Part 19 (1/2)

'I'm looking for Thor.'

'Big Red? Straight on in through the door here.'

Zaphod squinted through the gloom, but the door was proving as difficult to spot as Yggdrasil's mouth.

'I don't see any door.'

'You have to say the magic words.'

Zaphod rubbed his temples and concentrated. 'Okay. Don't tell me. I feeling something, coming out of the ether. Is it Trees are froody Trees are froody?'

'Flattery will get you everywhere,' said the tree and parted a cl.u.s.ter of creepers on the damp wall, revealing a nicotine-yellow glow behind. 'In you go, Blondie.'

Zaphod stepped inside. He did not need to bend down as the doorway behind the creepers had been built for a much larger person.

Nano Hillman Hunter gazed out of his office window at the tropical majesty of this planet he had purchased at the nebula's edge.

You did the right thing, Hillers, said his Nano's voice in his head. If you hadn't s.h.i.+fted these people from Earth, their atoms would be spread across the Galaxy by now. What do you think people would prefer, a little civil unrest or a whole lot of dead? If you hadn't s.h.i.+fted these people from Earth, their atoms would be spread across the Galaxy by now. What do you think people would prefer, a little civil unrest or a whole lot of dead?

Hillman knew that his Nano was right, but he couldn't help thinking that, somewhere along the line, he had been screwed. There had been a better deal to be had and somehow Zaphod Beeblebrox had kept it hidden from him, and it pained Hillman to think that he had been bamboozled by such an apparent moron.

The intercom box on his desk vibrated, dragging Hillman's attention away from the view. He waved his hand over the sensor and a little hologram of his secretary appeared on his desk.

'Yes, Marilyn?'

'There's a lady here to see you.'

'Does she have an appointment?'

Marilyn mewed, as though this was a difficult question. 'She says she will have.'

'That's a little cryptic, Marilyn. Could you ask for clarification?'

Before Marilyn could respond, a woman appeared in Hillman's interview chair. From his recent interviews, Hillman had become accustomed to a flickering style of materialization, but this woman arrived like somebody had flicked a switch.

'Jaysus!' he yelped.

'Actually, no. The name is Gaia, Hillman Hunter,' she said, her voice sonorous and comforting.

'Ah, yes. Gaia, the Earth Mother.' Hillman sifted through the stack of resumes on his desk. 'I wasn't planning on interviewing female G.o.ds.'

Gaia trained her deep-brown eyes on Hillman. 'No, but you would have made an exception for me, so I decided to hurry things along.'

The combination of eyes and voice was hypnotic and Hillman found himself very comfortable with this attractive lady.

'That was probably... that was a reasonable course of action.'

Gaia's face was heart-shaped with sensuous purple lips. 'You've got time to talk to me, don't you, Hillman?'

'Yes. Jaysus, yes, begorrah.'

'I am the Earth Mother, without an Earth, come to a new home. I could be happy here, Hillman. You could be happy too.'

'Yes, Earth Mother. Happy as a pig in... very happy.'

'There's no need for any more interviews.'

'No. Why would I need to interview anyone else?'

Gaia smiled and leaned forward. Hillman saw that her fingers were slim but strong. 'I can nurture this earth. I can make anything grow.'

'That's grand. Growing stuff is a good thing.'

The Earth Mother spread her arms and Hillman could smell the summers of his youth. 'The women will be broad-breasted and fertile, and the men will desire them.'

'About f.e.c.king time too.'

'All we need to do is clear up a few salary issues.' Which was exactly the wrong thing to say to Hillman Hunter; the fog in his mind cleared and he suddenly felt the need to ask a few probing questions.

'Salary issues? And what issues would they be?'

'Well, the entire package is pitifully small. How can I be expected to support a retinue...'

'A retinue, is it? I don't recall advertising for a retinue. One position only.'

'But surely a G.o.ddess of my stature...?'

Hillman was in like a shark. 'What stature is that? You were no great shakes in your last job. As far as I remember, the planet was plagued with famine and most of the crops that did grow were riddled with pesticides.'

'Things got a little out of control on Earth,' admitted Gaia. 'But that wouldn't happen again.'

'Oh really? Why don't we explore that. Let's say there's an uprising, a surge in belief for another G.o.d. How would you handle it?'

Gaia smiled kindly. 'I have dealt with problems in the past, you know. I can be tough when the situation demands it.'

'Please elaborate.'

'I remember once Ura.n.u.s hid the Cyclops in Tartarus so he couldn't see the light. This caused me considerable pain as you may not know this about me as Tartarus was my bowels in a reflexology kind of a way. So I fas.h.i.+oned a great flint sickle, and when Ura.n.u.s entered my chamber for his weekly how's-your-father, I had my son Chronos chop his doodle off with the sickle.' Gaia clapped delightedly at the memory. 'Oh, that was a night and a half. But I think I've answered your question. Firm but fair, that's my motto. I still have that sickle somewhere you never know when a few drops of dry divine blood will come in handy.'

Hillman crossed his legs, feeling a phantom loss that he fervently hoped never to experience.

Beside Gaia's name on her resume, he wrote four words: Over my dead body.

Asgard Zaphod stepped into as foul a den of broken dreams as he had ever been thrown out of and felt instantly at home.

This is my kind of place, he thought. Even the air in here is dangerous. Even the air in here is dangerous.

And it was. The germs huddled together and drifted through the murky air in coloured clouds, trying vainly to infect the ossified zombies and demi-G.o.ds. For once Zaphod was glad that Left Brain had jabbed him with AZ inoculations while he slept. At least, LB had sworn they were inoculations.

A cloud buzzed Zaphod's head, chanting 'Open pores, open sores.' But it was repelled by the scent of anti-virus in his perspiration.