Eschaton 1 – The Other End of Time

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Dan

They didn't walk back to the yurts. They fled. As rapidly as they could, all of them craning their necks to watch for pursuit-but Dannerman knew that if the amphibians attacked again there was very little they could do about it. He had organized them as best he could, but under the circumstances his best was not a lot. Martin had turned out to be able to walk, more or less. He was staggering, confused, seeming tranced and bewildered, with little strength in his limbs. But Jimmy Lin supported him on one side and Patrice on the other, and he managed. Rosaleen Artzybachova was making it on her own-not very well, either, but limping after the others with Pat's help; Pat was carrying Patsy's bundled-up clothing, too, and she had a spear to handle as well, since she was all they had in the way of a rear guard against the amphibians.

Dannerman was carrying the body of Patsy. Jimmy Lin had offered, but Dannerman could not let the man touch her damp, cooling and naked body. Dannerman had her cradled in his two hands, each one also holding a spear. Part of the time he walked backward, scanning the path behind them for possible attackers; there were none. One of Patsy's lax arms hung toward the ground. The other lay across her body, as though trying to preserve modesty. But she had no modesty left to preserve. Though her head hung down Dannerman could see that her eyes were open and so was her mouth. Patsy Adcock would never have let herself be seen in so unflattering a pose. She didn't look pretty. She barely looked like herself; she looked only dead.

Dannerman looked away. They had other things to think of. They would have to bury Patsy, which meant somehow digging a grave. He would have to organize some sort of guard duty to watch for a possible attack. What he would do if that happened he did not know; the yurts were simply not defensible. But there would have to be some sort of plan. Useless or not, it would have to be tried.

There was another thought swelling inside him, bursting to come out-well, no, he corrected himself; not a thought exactly. A pain. A deep hurt that he had never experienced before and did not know how to deal with. Sooner or later he would have to let it come to the surface-

But not yet.

As soon as they had crossed the little stream he put Patsy's body down, as gently as he could, and began giving orders. Martin was to be put to bed in one of the yurts, Rosaleen in the other. Jimmy Lin would be the first to stand guard, while Pat searched the yurts for something to dig a grave with. The others listened attentively. They didn't offer objections to his seizure of command. They moved. But they did not, exactly, obey. Jimmy Lin's first care was for his precious little fire, and only when that was fed did he, not Pat, begin looking for digging tools. Rosaleen flatly refused to be shut away from the others, so Patrice hauled a pallet out of a yurt for the old lady to lie on. Then Jimmy returned with a couple of flat-bladed wooden things that would do as scoops, and he and Dannerman began using their metal spears to loosen clods of dirt, while Pat and Patrice silently dressed Patsy's body. They didn't talk much. There wasn't much to say.

Digging a grave took a long time with crude tools, even though Pat and Patrice pitched in, scooping the clods of earth away when Dannerman and Jimmy had loosened them. Dannerman didn't notice the passage of time. He was glad for something to do, because that interior ache was rising willy-nilly to the surface of his thoughts. When the grave got too deep for both of them to be able to dig, he hopped out and let Jimmy stab and scoop while he confronted it.

The problem was this: How did you mourn the death of one-third of a lover?

This stiffening corpse by the side of the deepening grave was Pat. True, it was not the Pat, with whom he had made love just hours before, but certainly a Pat, indistinguishable from the very alive woman with whom he had talked and played and shared so much of a life, from childhood on. No, there was no doubt of it. When someone you "loved"-it was the first time he had used that word, even to himself-when someone you loved died you had to feel pain. Dannerman did feel pain, a lot of pain. But how baffling it was to see two copies of that beloved woman alive and well and helping to dig the grave.

To be sure, those other two were definitely mourning. There was no confusion in the tears and self-reproach. "If I hadn't panicked and stabbed the thing," Patrice kept muttering to Pat, even while she was scooping away the loose dirt into a pile. "Maybe they wouldn't have done anything. Maybe-"

The maybes were not helpful. Dannerman stood up. "My turn, Jimmy," he called, and replaced the astronaut in the pit. He had barely begun to dig when Jimmy Lin yelled and grabbed for a spear, and when Dannerman turned to look he saw a regular circus parade approaching: four or five of the great Docs, marching toward them, with Dopey perched in the arms of one of them.

"What is going on?" Dopey called fretfully. "Why are you digging holes? I have brought you your guns-it took a very long time to secure them, with much danger. Now there is no time for the digging of holes, since we must hurry and reclaim our base from the Horch!"

Dopey didn't take kindly to being told that the conquest of the Horch machines would have to wait. But then, when someone had explained to him what had happened, he was disgusted but surprisingly helpful. "General Delasquez," he remarked, "is forming a habit of electrocution. Fortunately one of these bearers is medically trained; I will have him treat the general."

"The hell you will," Patrice snapped, surprised and angered. "What does that thing know about human medicine?"

"Why, a great deal," Dopey assured her. "It was he who implanted the devices on your Starlab. He will know what to do for General Delasquez-also for Dr. Artzybachova, who, I observe, is also quite unwell."

Patrice started to reject the offer with indignation, but Rosaleen overrode her. She raised herself on one elbow and said, "Let's see what he can do, Patrice. I'm not much use to you this way."

That was all the consent Dopey needed. He didn't speak, but one of his golems bent over Rosaleen, picked her up with surprising gentleness and bore her away to the yurt where Delasquez was raucously snoring. Dopey didn't bother to look after them. He waddled toward the grave, where Dannerman had replaced Lin at the bottom, gazing disapprovingly at Dannerman's digging. "What are you doing? Is this some form of human death ritual? If you wish a hole dug to dispose of the cadaver one of my bearers can do this far more quickly."

Dannerman didn't look up. "We'll do it ourselves," he said shortly.

Dopey clucked in annoyance. "How you waste time," he complained. "I am very near to the limit of my endurance. We must act at once, or I must rest for a bit."

"Rest, then," Jimmy Lin says. "If the amphibians attack we'll let you know."

"Attack? Why would they attack? Although," he added meditatively, "it is unfortunately the case that they are not truly civilized anymore. They subdue their prey with electric shocks. You have seen such animals on your own planet? I believe they are called electric eels? But it was foolish of you to get so near them. They have no recent experience of land dwellers, you see; they have been isolated in their own pen for many generations. Now that the walls are down they are no longer confined, and who knows where they may wander to?"

No one responded but Jimmy Lin, turning his head to glare somberly at the alien, and all he said was "Shut up."

Dopey looked surprised, but obeyed the command; perhaps he was getting used to it. "Very well," he said after a moment. "It is foolish to delay, but I will rest for a few minutes. Wake me when you are ready for the reconquest of the base."

Dannerman glanced up long enough to see Dopey climb into the huge arms of a Doc. He didn't bother to watch as the huge golem carried him away, another Doc waddling irritably after. He was concentrating on carving out a straight, flat base for the grave.

He lost track of time. He was surprised when Patrice called down to him, "That's good enough, Dan."

He looked up in confusion. All five of his fellow prisoners were standing there, looking down on him, even Rosaleen and Martin. He had not even noticed that they had left the yurt. He peered up at Rosaleen. She was standing straighter, and there even seemed to be color in her face. "What did he do to you?" he asked wonderingly.

Rosaleen gave him the ghost of a smile. "God knows. As soon as the Doc touched me I was asleep. When I woke up, Dopey was there, lying on the ground-he's exhausted, you know- and the Doc was doing something to Martin. And then Martin woke up and we came out here."

"Dopey's still in the yurt?"

"Oh, yes. Sound asleep. Funny," she added. "I didn't even know he could sleep. He snores."

"Yes, yes," Pat interrupted, single-minded and impatient. "Dan? Do you need help getting Patsy down there?"

"Of course not." He took Patsy's body from Pat and Patrice and, gently, clumsily, stretched it out at the bottom of the pit. As he climbed out, Pat jumped in to straighten Patsy's corpse.

At the graveside, Patrice fretted, "I wish we had a coffin. I wish-do you think we should say some words over her?"

"My mother taught me some of the funeral prayers my grandfather used to say," Rosaleen offered. "I learned them in Ukrainian, but I could try to translate."

But Pat was shaking her head as Dannerman helped her out of the grave. "I'll say what needs to be said," she said firmly. "Patsy, we loved you. Good-bye."