Page Created: 10/25/11. Last Updated: 10/25/11.
Now I’m not saying that this story is true. Then again, ain’t saying it ain’t. You see, with a man like Smith you can never be sure.
I met him in a bar on Ridley’s Planet, oh, maybe a dozen Standard Revs ago. A couple of fellows from the Space Patrol were celebrating shore leave by mixing it up with a bunch of Warthuns. I was enjoying the resolution of this friendly difference of opinion from the relative safety of a corner Protecto-Booth nursing a Napalm in one hand and a dancer who’d had a little too much Rigellian Nosespice in the other. He motioned to be allowed to approach. I waved him in.
Southeast Indianapolis Smith. Even in those days he was fast becoming a legend. Nothing like he is today, of course—for one thing he hadn’t yet discovered how to make that alien star cruiser, the Kessel, run, nor had he been one of the aiders of THE SAUCED LARK, that ship hadn’t even been built yet, let alone getting crippled—but it still figured to be worth the investment of a couple of drinks to make his acquaintance.
He sat down, introduced himself, and ordered a Comet’s Head. The dancer eyed him with interest. Tall, lean, dark-haired, space-tanned. A wolfish glint in his eyes. He asked me how the mining was going. I said I’d had a good run in the Belts. I asked him what was happening in the trading business.
Well, he began, he’d just gotten out of a scrape on a backwater planet in the Crab Nebula. He and his partner, Rahar Ughoti, whom I gathered was a hairy alien resembling a four and a half foot silver fox, had made a delivery of questionable legality for a hundred Mega-credits. They were about to blast off (no one in their right mind would hang around the Clob any longer than they had to) when one of the natives approached him with a proposal.
It seems this clobbit—that’s what they call themselves, you see, had inherited a treasure map from his great-great-great uncle, or the local equivalent thereof. Until recently, he had not given much thought to liberating the horde from its current owner. But such were the whims of fate that he was now forced to do so. A little questioning confirmed that the whims of fate in this case being a euphemism for a rapid repayment of gambling debts or a meeting with a Deverian Pit Fiend. Scram, that’s the name of the clobbit with the map, had managed to recruit a few other wretches in similar circumstances to aid him in the recovery but he still needed some high powered assistance.
You see, the treasure belonged to a dragon named Growlgut.
Don’t go looking at me like I was on Antares Happy Chew. I was skeptical myself.
Sou’east Smith could guess what I was thinking. He pointed out that there are some pretty strange critters who make their home in this cosmos. He’d once traced a Betelguese Slime Devil to its lair, bagged a Sirius Putty, and had generally run across enough unlikely fauna and flora to stock an ex-tee-zoo or two. Even so, he was scarcely prepared for his first glimpse of the Clobbit Fire Spitting Dragon, but I’m getting ahead of myself here.
After a bit of haggling over the proper division of the hypothetical treasure, Smith and Ughoti loaded the party onto their hovercraft. The destination was, they were told, one of those mysterious ruined cities abandoned by the Outsiders. After scouting a bit, they set down near the entrance to the sewer, activated the craft’s personal defense field, and descended into the labyrinth.
It took a while to get to the right area. As Scram’s great-great-great whatever had been running for his life while mapping, some of the details were a mite sketchy. A collapsed chamber necessitated a wide detour at one point. They nearly passed up a cross corridor which they were supposed to enter at another. But Ughoti was moderately familiar with Outsider architecture and Scram had a good memory of old family stories, so they made it.
They rounded a corner and gaped in astonishment. The passageway had opened up into what was one of the largest junkpiles ever assembled. There are a number of animals which collect shiny objects, but this made a Filch look like a Denebian Pocketliner.
Piles of molding scent projectors lay scattered about at random. A score of rusting babas were stacked against the far wall. All about were mini-hordes of plasti-gels, yords, and other everyday items.
Scram had explained that the Clobbit Dragon possessed an obsessive collector instinct, but this had be seen to be believed. The other clobbits began to explore the cavern while Indianapolis and Ughoti stood guard.
Scram reminded his fellow clobbits not to waste time looking for gems or electrum while there was real treasure about. Somewhere in the room lay the fabled Galactic Express Credit Cards and Travelers Checks, possibly hidden beneath a bit of garbage.
The group began poking and probing the assorted piles. One of the piles took exception to this.
It was then that Smith got his first sight of the dragon. It measured more than fifteen megamerts from snout to the end of its barbed tail. Large green-gray scales covered the body. Vestigial wings sprouted from its back.
Indianapolis reacted at once, whipping out two photon guns faster than a frimmal could snotch. The beast screamed in pain from the blasts and spit fire at Smith. His garments burst into flame like an Ursan Preen at courtship time.
Telling this story is making my mouth dry. How about getting me a drink? Ahhh, that’s better. Now, where was I? Oh, yes, the fire spitting dragon.
There’s a bit of guesswork involved in figuring out how the critter pulls that stunt, owing as to how Smith and Ughoti neglected to take along a fully equipped diagnostic laboratory down there with them. The gist is that the dragon’s digestive system produces a substance something like napalm. If you do a little figuring, you can see that starting a fire is no great shakes for something with a body temperature that high, and its waste disposal system must have been a biochemist’s nightmare, excuse me, I’m getting off the track.
With Smith at this point resembling a Glyphx barbecue, Growlgut set out to collect the rest of his dinner. As it went past Ughoti, the fox-man thrust with his ion blade. He ws rewarded with a roar of pain before a sweep of the lizard’s tail sent him sprawling. When his eyes cleared, the Vulpine saw his blade imbedded in the dragon’s rump.
The offworlders would have probably been finished off then and there, had the clobbits not chosen that moment to panic. But with one of their dragon-slayers disarmed, and the other one being broiled, they decided to exit posthaste. This movement naturally attracted the dragon’s attention and he went bounding after them.
Actually, things were both better and worse than they seemed. Worse, because Indianapolis’ guns had been consumed by the inferno. Better, because the adventurer was pretty much unharmed because of a protecto-suit beneath his clothing. And he had just noticed a Zhing blaster lying atop one of the piles of rubble. He and Ughoti began to climb.
They had just reached the summit when the surviving clobbits returned being chased by you-know-who.
Ughoti motioned Scram to lead Growlgut past their mound, for he’d spotted a likely looking vulnerable spot of dragon where the back of the neck joinied the torso. Unfortunately, the clobbit was ignoring the signal and leading the creature right to them. Indianapolis gritted his teeth. Eyes that had gazed upon a ghost star narrowed. The angle was almost impossible. Scram and Growlgut reached the mound as the firing sequence concluded. There was a might roar and the world came tumbling down.
How about a refill? My throat is getting dry again. What’s that? I asked Smith the same question. He looked me right in the eye and said, “I should’ve known the blaster was defective. The damned thing exploded when I fired it. But between the explosion—love those protecto-suits—and the dragon running into our mound, the heap shifted. A horde of priceless silicon chips hidden beneath the rubble toppled, burying the monster. You might say that it was booty that killed the beast."
Now, the next time I ran into Sou’east Smith was in a marketplace on Tau Ceti Alpha where he told me that he had just come back from a trip to …
- - - - - - - - -
Story reprinted with permission from YOUNG DULLARD PRESENTS: AWESOME ASTEROID ADVENTURES: PULSE POUNDING PULP PENNINGS Copyright 1982 Philip J. De Parto. YOUNG DULLARD was small fanzine I edited back in the 80s. AWESOME was an homage to the science fiction pulps, with stories deliberately written in the pulpiest of styles. The pages were trimmed to pulp format size and given rough edges. Other stories in the issue included Boring Lensman by Thomas Pokorny and The Adventures of Vic Neutron by Vastly Spaceright.