Ascending - James Alan Gardner [15]
“That is foolish,” I told him. “If criminals wished to impersonate you, they could simply cut off your hand. Then they could rub the detached member against the wall—”
“Whoa!” Uclod interrupted. “Just whoa.” He swallowed hard. “What is wrong with you, missy? How can such grisly ideas pop into such a pretty head?”
“I am simply practical,” I said. “Unlike your Zarett’s security precautions, which seem to encourage villains to amputate—”
“Hush! Right now. Not a word.”
I hushed. He was clearly a squeamish alien.
A moment later he muttered, “You left your ax behind, right?”
I did not dignify that with an answer.
Past The Teeth And Over The Gums
The little man stepped back from rubbing the Zarett’s mouth. “She’s recognized me,” he said, quickly putting his hands behind his back. “We’re ready to go.”
I looked at the shadowy throat slanting upward. “It appears to be a difficult climb.”
“Climb?” he said. “We don’t have to climb.”
“Then how—”
I did not finish my question, because two distractions occurred. First, Uclod dropped to his stomach, lying flat on Starbiter’s lower palate. Second, the Zarett’s lips clamped shut and sealed themselves, plunging us into blackness.
“Get down, toots,” Uclod said.
I did not obey. “Why?”
Without the slightest warning, Starbiter lurched. I had time to think, Oh, it is a big ball and it is rolling along the street: then the floor beneath me tipped to the vertical and I fell down hard.
Down
The impact of my fall made a splash in the Zarett’s spittle. Though I could not see, I had the impression the creature’s mouth was flooding with saliva. I did not have long to think about that, because the rolling soon reached the point where the throat was no longer up but down. With nothing to hold on to, and nothing but slippery oral tissue under my body, I slid helplessly forward, tobogganing headfirst: bouncing blindly off the walls of the mouth, until I was funneled into the throat and hurled downward.
Zoom.
Saliva whooshed me on my way, like a stream of mucousy water, very slick and oily. I could not slow myself at all; when I flailed my arms, I only managed to roll onto my side. Then onto my back. Then onto my side again. But of all the positions, it felt the most pleasing to whiz along on my front, so I worked over to that.
At one point, something brushed against my spine—a thinning in Starbiter’s throat, perhaps the epiglottis Uclod had mentioned. I did not have time to grab it; anyway, it felt as slippery as everything else around me, so I doubt that I could have managed to stop myself.
The ride continued, but not in a direct line down. Soon after the epiglottis, the path veered to the right, rolling me high up on the throat wall before the route straightened again. That sent me seesawing back and forth, up the left wall, down to the bottom, up the right…which would have been most enjoyable, except that the slide leveled out quickly after that and my motion began to slow. Apparently, the Zarett had come to rest in a position that left this part of the throat horizontal. I saw light glimmering ahead; and with my last momentum, I slid into a small room whose walls shone as yellow as buttercups. Uclod was there, already on his feet. As I came to a stop, he bent over and asked, “How’re you doing, missy?”
How I Was Doing
“I am exceedingly vexed,” I said, elbow-deep in spittle. Though the fluid was rapidly seeping away through the porous tissues around me, I was still soaking wet in every particular. That is not a nice feeling, especially when one does not know if Zarett saliva is the type of liquid that leaves stains or crusty patches when it dries. Therefore, when Uclod offered me his hand as an aid to standing up, I scowled and did not take it; I rose on my own (with magnificent grace) and told him, “It was very most rude not to warn me what would happen.”
“You weren’t keen on being swallowed,” he said. “I figured it would cause less fuss if I