_If it took reduction or torch
hair, the Cirissins wanted a
bump. Hokum, thistle, gluck._
A young and very beautiful girl with golden blond hair and smooth skin
the color of creamed sweet potatoes floated in the middle of the
windowless metal room into which Wayne Brighton drifted. The girl was
not exactly naked, but her few filmy clothes concealed nothing.
Wayne cleared his throat, his apprehension changing rapidly to
confusion.
"_You_ are going to _reduce_ me?" he asked.
"The word is seduce, mister," the girl said. "They told me reduce, too,
but they don't talk real good, and I think I'm supposed to seduce you so
you'll tell 'em something, and then they'll let me go. I guess. I hope.
What is it they wantcha to tell 'em?"
Wayne cleared his throat again, striving merely to keep a firm grip on
his sanity. Things had been happening much too fast for him to have
retained anything like his customary composure.
He said, "Well, they want me to get them a, uh--well, a high dragon
bump." He pronounced the words carefully.
"So why dontcha?" the girl asked.
Wayne's voice rose. "I don't even know what it is. I told them and
they don't believe me. Now you're here! I suppose if I can't be
reduced--seduced--into getting them one, it will wind up with torch
hair. Believe me, I never heard of a high dragon bump."
"Now, don't get panicky!" the girl pleaded. "After all, I'm scared too."
"I am not scared!" Wayne replied indignantly. But he realized that he
was.
So far, in the hour or so he'd been a captive of the Cirissins, he'd
managed to keep his fright pretty well subdued. He'd understood almost
at once what had happened, and his first reaction had not been terror or
even any great degree of surprise.
He was a scientist and he had a scientist's curiosity.
And at first the Cirissins--or the one that had done all the
talking--had been cooperative in answering his questions. But then, when
he wasn't able to comprehend what they meant by high dragon bump, they'd
started getting impatient.
"What's your name?" he asked the girl. She was making gentle swimming
motions with her hands and feet, moving gradually closer to him.
"Sheilah," she said. "Sheilah Ralue. I'm a model. I pose for pitchers.
You know--for sexy magazines and calendars and stuff like that."
"I see. You were posing when--?"
"When they snatched me, yeah. Couple hours ago, I guess. The flash bulb
went off and blinded me for a second like it always does, and I seemed
to be falling. Then I was here. Only I still don't even know where here
is. Do you? How come we don't weigh nothing? It's ghastly!"
"We're in a space ship," Wayne told her. "In free fall, circling earth a
thousand miles or so out. I thought you at least knew we were in a space
ship."
The girl said, "Oh, bull. We can't be in no space ship. How'd we get
here so fast?"
"They have a matter transmitter, but I haven't the slightest idea of how
it works. Obviously it's limited to living creatures or they could just
as well have taken whatever it is they want instead of ... You don't
happen to know what a high dragon bump is, do you?"
"Don't be dumb. Of course I ... well, unless it's a dance or something.
I use to be a dancer, ya know. Sort of."
"With bubbles, I imagine," Wayne said.
"Tassels. They was my specialty. But there's more money in posing for
pitchers, and the work ain't quite so--"
"I doubt that a high dragon bump is a dance," Wayne said.
Then he rubbed his chin. High dragon bump? Bumps and grinds? Highland
fling? Chinese dragon dances? Hell, why not?
The idea of space travelers visiting earth to learn a new dance was no
more fantastic than the idea of them being here at all.
Wayne turned his face to the door and shouted, "Hey, is that it? A
dance? You want us to teach you a dance called the high dragon bump?"
A muffled metallic voice from the other side said, "Nod danz. Bump.
Huguff quig."
Wayne shrugged and grinned weakly at Sheilah. "Well, we're making
headway. We know one thing that it isn't."
The girl had drifted so close to him now that he could feel the warmth
of her body and smell the overwhelming fragrance of her perfume.
She put one hand on his arm, and Wayne found that he had neither the
strength nor the inclination to jerk away.
But he protested weakly, "Now, listen, there's no point in you--I
mean--even if we did, I couldn't produce a high dragon bump."
"What kind of work do you do, mister?" Sheilah asked softly, drawing
herself even closer. "You know, you ain't even told me your name yet."
"It's Wayne," he said, fumbling in an effort to loosen his tie so he
could breath more easily. "I'm an instructor. I teach physics at Kyler
College, and I've got a weekly science show on TV. In fact I'd just
finished my show when they got me. I was leaving the studio, starting
down the stairs. Thought at first I'd missed a step and was falling, but
I just kept falling. And I landed here, and ... Now, don't do that!"
"Why, I wasn't doing nothing. Whaddya do on your TV show?"
"I talk. About science. Physics. Like today, I was discussing the
H-bomb. How it works, you know, and why the fallout is dangerous,
and ... Oh, good Gawd! Seduce, reduce! High dragon bump!"
He shoved her away from him abruptly and violently and he went hurtling
in the opposite direction.
"Well, hey!" Sheilah protested. "You don't need to get so rough. I
wasn't going to--"
"Shut up," Wayne said. "I think I've figured out what the Cirissins
want!
"Hey! Hey, open the door," he shouted. "I've got to talk to you."
The door opened and a Cirissin floated in.
Sheilah turned her head away, shuddering, and Wayne found it wise to
close his eyes and open them little by little to grow re-accustomed to
the sight gradually.
The only thing he could think of with which to compare the Cirissins was
the intestinal complex of an anemic elephant.
It was not an entirely satisfactory comparison; but then, from his point
of view, the Cirissins were entirely unsatisfactory creatures.
Each of the four he had seen was nearly twice his size. They had no
recognizable features such as eyes, ears, nose, head, arms or legs.
Tentacle-like protrusions of various size and length seemed to serve as
the sensory and prehensile organs. Wayne had identified one waving,
restless flexible stalk as the eye. He suspected another of being the
mouth, except that it apparently wasn't used for talking. The voice came
from somewhere deep inside the convoluted mass of pastel-streaked
tissue.
"Wand tog?" the Cirissin rumbled.
Wayne said, "Yes. Do you mind telling me what you want a high dragon
bump _for_?"
"Blast away hearth," the Cirissin replied unhesitatingly.
Wayne swallowed and found it unnaturally difficult to do so.
"To blast away earth?" he said. "You can do that with just one high
dragon bump?"
"Certificate. Alteration energy maguntoot. Compilated, though. Want
splain?"
Wayne said, "Never mind. I believe you. Just tell me this: Why? Who do
you feel it's necessary to do it?"
"Cause _is_ necessary," the Cirissin explained. "Hearth no good. Whee
dun lake. Godda gut red oft."