“Never mind. The pimples go away when you get older,” the old man said kindly. “Shaggy Manes eat chemicals, too. Once upon a time farmers put so much fertilizer and pesticides on their crops that the ground became polluted. Nowadays we aren’t so foolish, but if we were, the Shaggy Manes would come to our rescue.” He smiled proudly at his mushrooms as though they were a herd of prize cattle.
“You mean . . . you mean these little things can pull poison out of the soil?” asked Cienfuegos.
“They not only pull it out, they digest it so that it’s harmless. It’s like a snack to them. Mmm! Yummy pesticides!”
The jefe looked stunned. “All those years of failed crops and sickened farmers . . . It could have been avoided so easily.”
“Not so easily,” cautioned the white-haired man. “You have to learn how it’s done—which mushrooms to grow, how to grow them, and what to do with them. The ones that eat mercury, for example, must be burned. You can reuse the metal.” The man led them around the fields, pointing out fungi that ate oil or pesticides or bacteria. “This little beauty,” he said, gesturing at a dull purple mushroom glistening with slime, “likes radioactivity. Positively wolfs it down. It’s called a Gomphidius.” He patted it fondly.
“Surely you don’t have radioactivity here,” said Cienfuegos.
“Never,” the old man said, “but if we did, we’d be ready.”
“This is what I’ve been looking for all my life,” murmured the jefe. “May I ask your name, sir?”
“I’m the Mushroom Master,” the man said.
“I would give anything to learn your skill. I could take one day off every week and come here. Please, sir, would you teach me?”
“Of course,” said the Mushroom Master, looking somewhat startled by Cienfuegos’s fervent plea.
The jefe turned to Matt. “You’d order me to come, wouldn’t you, mi patrón?”
“Of course,” said Matt, understanding that Cienfuegos couldn’t leave his work unless directly ordered.
“Then it’s all right.” The jefe closed his eyes briefly.
They toured the rest of the building, for only part of it was kept for renewing the soil. The rest grew edible mushrooms. By now Listen was complaining loudly that she was crotting tired, that she’d had it up to here with weird people, and that she was going to eat a Gomphidius, slime and all, if they didn’t get going.
“Patience,” said Cienfuegos. He picked her up and thanked the Mushroom Master at great length. They headed for the area labeled KITCHEN.
26
THE BRAT ENCLOSURE
In the kitchen, cooks were busily processing food—mostly vegetables—and servers were laying out banana leaves for plates. Groups of men and women drifted in, seated themselves, and were given rice and stew.
“I think we should wait until we get back to the hovercraft to eat,” said Cienfuegos, putting Listen onto the ground. “Everything is balanced in this place. I don’t know if they have enough food for visitors.”
“I wouldn’t touch that crap, anyway,” said Listen.
The stew consisted of grasshoppers and caterpillars in a thick gluey sauce with chopped-up carrots and onions. The diners ate with gusto, using their fingers. They could have as many helpings as they liked by raising a hand. A server would hurry over and refill the banana leaf.
Matt watched them. “Excuse me,” he began, uncertain how to open a conversation. The diners ignored him. “Excuse me,” he repeated. “Where are the children?” It bothered him that the only child he’d seen was Listen.
A woman looked up. “You must be newly emerged from Dormancy. Everyone knows they’re in the Brat Enclosure.” She gestured at a door.
“Those Dormancy graduates,” a man said, shaking his head. “Their brains don’t wake up for weeks.”
“Do children ever leave the Brat Enclosure?” asked Matt.
“Not if I can help it.” The woman laughed. The others seemed to enjoy the joke too.
“We take turns watching them,” the man explained. “It’s tiring to chase after prehumans, and we prefer to keep them corralled.”
“I’m a visitor from outside and don’t know anything,” said Matt. “Please tell me what you mean by Dormancy.”
“He’s dreaming. Nobody lives Outside,” someone remarked.
“Poor bobo. He must be from one of the outer ecosystems, perhaps Tundra,” said the woman. “I’ve heard they’re not too bright.”
“For shame! They’re all Gaia’s children,” scolded another woman.