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him with leveled pikes, then looked up at their companions who stood in a ring
around the Neanderthals, pike-points centered on the beast-men. Rod considered
telling them to lower their weapons, but decided it would be a little premature.
"A word from you, and they'd drop those spears like magic," the beastman
pointed out.
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"Yeah, I know." Rod grinned. "Ain't it great?"
"On your side, maybe." Yorick rubbed a hand over his eyes. "I keep getting the
feeling I've been through this all before."
"Nay, dost thou truly?" Tuan said, frowning. "I too have such a sense."
The Neanderthal shook his head. "Really weird. Like I've lived through this
already. Except& " He turned to Rod. "You ought to be about a foot taller, with
piercing eyes and a wide, noble brow."
Rod stiffened. "What do you mean, ought to?"
The Neanderthal held up a palm. "No offense. But you ought to have a haughty
mien, too whatever that is."
"Indeed," Tuan agreed. "And thou shouldst be hunchbacked, with fangs
protruding from the corners of thy jaws, and a look of murdering idiocy in thine
eye."
Yorick reared, startled. Then his face darkened and his eyebrows pulled down to
hide his eyes (he had a lot of eyebrow). He stepped forward, opening his mouth
and Rod jumped in quickly. "You, ah, both have this same, ah, sense of, ah,
dejavu?"
"Nice phrase." Yorick nodded in approval. "I knew there was a word for it."
Now it was Rod's turn to stare. Then he said, "Uh you've heard 'dejavu'
before?"
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"Know I have, know I have." Yorick bobbed his head, grinning. "Just couldn't
place it, that's all."
The handful of beastmen behind him growled and muttered to each other,
throwing quick, wary glances at Rod and Tuan.
"How about you?" Rod turned to Tuan. " 'Deja vu.' Ever heard it before?"
"Never in my life," Tuan said firmly. "Doth that signify?"
" 'Course it does." Yorick grinned. "It means I'm not a native. But you knew that,
didn't you, High Warlock? I mean, it's pretty plain that I didn't evolve here."
"Yeah, but I sorta thought you'd all been kidnapped." Rod frowned. "But one of
you was in on the kidnapping, weren't you?"
Yorick winced. "Please! I prefer to think of it as helping place refugees."
"Oh, really! I thought that kind of placement usually involved finding a willing
host!"
"So, who was to host?" Yorick shrugged. "The land was just lying there,
perfectly good; nobody was using it. All we had to do was kick out a few
dinosaurs and move in."
"You never thought we folk over here on Gramarye might have something to say
about it, huh?"
"Why? I mean, you were over here, and we were over there, and there was all
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this ocean between us. You wererCt even supposed to know we were there!"
"Lord Warlock," Tuan interrupted, "this news is of great interest, but somewhat
confusing."
"Yes, it is getting a little complicated," Rod agreed. He turned back to Yorick.
"What do you say we begin at the beginning?"
"Fine." Yorick shrugged. "Where's that?"
"Let's take it from your own personal point of view. Where does your story
begin?''
"Well, this lady picked me up by the feet, whacked me on the fanny, and said,
'It's a boy!' And this man who was standing near& "
"No, no!" Rod took a deep breath. "That's a little too far back. How about we
start with your learning English. How'd you manage that?"
Yorick shrugged. "Somebody taught me. How else?"
"Dazzling insight," Rod growled. "Why didn't I think of that? Could we be a
little more specific about your teacher? For one thing, the way you talk tells me
he wasn't from a medieval culture."
Yorick frowned. "How'd you guess? I mean, I know they didn't exactly send me
to prep school, but& "
"Oh, really! I would've thought they'd have enrolled you in Groton first thing!"
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Yorick shook his head firmly. "Couldn't pass the entrance exam. We
Neanderthals don't handle symbols too well. No prefrontal lobes, you know."
Rod stared.
Yorick frowned back at him, puzzled. Then his face cleared into a sickly grin.
"Oh. I know. I'll bet you're wondering, if I can't handle symbols, how come I can
talk. Right?"
"Something of the sort did cross my mind. Of course, I do notice that your mates
have something of a language of their own."
"Their very own; you won't find any other Neanderthal tribe that uses it."
"I wasn't really planning to look."
Yorick ignored the interruption. "These refugees come from so many different
nations that we had to work out a lingua franca. It's richer than any of the parent
languages, of course but it's still got a very limited vocabulary. No Neanderthal
language gets very far past 'Me hungry. That food-go kill.' "
"This, I can believe. So how were you able to learn English?"
"Same way a parrot does," Yorick explained. "I memorize all the cues and the
responses that follow them. For example, if you say, 'Hello,' that's my cue to say
'Hello' back; and if you say, 'How are you?' that's my cue to say, Tine. How're
you?' without even thinking about it."
"That's not exactly exclusive to Neanderthals," Rod pointed out. "But the talking
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you've been doing here is a little more complicated."
"Yeah, well, that comes from mental cues." Yorick tapped his own skull. "The
concept nudges me from inside, see, and that's like a cue, and the words to
express that concept jump out of memory in response to that cue."
"But that's pretty much what happens when we talk, too."
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