The Adventures of Duncan & Mallory: The Beginning

by Robert Asprin

  “No, no,” the two men mumbled.

  “Now apologize,” she ordered them.

  “Ah, Mama,” Meyer said. “It’s just a stupid animal.”

  “Tell it you’re sorry,” she said in a voice that reminded him so much of his own father that it almost had Duncan apologizing for them trying to drown him.

  “We’re sorry,” the two men said together. Duncan didn’t believe them for a minute. He was also extremely tired of being wet every time he turned around, and there was something else.

  “Everywhere I go someone or something tries to kill me. Look,” the Romancer said, and lowered his sword only a little, “I don’t want to stay here, and I surely don’t want to plant any trees. Even if I’d wanted to stay here before, I certainly don’t now. I didn’t come here on purpose in the first place. Could you maybe tell me where the nearest human settlement is? I’d just like to go someplace where nothing tries to kill me for a couple of days.”

  The mother one glared at the two men, who looked at the dirt in front of them. “I’m very sorry for my sons who are grown men and should know better. There is a road about a mile west of here that leads to Tarslick. All sorts of creatures great and small live there—including humans.”

  “And rats,” Jasper whispered to Meyer, but loud enough that Duncan could hear him. Their mother cut them a dirty look, and they both looked at their feet again.

  “Our world brought just as many disgusting things, my children. Remember that. Walk that way, young man,” she said, pointing down the road. “Soon you’ll come to another road; just follow it to Tarslick. You should be safe there, if anyone is ever safe in a big city.”

  “Thank you,” Duncan said, and started breaking camp. He didn’t care about wet clothes or anything else. Fate was telling him it was time to move again, and he was moving.

  * * * *

  Duncan walked most of the day. His fish hadn’t quite dried out again, and it was sort of rubbery, but he ate some anyway and kept walking. He didn’t want to have to camp in the woods again. But as it started to get dark he still saw nothing that looked even remotely like civilization, so he picked a spot and made camp.

  The next morning he was determined to make it to Tarslick, but the sign that said twenty-five miles to Tarslick didn’t give him much hope that he’d make it that day, either.

  By midday his feet were starting to hurt from walking in boots that had never had a chance to dry out completely. He was about to give up and make camp when he noticed a little side road. Soon there was another and then another. Shortly after that he saw his first ever car. It ran along the road, smoke coming out of a chimney towards the back. Its wheels weren’t anything like wagon wheels. They were made out of some black, tar-looking substance.

  The creature driving it—creature because it was nothing that could have been mistaken as human—waved and smiled at him but drove right by. Then the dirt road under his feet turned black and was hard and smooth as the road had been in the desert.

  He walked only a few more feet when there was another car, and then another, and then another. One machine made a loud noise that made Duncan jump, and then the driver was pointing at him and yelling for him to get off the road.

  Duncan realized he needed to get out of the way of the cars, so he moved to walk beside the road.

  More roads were crossing the main one all the time, and the closer he got to the city the more crossroads there were. He saw so many cars that they began to be less of a novelty and more of a nuisance because they kept him off the smooth part of the road. When he got to those cross roads he couldn’t figure out when the cars were supposed to go and when it was safe for him to cross. He came to the conclusion it was never really safe and started running across as fast as he could.

  About the time he realized he should stop for the night he found that he couldn’t. There were houses everywhere, but he saw no inns. He didn’t know what the protocol was here for knocking on a stranger’s door and asking if you could stay in their house for the night, but he had a feeling it wouldn’t be a good idea.

  His feet hurt, and he was starting to despair that he’d be walking the rest of his life when a car stopped next to him.

  The driver put down the glass in his door, stuck his head out and shouted, “Hey buddy, could you use a lift?”

  “Well, I have been happier,” Duncan answered, walking up to the car.

  The man in the car laughed. “I meant, do you need a ride?”

  “Yes, yes I do.”

  The man opened a door on the side of the car. Duncan took off his pack and his sword and got in holding his stuff on his lap. He certainly didn’t have much room in this strange wagon. The man reached across Duncan and shut the door. “You look like you’re a long way from home.”

  “Very far.” Duncan was busy checking out the inside of the car. There was a wheel the man turned—obviously to steer the machine. There were things on the floor he put his feet on, and the car made a little chugging, popping sound as it went.

  “Your first time in the big city?”

  “Are we in Tarslick now?” Duncan asked, looking around and hitting his head on the roof of the car as he did so.

  “You’re a big one that’s for sure,” the man laughed. “No, we aren’t to the city yet. Let me guess—you’re from up river.”

  “Yes, from Spurna. Thanks for giving me a ride.”

  “We humans have to stick together, right?” The guy laughed. “So what brings you to the city?”

  “I’m looking for a place where I can find work and no one will try to kill me.”

  “Aren’t we all?” He laughed again, “Name’s Drake, what about you?”

  “Duncan.”

  “Well hold onto your seat, Duncan, I don’t think you’ve ever even imagined any place like Tarslick.”

  * * * *

  Drake hadn’t been wrong. Tarslick was a huge, thriving city like nothing Duncan had ever imagined in his wildest dreams. There were buildings that shone with steel and glass, and bright, multicolored lights that reached as tall as six stories. There were roads and streets, some of which seemed to run into and out of the buildings themselves. Big cars, small cars, and motorbikes roared all around, seeming to come in and out of everywhere.

  There were horses and wagons, too, and so many kinds of creatures of all different sizes, shapes and colors that he’d lost count. Of course he couldn’t really count very far.

  Duncan couldn’t decide what to look at first there was just so much going on. Lights flashed in numerous languages in a rainbow of different colors. One sign even had a moving picture on it that kept changing. One minute a man was using some strange device to shave, the next a car was racing a horse and winning. Then there was a picture of a bright colored bird. It flew over a house and crapped; the crap soon covered the whole house.

  Duncan made a face, “What’s that?”

  “A really bad ad. It’s an insurance company. Their point is that they cover your whole house. I don’t think it really works. I keep wondering when they’re going to pull it.”

  Duncan nodded like he understood, which he didn’t, because he’d been asking about the thing making the pictures in the first place.

  “So. How much money you have?”

  “Two coins.”

  “Really?”

  He nodded.

  “Well, bro, I hope you get some good work soon.” Drake shook his head. “There’s only one place in the city where they will do more than laugh at you for that much coin, and it ain’t in one of the better neighborhoods.”

  They drove to a part of the city where there wasn’t as much traffic and the buildings weren’t as big or bright or pretty. Mud brick houses in various states of decay lined both sides of the road. In some places sheets of tin and cardboard boxes had been leaned against the decaying walls of the buildings to make infirm structures. It was obvious that people were living in them. There was a metal barrel in an alley. A fire was in it and a large group o
f different kinds of creatures had gathered around it for warmth. Some of them were cooking some sort of dead animal pushed onto a stick over the flames.

  To Duncan’s dismay Drake pulled over to the curb and stopped. “Well this is as far as I can take you, buddy. Good luck.”

  “Thanks.” Duncan reluctantly got out of the car. He looked back inside and Drake must have seen the apprehension in his eyes.

  “Big guy like you with a sword shouldn’t have too much trouble with the riff-raff.”

  “It hasn’t helped me so far.”

  “You’ll be fine. Just remember that in the city everyone has an angle.”

  “I will. Thanks, Drake.” Duncan waved and watched as the man drove away. He would have liked to take the man’s words of wisdom to heart, but the truth was he hadn’t understood most of what he said. He spoke the same language as most on Overlap—it having been decided long ago that it was easier that way—but he used words Duncan didn’t know and in a way he hadn’t heard them used before.

  Walking around, a stranger in a new land, trying to take everything in, he looked for someplace that might be an inn. He didn’t know what sort of filth he was walking in, but it stuck to the bottom of his boots and made a sticky sound as he walked.

  He could feel the eyes of the people inside those hovels watching him. The further he walked down the street, stepping over and around garbage, the more uncomfortable he got. So when he saw a sign he could actually read he walked in without much thought.

  The neon sign flashed, “Cater’s, bar, grill and lodging.”

  When he walked all the way into the dimmer-than-usual bar the floor creaked under his weight. The place looked like it was a bad wind away from falling apart, but the fellow behind the bar, the bar maid, and most of the cliental were human, which put him some at ease.

  The innkeeper looked from Duncan to the two coins he held in his hand. “Two coins won’t buy you much in the city, fellah.” He paused to spit some of whatever he was chewing into a funny-shaped pot sitting on the floor, and Duncan made a face. “Boy like you, fresh out of the woods so to speak, you’re an easy mark for the sharks in the city. Lucky you came here. I’ll tell you what. Since I’m in such a good mood I’ll let you have a stall in the stable for a week, but not a minute more. It’s my problem, I’m just too nice. Ain’t that right Abby?” he asked the bar maid.

  “Yeah that’s right Austin, yer ah peach,” Abby said. Then the large red-headed woman in the flowing pink and purple dress started laughing and walked away with a tray full of beers. Duncan watched the beers as they moved away and licked his lips.

  “Here you go, kid.” Austin, a small red-headed man with a handlebar mustache and garters to hold up his sleeves, pulled another beer and handed it to Duncan. “See, that’s what I’m telling you. I’m just too nice. It will be the death of me yet.”

  The barkeep took Duncan’s two coins and stuck them in his pocket then walked away to serve another customer. Duncan sat down at the bar and drank the beer slowly, savoring every drop.

  The stable wasn’t in much better shape than the tavern was. There were holes in the walls big enough to throw a cat through. The roof looked like it leaked, and of course the place smelled like moldy hay and horse crap. Still, after living in the wilds the stable seemed like a luxury suite to Duncan. He kicked a couple of horse apples out of where he wanted to make his bed and put down some fresh straw.

  The three horses he shared the stable with turned out to be much better company than fish heads on sticks. Still, Duncan was sure it would be a long time before he could forget the haunted look in Velma’s eyes as she disappeared into the swirling waters of the Sliding River.

  * * * *

  The very next morning Duncan went out to look for work. Austin pointed him in the direction of what he called an employment center.

  The city looked even dirtier in the light of day, and he found the things he was stepping over and around occasionally moved. He couldn’t tell if these creatures were alive or dead or something in between, and he didn’t try to find out.

  He had a certain unsettled nervousness he didn’t remember ever feeling before. As he looked up at the extremely tall building he was walking by he thought, It’s this place, it never rests, never sleeps. Like the city itself is a creature. I feel really small, like I’m something it’s eaten and is thinking about spitting out.

  The third building he entered turned out to be the right one. He was directed to sit in a big room full of chairs, most of which were filled with other people—and not-so-much-people—who he guessed were also looking for work.

  The people and not-people passed the time looking really depressed and looking at strange slick books with bright pictures which looked like they’d seen better days. Occasionally one of them would look at the clock on the wall and sigh. So he did it, too, just to fit in.

  After he’d waited for what seemed like forever, a small, grey woman with tall, grey hair called him into her office. She motioned for him to a chair in front of her desk, and then walked around to sit behind it. She was so small and the desk was so big that Duncan had to stretch his neck to see her.

  “Right off I can tell you that we’ll never be able to place you unless you take a bath, and wash your clothes properly. Nothing personal…” she held up a paper she had in her hand and read his name from it, “…Duncan. But you smell like bad fish and smoked cheese.”

  Duncan nodded. That seemed fair. He did smell like bad fish and smoked cheese.

  “And the beard has to go, too. There is a bathing room in this building for that purpose and a laundry in which to do your clothes. Here at Everyone Needs a Job Employment Agency we believe a clean employee is an easy-to-place employee. Is that understood?”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “Good. Now before I send you off to clean yourself up, what skills do you have?”

  “Excuse me?” Duncan asked.

  The woman looked him up and down and summed him up quickly.

  “No skills,” she said in a voice that sounded like she might have gargled rocks before coming to work that day.

  “I have a sword.”

  “Are you good with it?”

  Duncan thought about lying but then thought better of it. “No, no. Not really.”

  “Don’t worry, honey, we shouldn’t have any trouble finding you work. Let’s face it, the less skilled you are, the less you expect from a job. The less you expect from a job, the less you expect from life. And the less you expect from life, the easier it is to place you in employment.”

  And the Everyone Needs a Job Employment Agency didn’t have any trouble finding him work, either. Keeping it, however, was a different story for Duncan.

  His first job was as a singing waiter. They fired him after only three hours, stating that he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket, and that he still carried a tune with more precision than he could carry a tray of food.

  The employment agency got him a job the very next day trimming the hedges of a wealthy politician. Two days passed and he was still doing fine. Then on the third day he was paying more attention to a pretty girl walking past the front gates than he was his work. He accidentally lopped the head off of the governor’s favorite animal-shaped topiary. He tried to tie it back on with a piece of string, but it wouldn’t stay in place. His argument that it made a statement with the head hanging from the string did not amuse the governor, and he was fired on the spot.

  Next they placed him in a wolverine obedience school. It seemed that some fools thought wolverines would make good pets and guard animals. Duncan hadn’t done well there at all and would have scars for the rest of his life to prove it. He wasn’t there a day when one of the clients threatened a lawsuit. Duncan wasn’t sure what that was but from the looks on their faces it wasn’t a good thing. Duncan tried to explain to them how much better off they were.

  “Look, the animal wouldn’t behave at all before and now it sits, it stays, and it plays dead brilliantly.”<
br />
  “That’s because he’s not playing dead he is dead. You killed him.”

  “No I didn’t. He’s just sleeping.”

  “His head has been cut off and you’ve just shoved the pieces back together. You killed our pet.”

  Tying the head back on the wolverine hadn’t gone much better than tying the head back on the topiary.

  “It’s just a nick,” he said, shrugging.

  “No, it’s not! His head’s been completely cut off. Don’t try to tell me that will heal. I believe you’re stupid, I just don’t believe you’re that stupid.”

  The really bad wolverine trainer decided to change tactics. “He did it himself.”

  “Did it himself! You really expect me to believe he cut off his own head?”

  “It could happen.”

  “How?!”

  “I don’t think the real question here is how, I think it’s why? Why did little Beethoven decide he wanted to take his own life? Was it maybe that you expected much too much of him? Let us stop for a moment and ask ourselves where does the fault truly lie?”

  Well neither the client nor his employer thought he made a convincing argument, and he was canned on the spot.

  The next job the grey woman found him had him stripping in a woman’s bar. It had taken him four days to get over the humiliation of prancing around on stage mostly naked. He had just started making good tips when his natural clumsiness came calling. He tripped on a pair of discarded pants he’d started his act wearing and fell off the stage right on top of the club’s best clients sending all three to the hospital. To avoid a lawsuit—he wished he knew what those were—the club fired him.

  * * * *

  The little grey employment lady looked at him over her desk and the stack of accumulated “employment” files she had on Duncan.

  She took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. “If I didn’t like you, kid, you’d just be out on your fanny, but I’m gonna give ya one more shot ’cause there is this honest look in your eyes.” She took another deep, raspy breath in, let it out, then asked again, “Do you have any, and I do mean ANY skills?”