahds through the factory,” the torturer hissed. 'Confess!'

'But madam,' Parrano protested. 'Tours are not against the rules.'

'They saw our special project!'

'W-w-what special project?'

With a questioning tilt to her head, Charilor held up an eggbeater.

'Never mind the small stuff,' Tenobia growled. 'Bring me the gumbo!'

This Wuhs had already heard the stories from Gubbeen and Coolea; he was babbling out his entire life story and apologizing for every misdeed, minor, major and imagined, that he had ever committed. Sweat poured down his silly face as he tried to scramble away from the purple goo in the bowl. 'I'm sorry! I'll never do it again! I swear to you, ladies, I swear!'

'All right, all right, all right!' Vergetta exclaimed, pushing Tenobia away from her victim. 'I believe you.'

That declaration was little consolation to the Wuhs, who had passed out cold at the sight of the pseudopods of bubbling stew pulsing out of the bowl at him. Niki slung him over her shoulder and trudged downstairs to put him into a cell to recover his wits. Charilor picked up the gumbo and a spoon. 'No sense in wasting good food,' she commented.

'But if that gibbering fool didn't show them the Pervomatics,' Oshleen pointed out, 'then this Skeeve saw through the concealment wards. Damn, but this Klahd must be packing some fierce firepower. His reputation must be true.'

'As strong as ours?' Nedira asked.

'Well, it would have to be,' Vergetta agreed.

'I'll pit my wards against anyone's magik!' Monishone protested.

'Then how did he figure out where we were going? What we were making? The Pervomatic hasn't been anywhere but the factory and Ronko!'

'He wouldn't have to have seen them at the factory,' Caitlin spoke up. They all turned to the littlest Pervect. She pounded her hands down on her keyboard. 'He hacked us. I've got a power signature on my computer that came in not too long before the trouble started on Ronko.'

'He's got a computer?'

'Why not? He's got a credit card. I found his credit history on line between Deva, Klah and Perv.'

'How'd he get into your system?'

Caitlin avoided the eyes her elders, ashamed to be caught off guard. 'My bad. I didn't think I'd have to put locks on the back door to this thing, not since this is the only computer in the entire dimension, but it seems I was wrong.'

'Wow,' Charilor scoffed. 'She actually admits she was wrong about something.'

'I think all these Wuhses have been lying to us,' Loorna growled. She threw a hand at the glass prison on the table. 'That one claims that they hired him to get rid of us. I think they brought the Great Skeeve here to bankrupt us so that they can keep us here forever.'

'I want to go home!' Oshleen wailed.

'Right,' declared Vergetta, putting her hands down decisively on the table. 'This means war. He can't be in too many places at once, no matter how tough he is. We'll have several fronts. If he shuts one down, then we'll have the others. He can't cover every dimension. We'll diversify, get into places before he knows that we're there. And we'll shut him down. We are the Pervect Ten. The second he comes back here, he's history.'

Oshleen raised a slender eyebrow. 'What makes you think he's coming back?'

Vergetta picked up the snow globe and shook it. 'We've got his friend.'

TWENTY-SIX

'What do you say to a little revolt?'

— F. CASTRO

'In a paperweight?' I repeated, not for the first time.

'In a crystal sphere,' Kassery said, huddled with us behind the statue. 'I couldn't say if it was used to hold down paper or not. Many of those invited by the Pervects to… to go and converse with them… claim that they have seen him.'

Trust a Wuhs not to be able to make a straightforward statement about anything. 'Are you sure it's him, not an illusion?' I said.

'Well, I would hesitate to doubt such upright members of the community,' Kassery waffled, 'but I have also heard Coolea say something similar. He claimed that he saw my mate standing before our tormentors, then was whisked away.'

'I believe that would confirm that it is he,' Zol suggested. 'If the Pervect Ten meant to frighten their interviewees with the thought that they, too, could become a permanent guest they would leave him on display. Pervects are not subtle people.'

'That's true,' I agreed. 'All right, that's it. I've been feeling guilty because I believed I had driven Wensley to a suicide attack. That had me stuck for a while, but I'm not stuck any longer. We're going to get him out.'

'How?' Tananda asked, reasonably.

'The only way to do it is to beat the Pervect Ten into submission,' I insisted. 'We strip away their strength and put them at our mercy.'

The looks on my friends' faces ranged from astonishment to open pity. Even Gleep wore a puzzled expression.

'Ten Pervects at our mercy?' Bunny asked.

'Are you sure you are feeling all right?' Kassery inquired, with tender solicitousness.