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uninteresting; the witticisms, dull; the uniSwarm connection, irrelevant; the glands, ineffective; and most everything else, predictable. But when they accessed the culvert that stored the sexual material, they dwelt there for a long time, in amongst the froto-sense-data and the holo-clips and the scene-glyphs that had been burnt directly from his retina. It more than made up for the rest.
    They found many dark things there and they longed for more.

Chapter Eleven
    The hang-gliders and the little silver fish and the part of the vomit of the cow that had dropped in the Leech were far behind them now, some ten miles downstream of their current position, and the little flotilla of tuk-tuks was at last in sight of the tiny port at Bartislard.
    ‘Now, you be careful when you exit the vessel now, won’t you, me dear?’ Stanton Bosch said to the cow, as he tied the boat to its mooring on the broken pier. ‘Don’t want no more accidents now, do we?’
    It was harder for the cow to get out than in, and she had to make a little run with the boat bobbing up and down and rocking back and forth before she leapt. She steadied herself beforehand, as though she were taking a jump in a gymkhana, but when it came to it she botched it horribly and landed splay-legged on the wet boarding, sending the boat rolling so violently that Cormack was almost capsized.
    ‘You be careful there, you dangerous cow!’ said Stanton Bosch. ‘Almost had the skinny man in the water!’
    Cormack disembarked more proficiently, but was shaken and spent a while checking himself all over for little silver fish that might have been splashed on him.
    Soon after, all the Boschs had their tuk-tuks tied and their charges on dry land. Proton made a payment and they were dismissed.
    Then he assumed the look of a jungle tracker, sniffing for fewmets, and eventually found the poorly marked path to Bartislard in amongst the thick vegetation that grew out and around and all over everything.
    They marched ahead. Cormack and the cow were positioned in amongst the Guards, trying hard to keep up. The path seemed little used and was barely passable in places – vegetation had spread from the forest floor and covered it with shoots and tendrils, and it was thick with big fallen leaves that lay all about, so the way forward was just a path of wet, brown mulch that wound like a gutter in between the creeping green. Vines dropped from the damp canopy like streamers and draped over them as they walked, wiping their already dripping clothes with a further sticky wetness, and all around them they could hear the chirrups of frogs, and an insect buzz, and the whoops of the things they had heard on the boats, much louder now, but nowhere to be seen – just undergrowth and bush and clouds of mosquitoes about them, and trees that twitched here and there, and cracked and rocked in the sun-speckled distance.
     
    Proton pushed on at a vigorous pace and at every turn in the path, he got a little further ahead of the rest of them.
    Eventually he was out of view of Cormack and cow.
    They talked amiably. The cow was impressed with the vegetation.
    ‘Cormack, them vines up there does look so tasty, especially after being cooped up on a transporter ship. I does almost be tempted to take a nibble, if the Guards would only let me.’
    ‘I think you had better not.’
    ‘I does see some particular variety, that is yellow and almost straw-like in appearance, innit, strong and starchy, and it does hang down from the canopy most temptingly.’
    The cow looked up.
    ‘Why there does be one now! It is passing directly over me! If I just reach out me tongue, like here so, I think I could catch it in me mouth…’
    The cow reached for the vine and jerked on it hard, but it would not give. She gave it another tug and there was a small croaking sound from above. The vine came spinning down like a nunchaku, whipping viciously through the air with a scything sound, until it dropped to the forest