Myth-ion Improbable m-11

by Robert Asprin

  "And we just can't come out and ask for it," I said.

  Everyone agreed.

  "We're also going to need horses," Glenda said. "Unless you want to do more walking in this heat."

  I glanced down the street at the open countryside beyond the limits of the small town. Walking back out into that for any distance would be a very bad idea.

  We all agreed that we didn't want to do that as well.

  "Well, we need two things," I said. "Information about the golden cow, and horses to get us to the treasure."

  "Skeeve and I will try the place across the street," Glenda said. "You two head for another one farther along."

  "All right," Aahz said, surprising me by agreeing to Glenda's plan. "We meet back in the cabin on Vortex #6 in one hour."

  I made sure Glenda understood, since she was my ride out of here. Then we stepped into the street, making a wide turn around one of the large piles of horsepoop the guy was collecting.

  He just smiled at us and said, "Howdy."

  I tipped my hat at him and he seemed satisfied enough to go back to work.

  I was right in all fashions about Audry's Place. It was clear as we went through the door that it was both a restaurant and a bar. The bar was wooden and long, stretching the entire length of the left wall as we entered. A hatless guy wearing a white apron stood behind the bar, a rag in his hands.

  Three of the tables were occupied with a total of ten pa­ trons, all of them eating what looked to be large plates of vegetables. The music was loud and had a pretty good beat to it. It seemed like it was coming from a piano in the back, only there was no one sitting at the piano.

  Every person in the place glanced up at us as we entered, then went back to eating and talking as if they saw strangers every day and just didn't care. I considered that a good sign.

  "Howdy, folks," the guy behind the bar said, wiping a spot off the wood surface in front of him. "What's your pleasure?"

  I had no idea what the guy meant. I sort of understood the words, but standing in the middle of a bar, I sure didn't understand why he was asking me about pleasure. Just a little too personal a question for someone I didn't know.

  I glanced at Glenda, who seemed confused for a moment as well. Then she indicated I should follow her lead as she stepped toward the guy.

  Glenda nodded her head at the bartender, sort of like tip­ping her hat as we reached the wide bar.

  "A little something to drink, a little food, and a decent way to work off the debt." Clearly it had been the right thing to say, since the guy smiled like he had just hit the jackpot.

  "Strangers are always welcome in my place," he said, reach­ ing behind him and getting two glasses off the counter on the back wall. He put them on the bar and looked at Glenda, then me. "What'll wet your whistle?"

  At that moment I was really glad that Glenda was doing the talking. I was fairly certain he was asking what we wanted to drink, but I wasn't totally certain, and I had no idea what he had to offer that could do that to a whistle.

  "Oh," she said, "whatever you have will be fine with us."

  The guy grabbed a large bottle of orange liquid and filled both glasses to the top. Then he slid them to the edge of the bar in front of us.

  "Thank you, kind sir," Glenda said.

  Again the guy. beamed.

  "Just grab a seat and I'll rustle you up some of my best grub."

  At that moment I wanted to bang my translator pendant on the bar to make it work right.

  "Nothing special," she said, smiling at the guy and winking.

  He beamed again, his face red as he turned and headed for a back room. It seemed Glenda could charm just about any guy, no matter what dimension. I wasn't sure how I felt about that.

  She picked up her orange drink, indicated that I do the same, and then headed for a table in the corner, a little ways away from the rest of the patrons. I followed her, taking a chair with my back to the wall so I could see everything going on.

  After we were both seated I whispered to her, "You can understand him?"

  She shrugged. "Mostly going with the flow."

  "So we're going to have to eat grubs," I whispered, "to go with the flow?"

  I had never eaten a grub, and wasn't excited about having my first now.

  She laughed and patted my hand. "I think 'grub' means food in this dimension."

  "Well, that's a relief."

  "Yeah, isn't it."

  I took a tentative sip of my drink and damn near spat it all over the table. It wasn't orange juice at all. It tasted like pulped carrots. Sour-tasting carrots.

  "Interesting," Glenda said after taking a drink. Then she turned to me and made a face that only I could see. She didn't much like it either.

  I glanced around at the other patrons in the place. Every one had a glass of the carrot drink in front of them. It looked as if it was the only drink the place served.

  At that moment the guy came out of the back room carrying two plates. With a smile and a flourish he slid them in front of us. Vegetables. Asparagus, carrots, celery, a few sliced toma toes, and part of a cucumber, artfully arranged on a bed of what looked like grass.

  "Wonderful," Glenda said, smiling at the man with her big gest and most alluring smile. "I hope we can find a way to repay you for this feast."

  The guy had the common decency to blush. "I'm sure we will work something out." At that he beat a hasty retreat to the bar. Fingers seemed to be the preferred method of getting the food from the plate to the mouth, so I picked up one piece of celery and bit into it. It was soft, not fresh, and had a faint taste of horsedung.

  I hope I managed to swallow it without looking too insult­ ing to anyone who could see me.

  Glenda tried a piece of cucumber. I could tell it wasn't good either from how slowly she chewed and then forced her­self to swallow.

  "We're in a vegetarian dimension," I whispered as Glenda gave the bartender an okay sign that the food was good. "What do they do with all the cattle you claim are here?"

  "I have no idea," Glenda whispered. "But if I have to eat or drink any more of this garbage I think I'm going to be sick."

  "Yeah, me too."

  "Pretend to eat and I'll see if I can get some answers" she said.

  She stood and moved over to where the man stood behind bar. I couldn't tell what she was saying, but after a moment he laughed and looked at me as if I were the brunt of a joke. I pretended to bite and chew on a asparagus spear and just smiled back.

  At that moment Aahz and Tanda came in. They glanced first at Glenda, then saw me and came over and sat down in the other two chairs, their backs to the main part of the room.

  "Started without us, I see," Tanda said.

  "Couldn't resist," I said loud enough for the bartender guy to hear. Then I whispered, "This stuff is awful."

  "What is she doing?" Aahz asked, his voice a barely au dible whisper.

  I pretended to eat a tiny bit of grass, covering my mouth as I answered him.

  "Getting information. And for heaven's sake, don't order the food. You have any luck?"

  "None," Tanda said.

  A few seconds later the bartender pointed down the street in the opposite direction from where we had entered the town. Glenda smiled and came back over.

  "Horses are sold down at a stable just outside the edge of town," she said. "I told him we'd clean the kitchen for our food and drink."

  "I wonder what we'll have to do for horses?" Aahz asked, shaking his head.

  Glenda shrugged and kept pretending to eat.

  "Besides,", I said. "We don't know where we're going yet."

  "True," she said.

  "That's our biggest problem," Aahz said.

  Suddenly it dawned on me that we should know where we were going. What kind of magik map would simply lead to a dimension without giving directions to the location of the trea­sure in the dimension? After all, a world was a very large place to be looking for one cow.

  I had taken th
e magik out of the map as far as getting to this crazy dimension. But it hadn't occurred to us to check the map once we were here.

  "Aahz," I whispered. "Check the map."

  He frowned at me. "Why would I-"

  He must have had the same thought I had. Maybe, just maybe, the magik was back for local directions.

  He reached into his pouch and pulled out the parchment Since his back was to the bar, he kept the map in front of him so no one else in the place could see it. Then, slowly, he opened it

  It was instantly clear to me, as I pretended to love a hunk of cucumber, that the map had again changed. It was no longer a dimension map, but now a map of Kowtow.

  The customers closest to us finished off their veggie plate and got up to leave. That left only two other tables and the guy behind the bar. And at the moment he wasn't looking.

  "Open it all the way and see where we are," Glenda said. "It's clear."

  Aahz, much to his credit, didn't turn around to check to see if she was right. He simply opened the map and spread it out over our plates of bad food.

  No one paid any attention.

  The golden cow palace was marked on the map. Well, at least we knew where that was.

  Evade, the town we were in now was also marked. The road between them was marked as the lines between dimen­sions had been marked. There were a lot of other towns along the way, and one thing was very, very clear. We were still a long way from the golden cow.

  Glenda studied the map hard, almost as if she were memo­rizing it.

  "See anything that will help?" Tanda asked.

  "If we go back to Vortex #6 I can get us a lot closer."

  "Thank heavens," I said.

  "Don't be thanking anyone yet," she said, staring at the map. "It's still going to be too far to walk."

  Aahz folded up the map, put it back in his pouch, and stood.

  "Tanda and I will go find a secluded place to hop back," he whi spered, leaning forward so only the three of us could hear him. "Think you two can get out of here without being notic ed?"

  "Easy," Glenda said.

  "See you there," Tanda said, standing and moving toward the front door.

  After we had pretended to eat more of our lunch, push ing the stuff into a pile on one side of the plate like I used to do as a kid, Glenda got up and went back over to the guy behind the bar.

  I kept pretending, wishing the stuff tasted good, since the idea of eating had made me hungry.

  After a moment the guy in charge nodded to Glenda, smiling as if she had promised him more than I wanted to think about.

  She motioned that I should join her and I did, carrying our plates. The guy led us through the door and into what might be called a kitchen. There were barrels of the different veggies against one wall, and some dirty plates and glasses stacked near a water barrel. No wonder everything tasted so bad. I didn't want to even think about the fact that I had eaten a bite of some of the stuff from this room.

  "Wash water is in the barrel," he said. He tossed me a dirty towel. "Dry the dishes before wiping down everything else."

  Glenda put her hand on his shoulder and eased him around toward the door.

  "Don't worry," she said. "We'll get everything all cleaned up."

  "I know you will," he said. The guy was more putty in her hands than I was, and for some reason that thought just annoyed me.

  He went back out through the door and Glenda turned to face me.

  "Well, handsome, my father was right. You are special." I could feel myself blushing. "Thanks."

  "No, thank you," she said, "for everything. In all the years of trying to find the silly treasure on that map, I never thought I'd know exactly where it was at."

  "Well, now we do, and we can get there pretty soon," I said. "Jump us back to Vortex #6."

  She smiled and shook her head.

  "Sorry, my prince in a white hat. Maybe next time."

  With a slight wave and a kiss motion, she vanished in a slight POOF!

  "That's not funny," I shouted, staring at where she had been.

  The guy came in, looking puzzled.

  "What's not funny? And where is your beautiful friend?"

  I glanced around, then pointed at the back door.

  "I told her I'd get started on the dishes. She'll be right back, I'm sure."

  "Good," he said. "Let me know when she returns. She said she had a surprise for me."

  He headed back out into the main room, leaving me stand­ ing there alone in a strange kitchen.

  In a strange dimension.

  It seemed he wasn't the only one Glenda had planned a surprise for.

  Chapter Six

  "Alone again...naturally."

  R. CRUSOE

  Now I have to admit that my first reaction after Glenda left me standing there in that restaurant kitchen was to scream and shout and call out her name, along with Aahz and Tanda's names.

  Screaming would have covered up the panic I felt, but I knew for a fact that screaming would have done no good. But I still wanted to, more than anything.

  I didn't.

  My second reaction was to run like crazy out the back door, but then I would be a wanted man for skipping out on the lunch bill, and considering I might be stuck here for some time, I managed to not run either.

  But I sure wanted to.

  The third reaction I had was to go into automatic to give my poor mind time to sort through what had just happened. That was as good as anything I could do, so I turned and started washing off the dishes, dumping the garbage in a big pail, and dipping the plates enough in the dirty barrel water that they pretended to be clean.

  I could imagine that on the outside I looked calm and col lected, but on the inside I was a mess.

  "Don't panic. Don't panic. Don't panic," I kept saying to myself, timing the phrase with deep breaths and the dipping of the dishes in the water.

  Finally I got myself under enough control to ask a few questions.

  Why had she left me?

  No easy answer. At least none that I wanted to really ad­mit, yet there was nothing else that made sense. She had left. That simple. She had seen the location of the golden cow trea­ sure and that was the last thing she needed from me or Aahz or Tanda. On the first opportunity she had headed off on her own.

  Leaving me alone in a kitchen in a strange dimension. "Don't panic," I said to myself, dipping more dishes. I dumped more half-eaten food into the bucket, dipped another plate, and asked the next question. Had I been a fool?

  The answer to that one came clearly in Aahz's voice. Yes.

  He would also say it was nothing new or unusual. She had played me, and Aahz and Tanda, like a finely tuned musical instrument, using my heart and my emotions as the strings.

  "What a fool," I said aloud.

  There was no one in there to agree with me, but I didn't need anyone to agree. I knew I had been a fool.

  I scraped, dipped, and went on to the next question.

  What do I do now?

  I had no idea.

  Nothing. I was stuck here for the moment. Maybe forever if something happened to Aahz and Tanda, or if they couldn't find me.

  The thought made me panic, so I kept washing dishes.

  After a few minutes the guy came back in with more dirty plates. He was clearly disappointed that Glenda was not back yet, but he said nothing. He put the plates down and then left.

  I dumped the awful food and dipped the plates, doing my best to keep calm. But pretty soon I was out of dishes to wash. I used the dirty rag to wipe off all the plates and stack them, then I wiped off the counter as well. After I was done I couldn't think of anything else to do, so I went back out to the bar.

  "My friend came in a few minutes ago," I said. He looked as if he might cry, so I went quickly on with my lie.

  "She said she will be back in about an hour with your surprise."

  That brightened him right up again.

  "You want to check what I have done back there?
"

  "Nope," he said, smiling. "Everything is even with you as far as I'm concerned."

  "Great grub you got here," I said, patting my stomach and then tipping my hat.

  "Thanks, partner," he said, smiling and showing me the same ugly-looking teeth the woman had. "Anytime. You come back now, ya hear?"

  "Sure will," I said, and headed out into the street.

  The sun was still cooking the hard center of the street, so I stayed on the sidewalk, tipping my hat and saying "Howdy" to anyone who passed me. The guy with the shovel must have finished cleaning up the street, leaving only the big piles of horse droppings as evidence of his work.

  It hadn't been much longer than fifteen minutes since Glenda had left me, even though it felt like an eternity. There was no sign of her or Aahz or Tanda.

  I kept moving, fighting down the desire to shout out Aahz's name. And the desire to just run. I didn't know where I would run, but for some reason running was a massive desire.

  I reached the edge of town and stood on the last board of the covered sidewalk looking up the road that wound toward the cliff where we had hopped into this dimension. I was sure Tanda and Aahz would come back for me.

  Unless, of course, Glenda had done something to them on

  Vortex #6.

  I didn't want to think about that. If that happened, I was going to be stuck right here for a very long time.

  There was no sign of anyone on the road coming down the hill. I turned and headed back up the sidewalk, doing my "Howdy" bit to anyone who passed, with the hit-tipping routine added in. When I reached the other end of town and the end of the shaded sidewalk, I stared off into the distance to where the road vanished into some low hills.

  Then I turned around and started back.

  At the moment there was nothing else left for me to do.

  I managed to walk the entire length of the town six times before I decided that my behavior might attract attention I didn't want. When I reached the end of the sidewalk again, on the end of town where we had first entered, I sat down with my back to the wall.

  Overhead the sun was slowly dropping. It didn't look like it would be more than a few hours before it set. Then what would I do?

  I didn't have a clue.

  The question as to why Aahz and Tanda hadn't come back for me yet bothered me a lot. I figured that with my washing dishes and pacing the length of the town, a good two hours had gone by. The pacing had helped me some, allowing me to work off some of the panic and fear. For the moment it felt as if my mind was working pretty clear again, and I was proud of myself for how well I had done so far. I just hoped I would have a chance to tell Aahz and Tanda and let them be proud of me.