House of Suns

by Alastair Reynolds

“Good. You may leave via my lower digestive tract—the exit is opening now.” As I watched, the fronds parted near the middle of the floor to reveal a glistening shaft that had been hidden until then. “You will not have to return to the faceplate once you have emerged from my rectum,” the curator went on. “There is a waste-release spigot in my posterior armour.”