Orson Card - Ruins

“Or that’s what they want us to think,” said Param.

“Well, it worked,” said Rigg. “I’m thinking it. But do we believe it?”

“Why would they want to seem stupider than they are?” asked Umbo.

“Camouflage,” said Loaf. “Disguise. If they act like animals, then we don’t try to fight them, we avoid them.”

“I just want to wash this mess out of my shirt,” said Umbo.

“Wear it with pride,” said Olivenko. “Stained by yahoos in Odinfold.”

Loaf headed up the slope toward the yahoo oak. Umbo spread his shirt on the grass and jogged after him.

“Ready for more flung poo?” asked Loaf. “Aren’t you chilly?”

“It washes off my skin better than off a shirt,” said Umbo. “And yes, I worked up a sweat trying to wash the shirt, so now it’s chilly. But I will bravely and rationally defy the need of my body to get warm, and continue walking into noble combat with my soldier friend with a blob on his face.”

“I’m happy to see that you’re maturing nicely.”

“Almost ripe now,” said Umbo. “Fat lot of good it’ll ever do me.”

“You mean because the only woman in our party only has eyes for Olivenko?”

Umbo felt a stab of despair. As long as no one said it out loud, he had been able to halfway fool himself into not knowing that Param was sweet on the scholar-soldier.

“She’s young—as young as you, Umbo. She’s lived in a cage all her life, with only her mother for company, and I think we can agree the queen was crazy.”

“Beyond fecal,” said Umbo. If he used the word himself, they couldn’t taunt him with it.

“So let Param have her schoolgirl crushes on handsome young soldiers,” said Loaf.

“Young?” asked Umbo. “Olivenko?”

“Compared to me he’s young,” said Loaf. “And here we are at the fecal tree.”

Loaf boldly stood even closer to the tree than Umbo had. Sure enough, there was a rustling in the branches and a wad of dung flew out, aimed right at Loaf’s head.

But it never got there. Loaf’s big hand flew up and caught it. Incredibly fast reflexes, thought Umbo. A moment later, Loaf’s arm flashed like a catapult and the nightsoil flew back into the tree much faster than it had come out. Somebody in the tree yelped.

“How much poo do they have in their bodies?” asked Umbo.

“Maybe they can’t have a bowel movement until they have somebody to throw it at,” said Loaf. “So they have a lot stored up.”

“That makes us what? A laxative for yahoos?”

Rigg and the others came up behind them. “They both went back down the tree,” said Rigg. “Into the roots. And I bet they store vats of poo to make their FPs.”

Umbo knew the game. “Foul Potatoes?”

“Fecal Projectiles,” said Rigg.

“Flying Poo,” said Umbo. “Not so pretentious.”

“Fart Pellets,” said Rigg.

“Fetid Pies,” said Umbo.

“When you two boys are through playing word games,” began Loaf.

“Are we in a hurry?” asked Rigg. “I’m enjoying being out of Vadeshfold, and I don’t think the world will end while we Fling Puns.”

“Since you’re so much stronger than a human now, Loaf,” said Umbo, “perhaps you’d care to pull up the tree so we can get at the yahoos inside it.”

“Trees are sacred,” said Loaf. “I never disturb them if I can help it.”

“They’re also very heavy,” Umbo pointed out.

“They’re also deeply attached to the ground,” said Rigg. “Let’s leave the trees where they are, and deal with the people. I’ve been thinking through as many languages as I can get into my head, saying, ‘Greetings, yahoo, I’m from Ramfold.’ If I can come up with a language where ‘yahoo’ feels like a native word—”

“Don’t bother,” said a voice from the tree. He spoke a language Umbo had never heard spoken, but thanks to the Wall, he understood it at once. “This is the language you want. Yahootalk is mostly grunts and clicks and farts and belches.”

“So . . . I’ve been speaking it my whole life,” said Umbo.

Param chuckled, but Umbo couldn’t be sure if she was appreciating his humor, or taking his irony at face value.

“Who are you?” asked Loaf, “and why are you throwing doo-doo at us?”

“Are you really from Ramfold?” asked the timorous voice.

“You already know who we are,” said Rigg. “Stop pretending and come down here and talk to us.”

A long moment of silence.

“Would you mind terribly if we put on clothes before coming down out of the tree?”

“We’d prefer it,” said Loaf. “Take all the time you need. Empty your bowels and wash your hands. Put yourselves out.”

“How did you decide they were pretending?” asked Umbo.

“Humans are never going to lose language. There’s no reason for it,” said Rigg. “Whether they’re working hard or not, they’ll talk because that’s what humans do. So this nonsense of grunting is obviously false.”

“Obvious to you,” said Umbo.

“It’s obvious to you, too,” said Rigg, “or you’d be arguing with me.”

Everybody thinks they know everybody’s inner life, thought Umbo. But we’ve only known Loaf since Rigg and I stopped by their inn on the way to Aressa Sessamo. None of us really knows anything at all about each other’s motives and what’s going on in our unconscious minds. Nobody ever does.

Two fully clothed, diminutive people leapt lightly down from the tree. They bowed deeply. “Sorry for using you as a trial run for our social experiment,” said the woman, in fluent whatever-the-language-was. “We don’t get a lot of traffic through the Wall.”

“I’m betting we’re the first ever,” said Umbo.

“We have a solvent that will get the stain out of your shirt,” said the man.

“How about not throwing turds in the first place?” said Umbo.

The man sighed. The woman laughed. “I don’t think our disguise is really all that effective,” she said.

“Oh, it made me want to scrub my own skin off,” said Umbo. “If that was your goal—”

“You got here sooner than we expected,” said the woman. “So we weren’t sure it was you.”

“Who do you think we are?” asked Loaf.

The man handed Umbo a clean shirt that seemed to fit well enough. The fabric was smooth and comfortable; the shirt was light in weight, yet very warm.

“You’re Loaf, a soldier-turned-innkeeper-turned-bodyguard,” said the woman. “And you’re wearing one of Vadesh’s nasty little parasites. One of the boys is Rigg and the other is Umbo. The girl is Param, who should be heir to the Queen-in-the-Tent. And, not least, King Knosso’s right-hand boy, the scholar Olivenko.”

The dung had been irritating. This was frightening. “How can you possibly know so much about what’s going on in other wallfolds?” asked Umbo.

“We learned how to intercept and decode all the communications of the expendables, the orbiters, and the ships within a few hundred years of the founding of this colony,” said the man.

“You’re the biggest news in ten thousand years,” added the woman. “Ever since humans went extinct in Vadeshfold.”

“A tragedy,” said the man.

“I’m surprised Vadesh let you leave,” said the woman.

“He’s not equipped to stop us,” said Rigg.

“Oh, he has all the equipment he needs,” said the woman. “But since one of you is carrying his baby”—she indicated the facemask on Loaf—“I suppose he didn’t want to damage any of you.”

Umbo wasn’t sure if she was being literal or figurative. “You don’t mean that that thing is going to give birth,” said Umbo.

“Oh, goodness no,” said the woman. “I forgot you don’t have sufficient knowledge yet to understand irony or analogy in this context.”