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Karina & Silo

'You need to get over it, Silo.'

'I don't need to do anything.'

'For your sake—as well as mine.'

Silo took another swig. The drink burned his throat. He was feeling a little dizzy but not anywhere near dizzy enough. Not enough to rid his mind of Karina's shocking history.

'And doing that is only going to make things worse,' Karina said. She took the cylinder from him, sliding it to the other side of the table.

They were sitting in the salon. It was late. The room was half-empty. The corner they were concealing themselves in was in semi-darkness. Outside the window, the darkness of space continued on into forever. And there, right there, was Rictor 5, looking like a blue jewel in the midst of twinkling lights.

Karina was watching it too. 'I don't miss it in the slightest.'

'It's an awful planet. And its creatures ...'

' ... are awful?''

'That's not what I meant.'

'I know.' She sighed. 'Don't these things happen on Zibon?'

Silo gave an ugly grimace. 'Nothing like that. It's incomprehensible. If any Zibon did such a thing.' He shook his head. 'He would be thrown to the masses and ripped apart.'

He grimaced again as a series of disturbing images flashed across his mind. Silo pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, trying to squash them away. 'How can you stand it?'

'I couldn't, remember?'

'But now ...'

She shook her head. 'I don't know. When they're not happening to you it doesn't seem as bad as it actually is.'

'But it did happen to you!'

'It doesn't feel like it anymore. It's like ... it's like I'm seeing someone else. Seeing another little girl.'

'Don't say that.'

'What?'

'Little girl. It shouldn't be in the same sentence.' He dropped his arms to the table with a thud.

'It happens to little boys too. And babies. And old ladies.'

He stared at her, appalled.

'It's true.'

She looked so calm. How could she be so damn calm?

'I'm sorry to tell you that but you have to know what we are if you want to blend with us.' She looked down at the table with a frown, her forehead screwed up. 'In fact, that's a problem, isn't it? One you probably haven't thought about in all your excitement. What if our children—our boys—turn out like them? What if your species becomes more like us? What if all this becomes the norm?'

'That won't happen,' he said fiercely.

'Do you really want to contaminate your species?'

Silo clenched his fists upon the table. 'You're not a contaminant.'

'Aren't I?' She gazed sadly back into his eyes. 'He was my father, Silo. What if our children turn out like him?'

Silo stood. 'I can't talk about this right now.' He raked his fingers over his scalp. Men were watching him from across the room. He felt cold. He felt sick. 'I need another drink. Maybe ... maybe you should go back to our room.'

Karina looked up at him with a frown. She stood, barely reaching his nipple height. She seemed so small, so vulnerable. All he wanted to do was take her in his arms and hold her against him, to hold her so tightly that he could crush out all those terrible memories, out of her, out of him, like they'd never happened.