Uncharted Territory

Expedition 184: Day 1

We ended having C.J. fly us as far as the Tongue. Carson and I tallied up how long it would take to get to uncharted territory and how many fines we’d run up on the way and decided it was cheaper to go by heli, even with the airborne vehicle fines. And C.J. was overjoyed to have a few last chances at Ev. She kept him up front with her the whole way.

“Quit lollygagging with Evie and send him back here,” Carson called to C.J. when the Tongue came in sight. “We’ve got to check his gear.”

He came back into the bay immediately, looking as excited as a kid. “Are we in uncharted territory yet?” he asked, squatting down and looking out through the open hatch.

“We charted all this side of the river last time,” I said. “The regs are no alcohol, no tobacco, no rec drugs, no caffeine. You carrying any of those?”

“No,” he said.

I handed him his mike, and he stuck it on his throat. “No advanced technology except for scientific equipment, no cameras, no lasers or firearms.”

“I’ve got a knife. Can I take that?”

“Only if you don’t kill anything indigenous with it,” I said.

“If you get the urge to kill something, kill Fin,” Carson said. “There’s no fine on us.”

The heli swooped down to the Tongue and hovered above the near shore. “You’re the first out,” I said, pushing him over to the door. “It’s too big a fine to land,” I shouted. “C.J.’s going to hover it. We’ll throw down the gear to you.”

He nodded and got ready to jump. Bult elbowed him aside, shot his umbrella open, and floated down like Mary Poppins.

“Second out,” I shouted. “Don’t land on any flora if you can help it.”

He nodded again, looking down at Bult, who already had his log out.

“Wait!” C.J. said and came shooting out of her pilot’s seat and past Ev and me. “I couldn’t let you go without saying good-bye, Ev,” she said, and flung her arms around his neck.

“What on hell are you doing, C.J.?” Carson said. “Do you know how big the fine is for crashing a heli?”

“It’s on automatic,” she said, and planted a wet one on Ev. “I’ll be waiting,” she said breathily. “Good luck, I hope you find lots of things to name.”

“We’re all waiting,” I said. “All right, you told her good-bye, Ev. Now, jump.”

“Don’t forget,” C.J. whispered, and leaned forward to kiss him again.

“Now,” I said, and gave him a push. He jumped, and C.J. latched onto the edge of the bay and glared at me. I ignored her and started handing the bedrolls and the surveying equipment down to him.

“Don’t set the terminal on any flora,” I shouted down to him, too late. He’d already laid it in a patch of scourbrush.

I glanced at Bult, but he’d gone down to the river’s edge and was looking at the other side with his binocs.

“Sorry,” Ev shouted to me. He jerked the terminal back up and looked around for a bare spot.

“Stop gossiping and jump,” Carson said behind me, “so I can get the ponies unloaded.”

I grabbed the supply packs and handed them down to Ev. “Stand back,” I shouted to him, scanning the ground for a clear patch.

“What on hell’s keeping you?” Carson shouted. “They’re going to unload before I unload them.”

I picked a bare spot and jumped, but before I’d so much as hit, Carson yelled, “Lower, C.J.,” and I nearly cracked my head on the heli when I straightened up.

“Lower!” Carson bellowed over his shoulder, and C.J. dipped the heli down. “Fin, take the reins, dammit. What on hell are you waiting for? Lead ’em off.”

I grabbed for the dangling reins, which did about as much good as it always does, but Carson always thinks the ponies are gonna suddenly turn rational and jump off. They reared and shied and backed Carson against the side of the heli’s bay, like always, and Carson said, like always, “You rock-headed morons, get off me!” which Bult entered in his log.

“Verbal abuse of indigenous fauna.”

“You’re gonna have to push ’em off,” I said, like always, and climbed back on.

“Ev,” I shouted down, “we’re bringing this down as far as it’ll go. Signal C.J. when it touches the tops of the scourbrush.”

C.J. circled the heli and came in lower. “Up a little,” Evelyn said, gesturing with his hand. “Okay.”

We were half a meter from the ground. “Let’s try it one more time,” Carson said, like always. “Take the reins.”

I did. This time they squashed him against the back of C.J.’s seat.

“Goddammit, you shit-brained sonsabitches,” he shouted, swatting at their hind ends. They backed against him some more.

I maneuvered around to Carson’s side, and picked up a hind paw of the one that was standing on his bad foot. The pony went over like it’d been doped, and we dragged it to the edge of the bay and pushed it out. It landed with an “oof” and laid there.

Evelyn hurried over. “I think it’s hurt,” he said.

“Nope,” I said. “Just sulking. Stand back.”

We upended the other three and dumped them on top of the first one and jumped down.

“Shouldn’t we do something?” Evelyn said, looking anxiously at the heap.

“Not till we’re ready to go,” Carson said, picking up his gear. “They can’t shit in that position. Come on, Bult. Let’s get packed.”

Bult was still over by the Tongue, but he’d dropped his binocs and was squatting on the bank, peering into the centimeter-deep water.

“Bult!” I shouted, walking over to him.

He stood up and got out his log. “Disturbance of water surface,” he said, pointing up at the hovering heli. “Generation of waves.”

“There’s not enough water for a wave,” I said, sticking my hand in it. “There’s hardly enough to wet your finger.”

“Introduction of foreign body into waterway,” Bult said.

“Foreign—” I started and was drowned out by the heli. It flew over the Tongue, rippling the centimeter’s worth of water, and came back around, skimming the bushes. C.J. swooped past us, blowing kisses.

“I know, I know,” I said to Bult, “disturbance of waterway.”

He stalked over to a clump of scourbrush, unfolded an arm under it, and came up with two wiry leaves and a shriveled berry. He held them out to me. “Destruction of crop,” he said.

C.J. banked and turned, waving, and headed off northeast. I’d told her to swing over Sector 248-76 on her way home and try to get an aerial. I hoped she wasn’t so busy flirting with Ev that she’d forget.

Ev was looking south at the mountains. “Is that the Wall?” he said.

“Nope. The Wall’s off that direction,” I said, pointing across the Tongue. “Those are the Ponypiles.”

“Are we going there?” Ev said, looking sappy-eyed again.

“Not this trip. We’ll follow the Tongue south a few kloms and then head northwest.”

“Will you two stop sight-seeing and get over here and load these ponies?” Carson shouted. He had the ponies up and was strapping the wide-angle to Speedy’s pommelbone.

“Yes, ma’am,” I said. Ev and I picked our way over to him between grass clumps. “Don’t worry about the Wall,” I told Ev. “We’ll see plenty of it. We have to cross it to get to where we’re going, and after we do we’ll follow it all the way north to Silvershim Creek.”

“Not unless we get these ponies loaded,” Carson said. “Here,” he said, handing the reins of one of the ponies to Ev. “Get Cyclone loaded.”

“Cyclone?” Ev said, looking warily at the pony, which looked to me like it was getting ready to fall over again.

“There’s nothing to it,” I said. “Ponies—”

“Fin’s right,” Carson said. “Just don’t make any sudden movements. And if he tries to throw you, hang on for dear life, no matter what. Cyclone doesn’t get violent except when he senses fear.”

“Violent?” Ev said, looking nervous. “I haven’t had much experience riding.”

“You can ride mine,” I said.

“Diablo?” Carson said. “You think that’s a good idea after what happened before? No, I think you’d better ride Cyclone.” He held out the stirrup. “You just put your foot in here and take hold of the pommelbone nice and slow,” he said.

Ev took hold of the pommel like it was a hand grenade. “There, there, Cyclone,” he murmured, bringing his foot up in slow motion to the stirrup. “Nice Cyclone.”

Carson looked across at me, the edges of his mustache quaking. “Isn’t he doing good, Fin?”

I ignored him and went on attaching the wide-angles to Useless’s chest.

“Now swing your other leg up and over, real slow. I’ll hold him till you’re on,” Carson said, holding on tight to the bridle. Evelyn did it and got a death grip on the reins.

“Giddyap!” Carson shouted and smacked the pony on the flank. The pony took a step forward, and Ev dropped the reins and grabbed for the pommelbone. The pony took two more steps toward Carson, lifted its tail, and dumped a pile the size of Everest.

Carson came over to me, laughing fit to kill.

“What are you picking on Ev for?” I said.

He laughed awhile before he answered. “You said he was smarter than he looks. I was just checking it out.”

“You should be checking out your scout,” I said, pointing at Bult, who had his binocs up to his eyes again, “if you want to depart any time today.”

He laughed some more and went over to talk to Bult. I finished attaching the surveying equipment. Bult had his log out, and from the looks of it Carson was yelling at him again.

I swung up onto Useless and rode over to where Ev was sitting on his pony. “Looks like we’ll be here awhile,” I said. “Sorry about Carson. It’s his idea of a joke.”

“I figured that out,” he said. “Finally. What’s his real name?” he said, gesturing at the pony. It took a step forward and stopped.

“Speedy,” I said.

“And this is as fast as it goes.”

“Sometimes it doesn’t go this fast,” I said.

Useless lifted its tail and unloaded.

“Tell me they don’t do this all the time,” Ev said.

“Not like this,” I said. “Sometimes after we have ’em in the heli they get the runs.”

“Great,” he said. “I suppose sudden movements don’t spook them?”

“Nothing spooks them,” I said, “not even nibblers chewing on their toes. If they’re scared or they don’t want to do something, they just stand there and won’t budge.”

“What don’t they like?”

“People riding them,” I said. “Hills. They won’t go up more than a two percent grade. Backtrailing over their own pawprints. Going more than two abreast. Going more than a klom an hour.”

Ev was looking at me warily, like I was putting him on, too.

I held up my hand. “Scout’s honor,” I said.

“But you can walk faster than that,” he said.

“Not when there’s a fine for footprints.”

He leaned sideways to look at Useless’s paws. “But they leave foot-prints, don’t they?”

“They’re indigenous,” I said.

“But how do you cover any territory?”

“We don’t, and Big Bro yells at us,” I said, looking over at the Tongue. Carson had given up yelling and was watching Bult talk into his log. “Speaking of which, I’d better fill you in on the rest of the regs. No personal holo or picture-taking, no souvenirs, no picking wildflowers, no killing of fauna.”

“What if you’re attacked?”

“Depends. If you think you can survive the heart attack you’ll have when you see the fine and all the reports you’ll have to fill out, go ahead. Letting it kill you might be easier.”

He looked suspicious again.

“We probably won’t run into anything dangerous where we’re going,” I said.

“What about nibblers?”

“They’re farther north. Hardly any of the f-and-f are dangerous, and the indidges are peaceful. They’ll rob you blind, but they won’t hurt you. You wear your mike all the time.” I reached over and took it off and stuck it back on lower down on his chest. “If you get separated, wait where you are. Don’t go trying to find anybody. That’s the surest way to get yourself killed.”

“I thought you said the f-and-f weren’t dangerous?”

“They’re not. But we’re going to be in uncharted territory. That means landslides, lightning, roadkill holes, flash floods. You can cut your hand on scourbrush and get blood poisoning, or get too far north and freeze to death.”

“Or get caught in a luggage stampede.”

I wondered how he knew about that. The pop-ups, whatever they were. “Or wander off and never be found again, which is what happened to Stewart’s partner, Segura,” I said. “And you won’t even get a hill named after you. So you stay where you are, and after twenty-four hours you call C.J. and she’ll come and get you.”

He nodded. “I know.”

I was going to have to find out what these pop-ups are. “You call C.J.,” I said, “and you let her worry about finding the rest of us. If you’re injured and can’t call, she’ll know where you are by your mike.”

I paused, trying to remember what else I should tell him. Carson was yelling at Bult again. I could hear him clear over by the ponies.

“No giving the indidges gifts,” I said, “no teaching them how to make a wheel or build a cotton gin. If you figure out what sex Bult is, no fraternizing. No yelling at the indidges,” I said, looking over at Carson.

He was coming this way, his mustache quivering again, but he didn’t look like he was laughing this time.

“Bult says we can’t cross here,” he said. “He says there’s no break in the Wall here.”

“When we looked at the map, he said there was,” I said.

“He says it’s been repaired. He says we’ll have to ride south to the other one. How far is it?”

“Ten kloms,” I said.

“My shit, that’ll take us all morning,” he said, squinting off in the direction of the Wall. “He didn’t say anything about it being repaired when we did the map. Call C.J. Maybe she got an aerial of it on her way home.”

“She didn’t,” I said. Swinging north to Sector 248-76, she wouldn’t have gotten any pictures of where we were going.

“Dammit,” he said, taking his hat off, looking like he was going to throw it on the ground and then thinking the better of it. He looked at me and then stomped back toward the Tongue.

“You stay here,” I said to Ev. I dismounted and caught up to Carson. “You think Bult’s got it figured out?” I asked him as soon as we were out of Ev’s earshot.

“Maybe,” he said. “So what do we do?”

I shrugged. “Go south to the next break. It’s no farther from the northern tributaries, and by that time we’ll know if we have to check 248-76. I sent C.J. up there to do an aerial.” I looked at Bult, who was still talking into his log. “Maybe he doesn’t have it figured out. Maybe there are just more fines this way.”

“Which is just what we need,” he said glumly.

He was right. Our departure fines came to nine hundred, and it took a half hour to tally them up. Then it took Bult another half hour to get his pony loaded, decide he wanted his umbrella, unload everything to find it and load it again, and by that time Carson had used inappropriate manner and tone and thrown his hat on the ground, and we had to wait while Bult added those on.

It was ten o’clock before we finally got started, Bult leading off under his lighted umbrella, which he’d tied to his pony’s pommelbone, Ev and I side by side, and Carson in the rear where he couldn’t swear at Bult.

C.J.’d landed us at the top end of a little valley, and we followed it south, keeping close to the Tongue.

“You can’t see much from here,” I told Ev. “This really only goes another klom or so, and then you should get a better view of the Wall. And five kloms down it comes right up next to the Tongue.”

“Why is it called the Tongue? Is that a translation of the Boohteri name for it?”

“The indidges don’t have a name for it. Or half the stuff on this planet.” I pointed at the mountains ahead of us. “Take the Ponypiles. Biggest natural formation on the whole continent, and they don’t have a name for it, or most of the f-and-f. And when they do give stuff names, they don’t make any sense. Their name for the luggage is tssuhlkahttses. It means Dead Soup. And Big Brother won’t let us give things sensible names.”

“Like the Tongue?” he said, grinning.

“It’s long, it’s pink, and it’s hanging out like it’s going ‘aah’ for a doctor. What else would you call it? That’s not its name anyway. The Tongue’s just what we call it. The name on the map’s Conglomerate River, after the rocks it was flowing between up where we named it.”

“An unofficial name,” Ev said, half to himself.

“Won’t work,” I said. “We already named Tight-ass Canyon after C.J. She wants something named after her officially. Passed, approved, and on the topographicals.”

“Oh,” he said, and looked disappointed.

“What about that?” I said. “Any species besides homo sap have to carve a female’s name on a tree to get a jump?”

“No,” he said. “There’s a species of water bird on Choom where the males build plaster dikes around the females that look a lot like the Wall.”

Speaking of which, there it was. The valley had been climbing and opening out as we rode, and all of a sudden we were at the top of a rise and looking out across what looked like one of C.J.’s aerials.

It was flat all the way to the feet of the Ponypiles, with the Tongue slicing through it like a map boundary. Boohte’s got as many oxides as Mars, and lots of cinnabar, so the plains are pink. There were mesas here and there off to the west, and a couple of cinder pyramids, and the blue of the distance turned them a nice lavender. And meandering around them and over the mesas, down to the Tongue and then away again, arched white and shining in the sun, was the Wall. At least Bult hadn’t been lying about the break. The Wall marched unbrokenly as far as I could see.

“There she is,” I said. I turned and looked at Ev.

His mouth was hanging open.

“Hard to believe the Boohteri built it, isn’t it?”

Ev nodded without closing his mouth.

“Carson and I have this theory that they didn’t,” I said. “We think some poor species of indidges who lived here before built it, and then Bult and his pals fined them out of it.”

“It’s beautiful,” Ev, who hadn’t heard me, said. “I had no idea it was so long.”

“Six hundred kloms,” I said. “And getting longer. An average of two new chambers a year, according to C.J.’s aerials, not counting repaired breaks.”

Which meant our theory didn’t wash at all, but neither did the idea of the indidges doing all the work.

“It’s even more beautiful than the pop-ups,” Ev said, and I was going to ask him what exactly they were, but I didn’t think he’d hear that either.

I remembered the first time I’d seen the Wall. I’d only been on Boohte a week. We’d spent the whole time struggling up a draw in pouring rain and I’d spent the whole time wondering how I’d let Carson talk me into this, and we came out on top of a mesa a lot higher than what we were now, and Carson said, “There she is. All yours.”

Which got us a pursuant on incorrect imperialistic attitudes and how “Pursuant to proprietorship, planets are not owned.”

I looked over at Ev. “You’re right. It is presentable-looking.”

Bult finished writing up his fines, and we started out across it. He was still keeping close to the Tongue, and after half a klom he got out his binocs, looked through them at the water, and shook his head, and we plodded on.

It was already after noon, and I thought about getting lunch out of my pack, but the ponies were starting to drag and Ev was intent on the Wall, which was close to the Tongue here, so I waited.

The Wall disappeared behind a low step-mesa for a hundred meters and then curved down almost to the Tongue, and Carson’s pony apparently decided he’d gone far enough and stopped, swaying.

“Uh-oh,” I said.

“What is it?” Ev said, dragging his eyes away from the Wall.

“Rest stop. Remember how I told you they’re not dangerous?” I said, watching Carson, who’d gotten down off his pony and was standing clear. “Well, that’s if they don’t fall over with your legs under ’em. Think you can get down off him faster than you got on?”

“Yes,” Ev said, jumping down and away like he expected Speedy to explode.

I tightened the straps on the computer, dismounted, and stepped back. Up ahead, Carson’s pony had stopped swaying, and Carson had gone back up to it and was trying to untie the food packs.

Ev and I walked up and watched him struggle with the line. The pony dumped a pile practically on Carson’s foot and started swaying again.

“Tim-berr,” I said, and Carson jumped back. The pony took a couple of tottering steps forward and fell over, its legs out stiff at its side.

The pack was half under it, and Carson started yanking it out from under the motionless carcass. Bult unfolded himself and stepped decorously off his pony holding his umbrella, and the rest of the ponies went over like dominoes.

Ev went over to Carson and stood looking down on him. “Don’t make any sudden movements,” he said.

Carson stomped past me. “What are you laughing at?” he said.

We had lunch and incurred a few fines, but I didn’t get a chance to talk to Carson alone. Bult stuck like glue to us, talking into his log, and Ev kept asking questions about the Wall.

“So they make the chambers one at a time,” he said, looking across at it. We were on the wrong side of the Wall here, so all you could see were the back walls of the chambers, looking like they’d been plastered and painted a whitish-pink. “How do they build them?”

“We don’t know. Nobody’s ever seen them doing it,” Carson said. “Or seen them doing anything worthwhile,” he added darkly, watching Bult tallying up, “like finding us a way across it so we can get on with this expedition.”

He went over to Bult and started talking to him in an inappropriate manner.

“And what are they?” Ev asked. “Dwellings?”

“And storerooms for all the stuff Bult buys, and landfills. Some of them are decorated, with flowers hanging in the opening and nibbler bones laid out in a design in front of the door. Most of them stand empty.”

Carson stomped back, his mustache quaking. “He says we can’t cross here either.”

“The other break’s been repaired, too?” I said.

“No. Now he says there’s something in the water. Tssi mitss.”

I looked over at the Tongue. It was flowing over quartzite sand here and was clear as glass. “What’s that?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. It translates as ‘not there.’ I asked him how much farther we have to go, and all he’ll say is ‘sahhth.’ ”

Sahhth apparently meant halfway to the Ponypiles because he didn’t even glance at the Tongue again once we had the ponies up and moving, and he didn’t even bother to lead. He motioned Ev and me ahead, and went back to ride with Carson.

Not that we could get lost. We’d charted all this territory before, and all we had to do was keep close to the Tongue. The Wall dipped away from the water and off toward a line of mesas, and we went up a hill through a herd of luggage, grazing on dirt, and came out at another Scenic Point.

The thing about these long vistas is that you’re not going to see anything else for a while, and we’d already catalogued the f-and-f along here. There weren’t any, anyway—a lot of luggage, some tinder grass, an occasional roadkill. I ran geological contours and double-checked the topographicals, and then, since Ev was busy gawking at the scenery, ran the whereabouts.

Wulfmeier was on Starting Gate after all. He’d been picked up by Big Brother for removing ore samples. So he wasn’t in Sector 248-76, and we could’ve spent another day at Ring’s X, eating C.J.’s cooking and catching up on reports.

Speaking of which, I figured I might as well finish them up now. I asked for Bult’s purchase orders.

He must’ve worked fast while we were at King’s X. He’d spent all his fines and then some. I wondered if that was why we were heading south, because he’d tchopped himself into a hole.

I went through the list, weeding out weapons and artificial building materials and trying to figure out what he was going to do with three dozen dictionaries and a chandelier.

“What are you doing?” Ev said, leaning across to look at the log.

“Screening out contraband,” I said. “Bult’s not allowed to order anything with weapon potential, which in his case should have included umbrellas. It’s hard to catch everything.”

He leaned farther across. “You’re marking them ‘out of stock.’ ”

“Yeah. If we tell him he can’t order them, he fines us for discrimination, and he hasn’t figured out yet that he doesn’t have to pay for out-of-stock items, which keeps him from ordering even more stuff.”

He looked like he was going to keep asking questions, so I called up the topographical instead and said, “Tell me some more about these mating customs you’re an expert on. Are there any species who give their girlfriends dictionaries?”

He grinned. “Not that I’ve run across so far. Gift-giving is a major part of a majority of species’ courtship rituals, though, including Homo sapiens. Engagement rings, and the traditional candy and flowers.”

“Mink coats. Condos. Islands in the Tobo Sea.”

“There are several theories about its significance,” Ev said. “Most zoologists think the bestowing of a gift proves the male’s ability to obtain and defend territory. Some socioexozoologists believe gift-giving is a symbolic enactment of the sex act itself.”

“Romantic,” I said.

“One study found gift-giving triggered pheromones in the female, which in turn produced chemical changes in the male that led to the next phase of the courtship ritual. It’s hardwired into the brain. Sexual instincts pretty much override rational thought.”

Which is why females’ll run off with the first male who smiles at them, I thought, and why C.J. had been acting like an idiot at the landing. Speaking of which, here she was calling on the transmitter. “Home Base to Findriddy. Come in, Fin.”

“What is it?” I said, taking off my mike and moving it up so she could hear me.

“You got a reprimand,” she said. “ ‘Pursuant to relations between members of the survey expedition and native planet dwellers. All members of the expedition will show respect for the ancient and noble cultures of indigenous sentients and will refrain from making terrocentric value judgments.’ ”

Which could have waited till we got back from the expedition. “What did you really call for, C.J.?” I asked. As if I didn’t know.

“Is Evelyn there? Can I talk to him?”

“In a minute. Did you get a picture of that northwest section?”

There was a long pause before her answer came back. “I forgot.”

“What do you mean, you forgot?”

“I had other things on my mind. The heli prop sounded funny.”

“On hell it did. The only thing on your mind was jumping Ev.”

“I don’t know what you’re so upset about,” she said. “That whole area’s charted, isn’t it?”

“Here’s Ev,” I said. I patched her through and showed Ev the transmit button, and then looked back at Carson.

He’d want to know what I’d found out or hadn’t found out, but he and Bult were too far back to shout at, and besides, I didn’t want Bult figuring out why we’d picked the route we had.

If he hadn’t already. We’d long since passed the second break in the Wall, and he didn’t show any signs of crossing the Tongue.

“I’ll try,” Ev said earnestly into his mike. “I promise.”

It’s about time for a dust storm, I thought, looking at the sky. Carson usually likes to have one on the first day anyway, just in case something comes up where we need one, but he was deep in conversation with Bult, probably trying to talk him into crossing the Tongue.

“I miss you, too, C.J.,” Ev said.

Nothing was stopping me from pointing the camera at a likely suspect and doing one myself, but there wasn’t so much as a haze on the horizon. The Wall was only half a klom off along this stretch, and sometimes there are little kick-up breezes along it, but not today. The air was as still as a roadkill.

“Look!” Ev said, and I thought he was talking to C.J., but he said, “Fin, what’s that?” and pointed at a shuttlewren that was flying toward us.

“Tssillirah,” I said. “We call them shuttlewrens.”

“Why?” he said, watching the little bird fly over my head and back toward the other two ponies.

I didn’t waste breath answering. The shuttlewren circled Carson’s head and started back for us, flapping its stubby pinkish wings like it was about to wear out. It made two trips around Ev’s hat and started back for Carson again.

“Oh,” Ev said, turning around to see it making the circuit again, flapping for dear life. “How long can it keep that up?”

“A long time. We had one follow us for fifty kloms like that one time up by Turquoise Lake. Carson figured up it flew almost seven hundred kloms.”

Ev started asking for stuff on his log. “What does the Boohteri name for them mean?” he asked me.

“Wide mud,” I said, “and don’t ask what that’s supposed to mean. Maybe they build their nests out of mud. But there’s no mud around here.”

Or dust, I thought. I went back to thinking about dust storms. If Bult and Carson had been up ahead of us, I’d’ve taken my foot out of the stirrup and dragged it in the dirt to stir up some dust, but the way it was, Bult would catch me, and Ev would stop talking about shuttlewrens and ask what I was doing.

I looked back at Carson and waved, thinking maybe that would signal him to do something, but he was so busy talking to Bult I couldn’t get his attention. The shuttlewren, on its tenth lap, skimmed the top of his hat, but that didn’t get his attention either.

“Oh, look!” Ev said.

I turned back around. He was half up in the saddle, pointing off toward the Wall. I couldn’t see what at, which meant neither could the scans.

“Where?” I said.

“Over there,” he said, pointing.

I finally saw what he was looking at—a couch potato lying down behind a roundleaf bush and looking like a ponypile with fur.

I didn’t think the scan had enough res to pick it up, but I said, “I don’t see anything,” to stall while I set the camera on a narrow focus to the far left of it, just in case.

“Over there,” Ev said. “Is that—”

I cut him off before he could get more specific. “My shit!” I shouted. “Put the shield on. That’s a…” and hit the disconnect.

“What is it?” Ev said, reaching for his knife. “Is it dangerous?”

“What?” I said, locking the disconnect in for twelve minutes.

“That!” Ev said, waving his hand in the direction of the couch potato. “That brown thing over there.”

“Oh, that,” I said. “That’s a couch potato. It’s not dangerous. Herbivore. Lies down most of the time, except to eat. I didn’t notice it lying there.” I set my watch alarm for ten minutes.

“Then what were you looking at?” he said, staring worriedly at the horizon.

“The weather,” I said. “We get dust tantrums close to the Wall, and they play hob with the transmitter.” I punched the transmitter’s send three or four times and then held it down. “C.J., you there? Calling Home Base. Come in, Home Base.” I shook my head. “It’s out. I was afraid of that.”

“I didn’t see any dust,” Ev said.

“They’re only a meter or so wide,” I said, “and nearly invisible unless they’re in your line of sight.” I hit a few more keys at random. “I better go tell Carson.”

I yanked hard on the pony’s reins and prodded it in the sides. “Carson,” I called. “We got a problem.”

Carson was still deep in conversation with Bult. I gave the pony another prod, and it gave me an evil look and started backing. At this rate, the dust storm’d be over before I even made it back there. I should’ve made it twenty minutes. “C.J., you there?” I said into the transmitter, just to make sure it was off, and got down off the pony.

“Hey, Carson,” I yelled, “the transmitter’s down.” I walked back to his pony. “Wind’s picking up,” I said. “Looks like we’re in for a dust tantrum.”

“When?” he said, with a glance at Bult, who was busy digging for his log to fine me for being off Useless.

“Now,” I said.

“How long do you think it’ll last?”

“Awhile,” I said, looking speculatively at the sky. “Twelve minutes, maybe twelve and a half.”

“Rest stop,” Carson called, and Bult leapt off his pony and stalked over to look at my footprints.

Carson walked off in the direction of the couch potato. I looked back at Ev. He was standing with his head up and his mouth open, watching the shuttlewren. I caught up with Carson, and we squatted so we wouldn’t attract the attention of the shuttlewren.

“What’s wrong?” he said.

“Nothing,” I said. “I just thought we should have one dust storm before we crossed into uncharted territory.”

“You could have waited, then,” Carson said. “We’re not crossing anytime soon.”

“Why not? Is this break fixed, too?”

He shook his head. “Tssi mitsse, which means big tssi mitss, which I figure translates as he’s going to see to it we don’t get anywhere near Sector 248-76. What did you find out from C.J.? Did the aerial show anything?”

“She didn’t get it. She was too busy batting her eyes at Ev and forgot.”

“Forgot?!” he said. He stood up. “I told you he was going to louse up this expedition. I suppose you were too busy pointing out the sights to run whereabouts either.”

I stood up and faced him. “What on hell’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means you two’ve been so busy talking I figured you’d forgotten all about a little detail like what’s going on in 248-76. What on hell’s interesting enough to talk about all day long anyway?”

“Mating customs,” I said.

“Mating customs,” he said disgustedly. “That’s why you didn’t run whereabouts?”

“I did run them. Whatever’s in that sector, it’s not Wulfmeier. He’s on Starting Gate, and he’s under arrest. I got a verify.”

Carson stared south at the Ponypiles. “Then what on hell’s Bult up to?”

The shuttlewren changed course in midflap and started toward us. “I don’t know,” I said, taking off my hat and waving with it to keep it away. “Maybe the indidges have got a gold mine up there. Maybe they’re secretly building Las Vegas with all the stuff Bult’s ordered.” The wren circled my head and made a pass at Carson. “Maybe Bult’s just trying to run up our fines by taking us the long way around. Did he say how much farther we’d have to go before we could cross the Tongue?”

“Sahhth,” Carson said, mimicking Bult holding his umbrella and pointing. “If we go much farther south, we’ll be in the Ponypiles. Maybe he’s going to lead us into the mountains and drown us in a flash flood.”

“And then fine us for being foreign bodies in a waterway.” My watch beeped. “Looks like it’s starting to clear up,” I said. I picked up a handful of dirt, and we started back for the ponies.

Bult met us halfway. “Taking of souvenirs,” he said, pointing sternly at the dirt in my hand. “Disturbances of land surface. Destruction of indigenous flora.”

“Better transmit all those right away,” I said, “before you forget.”

I went over to Ev’s and my ponies, the shuttlewren tailing me. While Ev was watching it circle his head, I blew dirt off my hand onto the camera lens and then swung up and looked at my watch. A minute to go.

I messed with the transmitter a little and called to Carson, “I think I’ve got it fixed. Come on, Ev.”

I messed some more for Ev’s benefit, taking off a chip and snapping it back into place, but I didn’t need to have bothered. He was still gawking at the shuttlewren.

“Is that shuttlewren a male?” he asked.

“Beats me. You’re the expert on sex.” I released the disconnect, counted to three, hit it again, and counted to five. “Calling Ki—” I said, and kicked it on again. “—ng’s X, come in C.J.”

“C.J. here,” she said. “Where on hell did you go?”

“Nothing serious, C.J. Just a dust tantrum. We’re too close to the Wall,” I said. “Is the camera back on?”

“Yes. I don’t see any dust.”

“We just caught the edge of it. It lasted about a minute. I’ve been spending the rest of the time trying to get the transmitter up and running.”

“It’s funny,” she said slowly, “how a minute’s worth of dust could do so much damage.”

“It’s one of the chips. You know how sensitive they are.”

“If they’re so sensitive, how come all that dust from the rover didn’t jam them?”

“The rover?” I said, looking around blankly like one might drive up.

“When Evelyn drove out to meet you yesterday. How come the transmitter didn’t cut out then?”

Because I’d been too busy worrying about Wulfmeier and wrestling the binocs away from Bult to even think of it, I thought. I’d stood there coughing and choking in the rover’s dust and it hadn’t even crossed my mind. My shit, that was all we needed, for C.J. to catch on to our dust storms. “No accounting for technology,” I said, knowing she was never going to buy it. “Transmitter’s got a mind of its own.”

Carson came up. “You talking to C.J.? Ask her if she’s got an aerial of the Wall along here. I want to know where the breaks are.”

“Sure,” I said, and hit disconnect again. “We got a problem. C.J.’s asking questions about the dust storm. She wants to know why the transmitter didn’t go out with all that dust from the rover.”

“The rover?” he said, and I could see it dawn on him like it had on me. “What did you tell her?”

“That the transmitter’s temperamental.”

“She’ll never buy that,” he said, glaring at Ev, who was watching the shuttlewren start another lap. “I told you he’d cause trouble.”

“It’s not Ev’s fault. We’re the ones who didn’t have sense enough to recognize a dust storm when we saw it. I’m going back on. What do I tell her?”

“That it’s dust getting in the chip that does it,” he said, stomping back to his pony, “not just dust in the air.”

Which maybe would have worked, except two expeditions ago I’d told her it was dust in the air that did it.

“Come on, Ev,” I said. He came over and got on his pony, still watching the shuttlewren. I took my finger off the disconnect. “—ase, come in, Home Base.”

“Another dust storm?” C.J. said sarcastically.

“There must still be some dust in the chip,” I said. “It keeps cutting out.”

“How come the sound cuts out at the same time?” she said.

Because we’re still wearing our mikes too high, I thought.

“It’s funny,” she went on. “While you were out, I took a look at the meteorologicals Carson ran before you left. They don’t show any wind for that sector.”

“No accounting for the weather either, especially this close to the Wall,” I said. “Ev’s right here. You want to talk to him?”

I patched him in before she could answer, thinking sex wasn’t always such a bad thing on an expedition. It would take her mind off the dust anyway.

Bult and Carson rode in a wide circle around us to get in the lead again, and we followed, Ev still talking to C.J., which mostly consisted of listening and saying “yes” every once in a while, and “I promise.” The shuttlewren followed us, too, making the circuit back and forth like a sheep dog.

“What kind of nests do the shuttlewrens have?” Ev asked.

“We’ve never seen them,” I said. “What did C.J. have to say?”

“Not much. Their nests are probably in this area,” he said, looking across the Tongue. The Wall was almost up next to the bank, and there were a few scourbrush in the narrow space between, but nothing that looked big enough to hide a nest. “The behavior they’re exhibiting is either protective, in which case it’s a female, or territorial, in which case it’s a male. You say they’ve followed you for long distances. Have you ever been followed by more than one at a time?”

“No,” I said. “Sometimes one’ll fall away and another one’ll take over, like they’re working in shifts.”

“That sounds like territorial behavior,” he said, watching the shuttlewren make the turn past Bult. It was flying so low it brushed Bult’s umbrella, and he looked up and then hunched over his fines again. “I don’t suppose there’s any way to get a specimen?”

“Not unless it has a coronary,” I said, ducking as it skimmed my hat. “We’ve got holos. You can ask the memory.”

He did, and spent the next ten minutes poring over them while I worried about C.J. We’d talked her into believing the transmitter could be taken out by a gust of dust that wouldn’t even show on the log, and then I’d stood there yesterday and let the transmitter get totally smothered with it and hadn’t even had the sense to disconnect.

And now that she was suspicious, she wouldn’t let it go. She was probably checking all the logs for dust storms right now and comparing them to the meteorologicals.

Bult and Carson were looking in the water again. Bult shook his head.

“The staking out of territory is a courtship ritual,” Ev said.

“Like gangs,” I said.

“The male butterfish sweeps an area of ocean bottom clear of pebbles and shells for the female and then circles it constantly.”

I looked at the shuttlewren, which was rounding Bult’s umbrella again. Bult put down his log and collapsed the umbrella.

“The Mirgasazi on Yoan stake out a block of airspace. They’re an interesting species. Some of the females have bright feathers, but they’re not the ones the males are interested in.”

The shuttlewren flapped past us and up to Bult and Carson again. It rounded the bend, and Bult shot his umbrella open. The shuttlewren fell in midflap, and Bult stabbed it with the tip of the umbrella a couple of times.

“I knew I should have put umbrellas on the weapons list,” I said.

“Can I have it?” Ev said. “To see if it’s a male?”

Bult unfolded his arm, picked up the shuttlewren, and rode on, plucking the feathers off it. When he had half of them off, he stuck the shuttlewren in his mouth and bit it in half. He offered Carson half. Carson shook his head, and Bult crammed the whole thing in.

“Guess not,” I said. I leaned down and got a feather and handed it to him.

He was watching Bult chew. “Shouldn’t there be a fine for that?” he said.

“ ‘All members of the expedition shall refrain from making value judgments regarding the indigenous sentients’ ancient and noble culture,’ ” I said.

I picked up the pieces Bult spit out, which didn’t amount to much, and gave ’em to Ev. And looked off at the horizon.

The Wall curved back away from the Tongue and out across the plain in a straight line. Beyond it there was a scattering of scourbrush and trees. There wasn’t any wind, the leaves were hanging limp. What we needed was a good dust storm to throw C.J. off, but there wasn’t so much as a breeze.

It wasn’t C.J.’s figuring the dust storms out that worried me. She’d try to blackmail us into naming something after her, but she’d been doing that for years. But I didn’t want her talking about it over the transmitter for Big Brother to hear. If they started looking at the log, they’d be able to see for themselves. There was no way there’d been a dust tantrum in this weather. There wasn’t even any air. The feathers Bult was spitting out up ahead fell straight down.

Half a klom later we ran into a dust tantrum that was more like a full-blown rage. It got in the transmitter (but not before we’d gotten a full five minutes of it on the log), and up our noses and down our throats, and made it so dark we had to navigate by following the lights on Bult’s umbrella.

By the time we got clear of it, it was getting dark for real, and Bult started looking for a good place to camp, which meant someplace knee-deep in flora so he could get the maximum in fines out of us. Carson wanted to get across the Tongue first, but Bult peered solemnly into the water and pronounced tssi mitsse, and while Carson was yelling, “Where? I don’t see a damn thing!” the ponies started to sway, so we camped where we were.

We set up camp in a hurry, first because we didn’t want to have to unload the ponies after they were down, and then because we didn’t want to be stumbling around in the dark, but all three of Boohte’s moons were up before we got the transmitter unloaded.

Carson went off to tie the ponies up downwind, and Ev helped me spread out the bedrolls.

“Are we in uncharted territory?” he asked.

“Nope,” I said, shaking the dust out of my bedroll. “Unless you count what’s on us.” I spread the bedroll out, making sure it wasn’t on any flora. “Speaking of which, I’d better go call C.J. and tell her where we are.” I handed Carson’s bedroll to him and started over to the transmitter.

“Wait,” he said.

I stopped and turned back to look at him.

“When I talked to C.J., she wanted to know why the dust tantrum hadn’t shown up on the log.”

“And what did you tell her?”

“I said it came in at an angle and blindsided us. I said it blew up so fast I didn’t even see it till you shouted, and by that time we were in the middle of it.”

I told Carson he was smarter than he looked, I thought.

“How come you did that?” I said. “C.J.’d probably give you a free jump for telling her we blew up that storm ourselves.”

“Are you kidding?” he said, looking so surprised I was sorry I’d said it. Of course he wouldn’t betray us. We were Findriddy and Carson, the famous explorers who could do no wrong, even if he’d just caught us red-handed.

“Well, thanks,” I said and wondered exactly how smart he was and what explanation I could get away with. “Carson and I had things we needed to discuss, and we didn’t want Big Brother listening.”

“It’s a gatecrasher, isn’t it? That’s why the expedition left in such a hurry and why you keep running whereabouts when there isn’t supposed to be anybody but us on the planet. You think somebody’s illegally opened a gate. Is that why Bult’s leading us south, to try to keep us from catching him?”

“I don’t know what Bult’s doing,” I said. “He could have kept us away from a gatecrasher by crossing where we were this morning and leading us up along the Wall past Silvershim Creek. He didn’t have to drag us clear down here. Besides,” I said, looking at Bult, who was down by the Tongue with Carson and the ponies, “he doesn’t like Wulfmeier. Why would he try to protect him?”

“Wulfmeier?” Ev said, sounding excited. “Is that who it is?”

“You know Wulfmeier?”

“Of course. From the pop-ups,” he said.

Well, I should have known.

“What do you think he’s doing?” Ev said. “Trading with the indigenous sentients? Mining?”

“I don’t think he’s doing anything. I got a verify this morning that he’s on Starting Gate.”

“Oh,” he said, disappointed. In the pop-ups we must have gone after gatecrashers with lasers blasting. “But you want to go there just to make sure?”

“If Bult ever lets us cross the Tongue,” I said.

Carson came stomping up. “I ask Bult if it’s safe to water the ponies, and he pretends to look in the water and says, ‘tssi mitss nah,’ so I say, ‘Well, fine, since there aren’t any tssi mitss, we can cross first thing in the morning,’ and he hands me a pair of dice and says, ‘Sahthh. Brik lilla fahr.’ ” He squatted down and rummaged in his pack. “My shit, ‘lilla fahr’ is practically in the Ponypiles.” He glared at the mountains. “What on hell is he up to? And don’t give me that stuff about fines.” He pulled out the water analysis kit and straightened up. “He’s got enough already to buy himself a different planet. Fin, did you get that aerial of the Wall from C.J. yet?”

“I was just calling her,” I said. He stomped off, and I went over to the transmitter.

“What can I do?” Ev said, tagging after me like a shuttlewren. “Should I gather some wood for a fire?”

I looked at him.

“Don’t tell me,” he said, catching my expression. “There’s a fine for gathering wood.”

“And starting a fire with advanced technology, and burning indigenous flora,” I said. “We usually try to wait till Bult gets cold and builds one.”

Bult didn’t show any signs of getting cold, even though the wind over the Ponypiles that had sent that dust tantrum into us had a chill to it, and after supper he gave Carson some more dice and then went off and sat under his umbrella out by the ponies.

“What on hell’s he doing now?” Carson said.

“He probably went to get the battery-powered heater he bought last expedition,” I said, rubbing my hands together. “Tell us some more about mating customs, Ev. Maybe a little sex’ll warm us up.”

“Speaking of which, Evie, have you figured out which brand Bult is yet?” Carson said.

As near as I could tell, Ev hadn’t so much as looked at Bult since we started, except when Bult was snacking on the shuttlewren, but he spoke right up.

“Male,” he said.

“How do you figure that?” Carson said, and I was wondering, too. If it was table manners he was going by, that wasn’t any sign. Every indidge I’d seen ate like that, and most of them didn’t bother about taking the feathers off first.

“His acquisitive behavior,” Ev said. “Collecting and hoarding property is a typical male courtship behavior.”

“I thought collecting stuff was a female behavior,” I said. “What about all those diamonds and monograms?”

“Gifts the male gives to the female are symbols of the male’s ability to amass and defend wealth or territory,” Ev said. “By collecting fines and purchasing manufactured goods, Bult is demonstrating his ability to gain access to the resources necessary for survival.”

“Shower curtains?” I said.

“Utility isn’t the issue. The male burin fish collects large quantities of black rock clams, which are of no practical value, since the burin fish only eats flora, and piles them into towers as part of the courtship ritual.”

“And that impresses the female?” I said.

“Ability to amass wealth is indicative of the genetic superiority of the male, and therefore the increased chance of survival for her offspring. Of course she’s impressed. There are other qualities that impress her, too. Size, strength, the ability to defend territory, like that shuttlewren we saw this afternoon—”

Which the female shuttlewrens probably hadn’t been very impressed with, I thought.

“—virility, youth—”

Carson said, “You mean we’re here freezing our hind ends off because Bult’s trying to impress some female?” He stood up. “I told you sex can louse up an expedition faster than anything else.” He grabbed up the lantern. “I’m not gonna end up with frostbite just because Bult wants to show his genes to some damn female.”

He went stomping off into the dark, and I watched the bobbing lantern, wondering what had gotten into him all of a sudden and why Bult wasn’t following him with his log if what Ev said was true. Bult was still sitting out by the ponies—I could see the lights on his umbrella.

“The indigenous sentients on Prii built bonfires as part of their courtship ritual,” Ev said, rubbing his hands together to warm them. “They’re extinct. They burned down every forest on Prii in less than five hundred years time.” He tipped his head back and looked at the sky. “I still can’t believe how beautiful everything is.”

It was presentable-looking. There were a bunch of stars, and the three moons were jostling for position in the middle of the sky. But my teeth were chattering, and there was a strong whiff of ponypile from downwind.

“What are the names of the moons?” he said.

“Larry, Curly, and Moe,” I said.

“No, really. What are the Boohteri names?”

“They don’t have names for them. Don’t get any idea of naming one after C.J., though. They’re Satellite One, Two, and Three until Big Brother surveys them, which it won’t anytime soon since the Boohteri won’t agree to satellite surveys.”

“C.J.?” he said, like he’d forgotten who she was. “They don’t look anything like they did on the pop-ups. Nothing on Boohte has, except you. You look exactly like I thought you would.”

“These pop-ups you’re always talking about? What are they? Holo books?”

“DHVs.” He got up, went over to his bedroll, and squatted down to get something out from under it. He came back, holding a flat square the size of a playing card, and sat down beside me.

“See?” he said and opened the flat card up like a book. “Episode Six,” he said.

Pop-ups was a good name for them. The picture seemed to jump out of the middle of the card and into the space between us, like the map back at King’s X, only this was full-size and the people were moving and talking.

There was a presentable-looking female standing next to a horse made up to be a pony and a squatty pink thing like a cross between an accordion and a fireplug. They were having an argument.

“He’s been gone too long,” the female said. She had on tight pants and a low-slung shirt, and her hair was long and shiny. “I’m going to go find him.”

“It’s been nearly twenty hours,” the accordion said. “We must report in to Home Base.”

“I’m not leaving here without him,” the female said, and swung up on the horse and galloped away.

“Wait!” the accordion shouted. “You can’t! It’s too dangerous!”

“Who’s that supposed to be?” I said, sticking my finger into the accordion.

“Stop,” Ev said, and the scene froze. “That’s Bult.”

“Where’s his log?” I said.

“I told you things were different from what I’d expected,” he said, sounding embarrassed. “Go back.”

There was a flicker, and we were back at the beginning of the scene.

“He’s been gone too long!” Tight Pants said.

“If that’s Bult, then who’s that supposed to be?” I said.

“You,” he said, sounding surprised.

“Where’s Carson?” I said.

“In the next scene.”

There was another flicker, and we were at the foot of a cliff, with big, fake-looking boulders all around. Carson was sitting at the bottom of the cliff, sprawled out against one of the boulders with a big gash in the side of his head and a fancy mustache that curled at the ends. Carson’s mustache had never looked that good, not even the first time I saw him, and they had the nibblers all wrong, too—they looked like guinea pigs with false teeth—but what they were doing to Carson’s foot was pretty realistic. I hoped they got to the part where I found him pretty soon.

“Next scene,” I said, and it flickered to me coming straight down the cliff in those tight pants, blasting at the nibblers with a laser.

Which wasn’t the way it happened at all. Unless I’d wanted to go down the same way Carson did, there was no way off the cliff. The nibblers had run off when I yelled, but I’d had to go back along the cliff till I came to a chimney and work my way down and back around, and it took three hours. The nibblers had run off again when they heard me coming, but they hadn’t been gone long.

Tight Pants jumped the last ten feet and knelt down beside Carson, and started tearing strips she couldn’t afford to lose off her shirt and tying them around Carson’s foot, which only looked a little bloody around the toes, sobbing her eyes out.

“I didn’t cry,” I said. “You got any others?”

“Episode Eleven,” Ev said, and the cliff flicked into a silvershim grove. Tight Pants and Fancy Mustache were surveying the grove with an old-fashioned transit and sextant, and the accordion was writing down the measurements.

It looked like somebody’d cut up pieces of aluminum foil and hung them on a dead branch, and Carson was wearing a blue fuzzy vest that I had a feeling was supposed to be luggage fur.

“Findriddy!” the accordion said, looking up sharply. “I hear someone coming!”

“What are you two doing?” Carson said and walked right into a silvershim. He looked around, his arms full of sticks. “What on hell is this?”

“You and me,” I said.

“A pop-up,” Ev said.

“Turn it off!” Carson said, and the other Carson and Tight Pants and the silvershims compressed into a black nothing. “What on hell’s the matter with you, bringing advanced technology on an expedition? Fin, you were supposed to see to it he followed the regs!” He dumped the sticks with a clatter onto where the accordion’d been standing. “Do you know how big a fine Bult could slap us with for that?”

“I… I didn’t know…” Ev was stammering, stooping down to pick up the pop-up before Carson stepped on it. “It never occurred to me…”

“It’s no more advanced than Bult’s binocs,” I said, “or half the stuff he’s ordered. And even if it was, he doesn’t know anything about it. He’s over there tallying up his fines.” I pointed off toward the lights of his umbrella.

“How do you know he doesn’t know? You can see it for kloms!”

“And you can hear you twice as far!” I said. “The only way he’s going to find out about it is if he comes over to see what all the hollering’s about!”

Carson snatched the pop-up away from Ev. “What else did you bring?” he shouted, but softer. “A nuclear reactor? A gate?”

“Just another disk,” Ev said. “For the pop-up.” He pulled a black coin out of his pocket and handed it to Carson.

“What on hell’s this?” he said, turning it over.

“It’s us,” I said. “Findriddy and Carson, Planetary Explorers, and Our Faithful Scout, Bult. Thirteen episodes.”

“Eighty,” Ev said. “There are forty on each disk, but I only brought my favorites.”

“You gotta see ’em, Carson,” I said. “Especially your mustache. Ev, is there some way you can tone down the production so we can watch without letting the rest of the neighborhood in on it?”

“Yeah,” Ev said. “You just—”

“Nobody’s watching anything till we get a fire built and I make sure Bult’s out there under that umbrella,” he said, and stomped off for about the fourth time.

I got the sticks made into a passable fire by the time he got back, looking mad, which meant Bult was there.

“All right,” he said, handing the pop-up back to Ev. “Let’s see these famous explorers. But keep it down.”

“Episode Two,” Ev said, laying it on the ground in front of us. “Reduce fifty percent and cloak,” and the scene came up, smaller and in a little box this time. Fancy Mustache and Tight Pants were clambering over a break in the Wall. Carson was wearing his blue fuzzy vest.

“You’re the one with the fancy mustache,” I said, pointing.

“Do you have any idea what kind of fine we’d get for killing a suitcase?” he said. He pointed at Tight Pants. “Who’s the female?”

“That’s Fin,” Ev said.

“Fin?!” Carson said, and let out a whoop. “Fin?! Can’t be. Look at her. She’s way too clean. And she looks too much like a female. Half the time with Fin you can’t even tell!” He whooped again and slapped his leg. “And look at that chest. You sure that’s not C.J.?”

I reached out and slapped the pop-up shut.

“What’d you do that for?” Carson said, holding his middle.

“Time to turn in,” I said. I turned to Ev. “I’m gonna keep this in my boot tonight so Bult can’t get hold of it,” I said and went over to my bedroll.

Bult was standing next to Carson’s bedroll. I glanced out toward the Tongue. The umbrella was still there, burning brightly.

Bult picked up my bedroll to look under it. “Damage to flora,” he said, pointing at the dirt underneath.

“Oh, shut up,” I said and crawled in.

“Inappropriate tone and manner,” he said, and went back out toward his umbrella.

Carson laughed himself sick for another hour, and I lay there after that an hour or so waiting for them to go to sleep and watching the moons jostling for positions in the sky. Then I got the pop-up out of my boot and opened it on the ground beside me.

“Episode Eight. Reduce eighty percent and cloak,” I whispered and lay there and watched Carson and me sitting on horses in a pouring rain and tried to figure out which expedition this was supposed to be. There was a blue buffalo standing up the hill from where we were, and the accordion was pointing at it. “It is called soolkases in the Boohteri tongue,” he said, and I knew which one this was, only that wasn’t the way it happened.

It had taken us four hours to figure out what Bult was saying. “Tssilkrothes?” I remembered Carson shouting.

“Tssuhhtkhahckes!” Bult had shouted back.

“Suitcases?!” Carson said, so mad his mustache looked like it’d shake off. “We can’t name them suitcases!” and right then a couple thousand suitcases had come roaring up over the hill at us. My pony stood there like an idiot and nearly got both of us trampled.

In the pop-up version my pony ran off, and I was the one who stood there looking dumb till Carson galloped up and swung me up behind him. I was wearing high-heeled boots and pants so tight it was no wonder I couldn’t run, and Carson was right, she was way too clean, but he hadn’t had to fall in the fire laughing about it.

Carson swung me up, and we rode off, my tight pants hugging the horse and my hair streaming out behind me.

“Nothing here’s what I expected,” Ev had said back at King’s X, “except you.” Tonight he’d said, “You looked exactly the way I pictured you.” Which, I thought, trying to figure out how to make the pop-up run it again, was pretty damn good.