Amy Thomson: The Color of Distance

“Ilto is right,” Ninto said when Ani followed her out to thank her. “You are ready to become an elder. You handled that well.” A mist of regret clouded the colors of her words. “I’ll miss Ilto when he goes.”

“I think Ilto will die rather than leave the village,” Ani said.

“Does it matter?” Ninto asked. “Either way, he will be dead to us here.”

Ani disagreed. She wanted to know Ilto was alive somewhere in the world, even if she never saw him again. She said nothing. Ninto was an elder, and one didn’t argue with elders.

Ninto brushed her knuckles across Ani’s shoulder. “Thank you for letting me help.” She paused, and there was a flicker of color on her chest as though she was about to say something else. Instead she turned and climbed down the trunk.

That afternoon, Ilto took Ani and a tinka to help gather food for the evening meal. Their hunting went well. They killed two plump, scaly mityak and an unwary young moodar, its feathers bright with courtship colors. The tinka found a rotting log full of grubs, and gathered a bag full of bardarr berries. They would eat well tonight. Before returning, they paused to lay out a paste made from yarram and mashed dindi roots as bait to attract mantu. Back at the village tree, they rewarded the tinka with a strip of dried yarram each and a share of the food they had gathered, and returned to their room.

They ate steadily. Every time Ilto paused, Ani handed him some particularly choice delicacy. She wanted to be sure he ate as much as he possibly could before they started working again on the new creature. Ilto also pushed her to eat. At last, her stomach tight and bulging, Ani could eat no more. Ilto sent her to bed. Exhausted, Ani burrowed into her warm, moist bed of leaves and fell asleep.

Ninto woke her. The rank smell of sickness filled the room. Ninto’s skin was clouded with worry. Ani glanced over at Ilto. His breathing sounded ragged and reugh and his skin had the flat, silvery sheen of sickness.

“He drugged you to keep you asleep, and then started working again on the new creature,” Ninto said. “A tinka found him. Since it couldn’t wake you, it got me. Ilto won’t let me help him. He keeps breaking the link.”

Ani linked with Ilto. The alien taint in his blood was stronger than ever. She recognized it now. Some of the new creature’s cells had gotten into his body, and were attacking Ilto.

“Can you do anything?” Ninto asked.

Startled by the question, Ani looked at Ninto for a long moment before replying. If this was beyond Ninto’s skills, then it was probably beyond hers. She would try, though. She was willing to do anything for Ilto.

“It will be deep work,” Ani said. She had never been monitored by anyone other than Ilto.

“I’ll monitor you,” Ninto said, answering her undepicted request.

Ani linked with Ninto and closed her eyes. Ninto’s presence in the link felt so much like Ilto’s. It reassured her as she reached in through the link to sample Ilto’s blood.

With no warning at all, the link broke. Ninto eased Ani back into balance, then gently eased out of the link.

Ani opened her eyes and sat up. She reached out to Ilto to try again.

Ilto’s eyes flickered open. His hands moved away from hers. “No, don’t,” Ilto told her, his words pale under the deathlike silver sheen of his illness. “It might make you sick. I’ll take care of myself. The creature is ready; start the changes and put it in jeetho.”

“Siti, please—” Ani began, but Ilto’s eyes closed and he slid back into unconsciousness. She looked at Ninto, hoping for help.

“He told us not to interfere,” Ninto said, her skin olive-grey with resignation. “There’s nothing more that we can do but let him be and hope he gets better on his own.” She picked up a tumbi and handed it to Ani. “Now, eat. You’ll need your strength. We’ve got to put that thing in jeetho before Ilto recovers enough to start tinkering with it again. I’ve asked Hanto to look after Ilto while we’re busy.”

A large group of mottled brown mantu were feeding placidly on the bait they had left the night before. Ninto and her bami, Baha, helped Ani gather about two dozen of them. The mantu retreated beneath their oval shells as they were picked up.

Back at the village, they hauled an enormous trough from one of the storerooms. Pulling a mantu out of her gathering bag, Ani pried up the horny operculum that sealed the base of the shell. She sank her spur into the soft, yielding flesh beneath, injecting it with an enzyme that began the process of turning the mantu into jeetho, and put the shell in the trough. Ninto squatted beside her, and began stinging the mantu she had gathered.

The mantu flesh began melting as the enzyme took effect. Baha removed the shells, opercula, and any undissolved organs from the slimy grey mass. Nothing of the mantu would go to waste. The shells would eventually become feast platters, the horny operculum would be made into tools and ornaments, and the organs would be fed to the narey.

At last the gathering bags were empty. Ani leaned against the side of the trough. She felt drained and slightly dizzy from the effort of producing so much dissolution enzyme. Normally they only needed a few mantu, but the new creature required a huge batch of jeetho.

After stopping to rest and eat, they resumed work. The jeetho was now a translucent grey jelly, covered with a frothy black scum which they skimmed off. Once the jelly was clean, Ani stuck her wrist spurs into it and injected another trigger chemical. She stirred the jelly, tasting it with a wrist spur. The jelly began to stiffen and turn a faint pink. Ninto stuck a spur into the mass and flushed approvingly.

“You can leave it now,” Ninto said. She brushed her knuckles across Ani’s shoulder. “You did well.”

Ani turned and glanced inquiringly over at Ilto.

“He’s better,” Hanto told her. “He’ll be weak and shaky for a while, but he will recover. He’s a strong old kular. Just don’t let him play with that again,” she said, gesturing with her chin at the new creature.

By morning the jeetho was transformed from a grey jelly into a reddish mass, striated with veins. The surface rippled as air rushed through its primitive respiratory system. Several simple hearts pulsed rhythmically inside it. It was ready to receive the new creature.

Ani injected the strange animal with a trigger chemical to initiate the changes laid down by Ilto. Then they stung the jeetho once again, and laid the animal on it. The jeetho softened, and the new creature began to sink down into it. As Ani and Ninto watched, veins began growing into the creature’s skin.

This was a risky time. The creature would either live or die, depending on how well Ilto had done his work. Could it survive inside the jeetho? Ani stuck a spur into the creature, monitoring its adaptation. Its complex heart beat slowly and strongly in a strange one-two rhythm. The level of oxygen in the creature’s blood dipped as its face was covered, then rose again as the jeetho took over the task of supplying it with oxygen.

Once she was sure the new creature would survive inside the jeetho, Ani broke her link, pushing its arm into the clinging red jelly. The strange animal inside would be fed and nourished by the jeetho until its metamorphosis was complete. She stung the jeetho one last time. In a couple of days the jeetho would develop a tough, leathery skin.

Ani and Ninto hid the creature in a storeroom. When the jeetho’s skin hardened, they concealed the new animal in one of Ninto’s na trees, where it would not tempt Ilto while he recovered.

Juna awoke to darkness and confinement. She was inside some kind of damp, leathery sack. She tore her way out and found herself staring down at a fifty-meter drop. She moaned and clutched the tree branch she was on, her claws sinking deep into the bark. Claws?