I looked at Nick with a cocked eyebrow as if
he had lost his mind. This was nothing new of course; I almost always looked at
him like that. Then I realized Nick was right. It had also been bothering me
since I’d met Grizzly. His mannerisms, the way he walked and talked, and his
viewpoint on things. He had constantly reminded me of someone I had known in
the past but I could not put my finger on.
“Bloody hell—you’re right! He’s a huge,
hairy Holly!”
We then got up and walked across the hangar
to T-2 to pick up the carryalls.
After grabbing them out of the locker, Nick said,
“I wonder where one hides an arsenal of arms
where other people won’t find them, especially on a Martian outpost.”
“How should I know? I’m not a Martian
terrorist.”
“Well I know it was a waste of my time
trying to hide my stash of rum. Your girlfriend always found it.”
“Yeah, but she won’t be looking for
firearms.”
“Are you sure about that? She does get quite
angry with you sometimes. Not that anyone can blame her for that of course,”
Nick said.
“I know: why don’t we hide them in the empty
house next door to my house? No one would have any reason to go in there.”
“OK, why not? It’s as good a place as any. Let’s
go.”
We left T-2
and walked back for our buggies. We drove over to my place and parked in the
driveway. As we climbed out of the buggies, we looked around to see if anyone
was nearby, but aside from us the street appeared empty. We carried the bags
nonchalantly over to the empty house, and Nick casually kept watch while I
worked the blue panel to open the door, and then we casually dived in as I
touched the blue panel inside to close the door. We both breathed a sigh of
relief as the door clicked closed.
“No worries. That was easily done. Now the
question is where to hide them,” I said.
“Let’s hide them in the bottom of the dining
cabinet.”
“Yeah, OK.”
I stood up as the cabinet door slid shut.
“Well that’s that then. How about we stop in
at my place for a well-earned drink?” I said.
“Good idea. Let’s go.”
“OK, I’ll just check and see if the coast is
clear.”
I opened the shutter over one of the front
windows and surveyed the street. Satisfied that it was empty, I closed it again
and we walked out onto the porch. As the door slid shut, I heard a voice behind
me.
“What are you two up to now?”
Nick and I leaped so high into the air we
almost hit our heads on the porch roof. We deftly turned in midair as we
dropped back to the floor and landed. Mel and Sammy were leaning against the
wall with their arms folded.
“Whatever you do, don’t show fear!” I
whispered to Nick.
“Yeah, right back at you, mate!” he replied.
“We weren’t doing anything—just checking out
the empty houses,” I explained. (Yeah, I know, it also sounded idiotic to me as
I said it! If I’d had an ounce of sense I would have hidden them in a house on
an empty level where there was no likelihood of anybody being around to see us.)
“Codswallop! You were furtively
fast-walking across our front lawn with your heads spinning from side to side
making sure you weren’t seen going into this house. You were, in fact, acting
like two schoolkids up to no good who are scared you’ll be spotted.”
No comments:
Post a Comment