Garth, Harper, and I slaked our thirst as Mabel waited patiently for the barrel to fill again. I kept on drinking after Garth and Harper finished, sucking up water until my belly was distended and sore. I stopped just as I began to feel the urge to vomit.
"Jesus, brother," Garth said, "you must have been really thirsty. You're going to burst if you drink any more."
"I need all the water I can store," I replied, and decided that it would serve no purpose to tell Garth and Harper just why it was I wanted to tank up, and save myself repeated trips to the well.
I also decided it would serve no purpose to tell them that my primary sensation at the moment was not thirst, but fear.
Chapter Eleven
Standing on a narrow catwalk at the edge of a man-high adjustable vent cut in the side of the silo I was in, I watched the stream of my urine arc out and fall to the ground thirty feet below. The lobox was squatting on its haunches off to the side, just out of range, watching me with a good deal more than casual interest. Using the catwalks and vents, I was working my way around the perimeter of the three-silo complex as fast as my bladder would allow. This was my third evacuation, and now I knew I would have to go back to the working tap and tank up again. Mine was an execrable job, I thought with a grim smile, but somebody had to do it. By nature of expertise and-I hoped-talent, I had elected myself.
I heard my brother clambering up the steel ladder leading to the catwalk. "There you are," he said as he reached the walk and came up to stand beside me. "You've been gone more than an hour, and I've been looking all over for you. Harper's worried. What the hell are you up to?"
"I'm pissing."
"Don't be a smart-ass. I can see that you're pissing. If you hadn't drunk so much water, you wouldn't be pissing so much."
"You got that right. Thank you, Doctor."
"Come on, Mongo, what are you doing back here? I thought you and Harper checked it all out before. If there was any place that thing could get in, it would have been on us by now."
"I told you; I'm pissing-or I was. I'm finished now."
Garth shrugged, stepped to the edge of the vent, and reached for his fly. "Sounds like a good idea. It must be the power of suggestion."
"Not here," I said quickly, grabbing his sleeve and pulling him back from the edge.
"Huh?"
"Use the privy in the second silo. I don't want anyone pissing on the ground around here except me."
Garth stared at me, obviously baffled, and slowly blinked. "You're saying you can piss on Nebraska, but I can't?"
"Not this particular part of Nebraska, if you please."
"Why the hell not?"
"Because there can only be one leader of the pack, and both you and Harper decided it should be me. I don't want our friend down there to get confused. I'm scenting-spotting my territory. It's the essential first step."
"Mongo, what the hell are you talking about?"
"Go take care of your toilette, and I'll tell you when you finish. I'll meet you at the water tap."
Garth shook his head. "I don't have any toilette to take care of now; you've shocked the piss out of me. I want you to explain to me now why you can piss anywhere you want to in Nebraska, but Harper and I can't."
"Nobody, with the possible exception of Luther Zelezian, knows a whole damn lot about lobox behavior, except for what we've already observed. I'm assuming that loboxes passed on some of their natural traits to their modern heirs-dogs and wolves. I'm playing wolf. I'm marking out my territory, challenging that guy down there."
"By pissing on him?" Garth asked incredulously.
"It's a beginning. In order to work with large, dangerous animals, you have to understand a few things. The first and most important thing you have to understand is that they're not people, as cute, friendly, or otherwise human as they may seem.
You can never get them to do anything by trying to make friends with them, because they can't be your friend-at least not in the way we think of friends. One way or another, the animal must be dominated; it must be made to know that you're the boss, and that the shit's going to hit the fan if it doesn't do what you want it to do. There are a number of ways of accomplishing that end. The best way is to combine certain training techniques with lots of affection and respect. Or you can simply instill fear-beat the shit out of the animal, and hope you don't break its spirit."
"Like you do with Mabel?"
"No," I said, shaking my head. "I can't hurt Mabel. I told you. She only thinks I'm beating the shit out of her, and that's usually enough."
"I thought you were kidding me."
"No. Mabel's a special case. Some animals-African elephants among them-are almost never successfully trained or domesticated. Zebras are another good example. But with any animal, if you can establish close contact with it from the moment it's born, it becomes an enormous advantage. There's a phenomenon called imprinting. I didn't have Mabel when she was born, but I did get her when she was desperately sick, close to death. She was helpless, which is almost as good from a trainer's standpoint. I nursed her back to health, and she came to see me as care giver, provider of food, and so on. No matter how big she got after that, she would never really perceive me as small, as a dwarf. I was always her master-as much of a master as African elephants ever have. There are researchers who would even claim that she thinks I'm her mother."
"Now you're kidding me."
"The fact that you keep thinking I'm kidding you when I tell you how animals think and behave is the reason I can piss on this part of Nebraska and you can't. Luther has already imprinted this lobox and any others he may have around. Even though we don't know that much about loboxes, I think it's safe to assume I'd never be able to break into that brain circuiting-say, to try for affection-and so there's no sense in wasting time we don't have. If I'm going to wrest control of the lobox away from Luther, I have to break into another circuit in the animal's brain, in a manner of speaking. Luther dominates it on Luther's terms; the only chance I have is to dominate it on lobox terms. In short, I have to convince it that I'm leader of the pack, which is why I've been using my urine to mark off my territory. That's why I don't want you pissing out there, okay? I've been serving notice that he'd better watch his hairy ass if he keeps trying to mess with me."
"No more Mr. Nice Guy?"
"No more Mr. Nice Guy."
"You're crazy, Mongo. You plan to just keep pissing at him?"
"Nope. Like I said, that's just the first step. I think there are some factors in our favor. First, it's very smart, so it shouldn't take too long to discover whether or not I'm wasting my time. It actually seems to be able to comprehend its own existence and the possibility of death, so it can be intimidated-I think-if I can find the right buttons to push. I shot it; it knows I shot it, and that's good."
Garth slowly shook his head. "You don't have a gun now; it probably knows you don't have a gun now, and that's bad."
"I think it's safe to assume that I'm the first victim it's been primed for that it hasn't succeeded in killing. The lobox that ran with it was primed for Harper, didn't succeed in killing her, and was killed itself, by Harper. It will assume Harper is my mate-and only the leader of the pack could have such a powerful mate. Are you following all this?"
Garth grunted, laid a hand on my shoulder, and squeezed it affectionately. "I'm not the audience you have to convince, Mongo."
I was again getting an urgent call from nature. I stepped back to the edge of the vent, looked down. The lobox was still there, in the same position. I took the hickory trapeze bar, which I carried everywhere with me, rapped it hard a few times against the side of the silo, then shook it at the lobox. The lobox seemed singularly unimpressed. I rested the bar against the wall, again reached for my fly.