Silent Songs

by Kathleen O'Malley

  Instantly, Taniwha understood everything that had happened and was happening to

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  K'heera. She was not asleep--she was paralyzed, but totally conscious and aware. Terrified, the calf absorbed her meeting with these aliens, her poisoning and capture, and the cruel treatment she'd suffered for hours now.

  Taniwha understood the significance of their experiments because K'heera understood them. They were pulling blood from her body, while pumping a variety of substances into her to discover her reactions to them. The things she'd been through had exhausted her, yet her captors cared nothing for her need for sleep or respite from pain. Instead, they patiently analyzed her endurance. Anytime she lapsed into sleep, a device strapped to her forehead delivered an excruciating shock. Fal ing asleep had become so painful that K'heera now feared it with hysterical terror. The substances the aliens inflicted on her were sometimes painful, occasional y pleasant, and often mind-numbing, a thing she'd once feared. Now, though, she longed for the mind-numbing drug, even pleaded for it in her mind. If they'd only give it to her again, she'd be ... so grateful.

  While the experiments continued, her captors efficiently depilated her fur, leaving all her skin glistening and bare. But worse than that was what was happening to her mouth.

  Her large canine teeth, the fangs her people bared in honorable challenge, were being ground down to short, harmless, squared- off stumps. The Simiu had been given nothing to dull the pain, and the huge nerves in her canines screamed. K'heera could glimpse monitors she thought were measuring her brain activity, and helplessly watched them register every new sensation.

  The Simiu's mind sang a song of terror unlike anything Taniwha had ever known. Suddenly a new substance coursed through her, dulling her sleep-fogged mind, and she dozed involuntarily. The device strapped to her head shocked her unmercifully--and the sensation flooded Taniwha's mind as well. The calf sang out from the pain, and K'heera heard him. Instead of the rage and rejection he'd expected, the Simiu's consciousness grabbed at him with an insane urgency.

  HELP! SAVE ME! THEY'RE KILLING ME, OH, PLEASE, DON'T LEAVE ME

  HERE, DON'T LEAVE

  Taniwha was so shaken by the frightening onslaught, he forgot to come up for air. Then Father was under him, pushing him up until his nostrils broke the surface and opened automatically. Coming back to himself, to his own body floating pain-free in sweet, warm water, Taniwha realized the entire herd had heard K'heera's frantic pleas as they flowed through him. The herd 133

  grew frightened. What kind of beings could so blandly torture another creature? None, since the Great Hunger.

  Taniwha reached for his parents, but their thoughts were not reassuring.

  Mother could not sing to these aliens, so she decided they were insane, it was the only explanation for their split minds and their sickening cruelty. She urged the herd to leave, to return to the sea.

  Father agreed. As the herd's senior bull, he swam near the rear and pushed the herd eastward, urging them to swim swiftly, to ignore their hunger, their exhaustion. As unified as schooled fish, the Singers turned toward the sea.

  The aliens followed, whistling their bizarre songs. They flew ahead of the herd, lining up across a narrow place in the River. Suddenly a jolt of white power erupted from the flyers, striking the water like lightning, making it boil.

  Painful shivers trembled through the Singers. Another jolt fell and another, until they became a curtain of energy and pain. The bolts solidified underwater, meshing together like plant roots, weaving tighter and tighter.

  Water flowed through the web of power, but the openings in the shining mesh began to shrink.

  A young bull near Taniwha panicked, imagining the Great Hunger, seeing its terrible face, its bloody, tearing teeth. He turned from the power web, away from the sea, and everyone near followed, his panic overwhelming Father's calm urgency. Taniwha felt the power of his parents' mind guiding him, urging him toward the web, but a crush of massive bodies twisting and turning suddenly surrounded him. He was pushed back, away from the sea, away from his mother, and found himself swimming west with the others.

  The herd's cohesiveness evaporated as the fear of the Great Hunger engulfed mind after mind.

  Then the calf heard his father sing reassuringly. There was no Great Hunger.

  There were only these aliens and their unWorldly things. The old male ordered the herd to find openings through the shrinking web and swim through. His song was strong, but the younger males were afraid to pass through the tightening mesh.

  Then his mother touched Taniwha's mind, and he realized she was on the other side of the web. She'd been pushed through when they'd been separated, and now she called for him frantically, urging him to come to her so they could swim to the sea.

  The calf hesitated. His father was on this side with him, his mother on the other. When he finally surged toward the grid, there were so many squeezing through the tightening mesh, he was pushed aside. The web's power stunned whoever swam through

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  it, and every painful shock caused more panic in the herd.

  When the last portal became too small for even the youngest calf, Taniwha and his father were only two of many trapped on the wrong side of the web.

  Father ordered those who had escaped to swim for the sea.

  Still, they paused. All of them had loved ones behind the web. The old male's mind was strong, though, and he projected confidence that they would defeat these aliens as they had once conquered the Great Hunger. As the free Singers moved away from the web, they maintained contact with their friends, ready to lend their power to destroy this alien force.

  Taniwha's father appeared beside him and together, they swam westward, away from the web, only to face another grid pinning them into a small section of the River. After a few moments, they realized that the grids were moving, corraling the herd into a smaller area. Taniwha felt his father reach deep into his own mind and call up power his people hadn't used for generations. The entire herd linked with him.

  Taniwha listened as his father reached for the mind of the nearest alien and probed, searching its brain for its knowledge, its motives. His son and the combined herdmind followed him, even as aliens surrounded them,

  heedless of their mental assault. Father sang as hard as he could, using the fear Taniwha had taken from K'heera as a weapon. The creature shook its head slightly, then ignored the onslaught of the powerful telepath. Leaning over its sled, the alien touched Father with a small device.

  A terrible fire coursed through the great bull's body; as his flippers went limp, his body grew rigid. At the same time, the aliens struck another male, then a female. The helplessness coursing through the afflicted ones shattered the Singers' tenuous unity. They panicked, swimming wildly around and around the shrinking corral, pulling Taniwha helplessly along.

  A few elders stayed with the paralyzed ones, pushing them up to the air so they wouldn't drown. The rest of the herd surged wildly between the two power grids, their massive bodies slamming against the alien lightning webs, shocking themselves again and again. Taniwha heard his mother fighting to get in, to come to the aid of her calf and her mate.

  Even in his helplessness, Father tried to calm the herd, but it was too late.

  When the aliens attached devices to the three Singers and lifted them out of the water, even as Taniwha had once been lifted off the sandbar, the captive herd felt their friends'

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  raw fear. The helpless Singers were beached in low water, where the World's terrible gravity crushed them.

  An alien tended each of the helpless creatures, struggling to keep their massive heads in the air, even as Jib had once helped Taniwha. But the one handling Father was careless and allowed the old bull to inhale water.

  Taniwha and his mother both agonized as his father coughed painfully.

  Aliens swarmed out of their shelters and surrounded the beached Singers, chittering excitedly and waving alien devices.
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  Mother tried to force Taniwha to find an opening in the grid, in spite of the herd's confusion and the fear she felt for her mate. But the mesh was too small, and Taniwha too afraid. Desperately, he cast his mind. Despite the agony he knew she'd still be in, he touched K'heera again.

  The Simiu was just as he'd left her, only the dental work and depilation were completed. A new shift of aliens had come in and she thought they were reviewing the analysis of the previous group. Since the grinding had stopped, she'd grown indifferent. She'd convinced herself she didn't need sleep, that Simiu were strong enough to remain awake indefinitely. The loss of her fur made her cold even in the warm, humid environment, but she welcomed that, since it helped her stay awake.

  Even though Taniwha was young, he recognized the song of madness. The calf entered her brain rudely, wanting her to know he was there. He demanded answers. K'heera was not of the World, surely she understood these evil beings. What were they doing here? What were they doing to his people, to his father? K'heera tried to shut her mind down, not wanting to cope with anyone else's pain, but the youngster would not be shut out. He showed her what was happening on the beach.

  Slowly, she responded. The aliens are studying your people, she thought at him. Why. I don't know. I don't know what they want, I'm a prisoner, just like them. Save yourselves. There's nothing you can do for them. . . .

  Taniwha made K'heera see through his father's eyes as groups of aliens guided huge vats over to the Singers, vats that sloshed and dripped pungent liquids.

  Together, they watched the aliens surround the female Singer. Her panic surged through the herd, even as Taniwha's father uselessly urged calm.

  The being holding her head suddenly pushed her snout underwater. Every Singer and K'heera experienced her desperate struggle for air, but eventually her nostrils opened convulsively and she inhaled. Her lungs pumped furiously, pushing

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  water out, then sucking it back in again, her mind-thrashing panic driving the herd insane.

  Finally it was over, and Taniwha's father watched as the aliens flayed the flesh from the dead female and threw it into the vats. Her blood poured into the River of Life, and its scent was more than the captive Singers could bear.

  The Great Hunger was truly among them--no longer content to hide in the ocean, it had invaded their beloved River to feast on them!

  Hysterically, they battered the energy corral, burning themselves on the webs. Taniwha was caught in the throng, no longer able to see his father or hear his mother, as the Singers pushed against their prison with all their might. Finally, the aliens must have realized they would suicide on the grid.

  They dropped one of the webs, allowing the captive herd to flee westward up the River.

  K'heera, carried along on the tide of panic, watched their flight. She knew it was useless, and her knowledge shocked Taniwha as he was swept away.

  They can find your people whenever they want, she told him bitterly. Just then, the aliens began drowning the other bull. The dying male's panic overpowered all other mental communication.

  Taniwha felt his parents try once more to affect the mind of the alien holding his father's head. They used every bit of mental ability they could muster on the creature's intellect, but the alien ignored them. Its comrade handed it a chunk of hot, bloody flesh, cut from the not-quite-dead young bull even as their victim's mental death screams shook the herd to their core.

  The alien holding Father took the steaming meat, and calmly popped it into its wide mouth. Only then did the herd realize that every alien on the beach was eating flesh cut from the bones of their friends. The atmosphere among the un-Worldly creatures was one of feasting and joy.

  Taniwha heard K'heera as she thought wildly of the Captain's Night party she'd attended with Jib. The Simiu fought back nausea, but her stomach was so empty she had nothing to bring up.

  Suddenly the happy crowd turned its attention to Father. The young calf tried to turn back, to somehow rescue his father, but his mother's sister suddenly appeared beneath him and physically stopped him. At that same moment the old bull's captor dropped Father's huge head under the waves and sat on it while licking gobbets of Singer meat off its fingers. Other aliens clambered onto Father's back, hacking at his tough, aged skin with sharp

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  tools, ripping it away from the fat and muscle. The aliens scraped at the bull's rich fat stores, ignoring the blood and grease that covered them.

  Still, Taniwha heard his father's song. The bull struggled futilely to keep the images of his death from his youngest child. Despite Father's efforts, Taniwha, his mother, and K'heera, too, witnessed the slow, painful death of the old male.

  Tell Jib! K'heera begged Taniwha. Tell Jib and the others, before they're captured, too.

  Suddenly Taniwha's aunt blocked him from responding to K'heera's plea.

  She could hear her sister wailing her widow's song as her mate died horribly to feed these aliens, this new Great Hunger. Their people were captured, betrayed, slaughtered. What difference was there between one un-Worldly being and another? There would be no contact ever, ever again.

  NO! K'heera begged. Please, listen to me, don't shut me . . .

  Taniwha's aunt blocked K'heera's desperate pleading as she pushed him westward, away from the alien village. The calf's mother, on the east side of the web, was pulled away from the grid and finally swam with the free herd toward the sea. All Taniwha could smell through the great River of Life was blood and fear and death. And through the herdmind, beneath the mourning wail of his people, al the young calf could hear was the dying song of his father.

  CHAPTER 12

  The Invaders from Mars

  Tesa swam through the River of Fear . . . no, the River of Life. Underwater, in the dark, her arms propelled her body through the murky depths. Was she searching for Jib? She couldn't remember.

  Suddenly she thudded into something solid. She turned, only to bump into something else. Blocked, she swam to the surface.

  Before a curtain of stars in the dark night sky the Child Sun hung above the Moons. Two full, one half--the Moons of

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  the Fledgling's First Adventure. She started to smile, but. .. the Moons weren't their usual ghostly white. They were . .. red.

  All three glowed that ominous shade as Father Moon oozed, then dripped blood that fell straight down from space to plop into the River as though the big satellite were nothing more than a floating balloon. Drip. Plop. Drip. Plop.

  Tesa watched crimson ripples slap against the obstacles clogging the River.

  Brushing against the huge skeleton of a Singer, she suddenly realized the whole River was choked with those creatures' big white bones. Backing away, she collided with the stiff corpse of a White Wind, its elegant feathers waving limply on the current, pointing to others like it. Before she could move, the flaccid wing of a Hunter draped across her shoulder. Gasping, she floundered for the shore, pushing her way through the River of Death. A long, thin human corpse rolled up in her path. It was Meg. Beside the aged biologist floated Szu-yi. A short distance away bobbed Tesa's grandparents.

  Not far from them a lifeless Bruce rode the gentle waves, and next to him, floating facedown, was a tall, slim form with dark hair and a white feathered shirt.

  Just then the water bubbled and churned. She glimpsed something big-- a fin? a snout? --just before a massive, open maw ringed with scalpel-like teeth engulfed Bruce's body. Tesa screamed, her voice soundless, her lungs pushing air through her throat in panicky spasms as she splashed backward furiously.

  But the water was still again with only a ripple and an open space where Bruce's body had once been. Then something smooth slid against her thigh, something strong and full of hunger.

  Her feet touched ground--if it was ground they touched--and she struggled for land, pushing past bodies, stumbling over one last corpse, its ravaged brown face and sightless orbs staring sightlessly at the Moons. Jib? She pulled herself from the Ri
ver and collapsed, her feathered shirt soaked red, coated--sticky with blood. But at least she was finally safe.

  Then the Mate Kai shot up out of the River like a living mountain and came after her, its sleek skin marbled a searing red and blue, its wide mouth hanging open from the weight of its terrible teeth. She scrabbled backward, knowing it was too late, that she could never escape. The Mate Kai fell on her, grasping her shoulders roughly, and she swung out desperately.

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  It blocked her blows easily and shook her, then slapped her face gently. She blinked . . . and found herself warm, dry, in her own shelter. Bruce was holding her, trying to wake her, to pull her from the sickening dream. "Okay,"

  she signed. "I'm okay!"

  "You were yelling your head off," he signed worriedly.

  She collapsed against his chest, incredibly relieved to feel the warmth of his body, his thumping heart. He hugged her, but after a moment she pulled back. "Did you dream last night?"

  Bruce shrugged. "If I did, I can't remember."

  "Is Jib awake?"

  "Not yet. Father Sun's just now rising."

  She was out of the shelter in a second, wearing nothing but her faded StarBridge sleep shirt. As she burst through her clustered cohort, they leaped into the air in surprise, leaving a rain of feather dust in their wake.

  When she finally ducked into Jib's tent, he was on his back, mouth agape, eyes half-opened and staring. When she then nudged him, he sat up quickly.

  He cried out, wild-eyed, but Tesa couldn't read it.

  Bruce, coming in behind Tesa, moved to the young man's side. "You're awake now, son, in camp in Florida. Everything's okay."

  "No," the boy moaned, shaking his head.

  "No," Tesa agreed. "Something terrible has happened."

  He continued shaking his head, but remembered to sign. "It's fading, I can't remember. . .. The Singers .. . Taniwha ... K'heera. . . ." He rubbed his face.