His rare attempt at humor left Kitiara silent for a moment. Then they threw their arms around each other, grateful for their lives. The ramp in the starboard side of the hull dropped down, and the whole gang of gnomes boiled out onto the red turf.
Kitiara said, 'I guess we'd better go down and look after them, before they hurt themselves.'
The gnomes were lost in their specialties by the time Kitiara and Sturm joined them. Sighter scanned the horizon with his spyglass. Bellcrank and Cutwood were filling jars with scoopfuls of red dirt. Rainspot stood apart from the rest, his nose and ears tuned to the weather. He reminded Kitiara of a hunting dog. Stutts was rapidly filling pages in his pocket notebook. Wingover walked around the hull of the Cloudmaster, kicking the tight wooden planks now and then. Roperig and Fitter examined their anchor line and measured the amount that it had stretched when pulled taut. Birdcall and Flash were in a heated discussion. Sturm overheard something about 'wing camber variance' and listened no further. He scooped up a handful of Lunitarian dirt. It was flaky, not granular like sand. As it fell from his fingers, it made a tinkling sound.
'Do you smell what I smell?' asked Kitiara.
He sniffed. 'Dust. It'll settle,' he said.
'No, not that. It's a feeling more than a smell, really. The air has a tingle to it, like a draft of Otik's best ale.'
Sturm concentrated for a moment. 'I don't feel anything.'
Stutts bustled over. 'Here are m-my preliminary findings,' he said. 'Air: normal. Temperature: c-cool but not cold. No sign of w-water, vegetation, or animal life.'
'Kit says she feels a tingle in the air.'
'Really? I h-hadn't noticed anything.'
'I'm not imagining it,' she said tersely. 'Ask Rainspot, maybe he's noticed.'
The weather-wise gnome came running when called, and Stutts asked for his impressions.
'The high clouds will dissipate soon,' said Rainspot. 'Humidity is very low. I don't think it has rained here in a very long time, if ever.'
'Bad news,' Kitiara said. 'We haven't much water left on the ship.'
'Do you sense anything else?' Sturm queried.
'Yes, actually, but it's not a weather phenomenon. The air is somehow charged with energy.'
'Like l-lightning?'
'No.' Rainspot pivoted slowly. 'It's constant, but very low in intensity. It doesn't feel harmful, just… there.' He shrugged.
'Why don't we feel it?' Sturm asked.
'You're not the sensitive type,' Kitiara said. 'Like old Rainspot and me.'
She clapped her hands. 'So, Stutts, now that we're here, what do we do?'
'Explore. Make m-maps and study local conditions.'
'There's nothing here,' said Sturm.
'This is only one small 1-location. S-suppose we had landed on the Plains of Dust on Krynn. W-would you then say that there is nothing on Krynn but s-sand?' Stutts asked.
Sturm admitted that he would not. Stutts called his engineers, and Flash and Birdcall trotted up. 'St-status report.'
'The lightning bottles are two-thirds empty. If we don't find some way to refill them, we won't have enough power to fly home,' Flash said. Birdcall sang his report, and Flash translated for the humans.
'He says the engine was shaken loose from its mountings by the hard landing. But the cut power cable can be patched.'
'I have an idea about that,' said Wingover, who'd joined them. 'If we install a switch at that juncture, we can bypass the fused setting damaged by Rainspot's lightning.'
'My lightning!' the weather gnome protested. 'Since when do I make lightning?'
'Switch? What kind of switch?' Cutwood asked. The sound of disputation had drawn him and Bellcrank.
'A single throw-knife switch,' said Wingover.
'Ha! Listen to the amateur! Single-throw! What's needed is a rotary pole switch with isolated leads — '
Kitiara let out a blood-curdling battle cry and swung her sword around her head. The silence that followed was instant and total. 'You gnomes are driving me mad! Why don't you just appoint someone to each task and be done with it?'
'Only one mind on each task?' Sighter was scandalized. 'It would never get done right.'
'Perhaps Bellcrank could make the switch,' Fitter suggested timidly. 'It will be made of metal, won't it?'
Everyone stared at him, mouths open. He edged nervously behind Roperig.
'Wonderful idea!' Kitiara said. 'Brilliant idea!'
'There isn't much spare metal left,' Wingover said.
'We could salvage some from the anchor,' Rainspot said.
The other gnomes looked at him and smiled.
'That's a good idea,' said Cutwood.
'Fitter and me'll pull in the anchor,' Roperig said. They picked up the thick cable hanging down from the tail and hauled away. Fifty feet away, where the field of stones gave way to the deep dust, the buried anchor leaped ahead in dusty spurts. Then the hook caught on something. The gnomes strained and pulled.
'Want some help?' called Sturm.
'No — uh — we can do it,' Roperig replied. Roperig slapped Fitter on the back and they turned around, laying the rope over their shoulders. The gnomes dug in their toes and pulled.
'Pull, Roperig! Heave ho, Fitter! Pull, pull, pull!' shouted the other gnomes.
'Wait,' said Kitiara suddenly. 'The rope is fraying — '
The hastily woven cable was coming undone just behind Fitter. Twine and strands of twisted cloth spun away, and the two gnomes, oblivious, braced their backs against it.
'Stop!' This was all Sturm had time to shout before the rope parted. Roperig and Fitter fell on their faces with a plunk. The other end of the cable, weighted down by the anchor, snaked away. Bellcrank and Cutwood took off after. it. The roly-poly chemist tripped over his own feet and stumbled. The ragged end of the cable whisked out of his reach. Cutwood, with surprising verve, leaped over his fallen colleague and dived for the fleeing rope. To Sturm's amazement, he caught it. Cutwood weighed no more than fifty or sixty pounds, and the anchor weighed two hundred. As it continued to sink into the red dust, it dragged Cutwood along with it.
'Let go!' Sturm shouted. Kitiara and the gnomes echoed him, but Cutwood was already in the dust. Then, as the others looked on in horror, Cutwood upended and disappeared. They waited and watched for the carpenter gnome to surface. But he did not. Bellcrank got up and took a few steps toward the rim of the rock field. He was shouted to a halt.
'You'll go in, too!' Kitiara said.
'Cutwood,' said Bellcrank helplessly. 'Cutwood!'
A ripple appeared in the motionless dust. It roiled and grew into a hump of crimson grit. Slowly the hump became a head, then developed shoulders, arms, and a squat torso.
'Cutwood!' was the universal cry. The gnome slogged forward heavily, and when he was waist-high out of the dust, everyone could see that his pants had ballooned to twice their usual size. The waist and legs were packed with Lunitarian dust. Cutwood stepped to firmer ground. He lifted one leg and shook it, and a torrent of grit poured out. Bellcrank rushed forward to embrace his dusty friend.
'Cutwood, Cutwood! We thought you were lost!'
Cutwood responded with a mighty sneeze, which got dust on Bellcrank, who sneezed right back, prompting Cutwood to sneeze again. This went on for some time. Finally, Sighter and Birdcall came forward with improvised DustFree Face Filters (handkerchiefs). The siege of sneezing overcome, Cutwood lamented, 'My suspenders broke.'
'Your what?' asked Bellcrank, sniffling.
Cutwood pulled up his deflated pants. 'The anchor dragged me under. I knew it was taking me down, but I couldn't let all our scrap metal get away. Then my suspenders broke. I tried to grab them and the rope jerked out of my hands.' He sighed. 'My best suspenders.'
