Immobility (7 page)

“Anything else?”

Qanik pondered for a long time, his footsteps growing a little less certain. “We are alive and we are out here,” he finally said.

“Other than us,” said Horkai. “Other than the roaches.”

“No,” said Qanik. “Nothing can live here.”

“Then why can I live here? Why don’t I need a suit?”

Horkai felt Qanik’s shoulders twitch, wondered if he had forgotten he was carrying Horkai and had tried to shrug.

“You can survive,” Qanik said. “That is all I know.”

“And how do you know that?”

“Because you are not dead yet.”

Qatik loped up, his black suit now covered with white dust.

“I’ve found a place,” he said. “Just off the road, a facility of some kind. Industrial or farming related. A central building, a series of round cylinders as well, ten in all, on supports, with entrances near the base. Some are still standing.”

“Anyone living in them?” asked Qanik.

“Not that I could see,” said Qatik.

Qanik nodded, gestured the other mule forward with one hand. They followed him up to where the freeway had once crossed over another road—the bridge collapsed now. They clambered down the slope to the roadway below.

What Qatik had called cylinders Horkai recognized as silos. They weren’t far, only a few hundred feet from the freeway. The two or three largest had collapsed, caving in on one another, and were little more than bits and pieces of metal ribs now. But many of the others, smaller and perhaps shielded by the larger ones, were more or less intact.

They went toward them, the two mules pointing and nudging each other. They came close to one, walked around it until Qanik pointed to a huge tear in the metal. They moved on to the next one.

“What are you looking for?” asked Horkai, but neither of them answered.

The roof of the next was gone and they passed it by. The next still was slightly larger and they walked completely around it, squeezing their way through the gap between it and the next one. Finally Qatik turned, eyebrows raised.

“It will do,” Qanik stated.

With Horkai’s help they found the manual hatch release and Qatik tugged on it, but nothing happened. He pulled harder and Horkai heard the metal groan, but it was not until Qanik lumbered forward and grabbed hold as well that the hatch finally sprang open and tens of thousands of husks of long-dead beetles poured out, a fine powdery dust along with it.

When it had stopped, Qatik crunched to the top of the pile and, grabbing the lip of the chute, tried to pull his way in, but the opening was too small. He shucked the two backpacks and this time wriggled in. A moment later, his gloved hand was thrust back out, waited there, palm open.

“Come on,” said Qanik, and reached up to lift Horkai off his shoulders. He hung there helpless in the air, his lifeless legs dangling, like a child’s doll, and then Qanik thrust him up to the chute opening and Qatik’s hand closed around his shirt, dragging him awkwardly in, setting him down roughly on a narrow metal ledge.

“Find something to hold on to,” said Qatik, and thrust his hand out again.

There was a ladder beside him and he grabbed it with one hand. His gun was digging into his side so he took it out, balanced it on the ledge beside him. It was extremely hot inside, the air almost unbreathable. It was also very difficult to see. The only light was that coming up through the hatch and from an opening high above, a flap in the top of the roof, where the grain must have in the past been poured in. The backpacks flopped in beside him and then, suddenly, the light dimmed and, grunting, the black-suited form that was Qanik forced itself through. Once he was all the way in, he turned around and reached back out, pulled the hatch door closed with his fingers.

“Are you sure we’ll be able to open it again?” asked Horkai.

“Should be,” said Qatik, and then started up the ladder, nearly crushing Horkai’s fingers. Down below, beside Horkai, Qanik braced his legs against the inner edge of the hatch chute and dug through one of the backpacks, at last removing a fusee, which he cracked and threw down to rest on the hatch itself. It lay there, burning with a pale red light that cast wavering shadows all through the bottom of the silo. The acrid smoke made Horkai cough. Meanwhile, Qatik had climbed all the way to the top. Leaning far out, he pulled the upper opening closed.

Once he was down, the two mules untaped their hoods, careful to try to preserve the seal for later. They didn’t take them off, just slid them back on their heads so that their mouths were visible. Their chins, Horkai saw, were slick with sweat.

“Hungry?” asked Qanik. It was strange to watch someone talk when all you could see of their face was their mouth.

“This isn’t a good idea,” said Horkai. “The silo is going to fill with smoke.”

“We will not stay here long,” said Qatik. “We have enough air for what we need.”

“We will eat and then we will go,” said Qanik. He twisted the end off a metal cylinder and handed it to Horkai, motioned for him to drink. He did—water, warm and with a somewhat metallic taste. Qatik was already handing him a tin box that, when he opened it, he found to be full of hardtack.

“Pour some water into the box and wait a moment,” said Qatik. “Otherwise you will break your teeth.”

He poured the water in and waited. His eyes were burning from the smoke, making it difficult to see. He felt like he was suffocating.

“You’re certain I don’t need a suit?” asked Horkai. “You’re certain I’ll be all right?”

Qanik nodded. “You always have been,” he said. “If not, we’d already know.”

“How?”

“Skin rash at first, mild in the beginning but getting worse and worse. Then you would start to vomit blood. Around here, it wouldn’t take long for your skin to break into sores and ulcerate. If we were exposed to as much as you’ve been exposed to today, our circulation would be damaged and our hearts would fail.”

“Why hasn’t that happened to me?”

Qanik shrugged. “You are okay,” he said. “You always have been. You are not in any trouble.”

“We are the ones that are in trouble,” said Qatik.

“That’s why you’re wearing the suits,” said Horkai.

“They are not enough,” said Qatik.

“Not enough?”

“No need to talk about it,” said Qanik.

“But I want to talk about it,” said Horkai.

“You do not want to hear about it,” said Qatik.

“Both of you be quiet and eat,” said Qanik.

Horkai looked at the tin in front of him. The water had softened the hardtack, making it a little more flexible. He took a bite, found it tasteless, but managed to choke it down. He took a sip of water, another bite of the biscuit.

“I want to hear about it,” he said, chewing. “I want you to tell me.”

“Not a good idea,” said Qanik.

“He has a right to know,” said Qatik. As he spoke he ate, breaking off a corner of damp hardtack and chewing it. Both the mules, Horkai realized, were eating much more than he was, and eating much quicker.

Qanik shrugged.

Qatik turned to Horkai. Horkai watched his mouth moving just below the edge of the hood, the rest of his face hidden behind the shiny black fabric.

“These suits keep out only so much,” said Qatik. “They do not protect us completely.”

“So this will damage you?” asked Horkai.

“Not damage,” said Qatik. “Kill.”

“Kill? Then why are you doing it?”

“We are the mules,” said Qanik. “This is our purpose. This is what we were made to do.”

“Who told you that?”

“That is how it is,” said Qanik.

“But who told you?”

“Rasmus,” said Qatik.

Rasmus,
thought Horkai.
Always Rasmus.

“Can’t you do something?” he asked them. “Can’t you make better suits for yourself? Can’t we stop it?”

Qanik shook his head.

“What if we turned back now?”

“We are the mules,” said Qanik firmly. “This is what we do.”

“But—”

“What Qanik means,” said Qatik, interrupting him, “is that we are already dead. We have already been out too long. If we turn back, we still die, just not as quickly.”

“Don’t you care about that?”

Qanik shrugged. “We all have to die sometime,” he said. “Better to die doing what you are meant to do.”

“As mules,” said Horkai.

“As mules,” said Qanik, nodding.

Below them the fusee was sputtering, the shadows leaping more erratically. “Enough talk,” said Qatik. “Back in the hood, Qanik. Time to go.”

*   *   *

LATER, WALKING AGAIN
but riding on Qatik’s shoulders this time, moving upslope and coming closer to the point of the mountain, the sun now threatening to set, he tried to raise the issue with them again. At first he tried to ease into it gently, tapping on Qatik’s hood to attract his attention.

“If you’re going to die anyway,” he asked, “why wear suits at all?”

Qatik’s response was muffled. Horkai leaned forward and swiveled one ear and then asked him to repeat it.

Qatik tapped his speaker to clear it. “If we did not wear our suits, we would already be dead,” he said. “We would not be able to achieve our purpose.”

“Why trade your lives for a purpose?” asked Horkai. “What makes that a worthwhile trade?”

Qatik slowed, briefly came to a stop. Qanik, to one side, turned slightly, raised an eyebrow behind the faceplate. “Why are you trying to make me doubt?” Qatik asked. “Why now, when it is already too late, when I am already dead, when my purpose is all that is left to me?”

He started up again, slow at first. Qanik fell into step beside them.

“And what if you convince us?” asked Qatik. “The best that can happen is for us to decide there is no point carrying you and leave you here, on the side of this roadway, to die.”

He had, Horkai had to admit, a point. Quickly, he changed the subject.

“If you’ve never been outside, how do you know what things are?”

“We had been as far as the founder,” said Qatik.

“Still,” said Horkai. “That’s not very far.”

“Pictures,” said Qatik. “We’ve been given instruction. We have seen maps. We were given scenarios and made to solve them.”

“But it was not always perfect instruction,” said Qanik. “You had, for instance, to help us to open the hatch on the cylinder.”

“The silo,” said Horkai.

“Silo,” they said in unison.

“Farming related, then,” added Qatik. “We saw many pictures and we memorized many things.”

“And among those pictures were images of farms?”

“No,” Qatik admitted. “Among those pictures were images of farming-related buildings.”

“Do you know what a farm is?”

Qatik didn’t respond.

“A farm,” said Horkai, “is a stretch of land used to grow agriculture and livestock.”

“What is agriculture?” asked Qatik.

“Plants grown for food. You know what plants are.”

“There are plants near the founder,” said Qanik. “But they are dead. If you touch them, they break and sometimes fall into dust.”

“There are no longer living plants,” said Qatik. “There are fungus and mushrooms, and that is what we eat.
Agriculture
is no longer an important word. This is why we were not taught it. It is not important we know it. What is livestock?”

“Animals grown for food,” said Horkai.

“There are no longer animals,” said Qatik. “This is no longer an important word. It serves no purpose.”

“How do you know there are no animals?”

“Rasmus told us,” said Qatik.

“How does Rasmus know?”

But Qatik refused to answer the question. They walked on in silence awhile.

“Where do your names come from?” Horkai asked. And when Qatik said nothing, he asked again, louder this time, hoping to draw Qanik in.

“They were given to us,” said Qanik.

“What do they mean?”

“They do not mean anything,” said Qanik. “They are names.”

“No,” said Horkai. “That’s not what I mean. I mean where do they come from? Are they family names? Are they something from your ancestors’ culture?”

“I do not know,” said Qanik.

“You don’t know?”

“He never told us where they came from.”

“He? Who’s he?” Horkai asked, even though he already knew what the answer would be.

“Rasmus,” said Qanik. “Rasmus gave us our names.”

“Why would Rasmus name you? You’re as old as he is.”

“We are not as old as he,” said Qanik. “Not nearly. And I, I am not even as old as Qatik.”

“Maybe Rasmus gave you your name as well,” said Qatik to Horkai. “Are you certain your name is really your name?”

*   *   *

THE SUN HAD SLID BEHIND
the western mountains; all that was left of it was a wavery slit, and then that, too, was gone. There was still light but it was gradually fading away and would soon be gone entirely.

Qanik came close, rested his hand on Horkai’s lower back. “I can now be more specific,” he said. “It has been an entire day.”

Horkai nodded. “When do we stop to sleep?” he asked.

“We do not stop to sleep,” said Qatik. “There is no time. We stop when we die.”

10

BY THE TIME THEY HAD REACHED
the place where the freeway skirted the edge of the mountain and started back down, it was so dark that Horkai couldn’t see at all. The wind whipped viciously around them, making his shirt flap against his body. It was troubling to be moving through the darkness with no idea where you were going. The mules seemed to have no trouble picking a sure-footed path forward, didn’t even bother to slow down. As they passed over the top and started down, the wind tapered off, going suddenly quiet.

Above in the sky, behind the haze, arose a pale blur that he realized must be the moon. It helped him see again—though just a little, just enough to differentiate between the ground and the shape of Qanik walking beside them. If there were buildings to either side of the road, or farms, he couldn’t see them. There was a glimmer that might be water or might be something else. Nowhere were there any man-made lights.

For a long time he stayed still, listening. There were no insect noises, no birds, only the measured tread of the mules’ footsteps.