Butler, Octavia - Adulthood Rites

Now, here was Tino, childless and unused to children, but quickly at ease with them, quickly accepted by them.

Now, here was Tino, nearly dead at the hands of his own kind.

Dichaan linked with his nervous system and kept his heart beating. The man was a beautiful, terrible physical contradiction, as all Humans were. He was a walking seduction, and he would never understand why. He would not be lost. He could not be another Joseph.

There was some brain damage. Dichaan could perceive it, but he could not heal it. Nikanj would have to do that. But Dichaan could keep the damage from growing worse. He stopped the blood loss, which was not as bad as it looked, and made certain the living brain cells had intact blood vessels to nourish them. He found damage to the skull and perceived that the damaged bone was exerting abnormal pressure on the brain. This, he did not tamper with. Nikanj would handle it. Nikanj could do it faster and more certainly than a male or female could.

Dichaan waited until Tino was as stable as he could be, then left him for a moment. He went to the edge of Lo to one of the larger buttresses of a pseudotree and struck it several times in the code of pressures he would have used to supplement exchanged sensory impressions. The pressures would normally be used very rapidly, soundlessly, against another person’s flesh. It would take a moment for this drumming to be perceived as communication. But it would be noticed. Even if no Oankali or construct heard it, the Lo entity would pick up the familiar groups of vibrations. It would alert the community the next time someone opened a wall or raised a platform.

Dichaan pounded out the message twice, then went back to Tino and lay down to monitor him and wait.

Now there was time to think about what he had been too late to prevent.

Akin was gone—had been gone for some time. His abductors had been Human males—resisters. They had run toward the river. No doubt they had already headed up-or downriver toward their village—or perhaps they had crossed the river and traveled over land. Either way, their scent trail would probably vanish along the river. He had included in his message instructions to search for them, but he was not hopeful. All resister villages had to be searched. Akin would be found. Phoenix in particular would be checked, since it had once been Tino’s home. But would men from Phoenix have hated Tino so much? He did not seem to be the kind of man people could know and still hate. The people of Phoenix who had watched him grow up as the village’s only child must have felt as parents toward him. They would have been more likely to abduct him along with Akin.

Akin.

They would not hurt him—not intentionally. Not at first. He still nursed, but he did it more for comfort than for nutrition. He had an Oankali ability to digest whatever he was given and make the most of it. If they fed him what they ate, he would satisfy his body’s needs.

Did they know how intelligent he was? Did they know he could talk? If not, how would they react when they found out? Humans reacted badly to surprise. He would be careful, of course, but what did he know of angry, frightened, frustrated Humans? He had never been near even one person who might hate him, who might even hurt him when they discovered that he was not as Human as he looked.

2

Upriver.

The Humans had a long, smooth, narrow canoe, light and easy to row. Two pairs of men took turns at the oars, and the boat cut quickly through the water. The current was not strong. Working in relay as they were, the men never slowed to rest.

Akin had screamed as loudly as he could as long as there had been any chance of his being heard. But no one had come. He was quiet now, exhausted and miserable. The man who had caught him still held him, had once dangled him by his feet and threatened to dunk him in the river if he did not be quiet. Only the intervention of the other men had stopped him from doing this. Akin was terrified of him. The man honestly did not seem to understand why murder and abduction should disturb Akin or stop him from following orders.

Akin stared at the man’s broad, bearded, red face, breathed his sour breath. His was a bitter, angry face whose owner might hurt him for acting like a baby, yet might kill him for acting like anything else. The man held him as disgustedly as he had once seen another man hold a snake. Was he as alien as a snake to these people?

The bitter man looked down, caught Akin staring. “What the hell are you looking at?” he demanded.

Akin ceased to watch the man with his eyes, but kept him in view with other light-sensitive parts of his body. The man stank of sweat and of something else. Something was wrong with his body—some illness. He needed an ooloi. And he would never go near one.

Akin lay very still in his arms and, somehow, eventually, fell asleep.

He awoke to find himself lying between two pairs of feet on a piece of soggy cloth at the bottom of the boat. Water sloshing on him had awakened him.

He sat up cautiously, knowing before he moved that the current was stronger here and that it was raining. Raining hard. The man who had been holding Akin began to bail water from the boat with a large gourd. If the rain continued or got worse, surely they would stop.

Akin looked around at the land and saw that the banks were high and badly eroded—cliffs with vegetation spilling over the edges. He had never seen such things. He was farther from home than he had ever been, and still traveling. Where would they take him?

into the hills?

into the mountains?

The men gave up their effort and rowed for the bank. The water was gray-brown and rough, and the rain was coming down harder. They did not quite make it to shore before the canoe sank. The men cursed and jumped out to pull the boat onto a broad mud flat, while Akin stayed where he was, all but swimming. They dumped the boat, tipping both him and the water over one side, laughing when he slid along the mud.

One of them grabbed him by a leg and tried to hand him to the man who had captured him.

His captor would not take him. “You babysit for a while,” the man said. “Let him piss on you.”

Akin was barely able to stop himself from speaking out in indignation. He had not urinated on anyone for months—not since his family had been able to make him understand that he should not, that he should warn them when he needed to urinate or move his bowels. He would not have urinated even on these men.

“No thanks,” said the man holding Akin by the foot. “I just rowed the damn boat god knows how many miles while you sat there and watched the scenery. Now you can watch the kid.” He put Akin down on the mud flat and turned to help carry the boat to a place where they might be able to make their way up the bank. The mud flat was exactly that—a sliver of soft, wet, bare silt collected only just above the water. It was neither safe nor comfortable in the downpour. And night was coming. Time to find a place to camp.

Akin’s babysitter stared at Akin with cold dislike. He rubbed his stomach, and, for a moment, pain seemed to replace his general displeasure. Perhaps his stomach hurt him. How stupid to be sick and know where there was healing and decide to stay sick.

Abruptly, the man grabbed Akin, lifted him by one arm, thrust him under one of the man’s own long, thick arms, and followed the others up the steep, muddy trail.

Akin shut his eyes during the climb. His captor was not surefooted. He kept falling but somehow never fell on Akin or dropped him. He did, however, hold him so tightly that Akin could hardly breathe, so tightly the man’s fingers hurt and bruised him. He whimpered and sometimes cried out, but most of the time he tried to keep quiet. He feared this man as he had never before feared anyone. This man who had been eager to dunk him in water that might contain predators, who had gripped him and shaken him and threatened to punch him because he was crying, this man who was apparently willing to endure pain rather than go to someone who would heal him and ask nothing of him—this man might kill him before anyone could act to stop him.