"I broke out a hand sprayer full of a DDT solution, and sprayed it around me to try to clear the nearby air a little, so that I could have room to think. The midges loved it. But the plants that were in reach died so fast that you could watch their leaves curl up and drop off.
"I couldn't figure whether to turn up the fans and dissipate the cloud—by spreading it all through the ship—or whether to try to block off the other plant room, and save it at least. So I ended up by not doing anything, which was the right thing to do. No more plants died from the DDT.
"So then I did a few experiments, and found that the regular poison spray in the ship's fumigation system worked just fine. It killed the bugs without doing the plants any harm at all. Of course, the fumigation system is designed to work with the fumigator off the ship, because it's poisonous to humans too.
"I finally blocked the vents and the door edges in the head, after running some remote controls into there, and then started the fumigation system going. While I was sitting there with nothing much to do, I tried to translate what I could of the Myporian instructions. It was on page eleven that it mentioned casually that the midges—the correct word is carolla—are a necessary part of the life cycle of the marocca. The larvae provide an enzyme without which the plants die.
"Of course. I immediately stopped slapping at the relatively few midges that had made their way into the head with me, and started to change the air in the ship to get rid of the poison. I knew it was too late before I started, and for once I was right.
"The only live midges left in the ship were the ones that had been with me during the fumigation process. I immediately tried to start a breeding ground for midges, but the midges didn't seem to want to cooperate. Whatever I tried to do, they came back to me. I was the only thing they seemed to love. I didn't dare bathe, or scratch, or even wriggle, for fear of killing more of them. And they kept on itching. It was just about unbearable, but I bore it for three interminable days while the midges died one by one. It was heartbreaking—at least, it was to me.
"And it was unnecessary, too. Because apparently the carolla had already laid their eggs, or whatever it is that they do, before I had fumigated them. After my useless days of agony, a new batch came swarming out. And this time there were a few of a much larger thing with them—something like an enormous moth. The new thing just blundered around aimlessly.
"I lit out for the head again, to keep away from that intolerable whining. This time I took a luxurious shower and got rid of most of the midges that came through the door with me. I felt almost comfortable, in fact, until I resumed my efforts to catch up on my reading.
"The mothlike things—they are called dingleburys—also turn out to provide a necessary enzyme. They are supposed to have the same timing of their life cycle as the carolla. Apparently the shaking up I had given their larvae in moving the tanks and dipping the water up in buckets and all that had inhibited them in completing their cycle the first time around.