Only Human (Themis Files #3)(16)

—Enatast!

—Yes! I can say my name! I’m a genius. I’m gonna need something to write this down. Your turn. You are Enatast. I am Vincent.

Oh, don’t look at me that way. I have a feeling I’m not the smart one in this room. An hour from now, you’ll feel like you’re trying to teach a cat to do tricks. I learn yours, you learn mine. That’s the deal. You … are … Enatast …

—Yout … ay … Yincent.

—Close enough! Now where are my friends? Friends. Here. Let me mime them for you. Eva, tiny human. Eugene. Big Man. Rose. I can’t mime Rose. My friends!

—Optept akt.

—Yes, optept akt! Where are my friends!

—Eyet onyosk.

—Don’t eyet onyosk me. You know what I’m saying. Optept akt! I have no idea what it means, but I mimed my friends and you said Optept akt. Ast … see, with my eyes, optept akt!





FILE NO. EE011—PERSONAL FILE FROM ESAT EKT


Interview between Brigadier General Eugene Govender and Dr. Rose Franklin


Location unknown


—Wake up and smell the coffee, Rose! We’re goddamn prisoners!

—They’re just being cautious, General.

—Cautious! Is that what you call it? The doors lock from the outside. There are armed … teenagers outside the door. This is a jail.

—What did you expect? They don’t know us. They don’t know what our intentions are.

—Of course they know what they are. Our intention is to get out of this shithole and go back home, which is precisely what they seem to be hell-bent on preventing.

—I don’t think they mean us any harm.

—You don’t think … Goddammit! They killed a hundred million of us! That’s pretty unambiguous if you ask me.

—I’m certain that’s not what they came to do. And you know I meant the four of us. They could have killed us on the spot when they found us inside Themis.

—Is that good? Who’s to say they don’t want to torture us, dissect us, make us watch while they cut us into little pieces? Maybe that’s what they’re doing to Couture while you and I are talking.

—Shhhh!

—The kid’s sleeping, Rose. She can’t hear us.

—And what if she’s not? She’s ten! She’s scared enough as it is. Don’t put ideas in her head. Vincent’s coming back. He could be in the next room. You saw what he did to that guard when he grabbed Eva.

—Goddamn idiot. I thought he was gonna get us all killed.

—That’s my point. They didn’t kill us. In fact, since we arrived, the only violence came from us, not them.

—If I didn’t know you better, Rose Franklin, I’d say you’re taking their side.

—There are no sides. There are no good guys and bad guys here. Everyone is just trying to do the right thing. I’m trying to understand where they’re coming from.

—The right thing? Have you lost your goddamn mind? They’re killers, Rose. They kill people, by the million.

—So do we.

—And if we were holding four of them prisoner on Earth, they’d have every reason to be scared shitless. We would probably dissect them. I’m not saying we’re better than they are. I’m saying these aren’t the righteous evolved beings you make them out to be. They’re the dominant species on their world. They’re predators.

—You’re afraid of them because they are … well, alien. Europeans had these maps of North Africa at the times of the Crusades. They marked the regions where giants lived, where two-headed people could be found. People fear what they don’t know.

—Yeah, they do. People slaughter what they don’t know, they keep it in chains, they enslave it. I understand what you’re saying, believe me, Rose. I understand better than you do. This is what I’m afraid of. These people out there, they’re not alien. This is their home. We’re the aliens, Rose. We’re the two-headed monsters.

—I understand that the events of the last few days might indicate otherwise—

—Can you hear yourself? You’re talking like him, now.

—Just trying to be clear. But I truly believe that their intention, when they came to Earth, was not to slaughter millions of us. What do the military call it? A surgical strike. I think that’s what it was supposed to be. In a way, I think they came to Earth to help us.

—I don’t buy that for a goddamn second, but say you’re right. Does it change anything? No, it doesn’t. Not a goddamn thing. It’s not the intention that counts when it comes to genocide. They didn’t give us an ugly sweater for Christmas. They violently killed millions of us. You’re curious. I get that. But don’t lose sight of the facts. We know they’re killers because they killed millions. I don’t really give a damn if or why they wanted to do it. You want to study them, fine! Let’s bring one back with us. We’ll lock it in a cage and you can have a tea party with it every night if you want to. First order of business, though, is to get the hell out of here, get our butts back to Earth.

—How? Seriously, how do you propose to do that, General? Yes, I’m curious. Maybe my curiosity is skewing my judgment a bit. I’m willing to admit that. I want to know more about them. Now you might think that’s a bad idea, but I don’t see us having any other choice. We don’t know how we got here. We don’t know if Themis has the capacity to get back to Earth on her own, and even if she did, we wouldn’t know how. Besides, she’s disabled right now, and we don’t know how to fix that. It seems to me, and correct me if I’m wrong, that if we want to get our butts back to Earth, as you say, these people are gonna have to do it for us. I think the odds of that ever happening increase exponentially if we don’t treat them as enemies. We need to get on their good side. Whether you’re sincere about it doesn’t necessarily matter, but I’m sure it wouldn’t hurt.