But Abner only repeated that ancient, awful word: "Hurt in my arm ... hurt, hurt...."
MacMartree shrugged, and looked up at Cole, who was still standing helplessly by.
"Fetch the serum," MacMartree said. "I'll try setting the bone...." He grasped the twisted arm as he spoke, and one, tearing, final scream broke out of Abner's throat. Before MacMartree could react, Abner went rigid in every limb, then as suddenly relaxed and was still.
"He's dead," Cole choked. "Abner is dead!"
MacMartree felt for the heartbeat, shook his head.
"Only unconscious. The hurt did that, I suppose." He sat back on his haunches, thoroughly baffled. Cole sat, too, and a few yards away, where they had left him, Phillips stirred. He rolled over on his side and propped himself shakily on one elbow, roused by that last, ringing shriek of Abner's.
"It isn't right," MacMartree said, to neither of them. "The hurt, that went with sickness—a thousand years ago." He looked up at them.
"I read about these things, you see," he told them. "There was hurt, and there was sickness. When they knew enough about the human brain, scientists simply bred into the part of our minds that makes us aware of hurt the power to shut it off, automatically, before we're even conscious it exists. And as for sickness...." He looked at Phillips, shaking his head. "They got rid of that, too, and now...."
Neither of the younger men said anything for a time. They waited, desperately relying on the older man to help them, to bring them through this, whatever it was, into familiar ground again. At length, Cole spoke.
"Mac," he began softly.