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“Not so funny to me,” said Umbo.
“If that’s their worst weapon,” said Loaf, “we’re in little danger here.”
“If the idea was to humiliate and repulse me, it worked,” said Umbo. “Is it safe for me to wash in that brook?”
“I don’t know,” said Loaf.
“Can’t you ask the facemask whether it has any cousins in the water?” asked Umbo.
“It doesn’t understand language,” said Loaf. “Besides, it emits a stink that chases off the spores of other masks. So it doesn’t have to be able to detect whether they’re there or not.”
“You know so much, considering that it can’t talk to you.”
“I said I couldn’t talk to it. Its own messages come through loud and clear. And I can sense when it emits smells and fluids.”
“Can it eat nightsoil? Because I can offer it a lovely snack.”
“The only mouth it has is mine,” said Loaf, “so forget it.”
“Then I’m going down to the brook to wash.”
Loaf looked up into the tree. “She’s stark naked.”
“She?”
“I saw more detail the closer I got. Hard to tell how old she is. And she moves like an ape or a sloth. Not quick, never taking her eyes off us, but absolutely sure of hand and foot. Short-legged. And look at the feet.”
“I can’t look at anything, I’m going to wash,” Umbo called over his shoulder. The stink was only getting worse. It would probably be in his clothes forever. And he couldn’t expect any compassion or respect. When the danger you run into t
urns out to be flung poo, nobody remembers that you were the bravest when the danger might have been anything.
While Umbo washed his face and then his shirt in the stream, Loaf sauntered down the slope to talk to him. The others followed him, avoiding the tree.
“For some reason,” said Loaf, “the word that came to mind when I looked at the dung-flinging naked tree-clinger is ‘yahoo.’”
“Did the word come from the facemask or the Wall?” asked Umbo.
“The Wall. Facemasks don’t have language,” said Loaf. “Why are you so obsessed with the facemask?”
“Because he’s still trying to figure out how much of you is Loaf, and how much is this alien thing that makes you so attractive to look at,” said Olivenko.
Thanks for the translation, thought Umbo. Apparently the Wall hadn’t made Umbo’s words intelligible to the others without interpreters.
“The facemask doesn’t connect directly to my brain,” said Loaf.
“You think,” murmured Umbo.
“My hearing is superb, now, Umbo,” said Loaf.
“How do you know it isn’t connected to your brain? Maybe it’s connected and you don’t even realize it.”
Loaf shrugged. “Maybe, but what I sense are the chemicals it leaks into my body. It can flood me with emotion and desire. Rage, fear, hate, love, lust, comfortableness, grief. Bodily needs, too—itches. Full bladder, hunger, thirst. Whatever it wants me to do, it makes me want to do it.”
“So you’re a slave,” said Umbo.
“Just because I feel a desire doesn’t mean I have to act on it,” said Loaf. “The desires and needs and feelings are so strong, it took some getting used to. It was terrible at first, because my body automatically responded to these wishes, without any passage through my conscious mind. But I got control of it.”
“You think,” said Umbo again, this time aloud, since there was no point in muttering.
