Robert Asprin - Myth Alliances

'There," Zol concluded, retrieving Coley and tucking him into his satchel. "They are all working on it now."

He escorted Bunny to the huge table. The books, mirror and compacts, seeing that someone was paying attention to them, began flapping and blinking eagerly like puppies in a basket. Bunny wore an expression of delight, overwhelmed by the number of choices before her.

"Now, just let yourself choose," he told her. "They're all very impressionable at this stage. But use your intuition. You will know if you are making the right decision."

The entire concept of deliberately letting oneself be tied for life to any creature made me nervous. True, I had permanently impressed a dragon, but it had been by accident. If I had known it could happen, I would have stayed away from the stall. But then, I thought, putting my hand on Gleep's head, I would have missed all the joy and fun of the companionship we had shared. Apart from the yearlong chore of housebreaking, of course. Dragon dung is second only to Pervish cooking in terms of all-time gagging stenches, and dragon breath comes in third, I mused, as Gleep snaked his head up to slurp me affectionately on the cheek.

Bunny nodded. "They're all beautiful," she murmered, softly. Her hands ran over the surface of each of the books. I thought I saw the gleaming shells quiver at her touch. I understood that; I had felt the same way. She unrolled the big coil of silver and discovered that it was almost as wide as she was tall.

"That is really an item for an artist," Zol put in. "You'd mount it on a wall or a big table to work."

"Oh! I couldn't leave it in plain view," she explained. "It's too technological for Klah, and in the Bazaar I'd be afraid someone would be able to see what I'm doing. So much of my work is confidential."

Zol gestured toward the tiny ones. "Then you want a compact. It will do all of the tasks you have mentioned so far: bookkeeping, spreadsheets, projections, expense breakouts, and it will fit in a handbag or a belt pouch. See if you like any of these." The little round mirrors began to clack at her like castanets, all vying for her attention.

"Oh, they're perfectly darling," Bunny cooed.

The Kobold beamed. "How very intuitive of you! That's what they're called, Perfectly Darling Assistants, or PDAs for short."

The little objects, seeing that she favored them, began to jump up and down like fish snapping at bait. Bunny looked them all over carefully. Their jewel-like colors were very attractive. Each of them seemed to grow brighter, hoping to attract her attention. But as she came close to a red-cased compact, it opened wide to show its miniature screen. Bunny's blue eyes were reflected in it. She reached out, and it almost jumped into her hand. Bunny brought it close to her and began to stroke the smooth, gleaming shell, murmuring to herself.

"Goodness," Zol stated. "That one really likes you, Mistress Bunny. I've seldom seen such an enthusiastic response."

The feeling was mutual. Bunny kept turning the little object over, examining it, touching every inch of its surface. It leapt up to get the full benefit of each pass of her hand, and emitted a cacophony of sounds that was a combination of music, chirps, sensuous purrs and whistles.

"Awwww," Tananda crooned. "How cute!"

"It is," Bunny agreed. "I think I'll call her Bytina."

"How do you know it's a she?" I asked, skeptically.

"Well, just look at her," Bunny insisted, holding the little device out to me. It snapped its covers shut as I leaned down to examine it. "Oh, you've scared her."

"I've scared her?" I echoed. "What did I do?" "Now, now, Master Skeeve, the relationship has to build naturally, one connection at a time. Put her here for a moment, Mistress Bunny," Zol suggested, patting the top of Asciita's book, which extended a silver pseudopod large enough to hold Bytina. "Good! Now she, and you, will have connections to networks to which you are invited." Instantly dozens of books and mirrors on-a-stick all around the room began to blink. "See! They all want to get to know you."

Bunny glanced down into the minute magik mirror, which no longer reflected her face. Instead, we could see the image of a polished wooden desk. I understood the "desktop" concept now, because hundreds of envelopes of every size and. shape began to fall onto it with the swishing sound that real paper would make. 'There. You've got mail already."

Bunny tapped the mirror with her fingertip. "How do I open those envelopes?"

"There is your hand," Zol replied, pointing to a hand-shaped button. Bunny touched it, and the very image of her hand appeared in the picture.

"I can't open envelopes one-handed," she objected.

"Touch it with the other hand, too."

Suddenly there were two little hands in the mirror. It was good magik. The disembodied images picked up the first envelope, opened the flap and extracted an engraved card. Bunny peered close.

"I can't read it."

"Expand the window," Zol instructed her. Before Bunny could ask how, Bytina stretched and stretched until she was the size of a dinner plate. The first missive was now easily read.

" 'Welcome,' the card said in swirling blue letters, 'u r v beautiful i would like to be your friend do u like pizza (g)? rofl Kas Nostat.'"

Bunny smiled, bemused. "I like pizza very much," she said. "Who is Kas?" A unit in the far back of the room started blinking blue. Bunny's compact started flashing silver. "Oh! Are they talking?" "Yes. They all speak their own language. This is very convenient, because it will provide me with a means of communicating with you if we are not together."

Bytina's mirror filled with more envelopes, all of them flapping around like hysterical butterflies. Bunny opened them all with pleasure. Before long she had been introduced to everyone in the room. Further invitations were pouring in from farther afield. Zol identified some of the signatures as coming from entirely different countries in the dimension.

"How can it do that?"

"We harnessed natural forces," Zol explained. "You know how quickly a rumor can spread, for example? A story that you thought was private going to the ends of the earth before you know it? Well, we tagged one, let it loose, and followed how it made its way all over the world. Those information pathways are the basis of our system. So our rumor-nation, if you will forgive the term, is now able to ruminate upon our little problem. And Bytina is part of the solution."

"Well, I like her," Bunny declared, happily. "She is just darling, and she's a genius." The compact in her hands seemed wildly happy, flipping its mirror open and closed. Gleep came close for a sniff. Bytina closed her lid with a snap that nearly took off one of his whiskers. Gleep retreated behind me with his head peering over my shoulder. "You'd really like having one," she told us. "It's wonderful. I feel like I'm connected to so many people now."

"Not for me," Tananda insisted. "I have complicated enough relationships of the breathing kind."

"How is this worldwide connection doing on finding the dimension the Pervect Ten went to?" I asked, peevishly.

"I'm glad you asked," Zol smiled at me. "I believe I have an answer for you." Our host led us to yet another huge white room filled with Kobolds and computers. The Kobold scribes were too busy with their keyboards to look up at us as we entered, but they had noticed us. Several of the screens offered flashes of welcome. A vast silver curtain filled the wall opposite the door. On it was a complicated design that looked like a web. I would have hated to meet the spider-bear that had woven it; it was gigantic .

"There are an infinitely large number of dimensions that can be reached directly from Wuh," Zol lectured, gesturing up at the curtain. A pale beige light erupted close to the center of the web. "As you can see on this screen, we are here," he pointed to a small silver light immediately adjacent to the pale dot. At another gesture the whole chart burst into brilliance as the first-generation connections lit up. "Based on research I and other field researchers have already gathered, these are the other dimensions we know of that are on a first-jump basis with Wuh. Now, Pervects have a tolerance for far more poisonous atmospheres and less salubrious terrain than, say, Klahds and Trolls, but we can begin to eliminate numerous dimensions from the total. First of all, we can ignore the ones that don't use magik. And the ones whose level of civilization is insufficient to accept the presence of demons, particularly ones who resemble Pervects. You must admit their appearance takes a little getting used to."