Terry Pratchett: The Bromeliad 2 - Diggers

It had been a hard lesson for some of them. Not long after the nomesmoved into the quarry a fox was surprised and delighted to come across acouple of unwary berry gatherers, which it ate. It was even moresurprised that night when two hundred grim-faced nomes tracked it to itsden, lit a fire in the entrance, and speared it to death when it ran out, eyes streaming.

There were a lot of animals that would like to dine off nome, Masklin hadsaid. They'd better learn: it's us or them. And they'd better learn rightnow that it's going to be them. No animal is going to get a taste fornome. Not anymore.

"Of course it might all be nothing to worry about," said Angalonervously, around dawn. "We might never have to move."

"Just when we were beginning to get settled down, too," said Dorcas.

"Still, I reckon that if we keep a proper lookout we can have everyone onthe move in five minutes. And we'll start moving some food stores upthere this morning. No harm in that. Then they'll be there if we needthem."

Nomes sometimes went as far as the airport. There was a garbage dump onthe way, which was a prime source of bits of cloth and wire, and theflooded gravel pits further on were handy if anyone had the patience tofish. It was a pleasant enough day's journey, largely along badgertracks. There was a main road to be crossed, or rather, to be burrowedunder; for some reason pipes had been carefully put underneath it justwhere the track needed to cross it. Presumably the badgers had done it.

They certainly used it a lot.

Masklin found Grimma in her schoolhole under one of the old sheds, supervising a class in writing. She glared at him, told the children toget on with it-and would Nicco Haberdasheri like to share the joke withthe rest of the class? No? Then he could jolly well get on withthings-and came out into the passage.

"I've just called to say we're off," said Masklin, twiddling his hat inhis hands. "There's a load of nomes going over to the dump, so we'll havecompany the rest of the way. Er."

"Electricity," said Grimma, vaguely.

"What?"

"There's no electricity at the old barn," said Grimma. "You remember whatthat meant? On moonless nights there was nothing to do but stay in theburrow. I don't want to go back to that."

"Well, maybe we were better nomes for it," mumbled Masklin. "We didn'thave all the things we've got today, but we were-"

"Cold, frightened, ignorant, and hungry!" snapped Grimma. "You know that.

You try telling Granny Morkie about the Good Old Days and see what shesays."

"We had each other," said Masklin.

Grimma examined her hands.

"We were just the same age and living in the same hole," she saidvaguely. She looked up. "But it's all different now! There ... well, there are the frogs, for one thing."

Masklin looked blank. And, for once, Grimma looked unsure.

"I read about them in a book," she said. "There's this place, you see.

Called South America. And there are these hills where it's hot and rains all the time, and in the rain forests there are these very tall trees andright in the top branches of the trees there are these, like, great bigflowers called bromeliads and water gets into the flowers and makeslittle pools and there's a type of frog that lays eggs in the pools andtadpoles hatch and grow into new frogs and these little frogs live theirwhole lives in the flowers right at the top of the trees and don't evenknow about the ground and the world is full of things like that and now Iknow about them and I'm never ever going to be able to see them, and thenyou," she gulped for breath, "want me to come and live with you in a holeand wash your socks!"

Masklin ran this sentence through his head again, in case it made anysense when he listened to it a second time.

"But I don't wear socks," he pointed out.

This was apparently not the right thing to say. Grimma prodded him in thestomach.

"Masklin," she said, "you're a good nome and bright enough in your way, but there aren't any answers up in the sky. You need to have your feet onthe ground, not your head in the air!"

She swept away and shut the door behind her.

Masklin felt his ears growing hot.

"I can do both!" Masklin shouted after her. "At the same time!"

He thought about it and added, "So can everyone!"

He stamped off along the tunnel. Bright enough in his way! Gurder wasright, universal education was not a good idea. He'd never understandwomen, he thought. Even if he lived to be ten.

Gurder had turned over the leadership of the Stationer! to Nisodemus.

Masklin felt less than happy about this. It wasn't that Nisodemus wasstupid. Quite the reverse. He was clever in a bubbling, sideways waythat Masklin distrusted; he always seemed to be bottling up excitementabout something, and when he spoke the words always rushed out, withNisodemus putting "urns" in the flow of words so that he could catch hisbreath without anyone having the chance to interrupt him. He made Masklinuneasy. He mentioned this to Gurder.

"Nisodemus might be a bit overenthusiastic," said Gurder, "but hisheart's in the right place."

"What about his head?"

"Listen," said Gurder. "We know each other well enough, don't we? Weunderstand one another, wouldn't you say?"

"Yes. Why?"

"Then I'll let you make the decisions that affect all nomes' bodies," said Gurder, his voice just one step away from being threatening, "andyou'll let me make the decisions that affect all nomes' souls. Fairenough?"

And so they set off.

The good-byes, the last-minute messages, the organization, and, becausethey were nomes, the hundred little arguments, are not important.

They set off.

Life at the quarry began to get back to something like normal. No moretrucks came up to the gate. Dorcas sent a couple of his more agile youngassistant engineers up the wire netting, just in case, to stuff therusty padlock full of mud. He also ordered a team of nomes to twist wirearound and around the gates as well.

"Not that it'd hold them very long," he said. "Not if they weredetermined."

The council, or what was left of it now, nodded wisely, although franklynone of them understood or cared much about mechanical things.

The truck came back the same afternoon. The two nomes watching the truckhurried back into the quarry to report. The driver had fiddled with thepadlock for a while, pulled at the wire, and then driven off.

"And it said something," said Sacco.

"Yes, it said something. Sacco heard it," said his partner, NootyKiddies-Klothes. She was a plump young nome who wore trousers and wasgood at engineering and had actually volunteered to be a guard instead ofstaying at home learning how to cook; things were really changing in thequarry.

"I heard it say something," said Sacco helpfully, in case the pointhadn't sunk in.

"That's right," said Nooty. "We both heard it, didn't we, Sacco?"

"And what was it?" said Dorcas encouragingly. I don't really deserve this sort of thing, he thought. Not at my time of life. I'd rather be in myworkshop, trying to get this radio business sorted out.

"It said," Sacco took a deep breath, his eyes bulged, and he attemptedthe foghorn mooing that was human sound, " 'Bbbllllooooooooddddyyykkiiiddddddssss!'"

Dorcas looked at the others.

"Anyone got any ideas?" he said. "It almost s seems to mean something, doesn't it? I tell you, if only we could understand them-"

"This must have been one of the stupid ones," said Nooty. "It was tryingto get in!" "Then it'll come back," said Dorcas gloomily. He shook hishead.

"All right, you two," he said. "Well done. Get back on watch. Thank you."

He watched them go off hand in hand, and then he wandered away across thequarry, heading for j the old manager's office.

I've seen Christmas Fayre come around six times, he thought. That's sixwhatd'youcall'ems, years. And almost one more, I think, although it'shard to j be sure out here. No one puts up any signs to say what'shappening, the heating just gets turned down. Seven years old. Just aboutthe time when a nome ought to be taking it easy. And I'm out here, wherethere aren't any proper walls to the world, and the water goes cold andhard as glass some mornings, and the ventilation and heating systems arequite shockingly out of control. Of course-he pulled himself together abit-as a scientist I find all these phenomena extremely interesting. Itwould just be nicer to find them extremely interesting from somewherenice and snug, inside.