Flux

they were fashioning a stretcher. As he supervised anxiously, the two youngest men carefully lifted Ennek by the feet and shoulders and transferred him to the stretcher. Then the group made their way back across the scrub, back to wherever they had come from.
    Miner tried to follow, but he soon fell behind. He called out in desperation: “Wait! Please!”
    One member of the group, a woman with a thin face, came trotting back to him. She glanced at his throbbing arm and badly splinted wrist and made a small clucking sound. She lifted his uninjured arm around her shoulders and said something that he took as an encouragement to keep walking. With her supporting him he was able to make his way, albeit slowly, and he soon lost sight of Ennek and the others. He had to hope that the woman was taking him wherever the others were going.
    He lost track of time, just concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other. Eventually he became aware that they were on a pathway: simply a narrow, worn track in the dirt. The path took them over a hill—thankfully, it was gentle enough that he could manage it with the woman’s help—and then into a valley that was checkered with farms. The path widened into a wheel-rutted road. There were people working the land, cutting at the soil with hoes and pulling handfuls of some sort of grain and placing it in baskets. He was slightly heartened to see that none of them wore collars like his own and that they all looked healthy, well-fed, and well-clothed. Every one of them stopped what they were doing and stared as Miner and the woman hobbled by.
    Just when Miner was beginning to fear that he was going to have to be carried as well, he saw a small cluster of houses. They were simple wooden structures with bright red painted trim and with chickens and geese fluttering between them. The woman led him toward the farthest house. They passed through a narrow arch and into a tranquil green courtyard where two young children played with carved wooden figures. The youngsters froze, gaping at him as he shuffled by and entered the house.
    To Miner’s enormous relief, the first thing he saw was Ennek. The man had been laid on a thin pallet on the floor and stripped of the remains of his clothing. The squat man and a woman of similar age were kneeling beside Ennek, busily applying what looked like poultices. The woman glanced at Miner, gestured at a second, unoccupied pallet, and said something to the woman on whom he was still leaning. His caregiver took him to the pallet and he lay down on it.
    He tried to crane his neck to see what was happening with Ennek, but a handsome man who might have been in his early thirties knelt beside Miner, blocking his view. “Please,” Miner said. “Will he be all right?” But again, he couldn't understand the reply.
    The man and woman carefully removed Miner’s clothes. He blushed at being naked in front of strangers—some of them female—even though he knew his modesty was foolish. After all, he’d spent three centuries in Stasis without a shred of clothing.
    The strangers had roughened hands, but they were gentle as they cleaned Miner’s wounds and re-splinted his wrist—much more competently than he’d managed—and dabbed him clean with wet cloths. The man shaved the stubble from Miner’s face with a thin, sharp blade and smoothed a sweet-scented cream over his sunburned skin; that felt lovely, cool and slightly tingly. Then they made him drink two cups of grassy-tasting tea and another that was rich and meaty and delicious. Finally, they covered him with a soft blanket and moved away.
    The older couple was still crouched next to Ennek. His head was propped in the woman’s lap and the man was using a spoon to drip liquid from a cup into Ennek’s mouth. Then he’d massage Ennek’s neck so he would swallow.
    Miner felt suddenly very sleepy. There must have been something in the tea. He struggled to keep his eyes open, to watch over Ennek, but his eyelids were so heavy and the pallet beneath him was so soft. “Please,” he murmured, knowing nobody would understand him. “Please take care of him.”
    The older woman said something back to him, and it seemed to him that her voice was reassuring and her dark eyes kind. He tried to thank her, but fell asleep before he could manage it.

    ***

    When Miner woke up, he had to urinate very badly. He groaned and looked anxiously in Ennek’s direction. His friend was still unmoving, but perhaps he