“I am not going to hurt you,” he told her.
“You are not going to hurt me,” the human said, with great conviction.
“I have given you…” Tagen looked at his dermisprayer blankly, and then held it up for her to see. “What do you call a thing such as this that makes a human calm?”
“A sedative,” she said, without any hesitation.
Tagen echoed her, beginning to feel encouraged. This was going to work. He put the dermisprayer back into his belt and folded his arms, looking confidently down at her. “Tell me about your planet’s defense array,” he said.
The human merely looked at him.
All right, perhaps he hadn’t said that correctly. “Tell me about the way in which Earth repels off-world invasion,” he said.
The human’s chin drooped until it met her chest. She began to sink toward the floor.
Tagen stood her up again, scowling. “Tell me about Earth’s information and communications transferal devices,” he said.
“See en en,” said the human, which made absolutely no sense at all.
Tagen felt his lips thinning. “Tell me about the door,” he said darkly.
The human turned around, her eyebrows lifting with sluggish surprise. “That’s my door,” she said, and closed it.
As Tagen watched, she manipulated a series of switches and knobs set into the side of the door. “What did you just do?” he asked.
“I locked it. Now you can’t get in.” The human looked at him, weaving on her feet and beaming with pride.
“What would happen if I broke the lock?” Tagen asked.
The human considered the question. “Then it would be broken,” she said.
“Are there any other defenses? Sensors? Weapon triggers?”
“Nope. Just the lock.” The human frowned at him. “And you broke it.”
He opened his mouth to correct her, then gave up and took her shoulders, pointing her at the dark screen of the monitor. “What is that?”
“My tee-vee.”
“What does it do?”
“It brings piping hot platefuls of complete crap right into your living room and inundates you with commercials.” The human thought. “You can also play games and watch movies on it.”
Most of her words were totally unknown to him. He said, “Can you show me?”
“Sure.” The human stood there, smiling at him.
“Show me,” Tagen ordered after a long pause.
She began to stagger in the direction of the monitor and Tagen followed close behind, in case she fell, reminding himself that he had never thought it would be easy to question a human. The scientist had told him the effects of the sedative would last for roughly half a day. Hopefully, it would be long enough for her to train him in the basic necessities, such what was edible and how to use the privy.
The human sat down on the sofa with a rectangular black object in her hand. She aimed it at the monitor, pushed a button, and the screen lit up with images. “This is a movie,” she said, and pushed a button, changing the image. “This is a movie. This is a bad movie. This is a commercial. This is a show. This is a commercial. This is—”
It was going to be a long night.
*
Daria Cleavon came slowly to the realization that she was awake only after several minutes of staring at her bedroom ceiling. This disturbed her; she understood that she was normally quite quick to wake up, and that it should not be so bright in here. She turned her head to send an accusatory glare at the window and the whole room pivoted with her.
Was she drunk?
She could not remember drinking, but it seemed a logical assumption, explaining both the state of her head and the fact that she was still wearing yesterday’s clothes, even the shoes.
She peeled back her blankets carefully, eyes shut tight against the nausea even that little movement sparked in her, and tried to remember where she’d come by the booze. She couldn’t have stopped at a bar, could she? She never ordered anything alcoholic from the store, so she had to have stopped someplace. She could distinctly recall driving out to the post office, but everything after that was a blur.
An image came to her, rising like a soap bubble through the thick scum of her half-memories: a man’s face, huge in her mind’s eye, with the piercing golden eyes of a hawk. Daria sat frozen on the bed, blocking out all distractions as she fought to hold on to that surreal picture. She had the unshakeable impression that she had spoken to this man last night.
Was he a cop?
Daria’s subconscious seized on the idea. She thought perhaps he was, funky yellow contacts or not. Maybe he’d pulled her over for speeding.
And then he took her out for drinks?
Daria shuffled down the hall to the bathroom, bracing herself on the walls like an old woman. She wanted to run a shower, hoping that would clear her brain even a little, and then abruptly changed course and vomited into the sink.
She had to be drunk, she thought, staring in disbelief at her reflection in the mirror. Her face was green, the scars lacing up the left side of her face stood out white as cobwebs. She was just as drunk as drunk could be. How in the hell did that happen?
She rinsed her mouth twice, cleaned the sink, and then sat, exhausted, on the lid of the toilet and closed her eyes. She’d been drunk before. She didn’t remember it being anything like this. She must have tied one on like a Russian sailor. She—
The television was on. She could hear voices floating up the stairs and…and yes, that was the stark double-bong that cut Law & Order into sound bites.
Daria’s brow furrowed, although she couldn’t quite get her eyes to open. She hated Law & Order. Hated it in all its many incarnations. Dan had watched it all the time, even episodes he’d already seen. He’d been addicted to it or something. Since he’d left, Daria didn’t even watch the channels it came on.
Did the cop come home with her last night?
Alarmed, Daria realized she had vague memories of taking someone through every room in her house…answering questions…demonstrating appliances…
Uneasily, Daria slipped one hand between her thighs, gripping herself through her clothes, drawing comfort from the feel of all those layers of denim and cotton. She didn’t think she’d slept with him. She couldn’t imagine wanting to take a total stranger to bed, but then, she couldn’t imagine getting shit-faced with a cop and then showing him how the blender worked and apparently she’d done that.
Daria got up, splashed a little more water on her face, and went to see if there was someone in her house.
Gosh, she was being calm about this. Why was she being so calm? Having a total stranger in the house was a big deal, dammit.
Again, the quasi-memory of the man’s face suggested itself, frozen like a photograph. She could still hear echoes of his voice, even though she couldn’t quite make out the words. He had told her something very important, though, and then he had asked her questions.
Tell me about your planet’s defense array.
That couldn’t have been one of them. What the hell kind of question was that?
Daria started down the stairs and had made it past four of them when Law & Order abruptly fell silent. She stopped where she was and listened to whoever was in her house listening back at her.