"Dear sirs! Ladies and gentlemen! Salute to tthe nation! With the most humble respect, your Excellency, I have the honor to remain, most respected Princess Diko-bella, your obedient servant, technical supervisor, signature indecipherable! ..." The armored car once more started shaking and emitting flashes, then subsided.
I will afflict you with vines to cling to yo"u, thought Pepper, and your accursed race will be swept away by the jungle, your roofs will crumble, the beams will fall, your houses will be grown about with wormwood, the bitter wormwood.
The forest was moving in closer, climbing the hairpins, scrabbling up the cliff overhang preceded by waves of lilac fog, and out of it came crawling, gripping, and crushing, myriads of green tentacles, cesspits gaped open on the streets and houses tumbled into bottomless lakes, jumping trees got up on the concrete runways in front of packed airplanes, where the people lay in piles, anyhow, with their yogurt bottles, slate-gray document-cases and heavy safes, and the ground beneath the cliff yawned and sucked it d'own. That would be so natural, so much to be expected, that no one would be surprised. Everybody would be afraid simply and accept annihilation as a vengeance long feared and expected. Driver Acey would be running like a spider between the swaying cottages looking for Rita, to get what he wanted at last, but be wouldn't have time...
Three rockets went soaring up from the armored car and a military voice bellowed: "Tanks on the right, cover on the left! Crew, under cover!" Someone at once added thickly: "Dames to the left, bunks to the right! Crew to your b-bunks!" Came sounds of neighing and stamping, quite unhuman by now, just as if a herd of pedigree stallions were kicking and thrashing about in that iron box searching for a door to liberty, to the mares. Pepper swung his door wide and peered out. There was swamp beneath his feet, deep swamp, since the truck's monstrous wheels were more than hub deep in the mire. The edge wasn't far off, however.
Pepper crawled onto the back and made the long walk to the tailboard, thudding and clanking as he strode the length of the immense steel trough in the rich moon-shadow. Once there he climbed onto the tailboard and descended by way of endless small ladders to the water. He remained suspended for a time over the icy slime, screwing up his courage, then, as a burst of machinegun fire once more came from the armored car, closed his eyes and jumped. The bog gave way beneath him and continued to do so for a considerable time, it seemed endless, and by the time he touched bottom, the mud was up to his chest. He pressed his whole body down onto the mud, trod with his knees, and used his palms to push off. At first he could only struggle on the spot, but he got the hang of it after a while and began making progress; to his surprise he soon found himself out of the wet.
It'd be a good idea if I could dig up some people somewhere, he thought, just people would do for a start - clean, shaved, considerate, hospitable. No high-flown ideas necessary, no blazing talents. No stunning ideals needed, or self-hatred. Just let them clap hands on seeing me and somebody can run and fill the bath, somebody else provide clean sheets and put the kettle on. Just don't let anybody request documents or demand signatures in triplicate with twenty pairs of fingerprints, let nobody spring to the telephone to report in a meaningful whisper that a stranger had appeared covered in filth, calling himself Pepper, but this could hardly be the truth since Pepper had left for the Mainland and a directive about it had already been issued and would be made public tomorrow... No need either for them to be supporters or opponents of anything in principle. They wouldn't have to be principled opponents of drinking as long as they weren't drunkards themselves. Nor would they have to be supporters of truth at all costs so long as they didn't lie or say spiteful things to anybody's face or behind their backs. They shouldn't demand that anyone conform fully to any set of ideals, just accept and understand him as he was... Good god, thought Pepper, is that too much to ask?"
