“Why is he naked?” asked Onsofruct, distractedly. “And what’s that he’s got wrapped around his waist?”
“It looks very much like a whip,” murmured D’Jevier. “Though it seems to be attached between his legs.”
Glad of the distraction, Madame focused on the distant figure. “Well,” she remarked, “I would say it’s a smaller version of Penis-man’s appendage. One designed for inflicting punishment. How very interesting. Clothed, he showed no hint of it at all.”
“I believe you’re right,” said Questioner from her position at the center of the ledge. “An interesting variant.”
“None of this makes sense,” said Calvy, coming to stand beside Questioner. “How is one to understand it?”
Questioner said, “The Fauzi-dizalonz is like a mirror that reflects one’s desires. When you go through the first time, you come out looking as your thoughts and desires would form you, looking like that thing which is most important to you. To that monster, the one you call Penis-man, being male and light-skinned was most important to him. He emerged pale and male and sat in that cave for centuries becoming ever paler and maler. Whatever the others are, they display what was important to them.”
Calvy said, “If there had been women among them, no doubt some would have emerged as Breast-woman or Uterus-woman or Hair-woman.”
“Lips-woman, or Legs-woman,” offered Simon. “Mouth-woman, Nagger woman … “
“Enough, Simon,” said Madame, joining them from among the stones, D’Jevier trailing behind.
“But what’s the Fauxi-dizalonz good for?” begged D’Jevier. “What’s its purpose?”
Questioner said, “I infer that when Kaorugi sends one of its parts out to do something, the part returns with information. The information may be so vital that it will suggest a change or improvement in general structure. In the Fauxi-dizalonz, the information can be evaluated and implemented and possibly spread around to other units.” She fell silent, thinking. “From what we’ve heard from the Corojum, I infer also that the Fauxi-dizalonz destroys information. If a part has experienced evil or felt great pain, Kaorugi takes that memory away … “
“But these monsters didn’t go back in the Fauxi-dizalonz? So what will Bofusdiaga do with them now?” asked D’Jevier.
“They have been too long unfinished to send back through. Now they are only raw material,” said Questioner, “from which to assemble a partner for Quaggima. Using one or more of you ladies for motive power.”
Among a small grove of standing stones, the four young people were hunkered down knee to knee with Flowing Green.
“Long ago and long ago,” whispered Flowing Green in a voice like wind through the trees, “Kaorugi knew all living things, for there was only Kaorugi to know. Then came Quaggima. Oh, but it was strange when Quaggima came. Outside-ness came with Quaggima. Other-ness came with Quaggima. Separate life came with Quaggima. Kaorugi knew no outside, no other, no separateness from self until then.
“Kaorugi went deep, to think. Kaorugi makes all living things, but Kaorugi had never thought of making a thinking thing that was not part of itself. Only after Quaggima came, only after mankinds came and killed so many Timmys and Corojumi, only then did Kaorugi wonder if Kaorugi could make something that was not part of itself.
“Kaorugi told the last Corojum to take a pattern of this otherness, and Corojum took a pattern from you, Mouchidi. Corojum took a tiny bit of you, skin and blood, and Corojum bit you and put a tiny bit of Kaorugi into you. Inside you, the Kaorugi part grew. And the part Corojum took from you, Kaorugi used it when it made me. I am a strangeness, Mouchidi. Even Corojum says so, and Corojum is my friend. I am made of Kaorugi and made of you, a Timmy, yes, but a separate-part mankind creature also.
“So, now, if all is not to end or go back to long ago beginning and start over, we must create together, you and I and Kaorugi. Something that is not mankind alone. Not Timmy alone. Not even Kaorugi alone. And we must do it for sorrow of Quaggima, for pity of little ones in the egg, for delirious delight of it, for ecstacy of it, for love of it … “