“Nothingness,” Elata said. “Which is lighter than any gas, if the corona’s alive and the bladder is intact.”
Master Nissim steered them to the far side, in case the bladder suddenly imploded. When Seldom edged closer, Nissim said, “Don’t.” But then he stopped to stare at the carcass, admitting, “I’ve always wanted to see a corona, but I gave up wishing for it a long time ago.”
Thinking of his father, Diamond kept walking.
Elata called to him.
His legs started to run.
Huge as the corona seemed, its body still looked deflated, slightly shriveled. A wide slit was visible between the folds of meat, propped open by timbers, power cables strung deep into the wound. The air turned warm suddenly. Giant fans were pushing out heat and moisture, and Diamond smelled the rich oils and alien perfumes that clung to a man’s hair despite repeated washings. Sprinting, he called out for his father. The boy who couldn’t forget anything didn’t know when he began to run. Nissim was yelling. The others were chasing. The corona’s body rose up like a hill beside him, scales as big as tabletops still shiny and unscratched, but the exposed flesh between them shredded from being dragged over the raw coral. And then the body suddenly ended, becoming a forest of tangled necks that must have followed the creature while it was alive. Each neck was long and narrow, boneless but strengthened with interlocking fibers and muscle and nerves and a metabolism as hot as an iron forge. Every neck ended with a head sporting three triangular eyes and three triangular jaws, and every jaw was adorned with curved white teeth exactly like those the boy touched at the Ivory Station. This corona had fifty large heads, and every mouth was open, rasping tongues lying in the dirt, the bright long teeth slashing at the light.
A dozen necks and heads had been lifted high with portable scaffolding. Workers stood at a safe distance, dressed in the heavy gray suits necessary for the next essential job. Oftentimes other slayer crews would arrive to help, but no other ships were close today. They would have to work through the night and probably most of tomorrow before help arrived, and that helped set the serious, deeply focused mood. Cutting tools were propped behind the crew—long blades and powered saws and hand saws and lengths of priceless copper wiring. They were staring at something important inside the corona. Nobody was nervous, but there was determination to their faces—professionals engaged in the kind of work where one mistake or the tiniest failure of luck ensured disaster.
In the distance, the Master shouted, “Diamond.”
And the crew turned, finally noticing the boy charging toward them.
Men lifted long arms.
Someone shouted, “Back, back. Get away, boy!”
None were his father. But Diamond knew Father was close and kept running, even as the men waved and ran toward him. Except they didn’t run in a straight line because they were steering clear of the corona’s heads. They knew better and he knew nothing, and three dead eyes detected movement and the nearest neck dragged itself from the scaffolding and opened the jaws even wider, teeth sharper than the best metal slicing Diamond’s foot off at the ankle.
He crumbled, crying out.
Ten burly men descended, but then as a group pulled up short. This youngster was in misery and crippled for life, and they felt a little responsible or deeply responsible. Ashamed and horrified and sorry, several of them openly wept while a couple of young fellows restrained the neck with ropes and spikes, and then the biggest man stepped forward, using a pry bar and hard words to wrench open the dead jaws.
An odd little foot and its matching sandal fell to the sand.
The corona head was dragged back, and in frustration, the big man began beating it with the iron bar.
Diamond watched blood pushing from the stump of his leg. Another man called out for a towel or shirt—anything clean enough to press on the wound—but long before suitable rags were found, the bleeding had stopped.
By then, the Master and his friends were standing beside Diamond. Elata cried and Seldom threw his hands over his face. Diamond looked at the pale foot and the sandal that his father made for him. “Give it to me,” he said.
Nobody reacted.
Then with a loud voice—an impatient defiant voice—he shouted at the world, “Give me my foot please.”
Another man appeared.
A corona’s necks and its heads were not real necks and heads, but instead were more like toothy fingers that carried the beast’s eyes. Those swift jaws could kill any prey, and those precious teeth shredded the flesh and shoved the bits to the true mouth—a giant maw that had been wrenched open with three blackwood timbers. Walking slowly out from the dead corona’s mouth, the new man was barely dressed, wearing a thin shirt and shorts, his face browned by the sun but the rest of his flesh pale. He was sweating hard. Gray hair was plastered against his scalp. The breeze felt good, but the man was surprised not to find his crew waiting for him. Each one of those men was trusted and reliable, yet all of them had wandered off at the worst possible moment. Merit paused. He heard worried voices. Then he turned slowly, safely, discovering the missing crew standing in a closely packed circle.
A stranger was among them, taller than the others, and older. Merit knew the face but couldn’t remember from where. Two children were beside the familiar man, and it was the crying girl who picked something off the ground—cradling a little object with both hands. Merit saw the sandal and then the bloody foot. What a mess! Freshly killed coronas were treacherous. Dead reflexes were still capable of violence, and every head carried a small, furious brain. He had seen this tragedy too many times, and what in the Creators’ good world would tree-walking children be doing in this wasteland?
He stepped carefully among the dead heads, avoiding their gaze while watching the girl carry that severed foot into that circle of men.
Another child sat on the ground. He didn’t act injured. He was uncomfortable perhaps, but he sat upright and never cried out. The boy was familiar, but Merit had no expectations of finding his son. The idea that Diamond would be anywhere in the world but inside his room, safe and secret, was beyond his reach. One his sturdiest men turned away and vomited on the sand. But the boy didn’t throw up or faint or show any signs of shock. He simply held his lost foot in both hands, and he looked at the fresh stump, and then he tried to put the foot back in place. And in the middle of that madness, what was most surprising was the poise he showed—as if this was any day, and this was any little chore.
One fellow was beating the guilty head, accomplishing nothing. But when he looked up, seeing the boss, he said, “We don’t know who they are, how they got here. We aren’t to blame, Merit. Regardless how this looks.”
Hearing that name, the boy looked up.
And still, it took a moment to recognize his son. The context was wrong. No reasonable story could put him on this ground, not today or any other day. Merit assumed that he was sleeping or dying. Dreams and hallucinations were far better explanations for what sat on the bloody ground. But just to be sure, he called out, “Diamond?”
“Father.”
Merit ran. Better than anyone, he knew the risks, but he couldn’t stop himself. Exhaustion was forgotten. Old knees were healed. He covered the ground in a sprint and dropped beside his boy. The crew were stunned. Was this really the famous never-seen son? Merit touched the hot forehead and said Diamond’s name several times, quietly and doubtfully, ready to ask questions that came to him and were forgotten in the next instant.
“Mother left home,” the boy said, no prompting necessary. “She went last night or this morning and didn’t come back. I went outside looking for her. And I looked for you. Then I found Elata and Seldom.” He pointed at the other children. “And they took me to Master—”
“Nissim,” said Merit, looking at the tall man. “Of course, I remember you now, sir.”
The butcher nodded.
All that while, Diamond held the clean white bone of his foot against the fresh stump.