A CARE STATION

© Dana W. Paxson 2005

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A CARE STATION

1563 4D

Andrew woke in darkness again, staring upward. Almost everything he had carried, including the chemtorches, had been taken. He moved his toes, feeling the boots and the movement in his legs. Good. He raised himself to hands and knees, and crawled forward, nearly drained, until he bumped a wall; then he located an empty space along it. A doorway, and moving air — bad air, but circulating a little. Maybe a stairwell. He crawled in and found steps leading down. Better down than up; he raised himself to a sitting position and eased his feet down, then stood, clutching the steel railing.

He descended in a stagger, just one handgrip away from a tumbling, spiraling fall down the steep twisting stair. Time and again he fell back to sit, sucking breath in and shoving it out, until he could let his legs fall over the next two steps, and totter forward. At last he reached a landing, to be greeted by a faint swash of light from under a stairwell door. As he approached the door, shuffling, the light faded, and he fell.

A snuffling sound entered his mind. An animal? He lay still and waited, too drained to move or even open his eyes. Hands moved over his body and face, and a soft female voice said, as if to itself, “Yes! It’s one of them, maybe the father. He’ll be glad I took time to bring it to him.” Andrew listened, his mind remote as if everything came in through a comm unit. “Yethrib,” the voice called softly.

“Here.” A very deep, scratchy sound.

“Please pick this one up, carefully — don’t let his neck twist or dangle — and follow me.” Large heavy hands cradled Andrew and raised him, and then came the hypnotic jounce of a long smooth stride that lasted long enough for Andrew to pass out and reawaken. Next came a pause, a long ride downward in a lift, and another long walk. The air had cleared in the descent, now cool and dust-free, without scent except a mingling of florals.

“Here, Yethrib. You may return to Sobi now, the way you came. Leave him with me now.” The words received a grunt for an answer, and the hand lowered Andrew to the floor and withdrew, leaving a wall supporting his back. As heavy footsteps receded, Andrew opened one eye a little.

“Oh. You are awake?”

“I think so. Who are you?” Andrew opened the other eye and looked around. Bending over him was a woman dressed in a nondescript coverall, whose nose looked like two dotted lines bracketing a subtle ridge from her browline to just above a sensuous mouth. A narrow understreet, more nearly a corridor, ran left and right, lit by well-maintained daytubes.

“You’re wounded and dehydrated,” the woman said. “I’ve brought you to a… care station. Here you’ll get fixed up. Now try to stand.” She straddled him and put strong arms around him, and lifted as he fought his way to his unsteady feet. “I’ve got you. Come with me.” She drew him to a flat steel door in the corridor wall and said, “It’s me.” The door slid aside, they forced their way through thick stems and heavy leaves, and Andrew squinted in the bright sunshine. He had entered a garden.

“What is this place? I’ve never seen anything like this in the City.” He stumbled forward, and the woman caught him.

“Here. Sit down here. I’ll be right back with some help.” She led him to a stone bench, and he laid himself down on it, closing his eyes in the warm shine. This was too much. An insect droned past, and summer crept into his breath and his bones. He drowsed.

Somewhere in the distance the woman’s voice called out. “Turiosten? Who are you today? Oh, of course!” A laugh.

‘Who are you today?’ What a strange question. Andrew slept.

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