Part Ten, Chapter Eight - Oh God, Foreshadowing

Ske's driving is somewhat impaired by his wounded and bandaged hands, which isn't helped when Gris wallops him for chatting with Bittlestiffender and describing what a loathsome murderer Gris is while the agent was "comforting" the Widow Tayl.  And though seeing Gris and Ske perish in a fiery car crash would be a satisfying ending to this book, there's still just under a hundred pages left, so no such luck. 

Along the way Gris gets a call from Lombat Hisst's secretary informing him of a meeting.  Hisst is already waiting in the hanger, disguised as an exterminator along with a professional Apparatus burglar, a saboteur, and a scientist.  He has Gris don a similar jumpsuit, orders a distraction to keep Heller away from Tug One for a few moments, and the group slips aboard to inspect Heller's cargo.

Which they could and should have ordered inspected the instant it arrived on Apparatus property, passing the numerous security checkpoints you'd expect from such a paranoid agency.  But this is a work of biting satire, where logic and verisimilitude are less important than rants about the author's enemies.

The first few crates Heller's already loaded contain nothing more than spare parts, but others are more of interest to the mission of making Mission Earth fail.  Heller's packed a "miniature heavy-metal conversion plant," a device that uses Science! to turn elements into uranium or such.  Hisst chooses to ignore it, since Earth already has plenty of uranium, so he can't imagine why the humans would be interested.  But the other device is more problematic: "Elementary School Kit 13" uses laughably simple Voltarian Science! to convert carbon into hydrogen or oxygen, which would obviously be helpful in counteracting global warming.

But Lombar was thinking. "(Bleep) it, that thing could upset everything. Particularly one certain Earth person!"

"Precisely," said the scientist. "And I know you don't want to offend HIM!"

Oh boy.  There is another.  A mysterious Earthling with a vested interest in keeping the environment in the crapper, a human that even Lombar Hisst steps lightly around.

I bet this unrevealed villain turns out to be a psychologist.

So Hisst has his saboteur, uh, sabotage the pair of carbon converters, while Gris looks on.  Before you can ask yourself why they need Gris around in the first place, Hisst orders Gris to distract Heller so that the others can make their escape.  What follows is a hilarious four pages of Gris asking Heller if he needs anything, if there's anything he needs to stamp, if there's any last-minute purchases required for the mission, and so forth, while nervously checking over his shoulder to see if Hisst is through disembarking yet.  Gris ends up ordering a bunch of flowers and wreathes, enough bubblebrew and tup for a proper lift-off party, five separate bands, dancing bears, fireworks, new uniforms for the guards, nice clothes for the Countess Krak, the whole shebang.  All the while Heller is trying to hide his smile and Gris is mentally screaming "MY GODS, WHERE THE HELLS WAS LOMBAR!" and in the end he turns around and notices that the "exterminators'" car is long gone.  Buh-dum-tish.

Gris gets stuck with a nearly nine hundred credit bill, which threatens his newfound wealth, and realizes that he's just signed off for an extravagant party for what was supposed to be a secret mission.  The chapter concludes with - say it with me now - Gris being miserable.


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