pell For Chameleon

They started to retreat, though Bink did not want to desert Chameleon. A grizzled old centaur cantered up. "Don't just meander around!" he snapped. "Get around to the north quadrant." He pointed. "We've suffered heavy losses there, and Bigfoot can't do it all. He can't even see the enemy. They'll break through any minute. Get some rocks; don't use your sword, fool!"

"Don't use my sword on what?" Trent demanded, with understandable ire.

"The wiggles, naturally. Cut one in half, all you have is two wiggles. You-"

"The wiggles!" Trent breathed, and Bink growled his own chagrin.

The centaur sniffed. "You been drinking?"

"Bigfoot's passage holed the beerbarrel tree we took refuge behind," Trent explained. "I thought the wiggles had been eradicated!"

"So thought we all," the centaur said. "But there's a healthy colony swarming here. You have to crush them or chew them or burn them or drown them. We can't afford to let a single one escape. Now get moving!"

Trent looked about. "Where are the stones?"

"Here. I've collected a pile." The centaur showed the way. "I knew I couldn't handle it myself, so I sent out will-o'-the-wisps to summon help."

Suddenly Bink recognized the centaur: Herman the Hermit. Exiled from the centaur community for obscenity almost a decade ago. Amazing that he had survived, here in the deepest wilderness-but centaurs were hardy folk.

Trent did not make the co

Bink followed. He had to help too. If even one wiggle got away, there would at some later date be another swarming, perhaps not stopped in time. He caught up to the Magician. "Woof! Woof!" he barked urgently.

Trent looked straight ahead. "Bink, if I transform you here and now, the others will see, and know me for what I am. They may turn against me--and the siege against the wiggles will be broken. I think we can contain the swarm with our present creature-power; the centaur has organized the effort well. Your natural form would not be better equipped to wage this war than your present form. Wait until this is over."

Bink was not satisfied with all the arguments, but he seemed to have no choice. So he determined to make himself useful as he was. Maybe he could smell out the wiggles.

As they came up to their designated quadrant, a griffin gave a loud squawk and keeled over. It resembled the one they had directed here; it must have lost sight of its guiding will-o'-the-wisp. But all griffins looked and smelled pretty much alike to Bink. Not that it mattered, objectively; all creatures here had a common purpose. Still, he felt a certain identification. He ran to it, hoping the injury was not critical. The creature was bleeding from a mortal wound. A wiggle had holed it through its lion's heart.

Wiggles traveled by sudden rushes along wiggle-sized magic tu

It was a two-inch-long, loosely spiraled worm, hovering absolutely still in midair. It hardly looked like the menace it was. He barked, pointing his nose at it.

Trent heard him. He strode across with his two rocks. "Good job, Bink," he cried. He smashed the rocks together on the wiggle. As they came apart, the squished, dead hulk of the tiny monster dropped. One down!

Zzapp! "There's another!" Trent cried. "They tu

After that it was hectic. The wiggles were zapping determinedly outward, each in its own pattern. There was no way of telling how long they would freeze in place-seconds or minutes--or how far they would zap-inches or feet. But each wiggle went in the precise direction it had started, never shifting even a fraction, so it was possible to trace that line and locate it fairly quickly. If someone stood in front of a wiggle at the wrong time, he got zapped-and if the hole were through a vital organ, he died. But it was not feasible to stand behind a wiggle, for the closer in toward the source of the swarm one went, the more the wiggles were present. There were so many wiggles that a creature smashing one could be simultaneously holed by another. It was necessary to stand at the outer fringe of expansion and nab the leaders first.

The wiggles really seemed to be mindless, or at least indifferent to external things. Their preset wiggle courses holed anything-anything at all-in the way. If a person didn't locate a wiggle fast, it was too late, for the thing had zapped again. Yet it could be tricky to find a still wiggle, for it looked like a twisted stem from the side and a coiled stem from the end. It had to move to attract attention to itself-and then it might be too late to nab it.

"This is like standing in a firing range and catching the bullets as they pass," Trent muttered. That sounded like another Mundane allusion; evidently Mundane wiggles were called bullets.

The invisible giant operated beside Bink on the right, as his nose plainly told him. TRAMP!-and a wiggle was crushed out of existence. Maybe a hundred wiggles at once. But so was anything else that got underfoot. Bink didn't dare point out wiggles for Bigfoot; it would be his own death warrant. For all he knew, the giant was stomping randomly. It was as good a way as any.

On the left side, a unicorn operated. When it located a wiggle, it either crushed it between horn and hoof or closed its mouth over it and ground it to shreds with its equine teeth. This seemed to Bink to be a distasteful and hazardous mode of operation, because if it mistimed a wiggle-Zzapp! A hole appeared in the unicorn's jaw. Blood dripped out. The creature made a single neigh of anguish-then trotted along the path of the zap. It located the wiggle and chomped down again, using the other side of its jaw.

Bink admired the unicorn's courage. But he had to get on with his own job. Two wiggles had just zapped within range. He pointed out the nearest for Trent, then ran to the other, afraid Trent would not reach it in time. His hound's teeth were made for cutting and tearing, not chewing, but maybe they would do. He bit down on the wiggle.

It squished unpleasantly. Its body was firm but not really hard, and the juices squirted out. The taste was absolutely awful. There was some sort of acid-yecch! But Bink chewed carefully several times, to be sure of crushing it all; he knew that any unsquished fragment would zap away as a tiny wiggle, just as dangerous as the original. He spat out the remains. Surely his mouth would never be the same again.

Zzapp! Zzapp! Two more wiggles nearby. Trent heard one and went after it; Bink sought out the other. But even as they both oriented, a third zzapp! sounded between them. The pace was stepping up as the great internal mass of wiggles reached the perimeter. There were too many wiggles to keep up with! The complete swarm might number a million.

There was a deafening bellow from above. "OOAAOUGH!'

Herman the centaur galloped by. Blood trailed from a glancing wiggle-wound in his flank. "Bigfoot's hit!" he cried. "Get out of the way."

"But the wiggles are breaking out," Trent said.

"I know! We're taking heavy losses all around the perimeter. It's a bigger swarm than I thought, more dense in the center. We can't hold them anyway. We'll have to form a new containment circle, and hope that more help arrives in time. Save yourselves before the giant falls."