Robert Sawyer: Foreigner

At last, Novato reached the top of the stairs. She crossed the wooden platform leading to the ship’s half-closed door. That door led into a tiny chamber, the far wall of which contained another door. The chamber itself was completely empty, except for some grillwork on the walls.

This double-doored room was the subject of much debate.

Some thought it was an animal trap. Bait might have been used to lure prey into the outer chamber, then the outside door would have been closed quickly and the inner door not opened until the animal within had asphyxiated or starved to death. Certainly no hunter would catch food that way, but the bodies of the snip’s crew were so bizarre that one could scarcely imagine them actively pursuing food.

Others suggested the double-doored room served almost exactly the opposite function: a safety feature to prevent any of the animals aboard the ship from escaping—it was, after all, an ark—while crewmembers were disembarking.

Novato doubted both theories. She was certain there was another, more elegant explanation, but no matter how hard she contemplated it, the answer remained elusive.

Oh, well , she thought. Just one of many things about this ship I don’t understand.

As she had countless times before, Novato squeezed through the half-closed door with her lamp, entering the vast ark, looking for a miracle to help save her people.

Afsan’s recovery was remarkable. His shoulder had been easy enough to reposition, but getting the broken pieces of his skull to line up properly had been difficult and painful. Mondark had used gut ties to sew shut the gashes on Afsan’s muzzle and head, Afsan having remained stoically silent as the surgeon’s needle repeatedly pierced his skin.

Afsan had spent the night of the accident, and the one that followed, lying on Mondark’s surgical table, slowly regaining strength. Finally, when he was well enough to move, Afsan’s assistant, the lanky Pal-Cadool, had come to take him home.

That had been twenty days ago. Mondark had insisted that Afsan return every ten days so that his injuries could be checked.

“How do you feel today?” asked the healer.

“All right, I suppose,” said Afsan, “although the new skin itches, and the side of my head is still tender to the touch.”

“That’s to be expected. Frankly, you’re doing much better than I’d have thought. I didn’t think you were going to make it.”

Afsan clicked his jaws together. The gaps in his sawtooth dentition where teeth had been knocked out had begun to fill in with pointed buds. “No one is more pleased than me that your diagnosis was in error. How do I look?”

Mondark’s turn to click his teeth. “Well, nothing I could do would make you pretty, Afsan. If you want miracles, you’ll have to see a priest. But on the whole, you look remarkably well. Your scars are bright yellow, but the scabbing has diminished. Your back is still bruised around your shoulder blade, but that will clear up in time. Does it still give you pain?”

“Yes. But it’s getting better.”

“Good. And you’ve been following my advice about no heavy lifting?”

“Right,” said Afsan. “I’ve been skipping my usual shift on the docks.”

“Good. Now, let me remove your stitches. I’m going to touch your face.”

Mondark used a tiny pair of scissors to gently lift and cut each of the gut strings. Then, using his claws as pincers, he pulled the little threads out. Despite his efforts at stoicism, Afsan winced slightly as each one came free.

After removing the stitches on Afsan’s muzzle, the healer repeated the process for the ones on the side of his head. Eventually he stopped, but for some reason he didn’t move away from Afsan’s face. After a few moments, Mondark said, “How are your eyes?”

Afsan’s voice was cold. “Your repartee is slipping, Doctor. That’s not very funny.”

“I mean, there’s something different about your eyelids. It’s almost as if… Afsan, forgive me, but can you open your eyelids?”

“I never do that. It hurts to have the sockets exposed.”

“I know, but… forgive me, I’d like to open them myself. I’m going to touch your face.”

Afsan flinched at the sensation of Mondark’s fingers on the side of his head. He felt a strange coldness as his left eyelid was peeled open.

The healer sucked in his breath. “By the eggshells of the hunters…”

“What? What is it?”

“Afsan, can you see me?”

“What?”

“Can you see me?”

“Doctor, what are you talking about?”

Without any warning, Mondark’s fingers were on Afsan’s other eyelid, prying it open. “God,” he said.

With Afsan’s green lids peeled back, Mondark could see into his eye sockets. From the bottom of each pink fleshy well, a wet all-black sphere, about half the size of a normal Quintaglio eye, stared out at him.

Mondark had Afsan force his eyelids open while he brought a candle close to Afsan’s face. Quintaglio pupils were hard to discern against the all-black sclera, and light played across the wet surface making it all the more difficult to see, but there could be no doubt: Afsan’s pupils were contracting in response to the candlelight.

“Eyes don’t regenerate,” Afsan said, incredulous. “They’re like internal organs. Damage to them is permanent.”

Mondark moved across the room; too much closeness was bad for both of them. “Usually, that’s true. But very, very rarely, an organ, even an eye, will grow back. It usually only happens to young children, but it’s not unheard-of in adults.”

“But it was twenty kilodays ago that I was blinded. Why would my eyes be coming back now?”

“No doubt your recent head wound has something to do with it. You had to regenerate a lot of bone, a lot of flesh, a lot of muscle. Somehow your body went on to regenerate your eyes, too. Of course, they’re not fully back yet; they’re only about half normal size.”

Afsan shook his head. “That’s incredible.” And then, after a moment, he spoke again, his voice tremulous, as if he feared the answer. “So when the eyes have finished regenerating, will I be able to see again?”

Mondark was quiet for a time. “I don’t know. Your eyes have already regenerated in all functional aspects. Oh, they’re still too small; presumably they’ll continue to grow to fill the sockets. But the lenses are clear, the pupils are responsive, and both eyes track left and right in unison. Whether the eyes will actually work for vision, I don’t know.” Another pause. “You say you can’t see anything now?”

“That’s right.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Nothing.”

“Not even when I brought that candle flame close a moment ago?”

“No, not a thing. It’s pitch black, just like it’s been since… since Yenalb did this to me.”

“Well, come back in ten days. And come immediately if you get any hint of vision—a flash of light, a blurry image, anything.”

“I will, Mondark.” Afsan faced him from across the room, his eyelids open, the half-size black spheres appearing to look at him from the bottoms of their sockets.

The Dasheter continued to sail in. It was clear that they were approaching a small group of islands. Discounting the icy polar caps, until moments ago Land and its attendant archipelagos had been the only known dry ground in the world.

But now there was someplace else: a new land with possibly untold riches. Not gold or diamonds; those weren’t the types of riches Toroca was looking for. No, his Geological Survey sought valuables of another kind: things that could be used to aid in the effort to get the Quintaglio people off their doomed world.