Filaria - Brent Hayward [23]
“What did you say, crab? What’s that?”
Looking back at him from atop two eyestalks, both of which, poking up through the mesh of the holding net, appeared milky and cataracted, the crab said, “Me knowth.” A claw clicked, gesturing vaguely. “Fix wife, me knowth.”
“Know what? What do you know?” He shook the net.
Another lame movement of one claw, vaguely in the direction the god of dispensing had taken. “Them god no knowth.”
“You know something that our gods don’t?” Motioning his head up the embankment. “How can that be? Know what I think? I think you just overheard our conversation and now you’re trying to trick me into sparing your life. You’re stalling.”
“No no. Me fix wife. Fix frienth. Me know where.” Words were almost lost within the bubbles that frothed at the tiny mouthpieces of the desperate crab.
Tran so put his hand into the holding net and grabbed the creature in one fist. The crab protested and struggled. Tran so said, “I’ll kill you right here and now, if you’re stringing me along. I’ll crush you in one hand. Are you talking about the remedy?”
“Pleath, no hurth . . .”
“I asked you if you’re talking about the remedy. You know how to fix sick people? Is that what you’re saying?” Brine trickled his taut knuckles, dripping from seams and splits in the ruined structure of the carapace.
“Me tellth, me tellth! Me elp!”
Disgusted, Tran so threw the crustacean back into the net, where it thrashed about for a moment. He returned the holding net to the water so the crab could breathe. When the beast had righted itself and calmed somewhat — though it was still obviously agitated and in considerable pain — Tran so held up the net once more.
“If you tell me clearly what you’re saying, I might give you a chance to live.”
“Neth-work,” the crab hissed. “Man sleep. Man copy. Them have!”
“No riddles.”
“Man sleep! Below. Them have! Elp wife! Elp wife!”
“I’m going to take you home and boil you in water. Crack you open. Eat you with garlic and rock salt.”
The crab wailed as if it had already been plunged into boiling water. “No no noooo!”
Then an idea struck Tran so Phengh. An idea so audacious and simple he wondered why he had never thought of it before. “Maybe,” he whispered, “you can help me.” He stood. “Yes, maybe you can.”
“Yeth,” the crab echoed, clearly relieved. “Me elp, me elp.”
Tran so Phengh took two steps into the foul water. Under his feet, the slimy beach levelled off, sloping more gently toward deeper areas. Filthy water licked at his knees and debris clung to his calves. Chunks knocked gently against his legs. A small cut on his heel began to sting.
“Crab,” he said, “you’ll take me to where the lake god lives.”
“God?” The crab was baffled. “No god.”
“Yes god. You’re going to show me where it lives.”
Retrieving a slat from the water, Tran so steadied himself. The slat was soft and black and on the side that had been submerged in the lake, pinworms writhed and dropped between his fingers. “You will take me to the tank of the lake god,” Tran so told the confused creature again, “and then I’ll spare your life.”
“Me take? But man sleep — ”
“We’re going to meet your maker, crab. Because I don’t believe you know anything that the gods don’t know. I wanna go straight to the source.”
“No fix wife there. God no fix!”
Not far from where Tran so stood floated a fairly worthy-looking raft: four red plastic canisters lashed together and covered with a rigid, perforated plastic sheet. This craft had been bobbing, unmanned, in the vicinity for months, maybe years. Tran so waded out to it now, holding his net in one hand and his fishing rod in the other. He clambered aboard and stood, feeling proud, defiant, and somewhat absurd. In the net, the crab was silent, probably trying to come up with a new strategy for escape or at least some way to understand this unfortunate turn of events. Tran so chuckled under his breath. He felt his pulse, felt the beats of his own heart. He drew a deep breath and felt his lungs fill.
In the centre of the raft’s deck was a