Caretaker - L. A. Graf [51]
Probably not. The lack of spirit rested in the quiet conformity with which the Ocampa went about their small, cheerless duties.
Besides, whatever painted the pale, bluish light across this cavelike world wasn't a singular source--it probably didn't produce enough radiant energy to keep algae alive.
"We're underground..." Kim meant to say something more meaningful, but couldn't stop the amazed exclamation from escaping.
The doctor nodded, apparently understanding of the ensign's surprise.
"Our society is subterranean. We've lived here for over five hundred generations."
"But before that--" Torres must have heard the same unfinished longing in the doctor's tone. "--you lived on the surface?"
He nodded. "Until the Warming began."
"The warming?" Kim asked.
"When the surface turned into a desert, and the Caretaker came to protect us." Cutting himself off, the doctor stepped down toward one of the many moving walkways, but stopped before actually mounting it.
He glanced back as though expecting them to follow, and Kim tugged impatiently at Torres's arm. He was hungry for answers even more than for food, and was glad when the Maquis came along without protest. The doctor smiled as they caught up to him, then led the way deeper into the sterile city.
"Our ancient journals tell us he opened a deep chasm in the ground," he explained, looking at the Ocampa passing around them instead of directly at his patients, "and led our ancestors to this place. He has provided for all our needs since then."
Which didn't include the infusion of much brightness or color, as near as Kim could tell. And if the place had been any more silent, it would have made Kim want to scream. Leaning around Torres, he tried to see beyond the nearest archway for some sign of people congregating, socializing, talking, and found himself facing a small crowd of Ocampa who stared back at him with frank curiosity. They touched each other and glanced among themselves as though exchanging the same gossip and niceties as any other social gathering, only silently. So silently.
"Please forgive them." The doctor moved in front of Kim with a bobbed apology, shooing the spectators on their way. "They know you've come from the Caretaker. None of us has ever seen him."
He hesitated as the knot of people gradually cleared, revealing a softly lighted plaza crissed and crossed by a long queue of patiently waiting Ocampa. "Oh." The doctor raised up on tiptoe to see across the quiet gathering. "I'm afraid one of the food dispensers has failed again. The service attendant must be busy elsewhere." Pushing gently through the chain of people, the doctor startled Kim with the sound/feeling of his voice the way Kim had first experienced it the day before. (Would you please excuse us?) Maybe the silence in this underground city wasn't so unhealthy for the Ocampa after all.
All around them, people glanced up as the doctor's words touched them, their pale faces turning toward Kim and Torres like flowers toward a distant sun. Kim returned their wondering stares with a nervous smile, feeling oddly guilty for their attentions. When he and Torres reached the front of the line, the doctor reached around the first Ocampa in the queue and lifted the door to an innocuous wall unit so he could slide out two trays of moist, textureless food. It look distressingly like dog food, and it smelled like nothing much at all. Kim wrinkled his nose but didn't comment, and passed one tray along to Torres as the doctor darted forward to liberate a third from the open dispenser unit.
The trays, the utensils, even the lumpy mounds of processed protein, could have all been holographic clones of each other, for all the difference between them.
Torres scowled at her slop as though contemplating being sick over it.