of earthy
things and living things, things to keep the hands supple and things to make
them strong, and so he brought in a chicken from the brothers' henhouse and
covered it in the sloppy green-brown sauce, feathers and all. Bill, being the
clever one, woke when the smell of the sauce bubbling in the microwave reached
him, and he wandered into the kitchen.

To an untutored eye, Bill and George were indistinguishable. Both of them big,
even for their kind -- for their father had been an especially big specimen
himself -- whose faces were as expressive as sculptor's clay, whose
chisel-shaped teeth were white and hard as rocks. When they were alone together,
they went without clothing, as was the custom of their kind, and their bodies
bulged with baggy, loose muscle. They needed no clothing, for they lacked the
shame of the soft ones, the small thumb between the legs. They had a more
civilised way of reproducing.

"Joe hasn't returned yet?" Bill asked his strong brother.

"Not yet," George told his clever brother.

"We eat, then. No sense in waiting for him. He knows the supper hour," Bill
said, and since he was the clever one, they ate.

#

Joe returned as the sun was rising, and burrowed in between his brothers on
their nest of blankets. George flung one leg over his smallest brother, and
smelled the liquor on his breath in his sleep, and his dreams were tainted with
the stink of rotting grapes.

George was the first one awake, preparing the morning meal. A maggoty side of
beef, ripe with the vitality of its parasites, and gravel. Joe came for
breakfast before Bill, as was his custom. Bill needed the sleep, to rest his
cleverness.

"God-_damn_, I am _hungry!_," Joe said loudly, without regard for his sleeping
brother.

"You missed dinner," George said.

"I had more important things to do," Joe said. "I was out with an Imagineer!"

George stared hard at him. "What did the Imagineer want? Is there trouble?"

Joe gave a deprecating laugh. "Why do you always think there's trouble? The guy
wanted to chat with me -- he likes me, wants to get to know me. His name is
Woodrow, he's in charge of a whole operations division, and he was interested in
what I thought of some of his plans." He stopped and waited for George to be
impressed.

George knew what the pause was for. "That's very good. You must be doing a good
job for your Lead to mention you to him."

"That little prick? He hates my guts. Woodrow's building a