were doing all right, but Susan was struggling with her heavy backpack. I saw her lose her foothold several times, with Darla boosting her rear end back up. We continued the long descent. The air currents weakened as we got further down, then the odd angle worsened until it became a real problem to hang on, making it necessary to use the rungs as handholds only and fight for purchase with our heels against the smooth wall of the shaft, skidding and scuffing our way down. The angle was steep, but further ahead it began to level out. Before we got that far, the shaft began to move, sometimes lurching violently, banging up against us and making it hard to judge where to grab next. I heard a squeal, and before I could look back, Susan slid past me, disappearing into the darkness. Then the shaft buckled crazily and John was next to go. I reached out for him, but missed. The hand grips were almost directly above now and were impossible to grab if you were sliding. The flexible shaft was dancing like a length of rope in the wind, pitching wildly in every direction, and it was Darla's turn next, but I managed to catch her as she passed ? and lost my grip in the process.
It was a quick trip down. Very soon we were off me smooth plastic of the tube and onto a wet, warm sliding-board of organ-tissue. In the total darkness, I braced for a sudden stop, not knowing what we were sliding into, but before long I could see light ahead. Then the slope leveled out and we skidded over flat surface for a dozen meters until we stopped. We were soaking wet. A torch beam hit me and then swung to Darla. It was John, and he walked over, Susan with him.
'Interesting idea for an amusement-park ride,' he said.
I got up and helped Darla to her feet. 'Where are we?' I asked him.
He played the beam ahead and I saw a few parked vehicles in the distance. 'Good,' I said, got out Sam's key, and was about to call when something hit the back of my legs and bowled me over. It was the kid. He apologized, then groaned, as anyone would with 90 kilos of truckdriver on his chest. I got off him. John swung his light in the direction of the shaft. Lori and Roland were skating toward us like champions, then broke into a nimble trot over the treacherous surface until they reached us.
'You people were in a hurry,' Lori said cheerily.
'What was all that jerking around about?' I asked.
'Oh, that's nothing. We don't bother to spray down empty areas. And the floor's so slippery because we didn't put down rosin here.'
'Oh.' I keyed Sam.
'Where are you now?'
'Turn on your high beams.'
He wasn't more than a minute's walk away.
After me, it was Lori whom Winnie hugged when we all got in, and I was at a loss to explain how Winnie could have gotten any sense of betrayal from Darla, for clearly she had. At first, she barely acknowledged her onetime friend and interpreter. Perhaps she read the guilt in Darla's face, invisible to me, but by now Winnie's empathic powers were a given. I only wondered as to their extent. Whatever that was, I knew that Winnie's second sight was keen enough to see Darla's grief, and perhaps her regret at using Winnie as a pawn, because before long Winnie was hugging Darla too, her capacity for forgiveness and compassion probably greater than anything. It was a moment of revelation for me, because up until then I really didn't have a robust sense of Winnie's personhood, couldn't really accept her as the thinking, feeling being she obviously was. I didn't know what prejudices had gotten in the way; I have my share, but maybe the problem had been a simple lack of attention on my part. Winnie's subtle brand of personality and intelligence were easy to lose amid the gunfire, the frantic chases, the noise, and the intrigue. Her innate shyness and reticence didn't help either. All along I had caught glimmers of the light she was hiding under a bushel of soft, ape-brown hair, but I hadn't had the time nor the opportunity to groom through the shag and see what was glowing. Nor did
I now. We had to get somewhere, and quickly. But where?
'The pyloric tube between this sac and Fiona's starboard stomach-cluster would be best,' Lori said.
'Sounds cozy,' I said, thinking that it sounded horrible. But before we could get going, we had the kid to contend with. He said he was coming along for the ride, but was adamant about finding his car.
'I don't want my Chevy burped up like a pizza,' he told us.
'Where we're going,' I said, 'it could wind up as whale food.'
'Not my car, buddy.'
I silently agreed with him. That vehicle could give anyone an ulcer. The kid borrowed John's torch and walked off into the gloom. Lori said that there was something she wanted to look for, and left too. The rest of us took the opportunity to get out of wet clothes. The digestive fluid was beginning to eat through them and irritate the skin. Susan wailed that her new suit was ruined. I told her to shove all our laundry in the Sonikleen right away.
Lori returned first, carrying a piece of gear that consisted of two tanks worn on the back, connected to a length of hose with a spraygunon the end. She explained that one tank contained aluminum hyroxide, the other an antispasmodic chemical.
'It numbs Fiona up so she doesn't get the dry heaves,' she said.
About ten minutes later the kid's strange vehicle pulled alongside us in the aisle. Abused vehicles lay all around, the result of Sam's forcing his way out of the pack. I hoped Pen-dergast's insurance was paid up. I convinced the kid that the best bet would be to drive his car into the trailer. The observatory equipment only made up a quarter-load and was stashed in our special 'eggcrate' section for fragile goods. We had plenty of room. Sam slid out the ramp and let him in. I went back to look the trailer over, check for damage. The stargazer stuff seemed in good shape for all the rocking it had taken, but then Sam and I specialize in hauling delicate equipment, especially scientific gear. I improvised some chock-blocks for the Chevy out of spare bracing bars from the eggcrate nook, then looped tether lines through the Chevy's shiny chromium ?
'Hey! What d'you call these things?'
'Bumpers.' ? bumpers, and tied the lines off as taut as I could. It would have to do.
After Sam sealed up the trailer, we were ready. I started up and pulled away, heading for the part of the sac that was devoid of vehicles. There the floor got slippery again and started a gentle slope downward. Lori warned me to go slowly, and I took heed. The ceiling lowered and the walls got closer, the passage narrowing finally into a tunnel. The walls seeped clear fluid in glistening sheets, rolling and billowing like a flag in a soft breeze. The passage started to wind, then became serpentine. We slithered along until we encountered an obstacle, a white disk of tissue sealing off the passage like a drumhead. It was a valve. Lori told me to ease up to it and give it a nudge, which I did. After some prodding, the valve dilated and we went through. From there we wound our way back along the tube, passing more valves which plugged other passages branching to the side. We continued on the main route for a few more minutes until Lori told me to stop. She got into her spray gear and stepped out. When the door opened, an acrid, vomity stench found its way in. Everyone gagged. The walls here were more active, rippling excitedly in little waves that traversed the tube from rear to front. Lori sprayed the walls down with white goop, and in a minute or two things calmed down. She got back in. There was enough good air in the compressors to get most of the vomit-smell out, but enough lingered to make the wait uncomfortable. But we waited. 'How long should we stay down here?' John asked. 'Until the fight's over, whenever that is,' I replied. 'But if the ship is seized… well, it's anybody's guess.' 'We'll win,' Lori said confidently. 'We always do.' 'Why do the pirates want to take over another mega?' 'Theirs is probably getting old. Megas are scarce. Who knows? They may just hate humans.'
'Very likely,' John said sardonically. 'Humans are the beings you love to hate. Suzie, could you move over a bit?'
It was very cramped inside the cab. Everyone shifted positions in the back seat for optimum comfort. Darla and Winnie were in the aft cabin.
John began, 'Strange to find pirates on?' The rig suddenly shivered, then nosed forward and began to slide. I braked, but it did no good. We slid forward for a few meters before the tube leveled again. The walls were heaving inward now, constricting around the rig and squeezing.
'Fiona's spasming,' Lori said, looking worried. 'The attack must be disturbing her. I'd better spray again.'
'Wait,' I told her as the tube buckled and whipped around, the contractions squirting us farther forward. We waited for it to stop. 'Okay, now.'
We watched Lori spray the tunnel around us liberally. The rig got shoved forward again and I had to give Lori a blast on the horn to warn her. She turned, lost her footing and slipped, but crawled out of the way in time. She continued spraying until she ran out of stuff, then mounted the boarding rungs to get back in. Just as she got her
