The Worm Returns Read online

  He knew she was right. It was the way females were. “What are you saying, Queenie?”

  We would appreciate a particular service you may be able to render.

  “Sure. Let’s have it.”

  There is a species that is intruding on our demes—our land—that we abhor. We are unable to repel it, and this is causing us considerable distress. But you, with your—I believe you call them guns—might be able to discourage these vile creatures in much the manner our contingent of bugs will discourage the invasive worms on your planet.

  “But don’t you have magic to fight them off?”

  Our magic is contrary. It stops magic leechers like the worms, but this enemy is more physical. We are largely helpless against it.

  “I thought you ran this planet.”

  We have been the dominant species until recently. Now this new enemy threatens that, and indeed, our very existence. It is much larger than we, though smaller than you, immune to our stings, and unkindly aggressive. It is taking our land and driving us toward extinction. There was a mental sob. Please, help us in the hour of our desperate need.

  “For pitiful sake,” Dia muttered. “Has she no pride at all? Now she’s emulating a helpless maiden. She thinks you’ll be fooled by that.”

  Bad Buffalo pondered. This was of course an effort for him, because thinking was more difficult than simply blasting an enemy to smithereens with well-placed bullets. Of course, a giant hive of bugs could not fool him into seeing them like a human girl.

  The big bug dissipated into the swirling swarm, then settled into a new outline. Bad Buffalo gaped.

  Now the form was like a giant human woman sitting cross-legged on the ground, nude except for her golden crown, and extremely well endowed. Her voluminous hair seemed almost to float, and it buzzed slightly. Please, she thought, taking an eye-popping breath though she didn’t need to breathe. We would be ever so grateful. The foul odor had been replaced by an evocative perfume that made her twice as interesting.

  “Pheromones,” Dia grumbled.

  What could he do? He simply wasn’t very good at saying no to a lovely woman, even one he knew was buggy. “Sure, we’ll get rid of those brutes for you,” he said gallantly.

  “Spirits preserve us,” Dia said, and Horse snorted. They thought he was making a fool of himself. And he surely was. It was what men did in such situations.

  The Queen blew him a kiss. It smacked him upside the head like one of Dia’s kisses, only larger. Thank you. The dread enemy is the swatters. They look like this, only smaller.

  The form dissolved again into the cloud of bugs, then condensed into a giant beaver-type animal with a broad, flat tail. That awful extremity smashes us into oblivion.

  Fly swatters. Of course.

  Now Dia, resigned to the project, had a question. “He can plug the swatters, but what’s to prevent them coming back after we return to Earth?”

  They came to our region when an earthquake threw up a natural causeway connecting their foul island in the lake to the mainland. What you need to do is drive them back across the causeway, then destroy it. They can’t swim, so that will confine them.

  “Okay!” Bad Buffalo agreed. “Where are they?”

  The lake is not far from here. Follow the arrow. The swatter dissolved, and a huge floating green arrow formed, pointing the way across the purple plain.

  “There’s something she’s not telling us,” Dia said darkly. “And I can’t read it in her devious insectoid mind.”

  “Who cares? We’ll just plug the swatters, push out a link of the causeway, and be done. Then we’ll get our jarful of bugs and go back to Earth. It’s pretty simple.”

  “You’re a fool,” she said fondly. “But we’re stuck for it.”

  “Yeah,” he agreed, following the green arrow as it moved though the pink sky. The image of that cross-legged, bare bug woman lingered in his mind. Surely there was nothing to fear from such a sexy lady.

  Chapter 11: The Island

  Mercifully, something resembling a small hill appeared on the horizon. Hill might have been too generous. A slight curvature to the otherwise flat plain.

  “Not a plain, BB,” corrected Dia. “This is a steppe. Much more vast than plains, and much flatter, too.”

  Bad Buffalo didn’t know much about anything (other than shooting, riding, robbing, and womanizing), but he knew a step when he saw one, and this sure as hell wasn’t any step he’d ever seen.

  “Not that kind of step, BB. According to the Hive Queen’s mind, this steppe is so wide open and vast that many in her hive become hopelessly lost, usually dying of dehydration and hunger before they are found. It’s a good thing she has provided the arrow.”

  Bad Buffalo grunted. He didn’t like being lost or hungry. He probably didn’t like being disoriented, except he didn’t know what it meant. Still, if he had to make a list of his least-favorite things in the world, high up on that list would be hungry and lost, right below being cheated. Hell, he would put disoriented on that list, too, because it sounded terrible and it made his head spin thinking about it. In his pocket, he sensed Dia shaking her pretty little head.

  Anyway, Bad Buffalo was an expert tracker, so he was rarely lost. And he was also an expert hunter, so he was rarely hungry, either. Still, the few times that he had been either lost or hungry had made him angry. In fact, he was angry now thinking about it.

  “Easy, BB,” soothed Dia from his pocket.

  Still, he could see how a body could get lost out here, especially if, say, a fog rolled in. Or if there was cloud coverage. Not to mention, there wasn’t much in the way of eating, other than the tall purple grass, which looked unappetizing at best, although Horse occasionally eyed it.

  Bad Buffalo rode hard toward the slight rise along the steppe. The wind howled over his ears, just like at home. If anything, Bad Buffalo felt lighter somehow, and Horse seemed to run faster than usual.

  “It’s a smaller planet, BB. So there’s less gravitational pull. We both weigh far less than we did on Earth, perhaps even by half.”

  Bad Buffalo launched a whole volley of questions, which Dia patiently answered, all while the trio charged up the gradual incline.

  By the time Bad Buffalo had grasped the law of gravity they had crested the hill. In the distance was a sight to behold: an expansive lake, which glittered blue, completely surrounding a large land mass. This was called an island, according to the Hive Queen. Bad Buffalo ain’t never seen no island before. Until now. Turned out, the island wasn’t much different the rest of the landscape, except it was surrounded by water. It also had some trees and boulders, both of which the outlaw longed for. He missed hiding behind a tree, and waiting for a stagecoach. Or hiding among the boulders and waiting to ambush a local posse. In fact, Bad Buffalo was already missing his home planet. It was, he was certain, the first time he had ever missed anything before.

  But most interesting of all was the steady parade of huge, lumbering beasts that waddled out of the trees and formed a single-file line. They had to form such a line because of a narrow rocky land bridge that had thrust up from the lake depths. The massive creatures seemed shaky at best, clearly not built to navigate the irregular walkway. As Bad Buffalo sat high in the saddle, he watched no less than three of the creatures stumble off the causeway and into the lake itself, never to be seen again. He felt bad for the big fellows. Clearly, they were each putting their lives at risk to escape the island.

  Bad Buffalo frowned at that. He never knew of any creature, be it beast or man, who would put their lives at risk unless there was a good reason. Now, as a fourth creature stumbled off the rocky path and plunged into the dark depths, Bad Buffalo grunted, not liking this at all.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” he said aloud.

  He felt Dia’s little head moving inside his shirt pocket. “They’re prisoners.”

  “I think so,” said Bad Buffalo.

  The question was: had these creatures done something wrong to war
rant incarceration? Bad Buffalo doubted it. How could an entire species of animal warrant incarceration?

  “Maybe we need more answers,” suggested Dia.

  The gunslinger agreed and clicked his tongue...and Horse galloped down the slight incline, toward the lake, and toward where the massive, waddling creatures emerged onto the mainland...

  Chapter 12: Dragon

  Yet as they moved, Bad Buffalo wondered: how could the bugs have rounded up all the swatters and locked them up on the island, and then been unable to stop them from wading across the causeway when it formed? If they could do the first, why not the second? If the bugs hadn’t done it, who had? Usually a prison was at least guarded; he had been in enough jails to know that. But this island seemed to have been left strictly alone until now. This didn’t seem to make much sense.

  “The arrow is gone,” Dia murmured.

  So it was. The bugs had done their job and gone home. They were on their own.

  They came to the first of the creatures that had made it across the causeway to the mainland. Up close it looked more than ever like a giant beaver, maybe half the size of Horse, except that it wasn’t. It had no big front teeth to chew through trees, and its big flat tail was clearly not designed for slapping water. Or, for that matter, flies. It looked to be a kind of grass grazer, and that was what it was doing: eating the purple blades. It was evidently quite hungry. It seemed to be ignoring its fellows who had drowned while trying to cross the lake as if it didn’t care about them. That too was odd.

  “Ho, stranger!” Bad Buffalo called.

  The creature glanced at him with its single eye, then returned to its grazing. This was its reaction to an alien creature—that was to say, a man—it had never seen before?

  “Let me peek into its mind,” Dia said. Then: “It’s not smart like us, or if it is, not in the way we are. It’s just a—an animal, like Horse, only different.”

  “I always got along pretty well with dumb animals,” Bad Buffalo said.

  Horse twitched an ear at him questioningly.

  “I didn’t mean you,” Bad Buffalo said quickly. “You’re my pal. I mean the creatures home on the range, where the deer and the antelope play, and they almost never say a mean word and the skies are not cloudy all day.” Though he actually preferred the forests where an outlaw could find decent cover.

  Horse returned to his own grazing, accepting that.

  “But that only complicates the mystery,” Dia said. “The beavers aren’t exactly prisoners. They’re—” She paused to read farther into the creature’s mind. “Refugees.”

  “Refugees? From what? If a bad-ass like me doesn’t spook them, what does?” In fact he was just a bit annoyed by that lack of reaction. He was accustomed to terrifying folk.

  She probed again. “The dragon.”

  “The what?”

  “They are creatures of your folklore,” she explained patiently. “Giant fire-breathing reptiles, some of whom can fly. People found the enormous bones of ancient dinosaurs and figured that they must be dragons who remain a threat. I am adapting from the mythology to find a suitable parallel. This one is a lot like that, only it’s real. It seems it’s been toasting the swatters so that they have to flee their land lest they be roasted and eaten, alive or dead. They really don’t have much choice.”

  “Well, if one of them dragons comes near me, I’ll plug it,” Bad Buffalo said, caressing his holstered pistols. “But how’d the swatters get to the island?”

  “There seems to be a wormhole exiting there. So they are using it to cross from their world to this one, fleeing oppression. They just want to be left alone to graze.”

  “So then why’s the bug queen so afraid of them? They ain’t no threat to her.”

  “That’s what I don’t understand. All I can think of is that she’s so anal-retentive that she doesn’t want any alien creatures coming here, even if they’re harmless.”

  “She’s so what?”

  “Anal-retentive. She doesn’t like sharing. Can’t let anything go, even if she can’t use it herself.”

  “Not even a turd?” he asked, picking up some of the context. “But pretty girls like her don’t even have turds, do they?”

  Dia seemed privately amused, but answered, “She’s not really a pretty girl, BB. She’s a bug.”

  “Oh, that’s right. So I guess she can keep her turds if she wants to.”

  “It seems she wants us to break up the causeway so that the swatters can’t get across at all, even with high attrition.” She caught his confusion immediately. “So many of them drowning.”

  “What happens to the swatters if they can’t cross?”

  “I suspect they’ll get backed up until they clog the tunnel and can’t escape anymore. Then the dragon will eat them.”

  “I ain’t sure I like that. They’re like the deer and antelope, meaning no harm.”

  “I’m not sure what we can do about it.”

  “Well, I know! We can go plug that dragon. Then the swatters won’t have to flee, and the problem is solved, and we can get our jar of bugs from the queen and go save Earth from the worms. So you can get your magic back and get big and solid. So I can give you a real good poke.”

  “A marvelously succinct summary,” she agreed. “You certainly know your priorities.”

  “I sure do,” he agreed, flattered.

  “But are you sure it’s wise?”

  “I’ve never been wise in my life. I just do what I know how to do. I plug anything that gets in my way.”

  “That dragon could be pretty fearsome.”

  “What’s your point?”

  She shrugged. “Very well. Let’s go plug the dragon.”

  Horse started moving. He galloped down to the lake, plunged in, swam across, and emerged on the island.

  Bad Buffalo jumped off, carrying Dia with him. Then Horse shook himself dry. Water flew out in all directions, plastering them in the process. Then Bad Buffalo shook himself dry, and the water departed. So did the sprite, flung out of his pocket. She spread her wings and hovered nearby, unhurt though slightly mussed. She still looked cute.

  “It is an education to know you,” Dia said, amused.

  “Thanks.” He got back on his steed and she got back into his spin-dried pocket.

  Horse trotted along beside the line of swatters, tracing them back to their origin. Sure enough, this was a giant wormhole propped open by a fallen branch. The swatters were still trundling out of it.

  “You’re sure?” Dia asked as Horse paused.

  “Sure I’m sure! I may not know what I’m doing, but I’m never in much doubt.”

  “It may be dangerous.”

  “Yeah,” he agreed with relish.

  Horse plunged into the tunnel. There was room for him beside the line of swatters, and that line marked their route perfectly.

  They were on their way to plug the dragon. If the dragon had an ounce of sense, it would have been nervous.

  Chapter 13: Tor

  Now this is a suitable planet, thought Bad Buffalo upon emerging from the wormhole. Tall, craggy mountains surrounded them, many of them belching fire. Green plateaus filled the space between the peaks. Bad Buffalo liked green plateaus. Thick, reddish clouds filled the sky. Bad Buffalo wasn’t too sure about reddish clouds.

  The lumbering beaver beasts crowded the opening, which was held open with another such branch. Had the beasts concocted the use of such a branch? If so, then they might be smarter than the creatures at home. They were also quite patient, too, each waiting their turn to step into the wormhole, despite the creature circling high overhead, a creature that was belching fire of its own.

  Bad Buffalo hadn’t known his mouth had dropped open until Dia flew up and helped close it.

  “That, BB, is a dragon,” she said.

  “It’s so big.”

  “It is.”

  “I’m going to need a bigger gun.”

  “Or a better plan.”

  The creature bank
ed slowly in the air, its outstretched wings black against the red clouds. Its wings reminded the gunslinger of a bat’s wings, angular and coming to a point. A long tail trailed behind the flying creature. On its next fly-by, the creature dropped down, and now, Bad Buffalo could see what appeared to be scales glittering along its underbelly. Bad Buffalo might have felt something resembling fear, but he brushed it off. Fear didn’t suit him.

  “What do you know of dragons, little fairy?”

  “I’ve heard only stories, from fairies who had heard of stories, passed from world to world.”

  “Then tell me what you know, and hurry. It’s coming back for another look.”

  “Other than flying and breathing fire, I don’t know—wait!”

  “Wait what?”

  “They hoard gold.”

  “Fat lot of good that does me,” grumbled Bad Buffalo, although he made a mental note to be on the lookout for gold, one of his most favorite things in the world.

  “Also, if you could lodge an arrow under its scales, you could do mortal harm.”

  “I don’t want to do mortal harm. I just want to convince it to stop attacking the swatters.”

  Bad Buffalo had barely gotten the words out of his mouth, when the giant creature banked suddenly, dropped low, flapped its massive wings once, extended its wicked claws, and snatched a patiently-waiting swatter up off the ground. The creature bleated in pain and confusion.

  “We forget that the swatters are probably the creature’s natural food source.”

  Bad Buffalo understood the animal chain. He’d watched wolves attack caribou. He’d even watched a mountain lion snatch a raccoon out of a tree. He’d seen eagles pick bass from lakes, and hawks take field mice. How was a dragon grabbing a swatter any different? Did it make the dragon any worse than a pack of coyotes ganging up on, say, a fawn?

  Bad Buffalo suddenly wasn’t so sure. Who was he to decide what was right or wrong, especially on a distant world? He was about to say as much to Dia, when the dragon tore the swatter in two. Blood rained down, as each talon now held one half of the dead creature. Bad Buffalo could hardly believe his eyes. Next, the dragon released both halves of the animal, which dropped down amid a pile of...hundreds of severed swatters. Bad Buffalo could see them now, littering the hillside. He’d thought he was seeing bushes or rocks. But no. These were destroyed creatures.