"Magazine. That's where your bullets are stored? I've never heard that word before." Although that'll be obvious, Roland thinks, because the word hadn't quite come out from his mouth the way it had from the other man's: more like magda-seen.

He follows easily, paying equal attention to who he's following and what they're moving past. Not that he understands much of that latter, of course, but that'll come. May be just as well that some of his old friends never made it this far. There'd been one in particular who never had grasped the idea of watching quietly now in order to understand later.

Roland huffs to himself, pushing away the thought, and looks ahead again, frowning. Focus on who's here with him, what he's here for. He'd had a question, hadn't he. "What's automatic about it?"