Loofah pulled open the heavy glass door with the 'Entrance' sticker and yellowing posters advertising The Village Players in 'What The Butler Saw', Betty and Karen's dog walking service, and a perambulator for sale (as new), ring Mrs Norris for details.
It was a substantial shop, with a long aisle ahead of him offering greengroceries on one side and tinned vegetables on the other, and three or four check-outs to the right. He noticed that the cashier at one of these appeared to be fighting with his female customer as the three other women in the queue watched with apparent enthusiasm. No, they weren't fighting: he was embracing her, holding her tight in his arms with his face buried in her neck. A community shop, thought Loofah, presumably offering a more personal service than one gets in the big towns. Pulling a wire basket from a pile inside the door, he set off down the first aisle.
Drifting past the greengrocery shelves, he glanced indifferently at the trays of yellowing broccoli, unripe tomatoes and limp lettuces. Most of the items looked bored and fed up, and the display was sadly uninspiring. A few courgettes did puff themselves up in a half-hearted attempt at phallic ripeness, but he was the wrong gender and remained unimpressed.
The fridge cabinet was more hopeful: yoghurts and other 'dairy-style' desserts, butter-flavoured spreads of various types, and a wide choice pre-packed of cheeses ranging from a crumbly white Cheshire to the waxy delights of a red-skinned Edam. He was mainly drawn, however, to the pastries: a fine selection of pork pies, sausage rolls, and pasties of a least four varieties, including a vegetable samosa and a cheese and onion slice, both suitable for vegetarians.
Gazing at the display, he struggled to remember whether he ate meat or not. Then he began to worry about vegetables; perhaps meat was OK and it was these he shouldn't eat. In the end, a sausage roll seemed the best option—this probably wouldn't contain much of either.
As he reached into the cabinet, the front sausage roll helpfully slid itself to edge of the shelf, ready to be taken. But just as he was about to pick it up, a pork pie suddenly charged forward, pushed the sausage roll off the shelf and into the yoghurts below, and leapt into his hand.
Somewhat taken aback, Loofah held the pie at arm's length, eyeing it dubiously.
'Wot's your problem?' it demanded, in a distinctly aggressive tone.
'Actually, I wanted a sausage roll,' replied Loofah, going to put the pie back on the shelf.
'No way, mate,' snapped the pie, 'you're having me—and liking it!'
There was now a commotion coming from the dessert shelf; the ousted sausage roll was being jostled by two irate looking tubs of low-fat hazelnut yoghurt and had burst into tears.
'I'm not going to be spoken to like that, by you or—.'
'Look, mate, if you want trouble, you can have it,' snarled the pie, 'Otherwise put me in your fuckin' basket and get on wiv it.'
Loofah hesitated. He certainly did not want trouble; perhaps a pork pie would be nice after all. No, wait! What was he thinking? Was he really going to let himself be terrorised by a piece of processed food? With a surge of valour, he moved as if to put the pie in his basket but then suddenly darted forward, dropped it back on the shelf, and snatched his hand away.
'Fuckin' bastard!' yelled the thwarted pie, charging furiously to the edge of the shelf.
Loofah considered rescuing the poor sausage roll, which was now being well and truly roughed up by an assorted melange of dairy desserts, but in the end decided not to get involved. And in any case the rest of the pork pies—including some rather large family-size versions—were making threatening moves, coming to the support of their offended colleague.
'Come back 'ere, ya cunt!' shouted a furious voice behind him as he headed away up the aisle. He had never heard such language from an item of grocery in all his life.
The next aisle seemed to be nothing but household goods. As he strode quickly past the displays, however, his attention was caught by a shelf in the paper products section: toilet roll multi-packs, each with a wriggling Labrador puppy taped to it. These were wagging their tails and yelping happily at passing customers. What a lovely free gift, thought Loofah, and a definite improvement on the usual plastic dinosaur. He stopped to pet one of the puppies, noting with relief that none had any obvious axe wound scars on their fuzzy yellow bodies.
'Good afternoon, sir,' came a polite voice from across the aisle. It was a box of washing powder in the cleaning products section.
'Oh, hello,' replied Loofah and wandered over, relieved to find a product with manners. The box grinned, rather insincerely, and sidled to edge of the shelf.
'If you have a moment, sir, I would just like to tell you about my special offer. If you buy me and one of my friends here'—the neighbouring box smarmed up next to it—'you get this bottle of fabric conditioner—worth ninety five-pee—absolutely free of charge!'
At this the two boxes parted and a blue plastic bottle wriggled between them, smiling modestly.
'But, sir,' called another box from the shelf above, 'if you really care about quality of your family's wash—and I'm certain that you do—you'll know that economy powders won't give you that deep-down fluffy softness you demand from a detergent. But for a few pence more—.'
'But for fluffy softness coupled with fabric care for colours that won't fade,' piped in a bottle from further along the shelf, 'you need a liquid detergent—.'
'Only a biological powder can give your wash that bluey whiteness—.'
A cacophony now broke out on the shelves in front of him as washing powders, fabric conditioners and washing-up liquids began vying for his attention, yelling out about special offers and promising all manner of whiteness, freshness, and squeaky cleanness.
'…two for the price of one…'
'…just a few lemony minutes…'
Boxes and bottles jostled each other for front-of-shelf space, with three bottles of economy washing-up liquid overbalancing in their enthusiasm and toppling into the aisle.
'…cuts right through to the shine…'
'…April freshness…'
By now Loofah was completely confused. Perhaps he should play it safe with one of the two-for-the-price-of-one offers. But then, he thought, squirming with guilt, would that mean he cared more about his purse than the whiteness of his family's laundry? Anxiously, he then checked the palm of his left hand—it was distinctly rough. Maybe he should be worrying less about the squeaky cleanness of his dishes and more about the softness of his skin—though on the other hand he couldn't bear the idea of grease that he couldn't cut through.
'…hands that do dishes…'
Decisions, decisions, decisions: the clamour reached a crescendo and his brain whirled.
'…can be soft as your face…'
Suddenly, with light switch abruptness, he remembered; he had no laundry to do and his crockery—if indeed he had any—was all stacked away, sparkling clean and grease free. He was hungry, it was food he needed not cleaning products.
'Excuse me, everybody,' he began—but his words were washed away in the torrent of noise. He tried again, raising his voice. 'Please—I need to speak.' But to no avail. And so, taking a deep breath, he checked up and down the aisle that no-one was coming, and—.
'Be quiet!' he bellowed.
The cacophony instantly ceased and every product on the shelves turned to him, stunned into silence.
'Thank you so much. Now will you all please listen?'
Several dozen assorted boxes and bottles hovered expectantly at the edges of their shelves.
'I think you've all got the wrong end of the stick. You see, I don't need any cleaning products.'
The arrayed ranks watched him without response.
'I'm sure each and every one of you is a marvellous product, offering both good value and top quality to the housewife,' Loofah went on, 'But I'm here because I'm hungry. I don't actually have any laundry to do or dishes to wash.'
Still silence.
'Right, that's it, then. I'll be off,' he said, turning away.
'Before you go, sir,' shouted the original box, 'let me remind you that this unbeatable offer has to end soon. This could be your last chance to—.'
'Don't listen to that cheapskate,' yelled a voice from the bottom shelf, 'You need a detergent that cuts through grease and—.'
And, like a bursting dam, it began again.
'…for those stubborn stains…'
'…fresh as a mountain breeze…'
'…gravy, blackcurrant juice, even faecal incontinence…'
'Stop!' Loofah shouted, 'This is silly!'
But this time no-one heard. As the racket got louder and louder, rival boxes and bottles began barging into each other; two refill bags of eco-friendly powder tumbled off their shelf onto the fabric conditioners below and a whole rank of lemon-fresh washing-up liquid was pushed into the aisle by their bulkier, family-size neighbours.
Loofah opened his mouth to try again—then sighed and gave up. But just as he was turning to go a bottle of hand-wash detergent leapt off of the shelf and into his basket.
'You can't do that!' he said crossly, 'Get back on that shelf at once!'
'Shan't!'
And as he stood arguing with the bottle, the two boxes of economy powder also jumped in, carrying the free offer bottle of fabric conditioner between them.
'No!' cried Loofah, backing quickly away from the shelves, though too late to prevent a bottle of washing up liquid from joining the others in his basket.
'You're all being very silly,' he said sternly, 'Will you please get back to your shelves—this minute!'
The items in the basket sat tight, pretending not to have heard him.
'Right then. If that's the way it is, I'll have put you back myself.'
He reached for one of the boxes, which was squatting complacently in the middle of his basket; but this dodged smartly out the way, scuttling up the basket and barging the bottle of hand-wash detergent out of its hiding place in the corner.
'That's not fair,' whined the little bottle as he picked it out of the basket, 'I was here first!'
'No you weren't—I was,' said another bottle, and was jostled by one of the boxes.
'Don't you touch me!' shouted the bottle, ramming itself hard against the offending box.
Loofah sighed and, as a fight broke out in his basket, he went to return the hand-wash detergent—which had now burst into tears—to the rioting shelves. Unfortunately he got too close to the display and, as he leaned forward to replace the sobbing bottle on its shelf, two others leapt into his basket.
At the check-out Loofah joined the back of the single queue, trying to ignore the distant shouts and screams which still echoed from the detergent section on the far side of the shop. Whilst clearly not responsible for the outrageous behaviour of the shop's own product lines, he nevertheless was unable to prevent a certain sense of creeping embarrassment that threatened to bring a flush to his cheeks with each fresh upsurge of mayhem.
There were now five items in his basket: a highly eloquent Twix bar that had brought him to the verge of tears with its moving exposition on its need for self-actualization, a need that, for a chocolate bar, could only be satisfied by being purchased and eaten; a packet of roast woodcock crisps that contained a cheque for ten thousand pounds—or so it had solemnly promised when he had been deciding between it and a packet of salt and vinegar hula-hoops; a bottle of cola from the strangely silent soft drinks chiller; and a tin of dark tan shoe polish called Dudley which must have jumped in when he hadn't been looking, but which had been so well-behaved that he had decided to keep it.
Oh, and the last bottle of fabric conditioner. This had screamed so loudly when Loofah went to put it back on the shelves that he had let it stay. Although it didn't know it, he didn't intend to keep the bottle: he would leave it at the till on his way out and let the cashier deal with its hysterics.
The queue appeared to be moving very slowly. A tiny worm of impatience began wriggling in Loofah's belly and he looked to see what was going on. The cashier—a young man with jet black hair and deathly pale skin—had just finished totting up the front customer's shopping when, instead of just taking her money and sending her on her way, he reached across the counter and embraced her. As he buried his face in her neck, the customer gasped and went limp in his arms, sending a frisson of excitement rippling down the queue as the women—for all the other shoppers were female—pressed forward to watch.
What a palaver, thought Loofah crossly. Friendly service was one thing but surely this was going too far.
'You might prefer the other cashier,' said the woman in front, turning to Loofah with a sly smile. She nodded towards the next till where a thin young woman, with long black hair parted in the centre and the same pale complexion as her colleague, sat patiently waiting for custom.
'But you're in front of me,' said Loofah, 'Wouldn't you like to go first?'
'Oh no,' said the shopper, with girlish giggle, 'I'd rather wait for Damien—we all would.'
Pondering loftily on the seemingly limitless capacity of the average housewife for foolishness, Loofah crossed to the vacant till.
'Good morning,' he said brightly as he unloaded his purchases onto the counter.
The cashier stared at him blankly with bloodshot eyes and, without so much as a flicker of a smile, began totting up his shopping, packing each item into a plastic carrier bag.
There was a gasp from the next queue. Loofah glanced over his shoulder; the young man was embracing another customer, kissing her neck as she gazed dreamily into the middle distance while the rest of the queue chattered excitedly, each shopper eager for her turn. A nebulous chill of worry, like a drape of wet cobwebs, slithered over Loofah's scalp.
'How would like to pay, sir?' asked the till-girl in a flat monotone, as she popped the shoe polish into his bag.
'Er—do you take VISA?' he said nervously.
The girl did not reply, but reached across and stroked her fingertips down his neck.
'This will do nicely,' she said, and then hauled him across the counter by his jacket lapels and buried her face in his neck.
Pain: first a sharp stab as she fastened onto him, then a strange tingling that spread across his neck and down his body, contrasting exquisitely with the soft sucking of her lips and the wet lapping of her tongue. As the weird and deliciously intoxicating mix of pain and kiss blended and blurred in his brain, he felt the strength drain out of his muscles and he slumped against the counter. In no time he was lost, drifting to nowhere in a dark ship on a glass-flat, moonlit sea.
As suddenly as it had begun, it was over. With a jolt, Loofah tumbled back into the harshly lit shop. For a few seconds the cashier stared at him with unfocussed, bliss-filled eyes, a thin ribbon of scarlet trickling from the corner of her smeared lips. Then, coming to, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
'Thank you for shopping with us, sir,' she said, 'Have a nice day and do call again.'
Loofah collapsed onto the bench with a sigh and sat catching his breath as blurred rose bushes undulated in front of him, flowing in and out of focus, and white clouds floated across his vision. Since leaving the shop he had been weak and dizzy, hardly able to stagger up the swimming village street, and it was with considerable relief that he had found this small public garden outside the village hall where he could sit and eat his lunch.
Slumped on the bench, he gradually recovered from his exertions, and as focus returned and the clouds melted away, he peered into his carrier bag. There was the shoe polish, of course, and the little bottle of fabric conditioner which he had forgotten to leave at the till, neither of which seemed to hold much promise of significant nutritional value. However, he did have the crisps, the Twix, and the cola, surely the basis of a hearty and sustaining meal. Savoury before sweet, he thought, reaching for the crisps.
'What are you doing?' asked the packet, as he was about to pull it open.
'I'm going to eat you, of course,' he said.
'You can't do that!'
'Why on earth not?'
'Don't you know anything about healthy eating? I'm nothing but a blend of salt, fat and E numbers. Pure poison. You wouldn't survive five minutes after eating me.'
'Wouldn't I?'
'Not a chance,' it replied, definitively.
Loofah pondered for a moment. 'Then—why did I buy you?' he asked.
'The cheque—have you forgotten?'
And indeed, splashed across the front of the packet was a garish star-burst: "Cash give-away! Every packet contains a cheque for at least £10,000! Win your money now!"
'Fantastic! You're right, I had forgotten,' cried Loofah, going again to open the packet.
'Stop!' it cried.
'It's OK, I'm not going to eat you. I'm just getting my money.'
The packet sighed with patient exasperation. 'It's a good job I'm here, isn't it?' it said.
'What do you mean?'
'Always read the packet. Didn't your mother ever tell you?'
'I've read it. And it says there's a cheque, just like you told me.'
'The other side, dummy, the small print.'
Loofah turned the pack over and there found a small section, in truly minuscule lettering, helpfully headed 'Small print'. 'Employees of the company may not…', 'Valid proof of purchase may be…', 'Offer ends on…', and finally: 'Winning cheques rendered invalid if packet opened'.
He puzzled hard, wrestling with the implications of what he had read.
'So,' he said, dragging a newly formed conclusion from his straining grey matter, 'if I open you up to get the cheque, it automatically becomes invalid.'
'That's what it says.'
'Then to get the money I have to give the whole packet to the bank?'
The packet sighed again. 'Don't be silly—how can you bank a packet of crisps? It's all electronic these days—think what the crumbs would do to the database software.'
'I suppose you're right. I didn't think of that.'
Loofah stared at the bag, trying to imagine the crisp new cheque nestling among the slivers of toxic waste, a fortune in the palm of his hand—and yet completely out of reach.
'Let me see if I've got this right,' he said slowly, as his mind seemed at last to engulf the basic structure of the situation, 'I've got a cheque here for ten thousand pounds—but if I open the packet to get it out, it becomes worthless.'
'Correct,' said the bag.
'And I can't bank it without opening the packet.'
'Also correct.'
'So,' pondered Loofah, after a long pause, 'what's the point in having it?'
'What? Am I hearing right?' exclaimed the bag, 'You've got a cheque here for ten grand and you ask what's the point of having it? This is wealth, my boy, accumulated assets, capital. The point is to own it, of course, what more point do you need?'
'I think I see,' said Loofah uncertainly, 'And I suppose not being able to use the cheque means that I won't fritter it away?'
'Exactly. You're a rich man now—keep it that way. Now put me away before I get stolen.'
With a somewhat dubious frown, Loofah pushed the crisps into his jacket pocket. Oh well, he thought, no main course—better cut straight to the sweet.
'You're going to eat me, right?' said the Twix once extracted from the bag, an edge of naked terror in its voice.
'That's right.'
'You're just going to rip open my skin, bite bits off me, chew me to pieces?'
'Well, yes, I suppose I am.'
'Oh Jesus—please God—no!'
'But in the shop you said you wanted to be eaten. If I remember correctly, you said it was your path to ultimate fulfilment.'
'I said that?' it gasped, 'Oh God, oh God!'
'You're a chocolate bar and you were made for one purpose and one purpose alone—to be eaten. And every being comes to fulfilment only by attaining its life's goal, by doing what it designed to do. That's what you said.'
'I did?'
'Yes. And very well put it was too.'
'I get carried away, you see, with the competitive bravado of the selling situation. But I never thought it through, I never really thought where it would all end up.'
'You mean you don't want to be eaten now?'
'Don't you understand?' it said, its voice beginning to quaver, 'I can't go through with it, I just can't. Fingers tearing my wrapper, teeth smashing through my chocolate coating, chewing into my fudge topping, and crushing my shortbread bones to dust.' It ended with an anguished cry.
'Look, I'm sure it's not going to be that bad.'
'It's alright for you to say, you're not the one who's going to be eaten.'
'But I've eaten hundreds of Twixes and none of them have minded.'
'Hundreds? Not good for you, you know, very fattening. I think maybe you've had enough.'
'But I like Twixes,' said Loofah, determined not to be moved.
'Of course you do,' stammered the Twix, 'And that's why you bought me. To have and to hold, to keep with you through thick and thin, a friend for life.'
'Look, you're a chocolate bar, you're supposed to be eaten. And I'm hungry and I bought you to eat.'
'I could be a mantelpiece ornament or a paper-weight. I'm sure I'd make a very nice—.'
'And therefore I'm going to eat you—and that's final. Now please be quiet and let me get on with it.'
'Wait!' cried the bar, as Loofah was about to rip the wrapper.
'What is it?'
'I need to prepare myself,' it pleaded, 'Give me a minute, just a minute—please.'
'Alright,' he sighed, 'one minute.'
For a moment there was silence, broken only by the occasional whimper from the bar.
'Don't you like fruit?' it asked suddenly, 'Why not a nice apple?'
'I do like fruit and I would have been quite happy with an apple,' said Loofah, trying to be firm, 'But you persuaded me to buy you and so it's you I'm going to eat. Now, are you ready?'
'No, no, no! My family, let me speak to my family before I go. My dear, darling mother, bless her sainted soul, my little baby brother—.'
'Your family have probably all been eaten already,' interrupted Loofah, beginning to get irritated, 'Now stop this, you're being very silly. I expected better from a British-made chocolate bar.'
'A priest, a priest, I must see a priest. I have to make my peace with—.'
'Shut up, will you? I've had enough. I'm going to eat you and that's that!'
Loofah grasped the wrapper and prepared to rip.
'No—no—stop—please—look into your heart—.'
As he tore the first few millimetres of plastic, an agonized scream tore through the liquid air and he stopped, the hysterically sobbing bar collapsing into his hand. His appetite had completely gone.
Having slipped the overwrought Twix into his other jacket pocket, Loofah reached half-heartedly for the carrier bag. But just as his fingers touched the plastic there was sudden rustle and the fabric conditioner burst out of the bag, leapt off the bench and scuttled away through the rose bushes, whooping in triumph as it celebrated its newly won freedom. Recovering quickly from his mild shock, Loofah sighed—his little meal was not going at all well. He now peeped very tentatively into the carrier bag, half expecting the next item to make a dash for it as well. There was nothing left now but the cola and the shoe polish, both sitting quietly in the eerie light of their miniature plastic marquee.
'If you're hungry, you can eat me,' said the shoe polish, politely.
'It's good of you to offer, Dudley, but I won't.'
'I don't mind, honestly. I probably won't taste very nice, but I'll try not to make you ill.'
'You're very kind,' said Loofah, genuinely touched, 'But I'm not hungry, really I'm not.' He reached in for the strangely silent bottle of cola. 'I'm just a bit thirsty, that's all. I think I'll just have a little drink.'
He picked up the bottle very gingerly, ready for it to burst into tears, to yell at him or to jump out of his hands and run off across the pavement. It did none of these things, however, but just waited quietly, chilling the palm of his hand.
He took hold of the plastic top—still nothing—and turned it. There was a hiss of gas, but no screams of pain. With a sigh of relief he unscrewed the top.
The brown liquid gurgled across his tongue and then fizzed down his throat. Too sweet, too gassy, too cold, and it made his teeth ache: all in all a completely satisfying soft drink. It was only when he started drinking that he realised how thirsty he was and he drained the bottle in one go, tilting it to his lips until the last gulp had gurgled down into his gullet.
With a sigh of satisfaction he lowered the bottle. He could feel the cold liquid swilling around inside him, his stomach became steadily tighter as the trapped fizz bubbled out. Then the tightness eased slightly and a pocket of gas began climbing his gullet, returning by the route the cola had gone down moments before. As he belched, a tiny voice trapped in the bubble burst into the air.
'You rotter! You've just drunk me!'
Loofah sat bolt upright with surprise. The uncharacteristic silence of the cola bottle had indeed been too good to be true.
'But—but—you never said anything,' he said out loud, not knowing whether it could hear him.
'I was asleep,' burbled the voice, as more stomach gas bubbled through his mouth, 'And now I wake up and find I'm being digested.'
'I am most terribly—,' Loofah began, but was interrupted by another burp.
'And there was so much I was supposed to tell you.'
The cola's portentous words jolted Loofah into sudden alertness. 'Tell me?' he asked quickly, 'What do you mean, tell me?' No reply. 'You're not with the Secretariat, are you?'
There was a long pause as a gas pocket formed and then made its way mouth-wards.
'Temporarily,' it burped, 'On special secondment from the Department of Health. I thought it would be good for my career, but now look what's happened—cut down in the public service like some sort of patriotic hero.' It paused as another bubble tripped playfully upwards. 'And I thought being drunk on duty was something to do with going to the pub at lunchtime.'
'I really am very sorry,' said Loofah miserably, even as another stream was on its way up, 'I just didn't realise.'
'I suppose Jenkins will get the Birmingham promotion now, incompetent time-server though he is.'
The last burp left an acid taste in Loofah's mouth and he winced.
'I don't know what to say.'
'Though it's the pension as much as anything: fifteen years of contributions down the tubes.'
Gas production diminished as the drink digested; Loofah's belches were now delicate and ladylike, the little voice less vigorous.
'Oops, I'm fading,' bubbled the next stream, 'Better do something about my mission before I'm gone. Otherwise they'll all say I wasn't up to it, that they should have given it to that SEO from Agriculture, the one with the stutter and no chin.'
'Your mission?'
'Oh dear,' it burped weakly, 'I've been rambling. Not much time left.'
'Please try. What is your mission?' He waited, but no gas was forthcoming. 'Please tell me—I really think I need to know.'
But still there was nothing but a gurgling in his bowels, far below stomach level.
'You can do it,' Loofah went on, anxious now, 'Think of the Department. Think of Jenkins and the stuttering SEO. Show them they picked the right man for the job.'
There was a faint bubbling under his ribcage and another long pause as his churning stomach marshalled enough of the dwindling supplies for another sentence.
'To help you in your quest,' it belched, eventually, 'that's my mission.'
'To tell me where she is?'
'To tell you that you will find her.'
'But I know that alread—.'
Another small burp interrupted him.
'And that we will help you to find her.'
'We? You mean the Secretariat?'
As the next bubble burst—silently this time—images shimmered swiftly through his head as if released by the shattering of its rainbow membrane: of a bird's head peg, of two happy girl-dogs, of a fuzzy little head with oversized ears. A smile slithered onto Loofah's lips—and then froze. For as the diaphanous officials evaporated into the ether, they left behind them, like some noxious waste product, another image.
'And him—the other one,' said Loofah quietly, trying to keep the cold shudder from his voice, 'Are you helping him too?'
There was a long pause; he thought it had gone, but then came a slow trickle of tiny burps, each containing a few whispered words.
'Try to listen—no time to repeat. Like I just said, we are helping you.'
Loofah winced, confused, as something damp and nameless wriggled through his soul.
'But I don't understand,' he cried. 'How can you be helping us both?' Nothing, not the tiniest bubble. 'Please tell me—I must know.'
As he pummelled his belly, trying to dislodge any last stray pockets of gas, the little animal's last words seemed to echo silently through his skull.
'Look within,' he whispered; then added, through a breaking wave of disappointment: 'Was that my heart of darkness, then?'
A tiny bubble gurgled up, almost imperceptible in his gullet: 'No.'
'But the Emergent Propensity said—.'
He was interrupted by a final few bubbles, taking him by surprise.
'Look—within—but—within—what?'