"What is that?"
"These are feathers. Little feathers. Oryx gave them to me, as a special favour. See? More feathers are growing out of my face." He lets the children touch the stubble. He'd been lax about shaving lately, there seemed little point to it, so his beard was sprouting.
"Yes. We see. But what are feathers?"
Oh, right. They'd never seen any. "Some of the Children of Oryx have feathers on them," he said. "That kind are called birds. We'll go to where they are. Then you'll know about feathers."
Snowman marvelled at his own facility: he was dancing gracefully around the truth, light-footed, light-fingered. But it was almost too easy: they accepted, without question, everything he said. Much more of this - whole days, whole weeks of it - and he could see himself screaming with boredom. I could leave them behind, he thought. Just leave them. Let them fend for themselves. They aren't my business.
But he couldn't do that, because although the Crakers weren't his business, they were now his responsibility. Who else did they have?
Who else did he have, for that matter?
Snowman planned the route in advance: Crake's storeroom was well supplied with maps. He'd take the Children of Crake to the seashore, where he himself had never been. It was something to look forward to: at last he would see the ocean. He'd walk on a beach, as in stories told by the grown-ups when he was young. He might even go swimming. It wouldn't be too bad.
The Crakers could live in the park near the arboretum, coloured green on the map and marked with a tree symbol. They'd feel at home there, and certainly there would be lots of edible foliage. As for himself, there would surely be fish. He gathered together some supplies - not too much, not too heavy, he'd have to carry it all - and loaded up his spraygun with the full complement of virtual bullets.
The evening before the departure, he gave a talk. On the way to their new, better place, he would walk ahead - he said - with two of the men. He picked the tallest. Behind them would come the women and children, with a file of men to either side. The rest of the men would walk behind. They needed to do this because Crake had said that this was the proper way. (It was best to avoid mentioning the possible dangers: those would require too much exposition.) If the Crakers noticed anything moving - anything at all, in whatever shape or form - they were to tell him at once. Some of the things they might see would be puzzling, but they were not to be alarmed. If they told him in time, these things would not be able to hurt them.
"Why would they hurt us?" asked Sojourner Truth.
"They might hurt you by mistake," said Snowman. "As the ground hurts you when you fall on it."
"But it is not the ground's wish to hurt us."
"Oryx has told us that the ground is our friend."
"It grows our food for us."
"Yes," said Snowman. "But Crake made the ground hard. Otherwise we would not be able to walk on it."
It took them a minute to work this one through. Then there was much nodding of heads. Snowman's brain was spinning; the illogic of what he'd just said dazzled him. But it seemed to have done the trick.
In the dawn light he punched in the door code for the last time and opened up the bubble, and led the Crakers out of Paradice. They noticed the remains of Crake lying on the ground, but as they had never seen Crake when alive, they believed Snowman when he told them this was a thing of no importance - only a sort of husk, only a sort of pod. It would have been a shock to them to have witnessed their creator in his present state.
As for Oryx, she was face down and wrapped in silk. No one they'd recognize.
The trees surrounding the dome were lush and green, everything seemed pristine, but when they reached the RejoovenEsense Compound proper, the evidence of destruction and death lay all around. Overturned golf carts, sodden, illegible printouts, computers with their guts ripped out. Rubble, fluttering cloth, gnawed carrion. Broken toys. The vultures were still at their business.
"Please, oh Snowman, what is that?"
It's a dead body, what do you think? "It's part of the chaos," said Snowman. "Crake and Oryx are clearing away the chaos, for you - because they love you - but they haven't quite finished yet." This answer seemed to content them.
"The chaos smells very bad," said one of the older children.
"Yes," said Snowman, with something he meant for a smile. "Chaos always smells bad."
Five blocks from the main Compound gate, a man staggered out of a side street towards them. He was in the penultimate stages of the disease: the sweat of blood was on his forehead. "Take me with you!" he shouted. The words were hardly audible. The sound was animal, an animal enraged.
"Stay where you are," Snowman yelled. The Crakers stood amazed, staring, but - it appeared - not frightened. The man came on, stumbled, fell. Snowman shot him. He was worried about contagion - could the Crakers get this thing, or was their genetic material too different? Surely Crake would have given them immunity. Wouldn't he?
When they reached the peripheral wall, there was another one, a woman. She lurched abruptly out of the gatehouse, weeping, and grabbed at a child.
"Help me!" she implored. "Don't leave me here!" Snowman shot her too.
During both incidents the Crakers looked on in wonder: they didn't connect the noise made by Snowman's little stick with the crumpling of these people.
"What is the thing that fell down, oh Snowman? Is it a man or a woman? It has extra skins, like you."