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.How must they live from day to day, he wondered, with no outer protective covering?As he watched, the four tall beings were joined by two small, furred creatures that resembled nothing so much as gerekos, the mischievous tree-dwelling creatures that inhabited the forest.They left the golden ship and hurried across to the taller beings.Then one of the tall Fallen left the group and, with painful exactitude, stepped towards Pharan.He glanced right and left, and only when he was satisfied that the acolytes had arrayed themselves in the symbol of holy munificence—the stylised cup of the Creator—did he step forward and raise a hand.He spoke his name, and welcomed the Fallen to Calique.The spokesperson of the Fallen spoke his language, though inexpertly.“I am,” an unintelligible sound, “and my friends and I come in peace.”Pharan gestured, excitement mounting in his thorax, and then informed the spokesperson that it was his duty to lead the Fallen to the Sleeper.The Fallen spokesperson listened, and then inclined its head slowly.It turned and spoke to its fellows in a low, slow language that Pharan found hard to conceive might possibly convey the necessary information.Pharan dropped into a squat, which a day ago might have caused him pain; he felt nothing now but exultation.The spokesperson sat down, crossing its thick limbs.Slowly, cautiously, the others joined it and sat down to either side.Last of all came the furry creatures, which dropped into squatting positions and stared at him with huge dark eyes.The spokesperson said, “You spoke of the Sleeper.Please tell us more.” Its grasp of the language was rudimentary, and hesitant, but by concentrating fully Pharan understood its meaning.It was written in the scriptures that the Fallen, when at last they arrived on Calique, might be ignorant of their mission.The scriptures claimed that the Fallen might even be ignorant of the Sleeper, and the grand saga of the Sleeper and the Caliquans.It was Pharan’s noble duty to enlighten these strange beings.“Many thousands of cycles ago,” he began, “the Sleeper did fall to earth aboard a magnificent jewelled vessel; I say the Sleeper, though of course he was not known as the Sleeper then.”Pharan proceeded with the story, as it was laid down in the scriptures.The jewelled vessel was seen first by a lone acolyte meditating upon the mountain-top, who reported seeing a fiery coal descend from heaven and come to rest in the forest, three days north of the phrontistery.The Venerable at the time, one esteemed Baraqe, had foreseen the event in the stones, though further casting had failed to impart what future events might lie beyond the fiery coal’s arrival.He sent out a caravan consisting of his wisest teachers and a dozen of the finest acolytes, and three days later they reached the place where the coal had landed.They were amazed to find not some nub of meteorite but a complex vessel studded with winking jewels, though the vessel had suffered on impact: its skin was dented, many of its jewels lost, and oily smoke issued from within the craft.As they watched, a hatch opened, and a strange beast staggered forth and collapsed upon the ground.Their first reaction was revulsion, for the beast was hideous in the extreme; but revulsion was swiftly followed by compassion, for was not the beast one of the Creator’s creatures, and in need of succour?The being was injured, bleeding badly, its limbs shattered, and suffering who knew what terrible internal injuries? With much effort, for the creature was twice as tall and three times as heavy as the largest Caliquan, they managed to ease it onto the back of a sharl and made their way back to the phrontistery.For the next cycle the teachers and acolytes of the mountain nursed the creature back to almost full health.Through much of its bedridden recuperation, it was attended by an acolyte name Heth, who as well as ministering to its physical needs, undertook to guide its spiritual welfare too.To this end, Heth taught himself the creature’s language, and spoke of the scriptures, and the supreme Creator of all that the universe contained.It was from Heth that the story of the creature entered the scriptures and came to be passed down the generations.There were no terms for many of the creature’s more technical words, for the Caliquans were not a mechanical, tool-wielding race, and therefore much of what the creature told Heth was translated with approximate phrases and words.The creature—its true name was too complex for Heth to transliterate—was one of a team of world-menders, that is, beings who moved about the helix with the duty of restoring what was not perfect.There were many worlds on the helix, and over the multiple cycles of their existence, things became worn, mountains lost soil, rivers dried up, food trees died.The team of noble world-menders moved from world to world around the helix, ensuring that all was perfect, harmonious.They also aided the many races of the helix, in many ways.It was a fine profession, which brought much prestige to those who carried it out.However, one day as the world-mender was going about its business, a fault developed in the interior of the creature’s jewelled vessel—perhaps its heart failed, or its brain suffered fever; at any rate, the vessel fell from the skies and crashed upon the soil of Calique.According to scripture, the creature, when well enough to regain its feet, returned to the vessel and inspected it, and decreed it dead; he mourned its passing, for he could not leave the planet now, nor could he communicate with his fellow world-menders.However, there was hope that one day he might be reunited with his kind.He took Heth, accompanied by Heth’s teacher, into the jewelled vessel and showed them a long object, very much like a passing box in which acolytes and teachers alike were placed before burial.The creature explained that he would place himself within the box, and sleep for many cycles, and tell the box to wake him only when another craft fell from the skies to the soil of Calique.He instructed Heth to tell his people to watch the skies, and, when a vessel fell to earth, to be on hand to guide the Fallen to where he slept.Then he would awake and be returned to his people, via the craft of the Fallen.That was the story according to Heth, which was recorded in the scriptures, and which brought great merit to the people of Calique, for to aid a strange creature in its hour of need, without thought of gain or benefit to oneself, was the finest act a being could accomplish.Pharan recounted the story to the strange, longhaired spokesperson of the Fallen, who leaned forward and listened intently, from time to time turning slightly to relay the account to its fellows, who evidently did not understand the language of Calique.“And so, now, it is my duty to lead you to the Sleeper,” Pharan finished triumphantly.The spokesperson made a gesture with its head, which Pharan found unusual.It spoke to its fellows, two pinky-brown creatures and one as black as a gourd, and they all spoke together, with what might have been called animation if the term could be applied to creatures who moved with great lethargy.The spokesperson faced Pharan, and asked, “I take it that the Sleeper was of the race that was responsible for the building of the helix.”Pharan listened well, and worked out the clumsy words, and said, “We do not know whether the Sleeper belonged to the beings known as the Constructors.This was not recorded by Heth
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