the block in place.
This trick of mine always annoyed Fray. There were cranes and ramps that were specifically designed to allow workers to raise up the stone blocks, and hordes of skilful builders of various highly dextrous species standing by to mortar the stones into position. I was, Fray argued, spoiling it for everyone else by “showing off.”
I did not care; this was one of my rare moments of purely selfish joy.
From the top of the Temple I had a perfect high view of my entire world. I savoured it for a while, till Fray screamed at me to come down and stop being such a forsaken-by-good-manners turd-mountain braggart.
I visited the prisoner again. He had not eaten, nor had he drunk his water of life. His skin was paler than it had been when he first joined us. He looked terrible. He wasn’t pleased to see me.
I watched as Fray ran across the savannah. Her hooves thundered, her vast bulk blurred; she could run faster than any land animal I knew of on this world.
Fray’s savannah however was small, and not very plausible. When she reached the forest, she stopped abruptly, and tossed her head, and staggered around in half-circles to come to terms with the fact she was no longer running like the wind; and then she roared to the skies.
Lirilla laughed. She hovered next to my cheek, a whirlwind of colour and grace, lit by the sun.
Above us, Cuzco was flying loops in the air, with extraordinary grace. Fray snorted, getting ready for another run.
“Tell that fat fuck,” I said to Lirilla, of Fray, “that she’s a useless lumbering fat fuck.” This was a phrase I had learned from Fray; among her kind it is considered a term of endearment. (Or so I have been led to believe; for it is what she so very often calls me.)
Lirilla vanished, and was back in the beat of a wing.
“She says that she has seen great steaming mounds of shit more active than you,” Lirilla told me.
“Cruel,” I observed.
“I think she meant it kindly,” said Lirilla, anxiously.
“Tell her,” I said, “that she’s an awkward dim-witted loose-bowelled cart-carrier.” And Lirilla vanished; and flew across the savannah so fast it was as if she were rifting through space; and whispered in Fray’s ear. From my vantage point, I could see Fray snort and roar and crash her hooves on the ground.
I looked up; Cuzco, the orange-bellied giant, was flying on updrafts of warm air, not moving his six wings at all; like a cloud made of golden armour held up by hope and poetry.
And Lirilla was back, whispering in my ear. “Watch this,” she said, quoting Fray.
I saw Fray begin another run across the savannah; hooves pounding; dust rising up in clouds; her ugly ungainly body turned into pure graceful motion as she traversed the savannah with extraordinary speed. Finally, she came to a halt, steam billowing off her hide, and pounded her hooves on the ground and stood up on her three back feet and roared.
“Tell Fray,” I said to Lirilla, “that for someone who is so-clumsy-she-falls-over-her-own-huge-tits-all-the-time, that was not at all bad.”
“Tell me your name.”
The prisoner shook his head, stubbornly. Three days had passed, and I was making little progress with him. But I was still patient. It takes time.
It always takes time.
“Tell me your name.” My voice was gentle; I was using my sweetest tones to make it clear that I was on his side, and that I cared.
“Why are you doing this to me, you bitch from Hell?” he said, in calm fearless tones that betrayed his underlying panic.
“Because I want to be your friend,” I said.
He blinked. “How could that be possible?” he said accusingly. “You destroyed my entire world!”
“Not I. They. I am like you. A captive. A slave.”
He considered this assertion; clearly considering it to be an outrageous lie.
“You are an evil ugly loathsome vomit-inducing monster,” he pointed out. “Are you telling me my enemies are even worse than you?”
“I am not,” I suggested, “so very bad.”
He stared at me, his angry features trembling. His skin was soft, reddish in hue, marked with diagonal ridges, and it undulated slightly when he spoke.
“You’re really not my gaoler?” he asked, eventually.
“No.” I replied.
“You were captured as I was?” he said.
“Indeed.”
He considered this. “If that is so, perhaps I have wronged you,” he conceded.
“It was an easy mistake to make; I just want you to know I am here to help you.”
“Then I thank you for that,” he said courteously.
“So, what is your name?” I asked him.
“They call me,” he said proudly, then paused and uttered, as if bestowing a precious gift, his name: “Sharrock.”
And he stared at me, clearly expecting a reaction.
“In my world,” he added proudly, “I am-” But then he broke off, and did not conclude his train of thought.
For there no longer was, of course, a “his world”; and no one would ever again sing songs about him and his heroic exploits, whatever they might have been.
“My name is Sai-ias,” I told him gravely.
“What language are we speaking?” he asked, quietly; his spirits clearly dashed.
“It is not a language. We are not speaking. Or rather, we speak, but the ship transforms the sounds, via invisible translators in the air, into patterns of meaning in our minds.”
“The air does that?”
“It does.”
“How is such a thing possible?”
“I do not know,” I admitted.
“And who is in charge? Who controls this ship? Who are our masters?”
“I do not know.”
“How can you not know?”
I sighed, through my tentacle tips, and patiently explained:
“I was captured, as you were, by a spaceship. I have never seen my captors. Other slaves explained to me what I had to do, and how.”
“So you don’t know who these creatures are? The ones who destroyed my planet?”
“My people called them Ka’un. In my language, that means ‘Feared Ones.’ ”
“What do they call themselves?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where do they come from?”
“I don’t-”
“I get it. You don’t know. Have you asked? Did you try to find out? Do you know where on the ship they dwell? Do they look like you, or like me? What are their intentions? Do they have weaknesses? What is their purpose in attacking worlds like mine? Can we negotiate with them in any way?”
“They dwell in a Tower which no creature can approach. That’s all I know about the Ka’un,” I said.
Sharrock stared at me, intensity building in him like molten rock in a volcano approaching eruption.
“Then Sharrock,” he said, in the tones of a person making a vow that will change his life, “will find all the answers to all these questions, and more. And then he shall study the flaws and weaknesses of these accursed creatures. And then-”
“Then you shall wreak your wrathful vengeance upon the Ka’un?” I intercepted.
“Yes,” he admitted. And with some chagrin, he said: “You’ve heard that said before, I take it?”
I sighed, through my tentacle tips.
