I spoke up. “I really don’t think this is the time or place for this. We need to talk about this in individual therapy. All I’m asking today is that you give me a chance to keep working with you. I’m only trying to help—”
“You’re like her. Just like her!”
“I’m sorry?”
“Shan’oui! She said she wanted to help. It’s always help and then there’s none of us left!”
He slumped down in his chair, refusing any eye contact. I looked around at the rest of the group. “I think I need to discuss this with Pew in private. Do the rest of you mind stepping outside? Elsbet, can you disconnect for a moment? I’ll let you know when we’re finished.”
Elsbet vanished, and the rest of the group filed out. Olivia looked back at Pew with exasperation, shaking her head. “I’ll be as quick as I can,” I said to Eremis. He nodded, and I think he understood. I’d warned him this might not be simple.
He left me and Pew alone together in the meeting room.
17. Pew
I sat down beside Pew, trying to make it as much like a therapy session as possible, in spite of the fact that we were sat at the edge of a room intended for meetings of up to twenty people.
“We’re alone now, Pew. Can we talk about it?”
He didn’t answer. Just stared at the tabletop.
“Are you worried they’re going to start investigating you?”
Still no answer.
“Pew, you haven’t committed a crime. You’re the victim of a crime.”
He stared ahead with fixed, trembling eyes.
“Pew, what is it you’re afraid of?”
He snapped at the accusation. “I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid of anything. I’m not afraid of them. It’s just wrong.”
“What’s wrong?”
He whipped his head round. “They’ll come for me and it wasn’t me! It was them! It was them that killed her!”
“Killed who?”
“The last one they sent.”
“In the breeding programme? Do you mean Ley’ang?”
“Yes.”
He stared back at me, defying me to console him. I went on instead.
“I’m sure it wasn’t your fault, Pew. Can you tell me what happened?”
Another pause. “They put me back in the programme after I escaped. But there weren’t any women left. They were all dead. Some of them killed themselves because they couldn’t get pregnant by me.” He let that sink in, then continued. “There weren’t any women. But there was a girl. She was too young to mate before but they said she was ready now. She wasn’t ready. She was a child.”
“You mean she was too young to—”
“No! She was old enough for that. She was like a child. She believed all the bullshit they’d told her.”
“I understand. What did you do?”
“I couldn’t go with her.”
“Why?”
“She was like me. When I was younger. She thought they were telling the truth. She didn’t know she lived in a cage.”
“I see.”
“I tried to tell her but she didn’t understand. And they were all watching behind a mirror. I couldn’t touch her. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stand being in the same room as her. So they gave me the drugs.”
I realised what that meant, and what he must have been forced to do to her.
“I’m so sorry…”
“That’s what I have the flashback about. They put me back in there and I… I couldn’t stop it… I… beat her until she stopped screaming, I…” His gaze slid away. I feared the flashback starting.
“Pew. Slower. More careful.”
He locked his eyes back on me. “I killed her.”
I nodded. Not judging. Not condoning. Just acknowledging.
“Not straight away. I hurt her. I think… I think I was trying to hurt her so much she could never have children. I was so disgusted…”
“With the way the Soo treated you?”
“With us. The Pu.” He grimaced as he said the name of his species. “We never fought. We just let them do it to us.”
“I see.”
“She died in the ambulance… they said there was a crash, didn’t they?”
“Yes. That’s what’s in the records.”
“They lied.”
I nodded. “I can’t say I’m surprised.”
“Then Shan’oui came to me, afterwards. I didn’t even know what I’d done. She told me.”
He swallowed hard to keep his feelings in check. “I screamed. I wept. She told me I was the last Pu in the world.” He gave me a hard look. “And she said she was sorry.”
I nodded. “Okay. Thank you, Pew. I know that was difficult but I think you made some real progress—”
“You don’t understand.”
He was still angry. “Okay. What don’t I understand?”
“She said she was sorry. She said she’d tried to defend me. She said she’d done everything she could. She did nothing.”
“But she tried. Isn’t that right?”
“All she did was make it worse!”
“How did she do that?”
“She kept us there, in that prison. She shipped us out to fuck. She let them put cameras in so every Soo in the world could watch us fuck and die. She let them do everything. The only thing she didn’t do was save us.”
“She must have been in a very difficult position.”
“She thought she was being kind. She should have just killed us. That would have been kinder!”
“Pew, I can understand that you’re angry, but—”
“You’re like her. You’re just like her!”
“I don’t run a breeding programme, Pew.”
“You say you can make it better. You say you can give us justice. It’s bullshit!”
“All I can do for you is therapy—”
“It doesn’t make it better!”
“Pew, I’d appreciate it if—”
“You can’t bring them back!”
I had to pause.
“I can’t, Pew. I would if I could, but I can’t.”
His voice became unnervingly quiet and threatening. “Do you know what I did to Shan’oui?”
I didn’t answer. His eyes were locked on me, unblinking, rimmed with red, his hands trembling as they gripped the arms of the chair like claws. All my instincts told me he was going to attack. I reached for my pad, slowly, and shook my head to keep his attention on my face.
“I still had the drug in my system.”
“…You attacked her.”
The pad was in my jacket pocket. I couldn’t pull it out without him noticing.
His eyes widened with a fanatic stare. “I can still go back there. Every time I remember.”
As he did when Olivia touched him. He could set off the flashback and then he would be the monster again.
He was doing it now. Sweat on his brow. His eyes drifting to see a vision far in the past. A look of horror on his face for a moment. And then he was there.
He wasn’t looking at me. I grabbed for the pad and pressed the emergency signal.
He snapped his eyes on me like a beast in rut, and jumped—
But I wasn’t there. I was a shadow of light, an illusion sent across the many kilometres between Hub Metro and the centre. He plunged through me, not understanding, driven by animal lust and horror. He jumped to try again and I could only stand there, unable to help him, as he fell through me and wailed at how powerless he was.