Brown tones rippled through the mantles of the maia observing the scene. If the children were to be believed—and the scene she was watching gave strong support to their opinion—brown was the color of misery. The stricken maia herself was also dappled with brown hues, although the predominant color was ochre. Then, as Indira watched, the ochre faded. A few brown stripes continued to move slowly across the maia’s mantle, but now green rapidly appeared and spread.
The maia surrounding the scene began hooting. There seemed, somehow, a questioning tone to the hoots.
The stricken maia herself had stopped hooting. Suddenly, to Indira’s astonishment, the color of her mantle deepened—first to dark green, and then to midnight black. She had never seen that color on a maia before.
As if it were a signal, three of the maia moved to the fallen one’s side. Using their cowls like great shovels, they levered the creature upright. Two other maia moved forward, one on each side of the stricken one, and leaned into her. Then, most of her weight being carried by the two helpers—
No, realized Indira suddenly, pall-bearers.
—the trio began making their slow way north. Everyone followed, maia and human, the maia softly hooting and the children sobbing.
On the way, they met Julius and Korecz, who had come to see what the commotion was about. The biologist and the doctor fell in with Indira.
“What—” Julius started to say, but fell silent at the sight of Indira’s sharply upthrust hand.
Slowly, the procession made its way north, until they arrived at a grove of striking green plants, twisting vine-like things that curled and wove into each other like an enormous free-standing ball of spaghetti. The color of the stricken maia’s mantle, Indira noted, was now very close to that of the vine-plants.
The “bearers” gently set the stricken maia—
Wolugo, thought Indira fiercely. Her name is Wolugo.
—down to the ground. Then, they edged back. Silence followed, for minutes. Wolugo was motionless, except for a faint movement of the fleshy flaps deep within the recesses of her mantle cavity, back of the octopoid head. Julius had often speculated that these were the inhaling orifices for some kind of lungs (or their equivalent).
The rest of the colony’s adults arrived at the scene during the course of that long wait. Adams was the last to appear. The metallurgist examined the scene for a moment, then said loudly:
“Yes, of course. The elephant’s graveyard.”
Indira was shocked at the expression which flooded Julius’ face. For a brief moment, she thought the biologist was actually going to strike the man with his fist.
She was even more shocked when she discovered that she was hoping he would.
But the moment passed.
Not long after, Wolugo died. Indira had no doubt of the moment. Deep within the mantle cavity, she could see the maia’s flaps stop moving. And, in the space of but a few seconds, all color fade from her mantle, until there was nothing but gray. It seemed, to Indira, the dullest gray she had ever seen.
She found herself fighting back tears. When she realized what she was doing, she stopped fighting, and let the tears flow freely. All the humans, adult and children alike (except Adams), were doing likewise. And she saw that, across the mantles of the living maia, stately waves of brown and green were slowly moving.
A few minutes later, the maia began behaving strangely. Several of the maia left, heading back toward the oruc grove. One of those remaining began a peculiar movement on a patch of soil next to the vines—a kind of slow side-to-side two-step, dragging its peds.
After a minute or so, Indira saw that two mounds of earth were slowly piling up on either side of the patch.
Understanding struck her like a bolt of lightning. Her mouth agape, she turned to Julius.
But Julius was not there. He was already striding up the slope of the mountainside, heading toward the shell of the shattered landing boat. The place where the colony stored its tools.
Not long after, she saw him return. He was carrying a shovel in each of his hands. And over his shoulder were draped strips of various types of cloth and fabric. Green fabric. Brown fabric.