ref: b9fbb17c04e4ccfb2021dac818e514351ca8f646
dir: /troff/0402.ms/
.LP \& .ce .sp |4.25i .PP .ps 12 .CW ░ The Little Green Man was Ralph. No doubt about it. .PP .ps 12 Thomas hadn't seen him since the summer after sixth grade. Nobody had. They'd all hated him beyond any reasonable accounting for taste. Point of fact, hadn't he died, or something? Thomas felt certain he would have heard about it if anyone from the old team had spotted Ralph in these past twenty years. He could be forgiven his stunned, disassociative stupor\(emnobody would have expected Ralph to survive for two decades all on his lonesome. .PP .ps 12 Thomas shrugged. Sometimes it was precisely these guys who had to struggle at everything who ended up being the best operators. They never gave up, never stopped trying. There was no easy habit of surrender, with them, no sundry moral misgivings to distract them from the mission. .PP .ps 12 And what was Ralph's mission, here? .PP .ps 12 Evidently, Piotr had already sussed it out. To interfere, to cause confusion and delay within Thomas' sphere of influence. .PP .ps 12 Unacceptable, Ralph. .PP .ps 12 Figured he'd better step in before Piotr killed the poor, hardworking idiot. .PP .ps 12 But first, he had to go potty. .PP .ps 12 Thomas had made good progress holding it between scheduled breaks, but in spite of this his latest performance review still indicated some occasional spotting in his big boy trousers. He guessed they had detected his little accidents through some embedded percept capability. So, it was a haptic diaper, after all. He'd loved those leather pants, and it had torn him apart inside to cut them up, searching for the concealed surveillance apparatus. Which he hadn't even found. Well, that just meant it was time to go shopping for new pants. .PP .ps 12 Thomas approached the head, his visor scanning the entrance for telltale signs of recent visitors. He followed the floor into the men's room, still unconvinced by the seeming cleanliness of the facility. It just didn't make any sense. Shrugging, he unzipped his fly and edged closer to a randomly selected urinal. .PP .ps 12 Aw, man, it was too late. .PP .ps 12 His briefs were sopping wet. .PP .ps 12 "Again?" Piotr asked. .PP .ps 12 "Fuck off," Thomas groused, embarrassed at the spreading stain on his crotch. .PP .ps 12 Ralph was still laying there on the ground. Bruised, but apparently alive. .PP .ps 12 "I couldn't get anything out of him," Piotr lied, and climbed off of the Little Green Man. He shook up a Gray Pop and cracked it open, directing the overflow to spurt over Ralph's prostrate pre\-carcass. .PP .ps 12 "Hey," Ralph complained, "This gear was expensive." .PP .ps 12 "Shut up, Ralph," Piotr said, and kicked him again, hard in the ribs. .PP .ps 12 Ralph shut the fuck up. .PP .ps 12 Dr. James Joyce Fadd arrived at DET\-86 shortly thereafter, flanked by two assistants Thomas didn't recognize. They were there to work with Ralph. It transpired that there was some initial trouble with Dr. Fadd's login credentials, but within a few hours they were all whizzing downward through the subbasements, right past the government, to a neighborhood Thomas had never seen before. Smelled like an open sewer. Nice place, and Dr. Fadd appeared to know exactly where he was going. As usual, Piotr stared straight ahead and said nothing. Thomas tried to do the same. .PP .ps 12 No doubt it had been expensive to clear the area above ground in preparation for apprehending Ralph, but Thomas was sure it would all prove worth it, in the end. Even if Ralph couldn't consciously recall many details, quite a lot could be gleaned just from the caches in his pressure suit. In spite of all the Gray Pop, Ralph's gear was still nominally in working order. All in all, Thomas reasoned, a successful operation. .PP .ps 12 One remaining detail troubled him. .PP .ps 12 Why had Ralph signed up with the enemy?