Mission: Earth "Death Quest"

Read Online Mission: Earth "Death Quest" by Ron L. Hubbard - Free Book Online

Book: Mission: Earth "Death Quest" by Ron L. Hubbard Read Free Book Online
Authors: Ron L. Hubbard
Tags: sf_humor
Ads: Link
Ochokeechokee. It's the remains of a town and there may even be a hotel there. They're all hot onto it. They got their logistics worked out and all their estimates are firmed. But, Mr. Jet, don't you think a billion dollars is an awful lot to spend on just clean air? And why for a bunch of Florida crackers?"
    "It's necessary, Izzy. The pollution in the atmosphere will heat this planet up in time. I'm putting in the spores production plant in the Florida area because it's hot and will save fuel. The spores will rise into the trade winds, hit the stratosphere and circulate to both hemispheres. The spores will convert noxious gases into oxygen and it will take an awful lot of them. I'm sorry if you think it is unprofitable."
    "Oh, no, Mr. Jet," said Izzy. "I certainly would never dream of criticizing you. You wound me to think so. Besides, I maybe forgot to tell you, but when you said you were using mud electrical-breakdown for fuel, I enlarged the power plant a little bit and contracted the excess to the City of Miami Power Company for a quarter of a billion dollars a year: they use an awful lot of air conditioning there. Here's the contracts. I forgot to mention it."
    "Well, I'm glad we're going to show a profit," said Heller.
    "No, no, that's not where the profit comes from," said Izzy. "That just retires the project off the books in four years. The profit comes from this other corporation. I'm sorry if I forgot to mention it. I reactivated the original retirement estates corporation and we'll have a campaign to 'retire on your own alligator farm.' They were selling like hot cakes even before we got the place subdivided."
    Bang-Bang spoke up. "The deal is, they feed the tourists to the alligators and sell the alligator hides made up as purses, belts and shoes to the tourists. Perfect perpetual motion machine."
    Izzy said, reprovingly, "That's not true."
    "That's what you told me," said Bang-Bang self-righteously.
    "Don't listen to him, Mr. Jet," said Izzy. "I was just trying to sell him one of the farms, and what does truth have to do with salesmanship? Actually we make our profit out of constructing posh retirement houses out of the mud we dig from the scenic canals we're going to make to raise the alligators in. So don't you worry about the cost, Mr. Jet. You worry about those Indians."
    "All right," said Heller, getting up off the floor. "Now you, Missy," he said to the Countess Krak, "have you got your clothes together? Sun helmets and bikinis and things?"
    "What?" said Izzy. "You're not taking Miss Joy! Mr. Jet, there's alligators, Indians, mud-oy! A beautiful creature like Miss Joy in a horrible place like that? Forgive me, Mr. Jet, but I think you haven't thought this through. Florida just plain isn't civilized enough."
    "I'm not going," said the Countess Krak.
    "What?" said Heller, aghast.
    "Much as I don't want to be apart from you," said Krak, "we're in a hurry to finish everything up and I have other things to do."
    "Such as?" said Heller.
    Her smile was enigmatic. "I want to pick an item up that I haven't found. It's going to take a lot of search."
    "Oh, shopping," said Heller. "Well, I'll admit that I certainly didn't look kindly at the idea of you in all that mud and up to your knees in alligators. I won't be gone too long. Just to get everything staked out and the contractors started. I'll miss you. But I can see your point. It's all right."
    He was frowning a bit. Suddenly Heller turned to Bang-Bang. "Listen, Bang-Bang, and listen good. You keep an eye on her. You make sure she's safe at all times!"
    "You needn't say the rest of it," said Bang-Bang. "If
    I don't you'll take me to ten thousand feet and drop me with no parachute."
    "Precisely," said Heller.
    "You didn't have to threaten," said Bang-Bang. "Jesus-beggin' your pardon, ma'am-I'd booby-trap my own head to blow it off if anything happened to Miss Joy. Only, you tell her that. She's sort of got a way to arguing around my very best reasons."
    "You mind

Similar Books

The Wonder Bread Summer

Jessica Anya Blau

The Pyramid Waltz

Barbara Ann Wright

Ten Pound Pom

Niall Griffiths

Knight's Curse

Karen Duvall

AlliterAsian

Allan Cho

This Is How

Augusten Burroughs