crum-bum!" Trog snarled.
"After I set things to rights again, I'll string him up by his heels and
esplain the arrow of his ways to him with the cat-o'-nine-tails— two teams
working in relays. He'll be worry he ever seen this place."
"Trog," Roy said in a more kindly
tone, "do you ever regret the way you sold out Ajax and made off with
classified materials?"
"Naw," Trog said firmly.
"Anyways, I never made off with no secret stuff, nor no plans and specs
neither."
"Then, how'd you get here, three octaves
outside your own A-O zone?"
"It was screwy," Trog said. "I
was onna trail, headin' for a big time in Port Miasma, and all of a sudden I
run smack into a swamp where no swamp oughta be."
Lafayette's attention wandered, and he dropped
off into a sound sleep. It seemed hours later when Sprawnroyal's hoarse voice
at close range penetrated his lazy dreams of ease and comfort back home in
Artesia:
"... you're too big to lug, Slim. So, come
on, wake up now while we got a chanct, and let's check this out. This could be
the break we been waiting for."
O'Leary opened his eyes and winced at the throb
in his skull. He fingered a lump the size of a walnut above his ear. Slowly, he
got to his feet. Trog, trussed from neck to ankles in stout new hemp rope, lay
beside a small campfire. Around it Squirrely, Casper, and Rugadoon, bruised but
cheerful, sat eating enthusiastically from small cans.
"I had a nice talk with old Trog,
here," Roy told Lafayette comfortably. "I think maybe we gotta way
outa this mess after all." He paused to hand Lafayette two of the small
cans from his bulky backpack. "Better chow down now, Slim," he
suggested. "Once we get moving, there won't be no time."
"What are you going to do?" Lafayette
asked, dipping into a can of swamp-pheasant fricassee. "Good," he
commented.
"Right; what we figger is a man on a tough
field job needs class eats to keep up the old morale," Roy confided.
"Now, you know how to triangulate, Slim, check out what parts of a locus
match up with your baseline, and calibrate how far out you are, locus-wise, from
where you was at when you begun."
"I've never done the calculations,"
Lafayette replied, "but I understand the principle. For example, we can
figure Aphasia II is very close to Aphasia I, where Daphne's lost, on the basis
of the similarities in the landscape, plus personnel. Trog, for example."
Roy shook his head. "Trog's a bad example,
Slim. This here's the same Trog you run into before, not a analog. But
you're right; you're still in the same A-range as where you lost Daphne at. But
where's that at? Huh? How close are we to the Artesia range? That's a
little tougher; we got to fall back on topography. Like, in Artesia, you got a
desert, a dry lake bed, west o' town. Then in Melange, it's still a lake, and
farther in the same direction, just in the next range, you got a bay, a arm o'
the sea: that's Colby Corners and all, your old home town before you came to
Artesia. So here we got a saltwater swamp. Looks like a little tectonic
activity has pushed up a ridge and cut the bay off, and here it's partly
drained. In Melange it's turned into a freshwater lake: The swamp never formed
because the ridge wasn't that high there; so with the springs at the bottom,
plus rainfall, you got a lake. In Artesia, it drained and there was a spillway
open in the ridge, so it went dry and you got a desert. The swamp here puts us
off on a tangent to our direct route back to the Artesia/Melange
wide-range."
"How do we get back?" O'Leary cut in
impatiently. "At least to Aphasia I, if not to Artesia?"
"There's things I can't tell
"After I set things to rights again, I'll string him up by his heels and
esplain the arrow of his ways to him with the cat-o'-nine-tails— two teams
working in relays. He'll be worry he ever seen this place."
"Trog," Roy said in a more kindly
tone, "do you ever regret the way you sold out Ajax and made off with
classified materials?"
"Naw," Trog said firmly.
"Anyways, I never made off with no secret stuff, nor no plans and specs
neither."
"Then, how'd you get here, three octaves
outside your own A-O zone?"
"It was screwy," Trog said. "I
was onna trail, headin' for a big time in Port Miasma, and all of a sudden I
run smack into a swamp where no swamp oughta be."
Lafayette's attention wandered, and he dropped
off into a sound sleep. It seemed hours later when Sprawnroyal's hoarse voice
at close range penetrated his lazy dreams of ease and comfort back home in
Artesia:
"... you're too big to lug, Slim. So, come
on, wake up now while we got a chanct, and let's check this out. This could be
the break we been waiting for."
O'Leary opened his eyes and winced at the throb
in his skull. He fingered a lump the size of a walnut above his ear. Slowly, he
got to his feet. Trog, trussed from neck to ankles in stout new hemp rope, lay
beside a small campfire. Around it Squirrely, Casper, and Rugadoon, bruised but
cheerful, sat eating enthusiastically from small cans.
"I had a nice talk with old Trog,
here," Roy told Lafayette comfortably. "I think maybe we gotta way
outa this mess after all." He paused to hand Lafayette two of the small
cans from his bulky backpack. "Better chow down now, Slim," he
suggested. "Once we get moving, there won't be no time."
"What are you going to do?" Lafayette
asked, dipping into a can of swamp-pheasant fricassee. "Good," he
commented.
"Right; what we figger is a man on a tough
field job needs class eats to keep up the old morale," Roy confided.
"Now, you know how to triangulate, Slim, check out what parts of a locus
match up with your baseline, and calibrate how far out you are, locus-wise, from
where you was at when you begun."
"I've never done the calculations,"
Lafayette replied, "but I understand the principle. For example, we can
figure Aphasia II is very close to Aphasia I, where Daphne's lost, on the basis
of the similarities in the landscape, plus personnel. Trog, for example."
Roy shook his head. "Trog's a bad example,
Slim. This here's the same Trog you run into before, not a analog. But
you're right; you're still in the same A-range as where you lost Daphne at. But
where's that at? Huh? How close are we to the Artesia range? That's a
little tougher; we got to fall back on topography. Like, in Artesia, you got a
desert, a dry lake bed, west o' town. Then in Melange, it's still a lake, and
farther in the same direction, just in the next range, you got a bay, a arm o'
the sea: that's Colby Corners and all, your old home town before you came to
Artesia. So here we got a saltwater swamp. Looks like a little tectonic
activity has pushed up a ridge and cut the bay off, and here it's partly
drained. In Melange it's turned into a freshwater lake: The swamp never formed
because the ridge wasn't that high there; so with the springs at the bottom,
plus rainfall, you got a lake. In Artesia, it drained and there was a spillway
open in the ridge, so it went dry and you got a desert. The swamp here puts us
off on a tangent to our direct route back to the Artesia/Melange
wide-range."
"How do we get back?" O'Leary cut in
impatiently. "At least to Aphasia I, if not to Artesia?"
"There's things I can't tell
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