by Nōnen Títi
Nini looked at Irma for understanding, but it was Flori who nodded first. All were quiet then. Nobody wanted to open that door again, but in the silence they prepared to do it anyway. It was part of the job they had chosen to do. Nobody had said it would be easy. Maike promised to get some helpers.
Their faces covered with wet cloths to protect them from the putrid smell, and with plastic sheathing taken from some viewpanels to cover their bodies, they set to the grim task of identifying over ten sets of people. More than double than had died on the lander.
With three kor of people working in teams, it took two days. Every hour they had to stop for a drink and some air. Every so now and then somebody had to walk away to vomit or just cry for a while. The hardest were the people they knew… had known. Where decay had set in it became almost impossible. One whole family had succumbed to the disease. Maybe that was better: nobody left behind.
Some people questioned the need for this, considering that relatives were asking anyway and only a few from those brought to the clinic had survived, but it gave a sense of conclusion to have the proof. Irma went out time after time to talk to people. Benjamar came in and out, as did Maike. She had recruited those who were most social from different backgrounds and habitats; those most likely to recognize a face without having to look for items or features.
Between the sadness and the breakdowns, Nini felt an underlying optimism: She had been needed. They’d done the best they could. The sheer number and the sudden onset had overwhelmed them all, and the lack of knowledge and resources had them all in fear, but Nini had been no less capable than any of them.
Not the entire settlement had succumbed as Irma had been afraid might happen. Five out of every six colonists lived. People’s bodies could fight back – not all, but many. More such times would come, maybe worse, but they would never stop trying. They had relied on each other, not just in the clinic, but every person in town. All had been equally vulnerable; all quarrels and backgrounds, like Wana’s robe, meaningless.
But those were the logical explanations for her optimism. There was another feeling, one of intense peace and power which had come with the apparition of the veiled woman and hadn’t left her since. This was not the same woman from Nini’s earlier dreams, the old healer, and yet she had something to do with her. Nini didn’t mention that part to anybody, not even to Jema or Marya as she sat down with them when it was all over, their little home more than ever warm and safe. Both had been there for her throughout it all, quiet and undemanding. Life, no matter how bad, was good to Nini.
Burning Issues
Benjamar pulled his hand back, shocked that it had been in mid-air ready to hit Roilan, who followed the movement with his eyes all the way before answering Benjamar’s threat. “I merely did what made most sense. Irma said the bodies needed to be burned, so I organized it.”
“Without considering anybody else?”
“Of course I did; I’m not totally stupid. I took precautions. Just after Kundown is the least windy time and all surrounding buildings have been evacuated.”
“If that’s what you think I was talking about, then you are stupid.”
Roilan shuffled, aware of the people standing nearby hearing this. Benjamar didn’t care if they heard – he was angry. Angry at Roilan for having the clinic set on fire, just like that, because it was the least windy time, and angry at himself for not having organized something sooner, so people like Roilan couldn’t do this.
“I talked to Frantag first,” Roilan defended his action.
“Frantag is in no condition to make decisions like that. Don’t use him as an excuse. I’m holding you responsible if anything goes wrong – not Irma, and not Frantag.”
“Nothing will go wrong,” Roilan said.
But it was already going wrong: The bits of peat and oily rags they had stuffed into the clinic were not enough to produce the heat required. The bodies would smoulder at the edges, no more, and then what? It didn’t make sense; not for the pale looking faces that had come to watch this burning, the news of it spreading faster than the smoke the fire did produce.
Benjamar covered his face and walked away in search of someone or something to help out. At the corner of one of the streets leading into the square, he found Maike and a handful of guards trying to stop the onlookers from getting too close. One of those looking on, being held back with an immobilizer pointed at his head, called for Benjamar’s attention: It was Yako. Ever since the trial, the young man had regularly voiced his opinions, which were often different from the norm and, though sometimes a little too extreme, nonetheless worth hearing.
“There’s no talking to her,” Yako said, indicating Maike.
Benjamar slapped his hand down on top of the immobilizer the guard was holding. “Get that thing out of my way.”
Maike frowned when she approached. “What’s wrong?”
“Everything is wrong. Why did you go along with this without seeking confirmation?”
She frowned again. “I assumed it was a government decision, Benjamar. Roilan told me we’d have to burn tonight and to keep the people at a safe distance, so that’s what I’m doing.”
“I had hoped you had more sense in you than to just follow orders. By Bue, Maike, what government were you thinking of? Frantag can’t move for grief, Kalgar is gone, and the rest were up for elections. Who is Roilan to give you orders?”
She sighed, shaking her head. “I don’t know. It had to be done anyway. I thought the sooner the better.”
“I know that, Maike, but people should have been informed. It’s their families lying there: They needed a chance to say goodbye – some kind of ceremony, a few words. You don’t just set fire to the place.”
“I’m sorry.”
She looked worn out, ready to give up. She’d not had time to sit or think this last kor.
Benjamar put his hand on her shoulder. “Never mind. We’ll do a speech after. Do me a favour, though – get your people to lay down those immobilizers before they fall into the wrong hands. We almost lost Wilam. Get rid of them for good. Burn them.”
Maike protested, saying the guards were under strict instruction not to use them, and that they helped keep order.
“As long as they exist they will be used, and not always for the right reasons,” Benjamar replied.
“There are no right reasons,” Yako said. “Wars can’t be fought without weapons to fight them with, which makes their existence in itself an act of war and thus a wrong reason. All they do is emphasize how powerless the people are, which only fuels anger.”
“I didn’t ask you. You can’t even keep track of one man,” Maike retorted.
“Just imagine Tigor and his gang getting their hands on them,” Yako continued.
“What are you still doing here?” Benjamar asked him.
“Trying to convince her that this fire won’t do any good.”
“That’s right, and neither does your presence here. So go find a solution. Get better fuel. Get some helpers and then come back. Maike won’t stop you.”
Yako left after Benjamar had convinced Maike of the need for more fuel.
“What happened with Wilam was a freak incident. These haven’t been charged up since SJilai and shouldn’t be active anymore. They’re only there to make a point.”
“They’re making the wrong point, Maike.”
She was not that easy to persuade and insisted that the guards wouldn’t feel safe without them. Since Benjamar had just told her not to follow orders, he couldn’t expect her to make an exception in his case, so he left her to think it over. A leader was needed; not just the first loud-mouth who assumed the right to organize because he had been there when Frantag gave up. Roilan might feel empowered, being able to act, but he should also know when to back down.
Benjamar entered Frantag’s home without knocking. “The town needs you,” he said. “Help me organize a ceremony for your comate – for everybody.”
But his plea was once again to n
o avail. Frantag admitted that Roilan had come to see him, and that he’d said, “Just do as you think right.”
Could Roilan be blamed, then, for taking that advice for what it was?
Benjamar had done what he had after the storm, aware, more than ever, that in an emergency he should concentrate on keeping people moving. He had done just that. He’d gathered up those walking around aimlessly and helped them find a purpose, a place, and a job. Once the panic was over and the medical staff set about identifying bodies, he’d taken the job of going home to home; talking, informing, advising, and, most of all, listening. Listening to questions to which he had no answers, like why had this happened, and to tears he had no comfort for. Because somebody had to do it, because Irma couldn’t do it all alone; because people needed to talk, to eat, to clean, and to work until life would go on – just as it always did – until they had cried their water and started over, as Daili used to put it.
But Benjamar had found it very hard this time around: hard to get himself up after a sleepless night, hard because it was all so desperate. Kalgar should have been the leader to stand up and order people around. Frantag? It was painful just to look at him. “I should have never come,” he repeated, over and over.
Too many people were like that. Few had been out; few had eaten or cooked anything. Most were frightened to drink the water, so Benjamar had gone out again to warn for the danger of not drinking at all, repeating Irma’s words about it.
He had sat in too many inconsolable homes: In Daili’s home while Kalim cried like a little boy; cried over the loss of Daili and Tikot, with the girls standing by, Laytji unapproachable, in shock, and Hani repeating, “It’s not fair – it’s just not fair!”
But fairness had nothing to do with it. It was the random effect of the epidemic that terrified people – it hadn’t just attacked the ‘bad guys’. And now this harsh decision to just go ahead and burn the clinic, without any regard for the losses people had suffered, a hasty decision based on fear and a vague knowledge that bodies could be burned. Roilan was an engineer; he should have had the sense to consider how much heat was required for a furnace that size.
Thinking thus, Benjamar ended up at Nini’s home. When things were bad, she was his strength. He needed her to put it all in perspective – the anger he still felt for Roilan, and for all the wasted lives. He told all three women about the half-cast fire at the clinic, the immobilizers, and about having been so close to hitting Roilan.
“You need to take a rest yourself. You’re right that people shouldn’t sit down, but they shouldn’t keep walking forever, either,” Nini said.
Marya agreed with her. “That goes for Maike and Roilan too. As much as I don’t like the guy, he also hasn’t stopped helping all this time, yet I’ve heard people blaming him for it. They say he was unwilling to replace the drying well because it meant giving in to Frimon.”
Both were right. Everybody was tired. It was easy to lose control that way.
Jema stressed that this would fire up the stand-off between Roilan and Frimon rather than solving it, unless someone stepped in and took charge now. Like Roilan, Frimon was also hearing accusations. The Society had lost none of its closest people, which could have to do with their seclusion, but gossip was going around that maybe he had been responsible – that Frimon had threatened to contaminate the well, while he had only warned for the dangers. “People will go looking for a culprit and next they’ll come to you to put on a trial and stick someone in prison. They’ll call it justice for the hurt and the suffering,” she said.
Benjamar had heard them too, the twisted truths based on fear that Daili had mentioned. He told the women he was doing everything he could to get Frantag back on his feet, but it could take a while. In the meantime he would not allow anybody to point a finger at someone else. He told them what he’d told Hani: The disease didn’t pick and choose. It had taken those who were tired or weak or had less resistance. Nobody was too blame.
“Be careful how you say that then and to whom,” Jema said. Her eyes were smiling, but it wasn’t a real smile; there was more to her words.
Trying to get to the bottom of it, Benjamar looked her over. It was hard to describe her in any way other than literally. She was neither short nor tall, neither round nor thin, neither dark nor pale, neither expressive nor plain. He could go on like that; nothing stood out and yet she didn’t go unnoticed. She was attractive in being nothing special and she was nothing special only until she opened her mouth. Every word was a challenge and that was what he’d heard just now. He raised his eyebrows to ask her what she’d meant.
She evaded the question. “People don’t need a politician; in an emergency they need a leader. Maybe you should make it clear to everybody that this was Kun DJar talking, that this was her second warning. Daili believed it was possible.”
“It’s not like Kun DJar has a mind of its own,” Marya said.
“Says who?”
“It’s not possible.”
Nini stepped in. Maybe she found it too early for a debate. “You don’t have to see Kun DJar as having a personality, but Jema may still be right. We invaded the planet like the protozoa invaded the people. They attacked all of us, not just those who died. The reason we lived is because our bodies had a means of defence; they sent out a counter-attack to kill the invaders and won. We became immune. Maybe the planet needed to become immune to us.”
That’s what he loved about Nini. Not only had she diverted the rising tension, but she’d also come up with a plausible answer to the questions people would be asking. He left them a little while later to follow Nini’s suggestion and get some rest.
It took three days before the last of the fire went out, after the fuel from the landers – which, to Roilan’s irritation, Yako and a group of other men had carried in – had incinerated everything inside the building. It was three days of people walking by, glancing into the burned-out door and panels, to see what they could recognize. Three days of guards – with immobilizers – trying to prevent them from doing so. Three days of smoke which sat in people’s clothes and hair, no matter how hard they washed them. Three days before Frantag finally emerged because Benjamar threatened to have him dragged out. Three days before Maike came walking into his home late at night and in tears. She’d held out longer than most others.
“Those miserable idiots. We haven’t even had the chance to get over this and they’re starting again.”
He gave her a drink and let her spill it all: The search for a culprit had caused its first fight and Maike had brought one man to the emergency infirmary and locked three of them in the prison. She talked until she fell asleep on his floor.
Wolt wrote the first article for the bulletin four days after the burning. He started with words of regret and listed the people who had died. Seeing the name of a loved one on paper – even if it was a crinkled piece of recycled paper – helped those left behind feel the person was not forgotten.
Wolt stressed the importance of a renewed effort to organize elections as soon as possible, though he acknowledged the need for a bit of time to allow the followers of Jenet and Kalgar to find a replacement. He went on to list the most pressing needs for the colony in the light of the disaster. The words might have been Wolt’s, but the ideas that followed were Roilan’s.
A few days later, another bulletin sat on the wall of the social building. It wasn’t Wolt’s writing and it was equally biased, but this time in favour of Frimon. Somebody had decided that Wolt should not have the sole right to the public opinion anymore. There was nothing wrong with that, but what came next was a reaction from Wolt in stronger terms, followed by another piece from the other side, which, as Benjamar found out, was written by Harmon.
He dropped in at their home. “I see we have two bulletins nowadays.”
“Just so people get to read two opinions,” Harmon said.
“So where are the illustrations?”
Wolt answered that Kunag didn’t want to do them any
more. “He’s tired of the news and he’s grieving for his father.”
“And he doesn’t want to take sides,” Harmon added.
Benjamar warned the both of them to be careful how they worded their articles: “Even if you represent one opinion, you can’t just repeat threats or lies to hurt the other side.”
He left them, resenting that what should have become a time of forgiveness and remembrance was turning back into a competition between extremes, with nobody to take charge but the two men who had been rallying for elections until the day the disease took its first victim.
Frimon’s group might be peaceful and seek divine protection, but his words were of punishment for the destruction of the land. Fear about the unpredictability of natural disasters drove many to join his meetings at night, hoping to find safety in whatever it was that had protected the Society, believing what they had never believed before, needing the promise that it wouldn’t happen to them. Frimon was delighted to deliver that promise.
Roilan, in contrast, reacted with a purely scientific approach: The water had been contaminated because their lifestyle was too simplistic. He called civilization a basic right, and those who just couldn’t believe in a higher power flocked to Roilan for the same kind of promises.
But it was easy for people to put their name up and make promises; carrying them out was the hard part. Without Kalgar it was likely that they wouldn’t even manage to organize elections and somewhere during all the anger and the grief, the fact that Frantag was still around seemed to have been forgotten.
Besides, elections were no longer the first need for the colony. Governing was about leadership, providing stability, mediating between parties, and establishing some basic laws to protect all people. Somebody had to stand up as governor and that somebody should be Frantag, who somehow had to step back into public life. He had to stand up and look at the future, no matter how hard that may be, and organize the second expedition. “Now more than ever, Frantag, we need to find a location for another settlement. A colony shouldn’t have all its people in one place.”
