Pictured is a pyramid made of layers of crystallized mucus, atop which sits a clear globe like a fish bowl. Curled inside the bowl is the actual Extrusian, a long, thin, scale-less creature like a hagfish or lamprey. Its eyes are large and its mouth is a vertical slit running down the middle of its snout. [https://64.media.tumblr.com/4cc2029aec71eb6208869bfe885809eb/a54306fc60cd4ee9-b0/s640x960/ca1359129255d338412486058ecd1d2740aa59ec.pnj]
Picture by Timothy Morris
The meat market was not a Quotidian place. Koen's earlier grocery shopping experience had been designed to appeal to the sensibilities of hive-dwelling clones who viewed any activity with outsiders as a kind of war. The sensibilities that had created the meat market were harder to identify.
The place was mostly open-air, tucked like a grotto under the overhanging side of a large building. The purple-white spotlights were even brighter and more unpleasant than normal here, but at least someone had turned off the slime.
Caternaries stood under parasols, balancing trays of merchandise across the tops of their children. Proskelisks hung undressed carcasses from hooks, which they jiggled enticingly at passers-by.1 Neurospastics lurked in the backs of shadowy kiosks, but their puppets beckoned: come in.
Koen should have marveled at it. This was the alien bazaar he'd waited to see since he'd watched his first science fiction movie at the age of six. The mingling species, the smells of roasting, barbecuing, and fermentation, of spices and pheromones. Conversation cackled, hissed, and boomed.
Instead, Koen was just so tired. Sleep. You need sleep. Sleep. The fatigue beat in the back of his brain like an earworm. He wanted to shut off his mind just to take a break from the monotonous command.
General Graa pecked him on the cheek. "Obey me! I command that we check the chordates first."
"Some part of your brain may demand immediate action, but you would be wise not to give into it." This was accompanied by a chittering, thumping sound.
Koen turned, wincing with headache, to see the Admirable Self-Flinger hop up behind them. Behind her, a metal cylinder with legs held a leash attached to a muzzled Fancy Death.
"Please wait for me," said the Toxoplasmotic. "My pet requires attention."
"So does mine," Graa cried. "I am impatient."
Self-Flinger ran a hand and a foot along the buckles that attached the leash to the harness around Fancy Death's torso. "Your pet will not attack and maul the innocent bystanders."
"My pet is lost! Perhaps he is butchered! I am distressed."
"I'm very glad I came." Self-Flinger hopped up next to Koen, automatic jaguar-walker scuttling behind her, cat placidly following. "This situation is most uncomfortable."
Koen had spent this exchange thinking about how he could get out of here and go to bed most quickly.2 "Which way are the chordates?"
Graa pressed his body into the side of Koen's face. Feathers slipped over his beard stubble, slightly oily. His glasses went askew and Koen's headache grew more powerful.
Koen reached up to straighten his glasses and also protect his eyes from the open beak.
"Maybe these other non-Pick would like to eat Mr. Grumbles. Maybe he is exotic to them. Maybe he is scrumptious!"
"Soothe your amygdala, Graa," said Self-Flinger. "You cannot learn anything here if you see only the terrifying pictures projected by your brain."
"Don't you speak to me that way. I have no amygdala and you can't even fly.3" Graa gave a short cry. "I am dominant. It is I who will decide where to fly. That way!" Graa reared up on Koen's shoulder and stretched out his right wing.
Koen turned right.
Graa screeched. "No, not that way. I am frustrated with your stupidity! That way!"
He flapped his wing. It was still the one on the right.
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Koen looked to the right, and was rewarded with a jab to his ear. "No! Look where I'm pointing."
"I am!" Koen wondered if this was some sort of Orwellian brainwashing technique. His ear throbbed. He was so tired.
"I recognize the need for curiosity," said Fling. "Graa, which way are you pointing?"
"North, of course!"
"Which way is north?" asked Koen.
"Good question," said Fling.
"That way!" said Graa.
"This wa— ow! God damn it!"
"Caw caw! I am aggravated. How can you be stupider than Mr. Grumbles? Once again I will muster my patience and point you in the same direction." Mr. Graa spread his right wing.
This time, Koen did not look to the right. He closed his eyes and thought. Which way was north?
Right was…Koen didn't know what cardinal direction right was in. But they were facing more or less directly into the center of the grotto built into the side of this hive. He couldn't see it, but he was pretty sure the Atlantic Ocean was on the other side. That would be east, right? And was the river to the north? Yes, he thought it might be.
Graa wiped his beak on Koen's shoulder. "I am impatient. Again I am congratulating myself on my great patience. What is wrong with your magnetoreception?"
This is unknown. Human retinas do possess cryptochrome 2, a photoreceptor protein that, when excited by blue light, attains a pair of atoms with an odd number of electrons.4 These radical pairs (as they are called) behave differently when aligned with a magnetic field than when they are not.5 And these molecules are indeed wired into the human brain.6 Perhaps Koen had simply never learned to pay attention.
Koen turned toward the river, to the north, to the left, the exact opposite direction Graa had pointed.
"Yes!" crowed the Pick. "You deserve a treat. Here, let me regurgitate something for you." He slitted his eyes and gave a deep hiccup.
"That's all right," said Koen hurriedly. "The…knowledge of a job well done is all the thanks I need."
Fancy Death turned his head to track a three-legged Strophinx as she scuttled by. The jaguar's ears flattened and he pulled forward, testing the restraint of his harness.
"Down, Fancy Death," said Self-Flinger. "I have another question: why did you point the opposite way you want to go?"
"Of course I didn't," said Graa. "I
The two of them argued about translation while Koen swayed on his feet.
"I didn't need to
"Then why not try that?" Fling suggested.
That actually turned out to be easier for Koen, too. Rather than pointing with his wing in the opposite direction from where he actually wanted to go, Graa would press down on Koen's shoulder with one foot or the other, and Koen would turn. It was like being a bicycle.
"I am impressed with my understanding," said General Graa. "When I treat you like a steed, you are far easier to control than when I treat you like a person."
"Translator, translate that word, 'person,' as 'Pick,' please," said Koen.
Graa directed them towards the closest Caternary, an arch of heart-sized salps. These burped out manipulator-nets and answers. "No," they said, "we have not seen a creature like the one you're riding. What is it? Some kind of lamprey?"
And on to the next stall, and the next as Koen slipped further into unconsciousness. He liked being steered. He was so tired, but all he had to do was put one foot in front of the other. He didn't even have to keep his eyes open…
He was awakened by a slurp.
1"You lunge at it, you bought it."
2Also trying not to worry about what would happen if the jaguar escaped from its leash.
3The avian analogue is the nucleus taenia. See Cheng M et al. Nucleus taenia of the amygdala of birds: anatomical and functional studies in ring doves (Streptopelia risoria) and European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris). Brain Behav Evol. 1999 May-Jun;53(5-6):243-70. doi: 10.1159/000006597.
4Rodgers and Hore. (2009). "Chemical magnetoreception in birds: The radical pair mechanism." PNS 106 (2) 353-360. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0711968106,
5Foley, Lauren E.; Gegear, Robert J.; Reppert, Steven M. (2011). "Human cryptochrome exhibits light-dependent magnetosensitivity". Nature Communications. 2: 356. doi:10.1038/ncomms1364. PMC 3128388. PMID 21694704.
6Wang, Connie (18 March 2019). "Transduction of the Geomagnetic Field as Evidenced from alpha-Band Activity in the Human Brain". eNeuro. 6 (2): ENEURO.0483–18.2019. doi:10.1523/ENEURO.0483-18.2019. PMC 6494972. PMID 31028046. S2CID 84835867.