by Don Sakers
“To be sure.” The train slows, and the robot shows us through the door into a narrow corridor. As soon as we are through, the door slides shut. The robot stands before it, pointing toward the opposite end. “This way, if you please."
Saburo's eyes narrow. “This isn't a hospital. Where are we?"
The robot advances, and we have no choice but to fall back before it. Gingiber Maur's smile fades. “I am sorry, Doctor. Telorbat is under strict quarantine. We have no choice but to isolate those who have had contact with the Death.” We are halfway down the corridor, now, and the far door begins to open. “As a medical man, I am sure you understand. You will be cared for; our prisons have a complete range of services."
“Prison?” Saburo echoes. Then the robot shoves us forward, and we tumble through the door.
Ved clings to my operative's hand, and I wrap an arm about him, all the while singing to quiet him. For we have surely walked into his worst nightmares.
A room the size of a spacecraft hangar is crowded with coughing, weeping Humans. Some are dead already, others are motionless upon mats and have only hours of life left. Some of the healthier ones are ministering to the others.
“Keep Ved back,” Saburo tells me, and I am only too glad to comply. We stand in the middle of an open space, and I turn the boy's face to the wall while at the same time I hiss, “Saburo, what are we to do?"
“Don't worry. These people are paranoid, but they're stupid.” He glances at an instrument clasped about his wrist. “My ship will be here in five minutes, and in another five we'll be blasted out of here."
“Unless they have ships to destroy yours."
“You won't find a working starship on this planet. Everyone who could leave, did. That's why the city's so empty. The ones who got left behind decided to set up this quarantine, but it won't help them.” He bares his teeth in haughty animal aggression. “How's Ved?"
“Upset. We sing to calm him, and it seems to help."
“Good. Keep it up."
When Saburo's ship arrives, there is no doubt: a bright flash and a noise like thunder, then half a wall collapses in upon itself. Through smoke and dust, I see a moving wall of dark metal—the ship.
Saburo points and slaps my operative on the back. “Run!” he shouts.
By the time we reach the ship's hatch, twice seventy others have arrived as well. Some are too sick to move, yet they push themselves forward only to fall into the path of others. Their minds beat with terror and panic.
Saburo pushes through them roughly, then grabs Ved and my operative in firm hands and pulls us toward the ship as if through crashing surf. Human bodies press up against me, choking and vomiting, and I feel Ved's mind shake in counterpoint to his nervous body. The quiet melody of the Inner Voice pauses, then fragments as the boy's mental walls break and the full horror of his last few weeks comes smashing down on him.
He screams in an agony that paralyzes Hlutr on all nearby worlds. And I ... who stand as close to that cry as I am to the soil of Amny ... I stagger back, nearly driven from my perch in my Human operative's brain.
In that brain, in the confusion of the Inner Voice and Ved's pain, a miracle happens.
A personality submerged for a lifetime—the original identity of my operative—hears Ved's cry through the endless distance that she has driven between herself and reality. I feel her stir in that Human brain, and I am shocked to silence. Even the Hlutr could not reach her! Yet she comes forth, responding to a pain greater than her own.
Her name is Irisa, this Human whose body I have borrowed. She is almost as sensitive to the Inner Voice as is Ved, and she knows only that she must help him. Limbs move of their own volition, and Irisa lifts Ved, hugs him to herself. The ship's solid wall parts, and she carries him across the threshold to safety, followed by Saburo. The hatch closes, and the ship lifts off, soaring high above city and forest.
Rejoice with me, brothers and sisters of Telorbat. Give me your Inner Voices in song: for Irisa was lost, and has come back. For Ved, whose cry brought even the Hlutr out of their age-old reveries, is delivered from his hell. Irisa, moved to mercy by his need, has saved him.
Riding high above that world, rooted unregarded in Irisa's brain, I sigh. When a poor creature such as this, so frightened of mere existence that she turns her back on it and chooses the cool depths of madness ... when this poor beast can feel such mercy, dare a Teacher of the Hlutr feel less? These Humans are wild and terrible, yet there is within them a core of true beauty. An age ago as they count time, we Hlutr agreed to help them as we could, to find and develop that beauty. To guide them when they faltered on their road to truth. To aid the honest ones among them as they sought maturity. And now, as I watch the dawning of a consciousness even I had thought lost forever, I reaffirm that vow.
Behind me, I feel my own Elders, and theirs, perhaps up to the Eldest Herself, I feel them sway in agreement. You have learned, Little One, they seem to say.
Irisa knows what I require, and gladly she gives me the use of her body one last time. “Very well, Saburo,” I say, “Bring Ved to me on Amny. We will find your cure to the Death. And the Hlutr shall administer it, though it cost the lives of many times twelve thousand of us."
Saburo nods, and the ship turns back toward home.
* * * *
Ved and Irisa stand before me, in the peaceful night of Amny, and the gentle breeze brings me their alien scents. Saburo is weak, and must be carried on a litter; they settle him next to my trunk, where I can feel the fevered warmth of his body.
Help me, brothers and sisters. Sing with me, Elders. Time is short, and the problem very complex. You who know Humans, and you who are experts in animal biochemistry: sing with me.
The Hlutr sing in the Inner Voice, for now we are decided and there can be no hesitation. Those of us who study the problem must live more quickly than is our wont—for the Death would require many seasons of Human study to yield its secrets. We Hlutr do not have their machines, their computers, their vast laboratories; we have far better, the massed minds of the Hlutr themselves. This is our work, the work we are meant for, and as we unlock the mysteries of the Death, I feel the orange-red flush of deepest happiness creep over my body.
Now we live still faster, and seasons of time to us are but minutes to the watching Humans. The song builds upon itself, reaching toward a shattering crescendo—then there is the taste of victory, the rush of joy, and ... silence.
I slow my rate of living, until once again I am in the time-frame of Humans. Exhilarated, I have complete control over my entire body; my answer comes in a song that fills the whole glade.
“Saburo, it is done. We can make a counter-virus for the Death. Hlutr will manufacture it, then spread it on all your twelve thousand worlds. In weeks, the Death will be over."
“Thank you, Teacher,” he croaks. “W-when will you begin?"
Before I can even frame the question in the Inner Voice, my Elders answer it. When you wish, Brother Hlut.
“We will commence the cure at once.” On all those twelve thousand worlds, many times twelve thousand Hlutr stand ready to give their lives in the final detonation that will assure survival for Mankind. The night is alive with their song, a mixed song of triumph and a twinge of regret.
One of us must be first.
To the memory of the Traveller within me, I say, “Are you happy with me, little brother?"
“I am happy with you,” he seems to say. “Come, Teacher ... join me and be remembered forever."
“Stand back,” I tell the waiting Humans. The dissolution is catastrophic, as it spreads Hlutr-substance on the winds and streams—but most of the force is directed upward. They need not withdraw too far. And I want Saburo near enough to catch full benefit of the cure.
Now I feel it build within me, as my Elders guide me in this final, most difficult task. The change comes like a building glow from the very center of my being, a welcome swell of warmth that lifts me toward the cool, eternal stars.
Hlutr have done their job well. The cure, I know, will work. There is a last surge in the song of the Hlutr ... my brothers and sisters, saluting me and this thing I do. Two faltering Human voices join this song; I look down and see Irisa and Ved standing hand-in-hand over Saburo. And ultimate peace rises from the soil to engulf me.
Content, I fly upward to meet the stars and at last to take my place in the Universal Song.
END
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Author's Note:
After the success of my novelette “The Leaves of October,” I was on the alert for another story featuring the Hlutr. I have always been interested in the sociology of diseases and plagues, so I started researching in detail. Soon I had my story.
Many of the events in “All Fall Down” were inspired by historical events during the Black Death and in other widespread plagues.
“All Fall Down” was chosen to appear in The 1988 World's Best SF (DAW, 1988). Eventually it became the second chapter of my novel The Leaves of October.
“All Fall Down” is part of my Scattered Worlds series. The story takes place circa 4000 CE, and has a Chronological Sequence number of 5.28. (For more information about the Scattered Worlds and Chronological Sequence numbers, visit www.scatteredworlds.com.)
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