“What? All our cargo, are you kidding me? Do you have any idea how long it'll take?”
The sergeant shook his head. “No, no. We are concerned about one specific individual carrying what appears to be a funerary box in his backpack.”
Uh-oh. Chances that there were two such fugitives on a billion-mile-long megastructure, pretty low. I tensed and started planning escape routes before I remembered that I no longer resemble Bob, and I was not wearing a backpack at the moment.
“We will also need to inspect personal luggage.”
Awwww… shit.
“You will like hell,” Snidely exclaimed, striding up and sticking out his chest.
“And who might you be,” the cop glared at him and put a hand on his sword.
“I am Snidely Whiplash, of the Whiplash family. You’ve no doubt enjoyed our wine on many occasions. We can bring considerable pressure to bear if our family name is insulted.”
The cop was taken aback. No doubt dealing with powerful families, especially belligerent powerful families, was considerably above his pay grade.
After a moment the cop replied, “Yes sir, understood. Obviously, you would not be a suspect in any case. Your luggage is where?”
Snidely casually waved a hand in the direction of the miscellaneous pile. “See that it isn’t touched.”
As I followed Snidely's hand-wave, I got an idea. As casually as I could, I moved in the direction of the pile where our trunks were located. I began to untie the tarp covering the trunks and other small items. As I gathered it, I surreptitiously wiped off my trunk is much as I could. It still ended up looking more travel worn than Snidely's, but not by much.
A couple of cops came over, evidently pleased with my cooperation, and started looking over the pile.
“Those are Mr. Whiplash’s trunks,” I said, pointing to the two items. “Everything else is just cargo.”
One of the cops nodded to me and they began randomly opening boxes. “How many people aboard?” one said to me. “Captain Lisa, Ted, Freda, Orrick, myself, and Mr. Whiplash. We’re all on deck.” I pointed to each individual as a named them.
“None matches the description,” the other cop said. “And this is just junk,” he added, waving at the boxes.
“I'm sure the captain would disagree,” I replied with a small smile.
The cop snorted and they moved back to the gangplank. One shook his head at the sergeant. A few seconds of discussion with Captain Lisa and the cops trooped away. Letting out a breath, I re-tarped the miscellaneous pile. As I straightened up after tying the last bite, I found Snidely gazing at me, a slight frown on his face. As casually as possible, I gave the tarp a tug and walked off to my next chore. But any attention from anyone was bound to be a bad thing. I would have to keep an eye on His Bigness.
As it turned out, we would be crossing segments. Two passengers signed on, wanting to go in that direction, and the captain was able to subcontract on a shipment to Orchard Hill, just on the other side of the mountains. Subcontracting wasn't as potentially profitable as hauling our own goods, but it was a no risk payday. And a couple of paying passengers was just bonus.
The passengers, a very old Quinlan and her granddaughter, were heading back to the family home. Teresa was far too old to endure any kind of extended swim, so Belinda had swim upstream several hundred miles to take her home. Quinlans had a strong reverence for the elderly, so the captain didn't balk at all when we set up a comfortable area in the sun for Teresa. Even Snidely didn't seem inclined to complain.
Belinda doted on her grandmother, but wasn't otherwise talkative. She was friendly, but she would never use two words when a gesture or a grunt would do. On the few occasions that she did have to speak full sentences, she seemed to be almost out of practice. Remembering Bridget's comments about breeding away from tool user intelligence, I wondered if this might be a sign of that. Or maybe she just wasn't a talker.
Once they were settled in. We went through the by now routine frenetic running around that characterized leaving port. The cargo we'd taken on at Beetle Juice - which was mostly Beetle Juice, no surprise - was making the Hurricane wallow a little more than usual, so we were taking extra care to maintain a good conservative trim. Once the boat was in mid-river and running an easy reach, we were able to break for lunch. I jumped in with the other crew members and we chased down some juicy fish. Yum. Unfortunately, given the close quarters, I had to be seen to be eating, sleeping, and so on, just like everyone else. So, fish for breakfast, fish for lunch… when I was done with the Bender rescue, I resolved that I would never go near fish again.
We brought up a dozen or so as well, for the captain and passengers. I sat down with Teresa and Belinda, studiously ignoring Snidely who was snarfing back fish like he hadn't been fed in weeks. The Pav would've approved of his table manners. My mother, not so much. Belinda quietly removed the less desirable fish parts with a small but doubtless expensive knife, and offered the fillets to her grandmother, who took them with a smile.
“Belinda’s not much for talking,” Teresa said to me. “I've watched you try to engage her in conversation.” She placed a fond hand on her descendant’s head. “Kids are getting less and less verbal, it seems.”
“I have a friend who commented that it's less necessary in Heaven's River, so intelligence is being gradually bread out.”
“With some help from the Administrator, I’ve heard that theory. Not impossible but their manipulation would have to be very subtle.”
“Oh, in Father's name. More yokel superstition,” said Snidely. “Save me from the uneducated.”
Teresa gave him
