When he saw Hansen, Ritter clapped his hands in amazement. "Don't tell me you're wearing that when we go see your lizardmen!" he said.
A thought crossed the big engineer's mind. He added, "Unless you want me to kit you up? I can, you know—weapons and a force screen as good as anything you're going to find anywhere."
Hansen grinned slightly, absently. "Almost as good," he said.
Hansen wore hand-loomed wool trousers, a knitted wool pullover, and a short cape. A resident of the Open Lands would have exclaimed at the costly scarlet and indigo dyes, then noted that the cape was sewn from prime sables. To Ritter, the cloth was coarse, the colors muddy, and furs of any sort unhygienic and unsuited for the climate with which he was familiar.
More important, the short dagger slung from Hansen's belt wasn't a weapon in the engineer's technologically sophisticated terms.
"But, ah . . . ," Hansen mumbled. "I thought you and I ought to talk before, ah, I insert."
He looked around the workroom. There were tools and materials in such profusion that the huge expanse looked crowded. It looked like a junkyard.
There'd been a firefight in a junkyard once while Hansen was still in the Civic Patrol. Him carrying a needle stunner, and three villains with energy weapons.
This room was probably home to the engineer, but it depressed the hell out of Hansen.
"Look," he said, "why don't we go for a walk? Would you like to see somebody else's swamp?"
Ritter raised an eyebrow. "Sure," he said. "You over to Keep Worrel?"
"A little farther that that," Hansen said with a smile. "I'm thinking of visiting Plane Three where the androids that followed your ancestors' fleet wound up."
He grinned more broadly. "And though I don't intend to meet any of their descendants, I will borrow a pistol and personal forcefield."
They landed on what looked like solid ground. It was so soft that Hansen sank in to his ankles. Muck rolled almost to the top of Ritter's half-boots under his greater weight.
They were on a spit of land between shallow water-courses. Reedlike horsetails sprouted around them, growing only waist-high or less. There was no grass, but the mud itself showed the green tinge of algae between the bases of larger vegetation.
Ritter wrapped the stems of several spike-branched horsetails together in one broad hand and tried to use the plants as an anchor as he walked up the gentle slope. Their shallow roots pulled out with a squelching sound as soon as he put tension on them. Muttering under his breath, the engineer stepped upward unaided.
"You can clean off at my place before we go back," Hansen said. "Never fear."
He stared at the similar mud shoreline across the water. The bank was less than fifty meters away, but mist drawn from the swamp by the red sun overhead was almost thick enough to turn all its features into a blur.
"See?" Hansen said, pointing.
Ritter followed the gesture. The flicker of eyelids made a lump of mud coalesce into something alive: stumpy legs, a barrel-shaped body, and a head that seemed huge even for the size of the body.
The creature was several meters long, It was hard to be certain about the length, because the tail merged with mud, mist, and vegetation.
"A crocodile?" Ritter asked.
"Nothing so advanced," said Hansen. "An amphibian. A big salamander."
He cleared his throat. "You know," he resumed, "I've been thinking. There really isn't any need for you to come along on this project. You've done your—"
"Like hell I've done my job!" said Ritter, anticipating the next word. "If I'd done my job you wouldn't need somebody manning the control panel while the vehicle shifts planes!"
"One of the Searchers can handle that," said Hansen. "They're used to hardware, it won't be a problem."
"No," said Ritter. "We had a deal, you and I. I'm going to do my end of it, and I damn well expect you to do yours."
The giant amphibian emitted a great burp of noise. It sounded as though a truck had skidded to a hard stop. The beast slid into the water with unexpected grace, leaving behind only a roiled patch on the surface.
Hansen sheepishly reholstered his borrowed pistol. "Look," he said, "there's no question about you getting the freedom you want. I can set you up with a keep on your own plane, if that's what you like—"
The engineer grimaced. "I don't like taking orders from fools," he said. "That doesn't mean I want to act like a fool myself."
"—or," Hansen continued with a nod of approval, "you can take service with any of a number of . . ."
He cleared his throat. "Of gods," he said. "Me—I would be honored. Saburo has asked after you. I think you would find him undemanding and . . . not a fool, in most fashions."
Hansen bent as if to examine the large millipede crawling over the algal mat. "And of course there's Penny."
The engineer touched Hansen's elbow. Hansen met his eyes again.
"I told you I'd make your dragonfly work," Ritter said. "I figured that I could manage that in the lab, but I was wrong. I will do what I said."
Hansen slapped the engineer's hand away. "Do you want to die?" he snarled.
Ritter's left fingertips massaged the red mark Hansen had raised on the back of the other hand. "No, I don't," he said mildly. "Do you want to die, Master Hansen?"
"Sorry," Hansen whispered. "Yeah, that's a fair question."
He managed a wry smile. "It's just, you know . . . There's nothing in this that requires somebody of your talent. There's no point in you risking yourself for nothing."
Ritter squatted and tweezered up the millipede between the thumb and forefinger of his hand. The animal twisted its shiny black body furiously while its legs quivered in the air.
"Not for nothing," he muttered to the arthropod. "Sure, I'm scared, but I . . ."
Ritter put the millipede back on the ground carefully and stood up again. "I wasn't as good an engineer as I thought I was," he said. "Don't make me think I've failed as a man too, my friend."
Hansen squeezed the web of the engineer's hand where the red patch was still fading. "If you're not a man," he said, "then I'm sure-hell not fit to meet somebody who is."
He cleared his throat. "Like I said, there's no need for you to come. But if you want to—I'd be honored to have you covering my back. Friend."