Author's Note: This is a longer version of the contest drabble I posted a few weeks ago. I've since decided to expand this fic to the length of three or four chapters, the next of which I am currently working on. I hope that this new version is more interesting and readable than the old.
The Sum of All
The alien's flat, recessed eyes fluttered shut, and - curiosity overcoming their initial fear - the people crept back in to study it.
"Is it dead?" one individual asked the rest of the assembly, as a second bent to place the palm of his hand on the alien's chest.
He felt life quivering under the hard muscle and bone with an uneven beat. "No," he said, and when he lifted his hand it came away streaked with blood and soot. He looked over his shoulder, back at the trail of destruction that the alien's ship had torn through the city, and the rest of the people turned as one to look with him.
Another picked up the thread of his thought. "There's more than are needed here," she said, "and there may be some who are injured or trapped within those buildings." Three-quarters of the crowd nodded in agreement, and peeled off from the group to join the growing teams assembling around the damaged buildings.
The seven remainders were left starting down at the unconscious alien. "What is it?" one person said, and another built on the question by saying, "Why is it here?" while a third asked, "Where did it come from?" and a forth said, "What happened to it? What hurt it?" and the assembly as a whole began to sway anxiously as the questions piled upon one another unanswered.
One individual spoke above the mounting voices. He had the jittery manner of one who'd lost too many comrades to tragedy, and no longer knew exactly to whom he was connected. "I believe that it's of a kind with those who attacked Eastern Collective last year."
The rest of the assembly, six in all, looked for one to the other, reaching a quick and grim consensus. "Tell us everything," one said. Another added, "We can't act appropriately without knowing."
Those who'd witnessed the attack firsthand had deemed the details too distressing to be disseminated among the wider population, and now the six who'd known little of the matter before understood why; the imagines that flooded the communal space between their private consciousnesses were the sort that changed an individual's ability to interact with others forever. One would always be isolated, knowing of such horrible things in such awful detail, out of fear of harming others with that knowledge.
The strangers had been shadow-minded things, shallow and cheerful killers, and they hadn't been slowed by reason argument or the pleas of children. It had been impossible to reach any sort of understanding with them, let alone consensus. They'd been driven away, but not before no less than a quarter million individuals had been killed. There was no knowing when they might return in greater numbers.
"We should learn from them, and do as they did," the one who'd been there himself said, "and kill it while it's helpless."
The six who were new to the idea began once again to sway. "It doesn't look like them," one said. "How could they have been together?"
"None of the strangers from before looked similar," another said, slowly, because this was a point of great puzzlement for them all.
"They wore the same style of clothing. They were alike in that."
"This one's garbed differently," someone said, pointing at the dirty orange tatters the alien wore around its waist.
"The vessel is the same."
"If we could ask it what it wanted…" one ventured, but another cut him off discordantly.
"If it's allowed to wake it might do violence. The others didn't mind killing children."
"Be calm," someone said, peevishly. "This helps nothing."
The one who'd dared to first touch the alien lifted his arms for silence. "We're off-track," he said. "The question is: Were the strangers part of us?"
The response was quick and unanimous. "No, they were no part of us."
Catching the flow, another said, "You can't take up the ways of someone else without becoming part of him. Do we want that for ourselves?"
"I don't," one said. "Why should we change ourselves at their prompting?"
"We aren't meant to kill helpless people who haven't done us any intentional harm."
"That's them. It isn't us. We're the people here together, and we aren't like them."
A last said, "I won't allow strangers change us into something we don't want to be."
They took care of the alien, until it was well enough to go back to its own people.
