Freeware

"Solvents!" exclaimed Whitey. "We could make firebombs!"

"Oh right!" said Darla. "Like we'll walk back into the conservatory lugging buckets of gasoline. If the aliens see what's coming, they'll attack us first.

Or take hostages. I don't want anything to happen to Yoke or Joke. No, we have to think of a way to hit those freeware slugs giga fast and yotta vicious"

"I have an idea!" said Frangipane after a minute's thought. "We can spit out little balls of imipolex and have them move like the smart kinetic-energy bombs." She flicked one of her petals and sent a little lump of shiny gold imipolex bouncing across the room. "It is a waste of imipolex, but now after eating poor Gurdle-7, we can spare a little."

"So how's a bouncing glob going to hurt an alien?" asked Corey. The little gold ball bounced past the rath, and the rath sprang forward in an effort to gulp it down. As if in reaction, the ball took a sudden backward bounce, hit the rath in the nose, then bounced several more times with increasing amplitude, finally caroming off the wall and ceiling to return to Frangipane.

"Voila," said Frangipane. "The bouncing glob is clever."

"We can control pieces of ourselves, even after we split them off," explained Je

"Big xoxxin' deal," said Darla. "A smart plastic ball."

"Attendez!" said Frangipane. "It is the next part that is the really new idea.

If I put a sufficient amount of my quantum dots into a smart little ball, then I can make it commit the suicide." She spat another nugget of imipolex off into the air, but this time, just as the little ball neared the ceiling, it made a popping sound and fiercely caught ablaze. Flapping its flames like a burning mothball, it fell to the stone floor and consumed itself. "La poof!," exclaimed Frangipane.

"Yaar," said Whitey admiringly. "Flamin' poofballs!"

"Uvvy us how to do that, Frangipane!" said Ormolu. A few seconds later, Ormolu and Je

"You moldies can act like machine-gun flamethrowers!" exclaimed Darla. "The aliens won't have a chance!"

"But—whoah—that one poofball used up a lot of quantum dots," said Ormolu, feeling down into himself.

"Yes, I am afraid if I shoot very many poofballs, I won't have enough energy left to use my jets," said Frangipane. "I would not like that."

"But I have a huge stash of quantum dots!" exclaimed Corey. "I use them to charge up my Silly Putters before I sell them. Look here." He opened a cabinet and took out a shiny flask with little tubes and wires all over it. "It's a magnetic bottle. Ten grams in there! Stoke yourselves up to the max, guys."

"Save some for me to put into the needler and the ugly stick as well," said Whitey. "We want them at full charge."

Frangipane decanted a hefty splash of the quantum dot superfluid onto herself.

It was odd silvery-gray stuff that didn't move like an ordinary liquid. Then she passed the bottle on to the other two moldies They practiced firing off a few more flaming poofballs while Whitey charged up the needler and the ugly stick.

"The poofballs are perfect," exclaimed Corey. "I love them. I want to make a fire-breathing Silly Putter dragon when we get through with this. And maybe a mad fire-farter. Hey! Not so near the supply shelves, Je

"This place is compartmentalized against blowouts," said Whitey. "I don't know how many times I've heard you or Willy bragging about it, Corey. We just leave the conservatory and seal it off. The floor and walls are stone, and if the flames melt a hole in the titamplast ceiling, so much the better. The vacuum will put the fire out. According to what you've always said about the isopod's design, the blowout won't spread past the conservatory."

"Well, yeah, that's how it's supposed to be," allowed Corey. "But remember, it's just Willy who designed it. And we've never tested it. Getting out of the conservatory in time is go

"Give me that needler and let's get going," interrupted Darla, taking the big weapon back from Whitey. "My plan is simple. I'm going to stand near Joke and Yoke and blast every alien in sight."

"Yaar," said Whitey "And I'll use the ugly stick, and the moldies here can be spitting poofballs. What are you going to do, Corey?"

"I'm going to stand by the door and make sure everyone gets out in time.

Especially me." Corey hunkered down and called the rath and the Jubjub bird.

"You moldies better hurry up and do that vaccination thing before we go back.

We've been in here so long that I bet the aliens are starting to get suspicious."

"I've been like listening to them talk?" said Je

"Here you go, wigglers," said Corey, offering the rath and the Jubjub bird to the moldies. "You can do the vaccinations yourselves. We didn't really need to come back to my limpware studio for this at all. You just uvvy into one of these Putters and grep through the Limplan code to find the routine labeled 'Cubic Homeostasis'. Shell it around your uvvy reception ware and you're vaccinated.

But be careful not to put it anywhere in your main action group or you'll turn into a Silly Putter and get real simple."

Frangipane wrapped her petals around the kicking, squealing rath. She looked like a Venus fly-trap eating a fat green beetle Meanwhile Je

A few minutes later, they were walking back down the hall toward the conservatory Corey was holding the rath and the Jubjub bird. He'd temporarily paralyzed them so that he could cradle them in one arm Darla earned the needler and Whitey earned the ugly stick, both of them holding their weapons casually dangling Je

They found things in the conservatory much as they had left them. Terri was stretched out full-length, asleep on one couch, Joke and Yoke were perched next to each other on one of the other couches, and Willy was excitedly pacing about on the far side of the room. Four of the aliens were grouped near the fountain, dabbling their fingers in the water and talking with Yoke and Joke. The other eight freeware-possessed moldies were off on the far side of the room, examining S-cubes and conversing with Willy.

"You are such a bully!" screeched Je