Tenacious

The woman slept peacefully while Amanda adjusted her dress to meet the modesty standards of the human civilization that had brought her here, but, so far, could do nothing with her. Finished, Amanda settled into a chair between Kris and Jack, facing the captive. She folded her hands in her lap and joined them, waiting for the alien woman to waken.

Time passed with leaden boots. Jacques returned, mission no doubt accomplished, and took a chair from the conference table to sit quietly, watching his wife. The glass wall, and maybe other things, separated them.

Penny and Masao stayed where they were, standing and gazing at the sleeping child. In a secret moment, either his or her hand snuck into the other’s. Kris wasn’t sure who reached out first, and did not task Nelly to find out.

They waited.

Since Kris first met the aliens—and had to blast their ship out of space to keep it from ramming the old Wasp—she’d wanted to talk to one of them. Now, with that talk only moments away, she found herself wondering what to say. She ran several opening lines through her thoughts and found them all lame.

Well, I’m a Longknife. I’ll come up with something when it matters. We always do.

The woman awoke with a start, glanced around, and spotted the bassinet. She leapt from the couch and charged across the room.

She smashed into the clear wall and bounced off it. She let out a scream and slammed her fist into the wall. Then she shook her hand in pain.

~Your baby cannot hear you,~ Kris said. ~You can see she is safe. Unharmed. She cannot hear you.~

~Give Minna to me,~ the woman demanded.

~When we have talked,~ Kris said, firmly.

So the woman charged Kris.

Jack was out of his chair and blocking the woman in a flash. She tried slugging him, but the big Marine grabbed her wrist and swung her around, pinning an arm behind her back. She went for him with her other fist, so he grabbed that hand, too.

Both arms pinned, the woman bent over and screamed her frustration.

~We are going to talk,~ Kris said. ~It can be easy on you, or it can be hard. Your choice, but you will answer my questions.~

The woman quit struggling, stood up, and looked Kris straight in the eye. Then she eyed her sleeping child, and snarled, ~I will talk with you, vermin, though you will not understand a word I say.~

~I understand what you say quite well,~ Kris said.

~Your kind can understand nothing,~ the woman said. She looked like she might spit at Kris, thought better of it, and just stood in place.

Kris motioned for Jack to let her go. The look he gave her was one big question mark, but he did, quickly coming to stand beside Kris’s chair.

The woman slunk into her place on the couch, as far from Kris as possible. Her eyes stayed focused on her child.

~What is the ship?~ Kris asked.

The woman gave Kris a look of utter disdain. ~The ship is the ship. We live in the ship. The ship has always been and always will be.~

THAT SOUNDS LIKE SOMETHING SHE LEARNED BY ROTE, Jack said on Nelly Net.

YES, IT’S A CATECHISM ANSWER, Jacques agreed. TRY SOMETHING ELSE.

~Who are the people?~ Kris tried.

~We are the obedient ones. We follow the Enlightened One, who leads us safely through the stars.~

CATECHISM, AGAIN, Jacques said.

HOW ABOUT I SHOW HER THE TWO MOTHER SHIPS WE BLEW UP? Kris asked.

I’D SAVE THAT FOR THE FINAL BLOW IF WE STILL CAN’T GET THROUGH HER FACADE, Jacques said.

OF COURSE, HER FACADE MAY BE ALL SHE’S GOT, Penny put in. ALL THEY’VE GIVEN HER AND ALLOWED HER TO MAKE OF HERSELF.

THAT’S A HORRIBLE THOUGHT, Kris admitted, and tried again. ~Why are you not on the ship? Why are you on that planet with the pyramid?~

~The what?~

~The big stone thing you walked away from,~ Kris tried. Apparently, words like “pyramid” didn’t enter into a ship-raised vocabulary.

The woman tossed the question off with a wave of her hand. ~I do not know. The Black Hats came. They said I was a poison to the ship. They said I had tried to turn away from the enlightenment. They dropped me and the others off by the Place for Making Amends for All Errors. They gave us water and some food and told us to walk away in that direction and we would live to make more amends for our errors.~

She shrugged. ~So we walked until we came to the dark green place and now we live to wash away our errors.~

~And your errors were?~ Kris asked.

Again, the alien woman shrugged, eyes still locked on her child. ~You sound like Zinton. He said that the Black Hats and The Enlightened One were crazy. That we hadn’t done anything that other people hadn’t done. We hadn’t done anything wrong.~

~Was Zinton the man we found dead on the flat land of glass?~

~So you know of Zinton. Did the demons take him?~

~His body is still lying where he fell. Who killed him?~

She shrugged again. ~The men tried to silence his wild talk. It was bad enough we’d been expelled for our errors. Talk like that could only make our penance worse. We were there to make amends for our errors, not commit more.~

KRIS, I KNOW YOU AREN’T GOING TO LIKE THIS, Jack said on Nelly Net, BUT I DON’T THINK THIS POOR KID HAS ANY IDEA WHAT’S GOING ON WITH THOSE MOTHER SHIPS. SHE’S JUST A COG IN A VERY BIG AND NASTY WHEEL. AT FOURTEEN, CARA KNOWS MORE ABOUT WHAT’S GOING ON IN HUMAN SPACE THAN THIS YOUNG MOTHER DOES ABOUT THE SHIP SHE WAS RAISED IN.

I’M STARTING TO FEAR THAT YOU’RE RIGHT, Kris admitted.

~What do the ships do as they travel between the stars?~ Kris tried.

~The ship does the will of the Enlightened One,~ came back without a moment’s reflection.

~And that will is?~

~To destroy vermin like yourself,~ came casually, with no personal animus at all.

~Why must vermin be destroyed?~

Now the woman did look at Kris. ~Vermin must be destroyed because vermin are vermin. Only those who follow after the light can be allowed to breathe, to eat, to do the holy act of breeding. For all else, that is profanity and must be stomped out. That is the right way.~

She eyed Kris, the way a human might examine a wondering ant, then shrugged. This shrug started at her toes and went all the way to the top of her head. ~But you are vermin, what is life to you?~

~It is very important to me,~ Kris said.

~May I have my baby back, now, vermin?~

Kris reviewed what she’d discovered and found it not much to her liking. ANY IDEAS, GANG?

YOU WANTED TO TALK TO ONE OF THEM, KRIS. THEY DIDN’T WANT TO TALK TO YOU. NOW YOU’VE TALKED TO ONE, AND SHE HAS NOTHING MUCH TO TELL YOU. ARE YOU ALL THAT SURPRISED? Jack said.

I CAN’T SAY THAT I AM, Kris admitted, then tried a new twist. ~Look at me. I am no vermin.~

~You are vermin,~ the woman said back, not even bothering to look at Kris. ~I can smell the dirt and fear on you. You are vermin, and I would kill you if you were not surrounded by men who do your bidding. Is there any greater proof than that that you are indeed vermin? You, a woman, telling men what to do. That is not enlightened.~

SO THEY ARE A MALE-DOMINATED SOCIETY, Jacques said. A MALE-DOMINATED SOCIETY WHERE I SAW THE OLDEST WOMAN BOSSING THE MEN AROUND A LOT. NO BIG SURPRISE THERE.

Kris frowned at Jacques’s thought, then went back to her own. She wanted to tell the woman that she did not want to be at war with the ships. NELLY, IS THERE A WORD FOR “WAR”?

NO, KRIS. THERE ARE A DOZEN WORDS FOR “SUBMISSION” BUT NONE FOR “VIOLENT CONFLICT RESOLUTION.”

AGAIN, NO SURPRISE, the anthropologist said.

Kris had to resort to the only words she had. ~We do not want to be hunted.~

~Prey do not understand death, but you will die. When the ship comes, you will die in numbers too great to count, and we will take our trophies.~

Kris had had enough.

“Nelly, run the videos of the mother ships dying.”

“Do you think that is wise?” Nelly, Amanda, and Jacques said at once.