by Brian Yansky
I will keep you informed, Senator.
ATTACHED NOTE TO THE OFFICIAL CORRESPONDENCE:
Father,
You misunderstand me, sir. I am not asking for special treatment concerning my family. Nor am I complaining about conditions on this colony. Perhaps I only asked because of our conversation not long before I struck out on my mission. We sat in your study and drank Sumbulla, and you reminisced about your first assignment. You spoke of your passion for your first wife, how you felt the lack of her like a wound. I was deeply moved. Perhaps this was on my mind when I expressed my desire to have my wife and daughters here.
As for the product: of course I am aware that it is best if religious and product-rights groups do not learn of these hearing humans until the colony is settled. I will be, as you advise, careful in my reports.
I have taken one of the product as a second. She is superior to the others in both beauty and ability to hear. She is small and desirable. Hardly any taller than our own females, in fact. As you have mentioned in the past, it is good to have a second to keep one’s focus when away from one’s spouse. Also, it does give insight into the species.
I have studied her, particularly when she dreams. It is very curious. I do not know of another primitive culture that dreams. It is not true power, of course, but it is an altered state, a separate existence within the mind. Their experiences, apparently, seem real to them while they dream. This does not make them less primitive, because it is an illusion and contained within each unit, but it is interesting.
I look forward to your first visit. I will have much to show you.
Michael, Lauren, and I are sitting on one of the sofas in the library after dinner, the one time of day we get a little break. Lauren is telling us that Benjamin Franklin owned slaves, which is disappointing. The girl does know a lot about a lot.
Lindsey passes by with her sidekicks. At the same time, a girl who’s overweight gets up from a chair. Lindsey says, loud enough everyone can hear, “Porker.”
Lindsey’s sidekicks giggle. It’s like some bad teen movie.
The overweight girl turns bright red and lowers her eyes.
“Some things haven’t changed,” Lauren says.
“She was a model, right?” Michael says.
“She says she’s been in a lot of magazines, but I’ve never seen her. I don’t read those kinds of magazines much though.”
“She’s pretty hot,” Michael says. “I could see her as a model.”
“Typical guy. You’ve just seen her showing what a vain, self-centered creep she is and what do you say? She’s pretty hot.”
“Everyone has faults.”
He’s staring at Lindsey, who has settled at a table by some bookcases; she notices. He smiles. She smiles.
“God,” Lauren says.
Lindsey tosses her hair back. She’s one of those girls who gets a lot out of a hair toss.
“You know what’s got her so upset,” Lauren says. “The aliens don’t think she’s totally hot. They think she’s big.”
“She’s not big,” I say.
“She’s tall. They like their girls tiny. They assigned her to laundry. She wanted to be their personal secretary or something, but they told her no. And they call her big. That really gets her.”
“So she’s a porker to them,” I say.
“Maybe that’s why she said that to the girl,” Michael says. “See, I’m not really so shallow. I get the psychology of the whole thing. I think I’m gonna have to go over there and talk to her, help her understand what’s bothering her.”
“God,” Lauren says again.
He’s smiling and he puts up a fist. What can I do? I won’t leave a friend hanging. We touch fists, and off he goes.
“You boys,” Lauren says, more playful than I’d expect.
“Don’t put me with him. I’m not part of the Lindsey fan club.”
“I know.” She looks kind of thoughtful then. “What do you think you would have been part of?”
“What do you mean?”
“If all this hadn’t happened, what would you have, you know, become?”
“I don’t know.”
“What would you have studied in college?”
“Probably English. I don’t know for sure, though.”
Lauren does, of course. She knows everything. Double major: English and biology. Then she would have gone into the Peace Corps. She’d come back and go to medical school. She’d work for Doctors Without Borders or some other international group that helps those who can’t afford medical treatment.
“You would have been a great doctor,” I say.
“Thank you,” she says.
“For what?”
“I don’t know. Letting me talk about it. Pretending I have a future.”
A Handler passes by.
“You have a future.”
“Right,” she says. “Someone’s slave. That’s my future.”
“Maybe not,” I say, but I believe she’s right. I don’t want to but I do.
“You know better, Jesse. We’re going to be their slaves until we die. Just look around. They’re everywhere. There’s no way we can get away from this.”
“They aren’t everywhere,” I say. “They seem like they are, but they aren’t.”
“I’m afraid they are,” she says with the confidence of a straight-A student. “I feel them. If you try, you can feel them.”
“That’s the way it seems,” I say.
She looks slightly confused. “What do you mean?”
“Some nights I study their movements. My dad was big on observation. He was always telling me to really look at things. When I look closely, some of them fade, like they’re not real, like they’re phantoms. The aliens make them to make us feel like they’re everywhere.”
I lean closer to her. “Look at the one by the chair. Keep looking. Really look at it.”
Lauren stares at it, and after a few seconds, I can see that she sees it disappear.
“Unbelievable,” she says. She sits back. She taps the sofa with her fingers and for a second I’m reminded of Mr. Whitehead and the day of the invasion. “So maybe you’re right. Maybe they’re not omnipotent, but they took over our world in ten seconds. I’m not sure it matters if they’re everywhere or just almost everywhere.”
“It matters,” I say. “There’s a difference between omnipotent and almost omnipotent.”
We’re ordered to bed. She smiles and for just a second I think she might kiss me again. I can almost see a future of kisses from her, and it’s almost like I have something to look forward to. It doesn’t happen. She stands up. She says, “You’re right.” I should have kissed her is what I think. Then I think, What am I thinking? This isn’t the time for kissing or finding a girlfriend. This is the time to focus on staying alive.
“There is a difference,” she says at the top of the stairs. “Thank you, Jesse.” Survival is important, but even so, I’m still thinking about that almost-kiss as I head off to my room.
I’m dreaming. I know I’m dreaming.
I hear the girl crying again. Her crying is hushed, like she’s crying into a pillow or something. She stops abruptly. “Is someone there?” I don’t think she can be talking to me because I’m not there. I’m here in a bedroom that has the sweaty sock smell of a locker room.
“Who’s there?” she says.
“Are you talking to me?” I say. I can’t see her.
“Who else would I be talking to?”
“Right,” I say. “My dream, after all. You should be talking to me.”
“Are you trying to be funny?” she says. Something about her voice makes me think she’s cute. Maybe it’s a strange thing to think under the circumstances, but I’m pretty sure most guys would notice. I guess if I were in front of a firing squad and the squad was made up of all girls, my last thought might be, “That one on the end is kind of cute.”
“Not really,” I say.
“Who are you?”
“Look, it’s my dream. Shouldn’t I be asking the questions?”
“It’s not really a should or shouldn’t situation. Anyway, it could be my dream.”
“I guess.”
“But I think it’s yours. It doesn’t feel like one of mine.” She says this matter-of-factly as if she’s been in someone else’s dream before.
“Where are you?” I say.
“In a tower that’s not a tower.”
“A tower that’s not a tower,” I repeat. “That sounds like dream talk.”
“Maybe you’ve come in a dream because that’s the only way to get to me. You don’t know how to come any other way, right?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“What you’re talking about.”
“Maybe we should try something. Imagine you’re next to me. Just imagine that.”
“Okay.” This is strange, but dreams are strange, right? I do what she asks. I imagine myself next to her. Immediately, I’m in another room, standing next to a small, pretty girl. The moonlight slips through big bay windows, and I can see that she has straw-colored hair and enormous green eyes.
“I’m Catlin,” the girl says. “I don’t know how you broke through, but I’m glad to see you.”
“You’re in the house, Lord Vertenomous’s, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“My dad was right.”
“Your dad’s here?” she says, looking around.
“No. Not — never mind. How are we having this conversation?”
“We’re in your dream. It’s not ideal,” she says, “but I’m still glad to see you.”
She’s tiny but something about her seems large somehow. She puts her hand on my arm and tugs slightly, and I sit next to her on the bed.
“I need you to remember me when you wake,” she says.
“Who are you, though?”
“I need someone to know I’m alive because sometimes, locked up here, it feels like I’m not. I need to be sure someone remembers.”
“I’ll remember,” I say, though it does cross my mind that I might not. I don’t always remember my dreams.
Then I have a feeling. I’ve been having a lot of these feelings lately. The feeling is this: Lord Vert has been here recently.
“This is his room, isn’t it?” I say. I jump off the bed. I’m worried that I’ve walked into a trap, that the girl has lured me here.
“Not exactly, but you’d better go,” she says. “He could be coming.”
“Why would he come here if it’s not his room?”
“Go,” she says.
Then, somehow, she sends me away. I’m falling.
“Remember me,” she shouts.
I wake up.
At first I don’t remember what I was dreaming. Someone farts. It is probably the longest fart I’ve ever heard. Not that I’m an expert on farts, though sharing a room with this many guys is definitely giving me more experience in that area than I ever wanted. The guy’s extreme fart does not improve the odor of our room.
Then I suddenly remember the girl. I remember talking to her and I remember sitting on her bed and I even remember the feeling that Lord Vert had been there. She’s real, and she’s somewhere in this house.
To Senator & High Lord Vertenomous:
No, my implication was not that there might be a situation remotely similar to what happened in Sector 301. That primary species was advanced. This one is primitive.
I’ve picked the most advanced of their species I can find to be placed in my own house for observation. They have shown no unanticipated mental abilities.
My memory of the species in Sector 301 is that their contact with us caused latent talents to develop in them. Nothing like that has happened. I am finding that this species may be capable of a kind of primitive shield. Not something they can control. Something that is built into them. This causes the shadows I spoke of earlier. It may cause us some minor problems, but I do not anticipate that it will interfere with any of the delivery deadlines.
To Senator & High Lord Vertenomous:
Other houses have been alerted to be especially vigilant in observation of the species. We are proceeding as scheduled. I will say this: The species has very strong and often raw emotions. Everything is so direct in them. It is both attractive and repellent. Have you encountered this in other species?
To Senator & High Lord Vertenomous:
Of course I am not going native. Yes, I do enjoy my second, but she is only a slave. I spoke of their raw emotions only as an odd feature of their primitive minds. It is good to study product so that we may improve our teaching techniques.
To Senator & High Lord Vertenomous:
There has been an incident, a casualty actually. A patrol in Section 3, a remote, semidesert area just west of my position, did not make his report this morning. Another patrol was sent to the last-known coordinates, and they found his body. He’d been killed by one of their crude weapons. We are investigating, but there have been other problems in Section 3 that indicate some of the product is still loose there. It is annoying, but I see no real threat. I will increase patrols, and we will find and exterminate them.
To Senator & High Lord Vertenomous:
The product that killed the patrol has been captured. Two males. They claim to have come upon the patrol and to have killed him before he felt their presence. They claim to have had no contact with others. Unfortunately, when they were being brought back for interrogation, they managed to kill themselves by jumping from the transport device. We are investigating how it was possible for them to make such a move without the patrol in the transport knowing before they acted.
To Senator & High Lord Vertenomous:
I have communicated with the other house heads. We will be ready by the earlier shipping date you have ordered. No section head has indicated a problem, though there is, as to be expected, some minor resistance to new deadlines. All will be ready.
We’re in the library, sitting on a sofa. Most of the others have gone to their bedrooms without beds.
“Look,” Michael says, “there’s no comparison between the two sports. You look like you’re making out when you’re wrestling. Like you’re kissing and hugging another guy. It’s not a real sport.”
“It’s in the Olympics. Is football in the Olympics?” I say.
“Football is an American sport.”
“Yeah, well, there is no America anymore.” I’m sorry I say this the second it comes out. I want to take it back. “Anyway. Olympics. Real sport.”
“I could see boxing. I mean, it’s not as exciting as football, but it’s a sport. You ever boxed?”
“A wrestler will always beat a boxer. If their skill levels are the same, I mean. The wrestler just has to get inside the boxer’s range and take him off his feet and he’s helpless as a little baby. But they’re the same in one way. You do them alone. It’s all up to you. No team stuff. You don’t have to rely on anyone. I like that.”
“My man Tex is not a team player.”
“I don’t like team think. It’s fine on the football field, but it never stops there. It gets into everything.”
“Does anyone even watch wrestling? I suppose they watch Friday Night SmackDown or something. That kind of wrestling maybe.”
“Real wrestling is an old sport. The Greeks did it.”
“The Greeks?” he says, disgusted.
“You take people down in football. You tackle them, right?”
“I make people miss. Maybe you’ve seen the game? Running back. He gets the ball and runs down the field and people try to tackle him. Of course, other people block for him. Those would be his teammates.”
“I played football as a sophomore.”
“But quit because Tex can’t play with others.”
“I can. I just don’t like to.”
“People watch football,” he says. “More people watch the Superbowl than vote.”
“I don’t know if tha
t’s actually true,” I say. It sounds like it might be, though.
“They love you for it if you’re good. I was good, Tex. That was the one thing I could do better than anyone.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I know you were good.”
“Sometimes I don’t think I can stand this.”
I’m silent then. He’s spoken the unspeakable, and I’m afraid to say anything.
I think of my father saying What’s important, Grasshopper, is how you blend the skills you have when you’re in a real fight. Everything else is just play, sport, or entertainment. That was my dad. He’d been in that place where he’d had to fight for his life, and he’d survived because of what he did and what he knew. To me martial arts and wrestling were about a lot of things: skill, pride, focus, accomplishment, but I didn’t really understand what my father meant. Now I do.
“Maybe you can wrestle your way out of here, Tex,” Michael says.
“Maybe you can run your way out.”
A Handler comes over and tells us to go to our room.
“It’s not time,” I say.
Reason number fifty why I would never join the military is that I have a problem with authority. (I gave my dad fifty reasons when he tried to convince me to join up.) I suppose it is this character flaw that causes me to mess with the Sans in dangerous ways, even though I’m not gaining anything by it.
“Go to your room,” the Handler says, and he has that look they get when they won’t put up with much, a look that feels like a gun pointed at your head.
“Come on,” Michael says. He grabs my arm and pulls me toward the stairs.
Upstairs in our room, I ask Michael if he thinks they were listening to us. There’s a rumor going around that an alien was killed by rebels out west somewhere, and I think they’ve been watching us more closely. Michael says there are no rebels, that it’s just wishful thinking.
He says, “Anyway, why would they care what we say?”
“Maybe they’re worried. Maybe there are rebels.”