A Thousand Deaths Read Free

stood and stretched and rubbed his face. He was surprised to find the body of a young woman beside him on the ground. He couldn't recall who she was or where he was, and he didn't know what he ought to do. He felt small and forlorn and, as the minutes passed and he stared at the swollen, lifeless woman, Courane heard himself whimper. He was hungry, but there was nothing at all nearby that might provide him with even a meager breakfast. He took a deep breath and resigned himself. There was neither road nor sign of human settlement in sight, and he didn't have the least idea how he ought to proceed. He sat down again and waited. The breeze blew almost steadily and the sun felt good on his shoulders, but he guessed that by midday the heat would become intolerable, and that at night all the warmth would bleed away and he would suffer with the cold.
    An hour after awakening he found the piece of paper in his pocket. He was filled with joy. He read the directions several times and, though he didn't understand what they meant, he was given a new energy to obey his own instructions. He narrowed his eyes and looked to the horizon below the morning sun; he chose a landmark to walk toward. Then he bent and picked up the body and slung it clumsily over one shoulder. He leaned forward under the burden and trudged toward the eastern horizon. The sandy soil made walking difficult and Courane was soon out of breath, but he didn't stop. He had to get the woman back to the house before it got dark. After the sun set, he wouldn't know in which direction to walk. He worried about that for a little while, and then he forgot all about the problem. He muttered to himself as he went, and he was as unaware of the passage of time as he was of his own pain.
    Courane took a rest in the middle of the afternoon. The place he chose for his break was identical to the place he had spent the previous night. The sand and the rocks were the same. As he sat in the sparse shade of a tall weathered rock, he watched a fly crawling along one of the woman's arms. He had dropped her roughly to the ground, and one stiff arm stuck out as though she were indicating something to the southwest that intrigued her. The fly walked along the fine sun-paled hair of her arm. Her name was—
    â€”Alohilani! He remembered. He smiled at the achievement, but then his face contorted with grief. He wept loudly and helplessly as his thoughts battered him cruelly.
    His memories were fugitive visions, and he clutched at them greedily on the occasions when they presented themselves. He studied them all to the smallest detail, disregarding the pain they threatened. He didn't care about pain any longer. He needed to know the truth. He needed to know who he was, where he came from. He needed to know where he was going, what he was doing. He needed to know why Alohilani was dead, and why his mind functioned only at widely separated moments, with bewildering gaps in continuity and understanding.
    Courane felt a little sting on the back of his neck and at that moment he remembered how it had been.
    TECT informed him that he had failed for the third time, had used up his last chance and had wasted it like a kid with an extra dollar. He went home to his small apartment in Tokyo and waited for the verdict and the sentence. There was no doubt that he was going to be found guilty. TECT had no margin of compassion. In all his years, Courane had never heard of anyone else who had failed as he had, and so he had no idea what TECT would decide to do with him. His imagination ran wild, picturing everything from death by etiolation to being condemned to life as one of TECT's hired social deviates, an addict perhaps, or a member of some squalid ethnic group.
    There was a tect unit in the foyer of the apartment building. When the verdict and sentence were decided, they would be transferred there. No doubt the building's superintendent would run up the stairs with his usual mad energy to give Courane the