“Nothing a clip round the ear couldn’t fix. When they were young, anyway.”
“There’s one thing I haven’t asked…”
“Is there? Bloody hell, there’s a miracle and no mistake.”
“You’ve never told me their names.”
She chewed on her sandwich and looked out across the mountains.
“They’re dead and gone. What does it matter?”
“I’d like to know.”
“They haven’t even got graves, for gods’ sake.”
“But they had names.”
“Yeh.”
“Is this difficult for you…?”
“You’re not going out of your way to make it easy, are you?”
“They had names.”
“That’s right.”
“Have you forgotten?”
She whipped a look at me, full of rage. “I haven’t forgotten a damn thing!”
“Will it hurt to tell me?”
She looked away again and swallowed.
“Olivia?”
“Caterine. Vicktor. There, are you happy?”
“Which one was the eldest?”
“Caterine.”
“Thank you, Olivia.”
“Now leave me alone.”
“There’s one other question I wanted to ask.”
“Well bloody ask it then!”
“There were two revenants at the station when we found you.”
“Yeh.”
“You put them down before you tried to kill yourself.” She took a bite of her sandwich and didn’t answer. “Were they Caterine and Vicktor?”
She chewed on her sandwich for a time and stared out over the mountains.
“Olivia?”
She snapped back at me. “I’m having my sandwich. Can’t I do that in peace?”
I left her to her meal. She wasn’t enjoying it any more.
10. Pew
Pew buried himself in his studies, which seemed to be the only thing that would take his mind off his troubles. He retreated into his room whenever he could, so I popped in a couple of times each day to see how he was, and made sure he came out for meals, when he was usually quiet and would excuse himself as soon as he decently could.
It was only when I called him in to deal with an administrative matter that we made progress. His request to be placed on the euthanasia track had been processed swiftly, as they usually are. It’s easy to get into the programme, but extremely difficult to get as far as euthanasia. I’ve only seen it happen once; when the patient feels they have a chance of getting what they want, they tend to open up to their therapist, and healing begins. The euthanasia track saves many more people than it kills.
I needed Pew’s signature on the final document; he said the necessary words, scribbled his name, added his Hub ID code and thumbprinted the pad, and then I added my own codes and imprints as the witnessing officer.
“That’s it,” I said.
“That’s it?” he asked.
“Yes. That’s everything.”
“Can we start?”
“The next time we have a therapy session, Pew.”
“I, I want to start now.”
“It’s going to take a long time. There’s no need to rush into it.”
“I’ll tell you about Ley’ang.”
I stopped there. He was dreadfully pale, and sweating. “Are you sure? You don’t look very well.”
“I’m fine. Let me tell you. Please!”
“Okay. Let me make you some tea.” I rose to prepare him a cup.
“It— it—” The words would not come, and he struck the arm of his chair, frustrated.
“You don’t need to jump in this fast, Pew.”
“It was…” he swallowed. “The same that happened to Qaliul.”
“The girl who came to the centre when you were young?”
“Yes! She was older than me. They put her in the programme first. They…”
“You said she died.”
“She killed herself.”
“Because of what they did to her?”
He replied with utter horror in his voice. “Yes!”
I gave him his tea. “How did you know? You were only a little boy.”
“She sent me a letter. She gave it to the other Pu, they kept it for years but I found it when they were old… she told me they were… raping her and she was going to kill herself and they were going to do the same to me when I was her age and she wanted us to run away but she couldn’t find a way and she thought they might, she thought they might… because I was a boy she thought they might… they might make me…”
I took the tea from his shaking hands.
“Pew. You’ve said it. It’s okay.”
“I haven’t said it! I haven’t said anything…”
“They forced you into the breeding programme—”
“Yes! But it was different for boys. They made us… they, they… it wasn’t the same for boys…”
He couldn’t say it.
“Pew… is this something you’d prefer to talk about with a male therapist?”
“No! No, I can… it’s not you, it’s just…”
He was lost for a moment, looking around, almost as though he were trapped. He looked up at me. “Let me show you.”
“Um…” I must have looked a little confused.
“There’s a documentary I found. I can explain it with, with that.”
“Okay, go ahead.” I handed over a pad so he could control the wallscreen. He called up his home folder and found a documentary on agricultural practices on a primitive world — not his one, nor any I recognised. They had apparently domesticated gazelles early in their history and turned them into typical cattle-like givers of meat and milk. He drilled down further into the documentary package and found a piece of video showing details of breeding practices.
A narrator spoke over pictures from a stainless steel model farm scattered with hay and muck. “When the breeding season comes, it is the largest and strongest males that will be selected for stud so their size will be genetically transferred to the next generation.”
A farmhand in overalls led a docile bull gazelle from a pen. Pew stood, nervously watching as I took in the documentary.
“The bull is led to the selected cow and allowed to mount her.” The bull gazelle did exactly that, with details that seemed a little too graphic until I checked the metatext and discovered this was a training video for agricultural students.
“However, approximately eight per cent of bulls show no interest in mounting. It is unknown why, though there are studies ongoing. For the purposes of this video, we shall only discuss the two most commonly used solutions.
“Artificial insemination is used in a number of cases.” The screen showed a bull gazelle suffering the attentions of a vet to collect semen. “This is the preferred method in the modern day as it offers the least risk to livestock. Traditionally, however, bulls have been given sindvort in their feed which acts as an inducement to mounting.”
The screen showed a bull gazelle munching on a paste mixed in with his feed, then cut to a bull entering a pen with a cow and immediately charging at her, making her run to one side. But these gazelles had been made so large by breeding that she could not escape and he mounted her — only more insistently, forcing her against the side of the pen.
“While this method is undoubtedly effective, there are risks involved to the health of both the bull and the cow. Gorings are frequent…” The screen showed a bloody wound in the side of the cow gazelle. “…and can be fatal.”
The screen cut to lower resolution video shot at a real farm rather than the unnaturally clean facility in the main video. A bull had gored a cow so severely that his horns were embedded in her flanks. He could not be calmed by the farmhands, while the cow shrieked in pain and stumbled. “The practice is now banned in many countries, while artificial insemination—”