and we go back to emptying the wagon of vines. Without Bash asking, I go back to talking. “What are the wheel caps on a wagon called?”
“Hubcaps.”
I gasp. “You call them hubcaps?! We have the same thing for our cars!”
Bash stops forking to stare at me. “Hells fucking Creator, I should hope so. It’s a damned wheel. How many ways can you possibly attach it to the spindle?”
“Spindle?” I shake my head. “I don’t think we have spindles. Not unless you’re spinning wool.”
Alien eyes colored with disbelief take me in with thorough deliberation. “No, not possible. If your vehicles ride on wheels, you have to use spindles. Axle shafts? Something, anything.”
“Axles sound familiar. I’m no car buff, but I can confirm we use those.”
Looking both condescending and relieved, Bash blows out a breath and walks more vines to the building. As he returns, he’s Mr. Diplomatic as he heckles, “Even for a society as backwards as humans obviously are, you have to be more advanced than you’re making your people sound. Even Krortuvians have mastered the art of basic ground transportation.”
“You are really judgmental, and we totally have ‘basic’ ground transportation covered. Our ground transportation would blow your mind.”
“Oh, I’m sure it would,” he mutters.
“I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that Krortuvians are a species of alien?”
“A dreadful one. What subject are you going to fill my ears with next? You mentioned wool. Perhaps you’d like to extol to me the methods for making yarn?”
“Hey, the manufacturing of yarn is no joke. Not where I’m from. Not unless you want to get stabbed with a knitting needle and earn a crochet hook up your nose.”
“Give me your hand,” Bash says suddenly.
I stop, and hold my hand up, peering at it. “Why? It looks fine.”
Bash takes ahold of my fingertips and spits on my palm. “To prevent blisters. Continue,” he motions for me to go back to forking him vines. “Speak on.”
“Aww, thanks. A news article I read when I was back on Earth was about a paleontologist doing a dig in Nebraska, where he discovered the remains of rhinoceros and African cranes. Cranes that do not migrate! Rhinos that you’d think would only have ever been found halfway around our world, on a whole other continent. Except that they were in the middle of nowhere on the wrong continent. Africa to Nebraska? Oceans would have prevented migration, so how’d they get there? It’s super interesting.”
There’s a long pause as Bash walks his forkful to the chamber and stalks back. “Well? How did they come to be in such a far off place?”
“No one knows for sure. There’s a Pangea theory. That’s where it’s believed we had one big supercontinent on our planet before some catastrophic event broke up the land into chunks and scattered them across the Earth’s water.”
“What was the catastrophic event that officials propose did this?”
“No one knows that either. Depending on who you listen to, it could be anything from a comet hurtling down on the planet surface to a religious overthrow known as the katabole where God stomped Satan’s ass for trying to take the throne. Neat stuff.”
Bash grunts. “With no answers.”
“No solid conclusion, depending on who you listen to. Hey!” I cheer, grinning down at him. “We cleaned out the wagon!”
Bash’s tail scrapes the ground as he sweeps his appendage sort of moodily. “We finally did.”
“Hmm. As team motivation speeches go, yours could use some work, boss.”
“I have spent another day among humans, and not one of your people has died under my hands. How’s that for motivational?”
I cluck my tongue at him. “I don’t think you know what it means.”
“Get over to me and get down from there.”
I drop my pitchfork along the inside of the wagon where he shoved his, and I move to the tailgate, placing my hand on his shoulder, and again he helps me down. “Thanks,” I say.
“Hmph,” he grumbles, but what I think he means is, You’re very welcome, Isla. It was my pleasure to be chivalrous and assist you in alighting from that great height.
When he sees me shaking my head at him, he gives me a warning sort of look and uses his tail to shoo me around to the wagon seat’s high steps.
“Where do you get your clothes?” I ask.
“Let’s return—” Bash starts, then his ears flick twice before he tosses his horns, clearly thrown. “Conversational whiplash is a grave concern when conversing with you.”