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  “I’ll wager you have.”

  “So you’ll please forgive me if I sometimes say rude things. They’re not intentional.”

  “So noted.”

  “Like why, when you can have any kind of head, did you choose a troll’s?”

  Koertig gave him a hard stare. “Is this one of those rude questions I’m supposed to forgive?”

  “It’s the only way I learn, sir.”

  That seemed to mollify the pluriban. “There’s nothing rude about learning, I suppose. Very well, I choose a troll head because the brain is bigger. More brain tissue allows greater cognitive function.”

  “Really? The trolls I’ve met–”

  “Are dumber than turnips. Yes. That is because they don’t make use of their extra brain tissue. But when my mind was transferred into this head, I was able to tap into areas of the brain that were inaccessible to its previous owner.”

  Mind transfer…fascinating.

  “I always assumed the brain itself was transferred.”

  Koertig looked at him as if he’d just grown a third eye. “Don’t be absurd. Imagine the myriad neurological reconnections that would necessitate.”

  Telly’s mind swarmed with possibilities.

  “Can you transfer your mind into more than one body?”

  “Aren’t you listening? I said transfer – I did not say copy. One mind, one body.”

  “Oh, yes, of course. Sorry.”

  “Stop apologizing and go bring me that boy. I have a meeting with Falzon shortly and I want thew human here waiting when I come back.”

  Telly hurried for the lot where the Uberalls kept the vehicles. The errand was wasted effort. Ryan was not at Armagost Farm, but Telly couldn’t say so, because he wasn’t supposed to know that. Dr. Koertig was going to be very disappointed when he returned without Ryan. Would Master Simon admit that he was missing? Telly didn’t care. He simply prayed that Ryan and Emma were alive.

  4

  Ergel stepped into Master Simon’s and went all cringely inside as the boss looked up from the papers on his desk.

  “Ah!” he said with a smile. “A quick return. Where are our runaways?”

  Ergel had practiced all night what he was going to say and how he was going to say it, but all that went smoky as he stood before the desk.

  “Ergel is afraid he has bad news, Master.”

  The smile disappeared. “Oh, I hope not, you miserable troll. I sincerely hope not. The fact that you’re here must mean that you’ve succeeded in finding them, for I can’t imagine a circumstance where you would return from the hunt empty handed.”

  “There is nuffin’ for Ergel to be puttin’ his hands on.”

  “Explain.”

  “The two humanses and Dillon was motorvated to Balmore by an unknown personage. Before Ergel could reappropriate them, the Silent Ones attacked.”

  Ergel cringed as Master Simon shot to his full six feets of highity.

  “What? They were down near the harbor?”

  “That was where Ergel be trackifying them, sir. The big blacky cloud moved in, it did, and wasn’t leaving no one or nuffin’ behind after it was gone.”

  Master Simon pounded the desk. “Those two humans belong to Falzon!” He jabbed a finger at Ergel. “You let them escape! You are going to tell Falzon their fate. And if I know that rakshasa, he’ll make you wish you’d disappeared with them!”

  Ergel began to shake inside. He’d heard about the horrible things what happened to them what displeased Falzon.

  “Please, sir. Ergel done his bestest.”

  “Lucky for you Falzon is leaving for the other side of the globe to visit his homeland. You have a temporary reprieve.”

  “But the Silent Ones tooked them.”

  “Yes, you tell Falzon when he returns that if he has a complaint, he should take it up with the Silent Ones. See how that plays out for you.”

  “Ergel woulda been savin’ them if’n they was savable, sir. ’Specially Dillon. But there not be nuffin’ he could do.”

  Master Simon seemed to deflate. “Oh, dear. Dillon. Dillon is gone too?”

  “Ergel be sorry, sir.”

  He hadn’t liked Master Simon’s son – always getting in the way – but he had come to respectify Dillon’s spunk. Ergel had started out thinking of him as a spoiled, snot-nosed rich kid who simply wanted attention. One day he’d told his father he was gonna live as a human slave to show him how cruel it was. Master Simon had larfed when he shaved his palms, dressed in slave clothes, and joined the humanses in the sangreflor fields. No ones, ’specially his father and Ergel, had expected him to last a day, but he been existicating like a human slave this past year and a half. He’d sought out no special treatmentations. Not that his father was ’bout to offer any. The boy’d proved a tougher kid than anyone had ever imaginated.

  Ergel couldn’t tell how Master Simon felt about his son dying. He showed nuffin’. But then, he never showed nuffin’ ’bout nuffin’ anyhows.

  “I’ll have to tell his mother,” Master Simon said in a low voice. “I’d almost rather tell Falzon.” He glared at Ergel. “This is all your fault.”

  “No, sir! It be the faults of the one that motorvated them aways.”

  “Who would do that, Ergel? Tell me that.”

  “The pipsqueakity human brat said his brother was a Uberall.”

  “That proved false. No one at the compound tested out human.”

  “Ergel don’t be pretending to know nuffin’ ’bout no tests, but he knows mistakes be happening all the time. If there be a human spyer in the Uberalls, then the spyer be the one that spiricated them kids away.”

  “Finding him won’t bring Dillon or Falzon’s kids back.”

  “But twisting his neck around and grinding his bones for meal will pleasure Ergel.”

  “You sound like Falzon…” A light began to shine in Master Simon’s eyes. “Wait… if you can track down the one who spirited them away, and unmask him as a human spy among the Uberalls, it won’t completely make up for the loss of two human slaves, but it might mollify Falzon somewhat. Or, at the very least, distract him.”

  “Mollification and distractication… these be good?”

  “They won’t be bad. I want you to join the Uberalls and watch for anyone who’s acting strange. Or see if anyone’s missing. Perhaps the one who drove them to Balmore was caught in the attack as well.”

  “Yes, sir. Ergel will infiltricate himself and be yer spyer. What does you be wanting Ergel to do once he finds him?”

  “Just report to me. I want to have a few words with this spy before I present him to Falzon.”

  “Excuse me?” said a voice from the doorway.

  Ergel spun to see a young lycan in a Uberall jumpsuit.

  “What you be wantin’?”

  “Doctor Koertig sent me over for the young human slave who was at the compound the other day.”

  Master Simon stiffened. “He sent you for one my slaves? And what did you think you were going to do with him?”

  The Uberall seemed surprised. “Um, bring him back to the compound.”

  “One of my slaves?”

  “Yeah. The kid’s one of Falzon’s.”

  “No,” Master Simon said, coming around the desk. “‘The kid,’ as you put it, is mine.”

  He was bent forward as if about to spring. Ergel knew he got like this when he was angrified.

  “But–” the Uberall began.

  “No buts. I hold the lease, therefore he is mine for the term of the lease, and the lease has years to run.” His voice volumated upward. “Who does Doctor Koertig think he is that he can send one of his lackeys over at his whim to pluck one of my slaves from his work and do whatever it is he wishes to do with him while my quotas go unfilled?”

  The Uberall backed up a step and raised his hands. “Hey, don’t shoot the messenger.”

  Master Simon was shouting now. “Is that what you are? A messenger? Well, then, good! I have a message for you to take ba
ck. You can inform Doctor Manfred Telford Koertig that I paid for that boy’s lease and I’m going to get my money’s worth out of him.”

  The Uberall’s face went slackish. “Did… did you just say ‘Telford’?”

  “Yes, I did. That’s what the ‘T’ in Manfred T. Koertig stands for. And you can also tell him that the next time he’s so presumptuous as to send a lackey around for one of my slaves, I will shoot the messenger! Now get out!”

  The Uberall stared a moment, then stumbled away.

  “I don’t think we’ll be hearing from Doctor Koertig again soon,” Master Simon said as he returned to his place behind the desk. “That bought us some time, but Koertig has Falzon’s ear. He might persuade the rakshasa to cancel the boy’s lease. You must move fast, Ergel. If there’s a spy in Falzon’s camp, find him and find him quickly!”

  “You can counts on Ergel, Master Simon.”

  5

  Manfred never liked meeting with Falzon. But he did like the funding he provided for his research, so he put up with the creature. Put up with his odor and his rages and his capricious cruelty.

  Falzon conducted his “audiences” – as he liked to call them – in the large room at the rear of his bunker. As Manfred entered the too-familiar rakshasa effluvium assailed his nostrils. Manfred had never sniffed the dredged bottom of a polluted lake, but he wouldn’t be surprised if it smelled like a rakshasa.

  At eight feet, Falzon was tall, even for a rakshasa, but he seemed to feel a need to look down even further upon his minions. Thus the platform positioned center-rear in the room, and the huge, throne-like chair upon it.

  He wore his usual sleeveless tunic, the better to display his absurdly muscular arms and to let the lights shimmer along the scales of his green skin. Manfred always thought it a useless exercise in vanity, because no one looked at Falzon’s arms once they’d seen his face. His large black eyes held no hint of warmth, and the long razor-sharp teeth that crowded his mouth were better suited to some deep sea horror than a creature that trod the land.

  His mercurial mood swings always put Manfred on edge – one never knew what he would be angry about – but he refused to show it.

  “Ah, Doctor Koertig,” he said from his throne. He leaned back with one leg draped over an arm of the chair. “Right on time. I like promptnesss.”

  “I know you do. That’s why I’m always on time for you.”

  My first lie of the meeting, Manfred thought.

  He believed in precision, both in his work and his life. Tardiness was imprecision. He did not tolerate it in himself or others.

  “As you ssshould be.” He clapped his huge, taloned hands. “Ssso. Why have I sssummoned you today?”

  “I’m sure you’re about to tell me.”

  The rakshasa blinked his soulless eyes as he processed the remark. He was used to his minions groveling and trembling before him. Manfred refused to cower and insisted on dealing with Falzon as an equal. He could afford the luxury because Falzon needed him. And if the rakshasa should happen to rip off an arm, Manfred could always replace it.

  “Yesss,” Falzon said after a heartbeat or two. “That isss exactly what I am going to do. I wish to discusss the breach generator.”

  Was that all? Manfred hid his relief.

  “It continues to work as designed. We’re shanghaiing as many humans as we dare without revealing ourselves, but if you want us to pick up the pace–”

  “What isss the biggessst breach you can make?”

  Where was this going?

  “Approximately as wide as I am tall.”

  Falzon shook his massive head. “Not big enough. I want bigger.”

  “I suppose we could up the power and stretch it to where you could walk through, but–”

  “Bigger! Much bigger!”

  “How big?”

  “You have ssseen our courtyard?”

  Of course he had. He walked across it every day. Oh, wait. Oh, no… he couldn’t want…

  “You want to open a hole into Humania that big?”

  He grinned – a hideous sight. “Yessss!”

  “But that’s – that a couple of hundred feet!”

  The grin broadened. “Yesssss!”

  “The Veil won’t allow it. It resists even the small breaches we make.”

  “Then overcome the resssissstance!”

  Manfred began pacing. How to explain interdimensional physics to this creature? He had a monster’s body with the emotional maturity of a two-year-old lycan, whose philosophy of life could be boiled down to I want what I want when I want it!

  “We call it the Veil, but it’s not a piece of cloth we can simply poke a hole through. It’s an interdimensional barrier and we simply don’t have the circuitry to stand up to the enormous power flow necessary to open a hole that big.”

  “Nonsssenssse! Increassse the power twenty timesss and a five-foot hole becomesss a hundred-foot hole.”

  Didn’t they teach geometry back in the Y-RC?

  “I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way. The area of a five-foot hole is about twenty feet. If you simply double the diameter to ten feet, you quadruple the area to almost eighty feet. Expand the diameter to twenty feet and the area is over three-hundred feet. Do you see where I’m going?”

  “I sssee only that you are boring me.”

  “The area of the hundred-foot hole you mentioned is close to eight thousand square feet. That’s four hundred times the diameter of a five-foot hole, which means we’ll need to pump four hundred times the power of a five foot hole to open a hundred-foot hole. That will melt all the components. And a two-hundred-foot hole? I don’t think there’s enough power on all of Nocturnia to open it. And even if we could generate it, we do not have the circuitry to stand up to that.”

  “You may need less power than you think.”

  “Oh, really?” Did he think he was an electrical engineer now? “How do you figure that?”

  “What if I told you the Veil is thinning.”

  “I’d say you’ve been reading Bluthkalt’s papers while drinking whatever intoxicant you rakshasa drink. It’s a myth, started by Bluthkalt after he lost his mind.”

  “I have confirmation from another sssource. The sssavantsss at the Kolkut Academy of Sssience have confirmed that it isss thinning – not only thinning, but at an sssteadily accelerating rate.”

  “Why haven’t I heard of this?” Manfred said, hiding his shock. “Where has it been published?”

  “It will appear in the Journal of Physics next month.”

  A respected journal. If they accepted it…

  Carefully considering his next words, Manfred said, “I look forward to reading it. But you realize, don’t you, that thinning of the Veil is not a good thing. If it gets too thin the results could be catastrophic.”

  “I am well aware of that.”

  “You don’t seem terribly upset about that.”

  “That dependsss on your anssswer to my next quessstion. Tell me, doctor: Will a thinner Veil allow you to open a larger breach?”

  “It certainly will.”

  “And keep it open for longer?”

  “Most assuredly.”

  “Then I am happy about the thinning of the Veil. I want that larger breach.”

  “For what purpose, may I ask?”

  Falzon shot to his feet and leaped off the dais. For a heart-stopping second Manfred was afraid he was about to lose his head for asking an impertinent question. But no… Falzon was simply in an expansive mood and needed space to move around.

  “Imagine the military command center of the most powerful nation on Humania. Imagine it’sss a night with a full moon.”

  Manfred saw immediately where this was headed but let Falzon rattle on.

  “I’m imagining.”

  “Now imagine a breach,” he said, spreading his arms, “asss big as the courtyard outssside. Imagine it opening right in the heart of that military control sscenter and vomiting forth a horde of necrosss and nosssiesss and
squatches and lycansss in full fang. The breach closssesss and reopensss at the doorstep of that nation’sss leadersss, and again, an army of Nocturniansss rushesss through. Before anyone knowsss what hasss happened, we are in control of their leadersss and their military, and thereby in control of their country. We essstablish a bassse there and then we begin to take over every nation on Humania, one by one. What do you think?”

  Insane, Manfred thought.

  “Ambitious,” he said, then quickly added, “and brilliant.”

  Falzon raised his arms and scraped the ceiling with his talons. “Of courssse! “You expected anything lesss?”

  “Decidedly not. This is exactly what I expected. But you don’t have that sort of army.”

  “But I do! Or I will very sssoon! The map of Nocturnia isss ssstudded with Uberall groupsss. After I return from my home visssit, I will begin a tour of the Uberall campsss around the globe to tell them to arm themssselvesss and prepare for the invasssion of Humania. I am calling it ‘Operation Fang and Claw.’”

  Manfred suppressed a groan at the trite title, but nodded enthusiastically and said, “A truly awe-inspiring appellation.”

  “I thought ssso. And I expect you to have sssolved the breach limitationsss by the time I finish my tour.”

  “But–”

  “Get to work! We don’t have forever!”

  “I’ll get right on it,” Manfred said as he hurried from the room.

  Falzon had been talking about invading Humania ever since the Uberalls became popular and their ranks swelled after his killing of Bluthkalt. Manfred had always considered it empty bluster and bravado. But now the rakshasa appeared to be serious – deadly serious.

  The entire enterprise was fraught with risks. If the invasion failed, Humania would learn of Nocturnia’s existence, and the humans were much better schooled in mass destruction than Nocturnians. Nocturnia would sorely regret Falzon’s impetuous move.

  But of greater concern was the thinning of the Veil. The physics department at Kolkot Academy of Science had an excellent reputation. If they said the Veil was thinning, then it undoubtedly was. If it thinned too much, the barrier between Nocturnia and Humania would go down. That would precipitate the merging of dimensions, with both worlds trying to occupy the same space. The result: the destruction of both worlds.