Parable of the Talents - Octavia E Butler Page 0,107

had had.

We took guns first. We didn’t try to stop the outsiders from their orgy of destruction, but we did guard the things we collected: guns, ammunition, clothing, shoes, food. Outsiders understood that. We were like them, taking what we wanted and guarding it. Some of them had found guns, too, but there was a respectful wariness between us. Even people who got crazy drunk didn’t come after us.

Someone shot the locks off the gate, and people began to leave.

Several people tried to shoot their way into the single unburied maggot, but it was locked and impervious to any effort we could make. In fact, if even one of our “teachers” had slept in the maggot, he could have defeated our escape. He could have killed us all.

Our own trucks were long gone. One had been destroyed when Gray Mora said his final “no” to slavery. The other had been taken and driven away. We had no idea where.

When it was light, I counted seven people dead on the Lazor wire. I suspect most had bled to death, although two had opened their own abdomens, even slicing into their intestines propelled by their mindless lunge for freedom. Lazor wire is impossible to see at night in the rain, and even the lowest street pauper should know the dangers of it. When we were ready to leave, I collected Allie, who had stayed inside the school and just stood at a window, staring out at us. I cut off her collar, then I thought about the Faircloths. I had not cut off their collars. They had not come to me. The two Faircloth boys, of course, had been taken away with the rest of our young children. Alan Faircloth, the father of Beth and Jessica, must have taken his daughters and slipped away—or perhaps the Sullivans had found them and taken their revenge.

I sighed. Either the girls were dead or they were with Alan. Best to say nothing. There had been enough killing.

I gathered what was left of the Earthseed community around me. The sun wasn’t visible through the clouds, but the wind had died down, and the sky was pale gray. It was cold, but for once, with our fresh clothing, we were warm enough.

“We can’t stay here,” I told my people. “We’ll have to take as much as we can carry and go. The church will send people here sooner or later.”

“Our homes,” Noriko Kardos said in a kind of moan.

I nodded. “I know. But they’re already gone. They’ve been gone for a long time.” And a particular Earthseed verse occurred to me.

In order to rise

From its own ashes

A phoenix

First

Must

Burn.

It was an apt Earthseed verse, but not a comforting one. The problem with Earthseed has always been that it isn’t a very comforting belief system.

“Let’s take one last look through the houses,” I said. “We need to look for evidence of what they’ve done with our children. That’s the most important thing we can do next: find the children.”

I left Michael and Travis to guard the goods we had collected, and the rest of us went in groups to search the ruins of the houses.

But we found nothing that related to the children. There was money hidden here and there around the cabins, missed by the marauding inmates. There were piles of religious tracts, Bibles, lists of “inmates” brought from Garberville, Eureka, Arcata, Trinidad, and other nearby towns. There was a plan for spring planting, a few books written by President Jarret, or by some ghostwriter. There were personal papers, but nothing about our children, and no addresses. None. Nothing. This could only be deliberate. They feared being found out. Was it us they feared, or someone else?

We searched until almost midday. Then we knew we had to go, too. The roads were mud and water, and it was unlikely that anyone would try to drive up today, but we needed to get a good start. In particular, I wanted to go to our secret caches where we had not only the necessities but copies of records, journals, and in two places, the hand and foot prints of some of our children. Bankole took hand and foot prints of every child he delivered. He labeled them, gave a copy to the parents, and kept a copy. I had distributed these copies among two of our caches—the two that only a few of us knew about. I don’t know whether the prints will help us get our children back. When