"How do we ... make the food?" she asked.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"Henry and I, we have never actually prepared food," admitted Luxa.
Gregor could see Henry scowling at Luxa, but she did not look at him.
"You mean, you never even made yourself a sandwich?" asked Gregor. He couldn't cook much, but if his mom had to work late, he'd make dinner sometimes. Just stuff like scrambled eggs or macaroni and cheese, but he could get by.
"A sandwich? Is this a dish named in honor of Bartholomew of Sandwich?" she asked, puzzled.
Gregor said, "I don't really know. It's two slices of bread with meat or cheese or peanut butter or something between them."
"I have not made a sandwich," said Luxa.
"It's not hard. Here, slice off some pieces of meat. Not too thick," he said, handing her a knife. Gregor sawed away at the bread, managing to get eighteen slices out of one loaf. Luxa did a pretty good job with the meat, but then, she was used to handling blades. He showed her how to assemble the sandwiches, and she seemed somewhat pleased with her accomplishment. She took four for herself, her cousin, and the bats. Gregor took the other five. It would be asking too much of her to serve Ripred and the roaches.
He roused Boots, and she started right in on her sandwich. Temp and Tick gave polite nods of thanks for theirs. Then Gregor approached Ripred, who was leaning sulkily in the tunnel. He held out a sandwich. "Here," he said.
"For me?" said Ripred, with exaggerated surprise. "How very thoughtful of you. I'm sure the rest of your party would be happy to see me starve."
"If you starve, I'll never find my dad," said Gregor.
"Quite true," said Ripred, popping the entire sandwich in his mouth. "It's good we have this understanding. Mutual need is a strong bond. Stronger than friendship, stronger than love."
"Do rats love?" said Gregor dryly.
"Oh, yes," said Ripred with a smirk. "We love ourselves very much."
"Figures," thought Gregor. He went and sat with Boots, who was polishing off her sandwich.
"More," said Boots, pointing at Gregor's uneaten sandwich. He was ravenous, but he couldn't let her go hungry. He started to break his sandwich in half when Temp delicately pushed his sandwich in front of Boots.
"The princess may eat mine," said Temp.
"You need to eat, too, Temp," objected Gregor.
"Not much," said Temp. "Tick will share her food with me."
Her food. So Tick must be a girl roach.
"He will share with me," said Tick.
And Temp was a guy. Not that it made any difference to Gregor; it was just one more way he could avoid insulting the bugs.
Since Boots had already munched halfway through Temp's sandwich, Gregor accepted. He'd try to give them part of his food at the next meal.
Breakfast was finished in two minutes, and they packed up. They were starting to mount Ares and Aurora when Ripred stopped them. "Don't bother. You cannot fly where we go," he said, and indicated the tunnel. It was barely six feet high and only a few feet wide.
"We're going in there? Isn't there another way to get to my dad?" asked Gregor. He didn't want to head into the dark, narrow space with Ripred, even if they had mutual need.
"There is another way, but not a better way. Unless you know one," said Ripred.
Gregor could feel Ares and Aurora twitching in distress. "What about the bats?"
"I'm sure you'll work that out," drawled Ripred.
"Can you walk?" Gregor asked Ares.