5. Unwanted Guests
Our story thus far:
Arthur Dent and his friends thought they would enjoy a peaceful, relaxing holiday on the tranquil ocean world of Zuliphix XII, but they arrived in the middle of the planet's six-day-long rainy season. As if that weren't enough, a nasty civil war broke out, from which they were barely able to escape with their lives.
They went off to have a bite to eat, but before they could even get through the drinks, a party of very large and nasty-looking aliens started shooting at them, and they were forced to leave in a hurry, and without paying, which has made the management somewhat upset. (1)
They traveled an ungodly amount of light-years in the wrong direction before the aliens caught them up and demanded that they turn over the person known as Arthur Dent. That they made these demands while Arthur was in fact standing in front of them, suggests that they may have the wrong person. Coincidentally, Zaphod has not been seen since.
Before his disappearance, Zaphod suggested that they invite the alien captain over for drinks. The Heart of Gold is about to host the nastiest aliens this side of the Vogons. (2)
As if matters weren't bad enough, Arthur is very ill from food poisoning, and Trillian is beginning to get the idea that she's forgetting something . . . but she's not sure what it is.
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Arthur might not have been in the best of physical shape right now, but even he knew it wasn't a good idea to let the Zubranites have the run of the ship. "We should post a guard, or something," he suggested to Trillian.
"Good idea. Oh, Marvin!"
Marvin heaved a mechanical sigh. "It's always the way. When something dangerous needs doing, who always gets called upon? It's not like you lot care about me . . ."
"Don't be ridiculous, Marvin," Trillian said. "Of course we care about you. Now I need you to go up to the bridge and keep the Zubranites entertained while we go and see where Zaphod's hiding. Can you do that?"
"Entertain them? I'm too depressed to entertain anyone right now," Marvin moaned.
"Well, just do your best."
Marvin trudged off to guard the bridge while Arthur and Trillian went to find Ford, who had gone to have a little lie-down in his cabin. "Could someone make the room stop bouncing?" Ford pleaded of his visitors when they came in. "It's wreaking havoc on my equilibrium."
"The room's not—" That was as far as Trillian got before Ford started coughing. This wasn't a good sign.
Arthur blinked as he saw the purple spots breaking out on Ford's face. "What's that?" A perfectly natural question to ask under the circumstances, but one that caught Ford by surprise nonetheless.
"What's what?"
"The spots on your face," Arthur said.
"Oh, that. That's just Betelgeusian spotted fever. I've had it on and off since I was eleven. It'll go away on its own."
"How long?" Arthur asked. "A day? A week? A hundred years?"
"Depends on local time values, but on average . . . six weeks or so.:"
"Six weeks?" Arthur was aghast at the prospect of Ford being out of commission that long. If they even survived that long, what with the Zubranites running amok all over the ship.
Ford nodded. "About that. Oh, and it's very contagious. It spreads through the skin . . ."
Trillian and Arthur took a step back from Ford's bedside while keeping nonchalant looks on their faces. "Through the skin, you say?" Arthur asked nervously.
"Yeah. But you can't get it if you've already had it, so if you see Zaphod, send him down here, would you? Otherwise, he'll sneak off to Zark knows where when you're not looking."
"We've been looking for him!" Arthur exclaimed. "It's like he's just disappeared into thin air!"
"He won't have gone far from the drink supply. Try harder."
Arthur was about to say something, but Trillian gave him a look and then said to Ford, "We will. You just stay here and get better."
With that, the two of them left Ford's room and went to see if Zaphod was hiding somewhere, or if he'd completely disappeared. But where could he be?
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"You can't keep me here!" Zaphod shouted to empty air.
"Says who?" The Zubranite's disembodied voice echoed off the interrogation room's wall, which was some distance away. Zaphod kicked at the air in a vain effort to free himself from his bonds, but the Zubranites were experts at tying up their prisoners.
"I'm warning you," Zaphod challenged the void, "I'll grab you by the throat and wring your neck so fast it'll make your ugly head spin! I'll vaporize you before you know what hit you! I'll—"
"And how will you do this," the voice asked, "with all three of your arms bound and suspended from the ceiling?"
"I'll find a way!"
"Sure you will. In the meantime, you will return to us what is ours!"
"Yeah, about that . . ." Zaphod didn't know how to tell them that the money he'd borrowed—all right, stolen—from them was already long gone.
The Senior Interrogator, also known as Arrggghh! by his prisoners (3), watched Zaphod struggling with a look of pure delight. That'd teach the arrogant bastard! Just because you used to be President of the Galaxy, you think you can push other races around, you slimy piece of dherr!
"Sir," his assistant interrupted him. "Our other prisoner has . . ."
The Senior Interrogator turned to him. "Has what?"
"Has, um, escaped, sir."
"Well, get it back! It can't have gone far! Have all available personnel search all areas of the ship at once!"
"Sir, the last batch we sent out hasn't returned yet. This prisoner could be very dangerous . . ."
"Dangerous? How dangerous could it be? It hasn't even got weapons!"
"It, um . . . does now, sir."
The Senior Interrogator was so incensed by this that he stormed off, leaving Zaphod on his own . . . and giving him time to come up with a plan. It happened that there was a ventilation duct directly above his heads; now if he could only reach it, he could sneak off to the teleport chamber and get back to the Heart of Gold.
To reach it, he'd have to get his hands free, which would be the real trick. His only consolation was that the Zubranites were so incredibly stupid that they'd tied his hands with plain (that is, easily worn through) rope, instead of something a bit more sturdy. He turned his left head and began gnawing the rope, hoping against hope that time would be on his side.
Ford Prefect's plan also involved ventilation ducts. If he could just get to the environmental controls and lower the temperature on the ship, the cold-blooded Zubranites would go into hibernation mode, enabling Arthur and Trillian to send them back where they came from.
He hoped he didn't get lost—he wasn't too sure of the layout of the ship, but it wasn't too terribly big, so if Marvin kept the Zubranites occupied long enough for him to wander around a bit, he was home free.
He dipped a cloth into his bedside glass of water and wiped the fake spots off his face. Betelgeusian spotted fever was a disease which did not in fact actually exist, although Ford was feeling a bit tired and dizzy.
Must be delirious, he thought, if I think I'm going to get away with this.
He removed the grille from the vent, laid it aside, and crawled into the shaft.
Now which way was it again? He tried to recall the schematics of the ship, which he'd glanced at once and then forgotten. Environmental . . . I think it's down this way.
Some time later (it may have been as much as an hour, he wasn't sure), he finally found the right chamber.
"Ah, good," he said to himself. He dropped down, aiming to land on his feet but missing and making an entirely ungraceful landing on his arse. He slowly got to his feet, black dots swimming in his field of vision. He ignored them.
"Now to give the Zubranites a chill they won't soon forget."
Ford turned the dial all the way to the left, dropping the temperature to the equivalent of 60 degrees Fahrenheit. (Living on Earth for so many years had changed his frame of reference; he now thought in terms of a planet that no longer existed.)
It's not working, he thought, even as the temperature readout digits went from 75 to 70, and kept dropping. It's getting warmer in here. What did I do wrong?
The thought occurred to him that maybe Marvin could help, and he left in search of the Paranoid Android. He didn't get more than a few feet before the dizziness overtook him and he collapsed in the middle of the corridor, where he wasn't found till quite some time later.
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The Zubranite Captain's already ugly mood was getting uglier by the minute. "Enough of this stalling! I want the aliens to show themselves right now?"
"Which aliens would that be?" Marvin asked, not really caring about the answer.
"The aliens hiding Arthur Dent, you mechanical moron!"
"I do have a brain the size of a planet, you know." Marvin thought if anyone was a moron around here, it was the Zubranite captain, who'd used his Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster to polish his armor. It had worn a hole clear through, which hadn't improved his mood any.
"I don't care! Get Dent out here at once!"
Marvin sighed an electronic sigh. "I suppose I could do that for you, if I wasn't on guard duty. I can't leave you alone on the bridge."
"Why not?"
"I have orders."
"Well, I'm ordering you to produce Arthur Dent within the next five greblocks, or I'll start shooting something!"
"Sir," his bodyguard said, "if you do that the laser fire could rebound off the wall and—"
"SILENCE!"
Marvin sighed again. "I'll go and get him." He clanked off, through a door which was too terrified of the Zubranites to express its pleasure at opening or its satisfaction at a job well done, and went to find Arthur Dent.
Arthur and Trillian were on their way back to the Medical Bay when they rounded a corner and Arthur saw the most hideous creature he'd ever seen (4) crouched at the far end.
It was an enormous rabbit.
Not a cute and cuddly rabbit, either; this one had huge red eyes and slavering fangs that looked as long as his arm.
It had finally happened. The bunnies had come to get him.
"Arthur," Trillian said, "what's wrong?"
Arthur couldn't speak for a moment. Then he hissed through clenched teeth, "Don't you see it?"
"See what?" She looked in the direction in which his eyes were staring fixedly, but there was nothing there.
"See what? It's right there! It's a—"
It started to hop towards him.
"RUN!" He grabbed Trillian by the arm and sprinted back the way they had come . . . for about six feet. Then his exhausted body could take no more, and he had to stop, gasping for breath and leaning on the wall for support.
"Arthur, what is it?"
He stammered, "R-r-r-r-rabbit."
"Rabbit?" Trillian repeated, looking over her shoulder. "But there's nothing there!"
"How can you not see it? It's huge!" Arthur spluttered. His face had gone a funny color, even worse than the green.
Trillian put a hand to his forehead. "Oh, Arthur, you're burning up! We've got to get you back to bed. Come on."
"Just don't let it get me!"
"I won't let it get you," she said in a soothing tone. No point arguing that the rabbit wasn't there now.
This was turning out to be a disaster, she thought. All she wanted was a nice holiday on a sunny beach. Now Arthur and Ford were ill, Zaphod was who knew where, hostile aliens were aboard their ship with only a manically depressed robot to talk to, and . . . And what? What was it she was forgetting? Was there someone else here?
And was it her imagination, or was it getting cold in here?
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Ford lifted his head and looked about. He could hear footsteps approaching, but couldn't tell from which direction. Nor could he determine whether they were Human, Zubranite, or mechanical.
Finding nothing nearby to hide behind, he lay flat on the floor in the hopes that whoever it was would walk right by without seeing him. After all, how often did you look down while you walked?
The footsteps passed him by, and Ford breathed a sigh of relief. He pushed himself up on his elbows. Bright blue dots swam before his eyes, and his head was throbbing like he'd had one too many drinks, which he hadn't in some time. He wondered if he'd picked up some weird disease on Zuliphix XII; they said all kinds of microbes lurked in holiday resorts. And both sides in Zuliphix's civil war had used chemical weapons; what might that have done to his body?
"OK, Ford," he said to himself, "time to get up and . . . ooh, nice cool floor . . . feels good . . . I think I'll just stay here a while."
He passed out again, but not before the most absurd thought entered his mind: I hope before I die I at least find out what's up with the rabbits.
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"There's no escaping now," the Senior Torturer said to a chained and helpless Zaphod Beeblebrox. "You think you're so clever, but we'll see just who the clever one is when I get my hands on you."
Zaphod looked at the hands in question. "How long have you been biting your nails?"
"Your clever remarks won't save you now."
"I'm serious. You under a lot of stress?"
The Torturer was baffled by this behavior. Shouldn't the prisoner be crying and begging for mercy?
"And I can tell from the way you walk that your back's giving you trouble, too. I can sort that out for you."
The Torturer didn't know what to do. On the one hand, he knew prisoners would say and do anything to get free, up to and including several acts that were illegal on many planets.
On the other . . . his back had been bothering him a great deal since his wife had talked him into an afternoon of furniture-moving last week.
"Okay, then," Zaphod said. "Walk around in pain the rest of the day. It's up to you . . ."
The Torturer thought about it. Given that he'd had to sleep standing upright against a wall for the past three nights, losing his job and possibly his life was a small price to pay.
"All right," he said. "But no tricks, mind you."
"Who, me?" Zaphod said indignantly.
The Senior Torturer lay across the Table of Excruciating Agony and waited for Zaphod to do his magic, a move which will henceforth be referred to as "Mistake Number One". Closing his eyes probably didn't help any.
Zaphod made a few rubbing motions against the Torturer's back with two of his hands, while the third slipped the keys to the chains out of the Torturer's pocket. He withdrew so quietly and unobtrusively that the Torturer fell asleep, only waking up some time later when alarms went off.
His first thought was That feels a lot better.
His second, upon noticing the absence of 1) his keys, 2) his gun, and 3) his prisoner, was I'm going to get lynched for this, aren't I?
Zaphod had passed the same set of pipes four times by the time the alarm went off. You'd think if you followed the ventilation ducts for far enough, they'd eventually come out somewhere, but the Krelinians(5) had built their ventilation system with stowaways in mind, and most of the ducts only led, eventually, to themselves.
"Okay, Beeblebrox," he said to himself. "Ten points out of ten for style, but minus several million for no sense of direction. Wish I'd thought to bring a map or—"
He looked up just in time to avoid colliding with the last person he'd ever expected—or wanted—to see again.
"You!"
"You!"
Stay tuned for the exciting (6) conclusion!
(1) Zaphod did toss some money on the table, but it wasn't the local currency, and is in fact worthless anywhere but its point of origin.
(2) It's probably a good idea to have a Vogon between you and a Zubranite. Vogons make better targets.
(3) Since that's all they were capable of saying by the time they actually saw him.
(4) Except for Agrajag.
(5) You remember them, don't you? The Zubranites stole their ship back in Chapter 4.
(6) They always say that, although it isn't always true. But it will be in this case!