"There are people around who are sometimes wasting their bodies. But I'm not sure, given your nature, if you consider that an upgrade."
I turn to Hottopic. "You fix stuff, why not fix the world? Kill the breeze?"
"Hood doesn't like anyone. It isn't personal. If something happens to Hottopic, someone else needs to know how to treat with you. The Maul's survival is more important than any one of us."
"Can we kill The Breeze?"
"And also, do you want to be …
I consider what Hood is saying. It's a worthy concern but too improbable that I was set up from the beginning with the danger at Cache's place and the like.
"Are you Muzak? Do you play the tunes in The Maul that keep The Breeze away?"
She's actually kind of hard to play. Not dumb, but messed up. Needing enough depth to keep her interesting, but so dysfunctional that she doesn't reveal her depth much. And occupying this horror-show trope of the Faceless but not being a straight…
It's crazy and I don't have the words. I've heard tell from the old-timers that back when they were building things, if a person had a dick, they were a man. If they had tits, they were a woman. But now, we just do whatever and everyone's good. …
I'm staring at the new mother, humming along for a bit before I start to mumble. "...It's not the things you do that tease and hurt me bad, but it's the way you do the things you do to me...I'm not the kind of girl who gives up just like that, Oh n…
"I don't know, Auntie, It doesn't seem right to have those babies just on the faint hope we can get things back. I think we need something new. Something the Breeze doesn't hate."
"Want?" I'm uncharacteristically washed with memories. "When I was a wee-one, sure -- everyone wants a baby."
And uncharacteristically verbose. "Not here; not in this fallen world though. It wouldn't be a kindness. We've got to live these live…
"Hm. Okay." I'm just thinking about stuff for a while. Long enough that maybe Hottopic goes back to moving toward the Cabal. "I'm just going to wait with you then...until we can talk to Muzak."
I hold my words as we walk the Maul, my only sounds coming from my various garments. As we start to pick our way through the dump that folks call Discover (because of the big black and orange sign on the wall), I finally address Hottopic. "I need …