The Host (The Host #1)(146)
“Like cottage cheese,” he agreed.
I gagged and then shuddered at the image.
“It makes me sick, too,” he admitted. “Doc gets real bent out of shape. Every time he thinks he’s got it cracked, it goes south again. He’s tried everything he can think of, but he can’t save them from getting turned into oatmeal. Your souls don’t respond to injected sedation… or poison.”
My voice came out rough with new horror. “Of course not. Our chemical makeup is completely different.”
“Once, one of yours seemed to guess what was going to happen. Before Doc could knock the human out, the silver thingy tore up his brain from the inside. Course, we didn’t know that until Doc opened him up. The guy just collapsed.”
I was surprised, strangely impressed. That soul must have been very brave. I had not had the courage to take that step, even in the beginning when I was sure they were going to try to torture this very information from me. I didn’t imagine they would try to slash the answer out for themselves; that course was so obviously doomed to failure, it had never occurred to me.
“Jeb, we are relatively tiny creatures, utterly dependent on unwilling hosts. We wouldn’t have lasted very long if we didn’t have some defenses.”
“I’m not denying that your kind have a right to those defenses. I’m just telling you that we’re gonna keep fighting back, however we can. We don’t mean to cause anyone pain. We’re makin’ this up as we go. But we will keep fighting.”
We looked at each other.
“Then maybe you should have Doc slice me up. What else am I good for?”
“Now, now. Don’t be silly, Wanda. We humans aren’t so logical as all that. We have a greater range of good and bad in us than you do. Well, maybe mostly the bad.”
I nodded at that, but he kept going, ignoring me.
“We value the individual. We probably put too much emphasis on the individual, if it comes right down to it. How many people, in the abstract, would… let’s say Paige… how many people would she sacrifice to keep Andy alive? The answer wouldn’t make any sense if you were looking at the whole of humanity as equals.
“The way you are valued here… Well, that don’t make much sense when you look at it from humanity’s perspective, either. But there’s some who would value you above a human stranger. Have to admit, I put myself in that group. I count you as a friend, Wanda. Course, that’s not gonna work well if you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you, Jeb. But…”
“Yeah?”
“I just don’t see how I can live here anymore. Not if you’re going to be slaughtering my family in the other room. And I can’t leave, obviously. So you see what I mean? What else is there for me but Doc’s pointless cutting?” I shuddered.
He nodded seriously. “Now, that’s a real valid point. It’s not fair to ask you to live with that.”
My stomach dropped. “If I get a choice, I’d rather you shot me, actually,” I whispered.
Jeb laughed. “Slow down there, honey. Nobody’s shooting my friends, or hackin’ ’em up. I know you’re not lying, Wanda. If you say doing it our way isn’t going to work, then we’re going to have to rethink things. I’ll tell the boys they’re not to bring any more souls back for now. Besides, I think Doc’s nerves are toast. He can’t take much more of this.”
“You could be lying to me,” I reminded him. “I probably couldn’t tell.”
“You’ll have to trust me, then. Because I’m not going to shoot you. And I’m not going to let you starve yourself, either. Eat something, kid. That’s an order.”
I took a deep breath, trying to think. I wasn’t sure if we’d come to an accommodation or not. Nothing made sense in this body. I liked the people here too much. They were friends. Monstrous friends that I couldn’t see in the proper light while sunk in emotion.
Jeb picked up a thick square of cornbread soaked through with stolen honey and shoved it into my hand.
It made a mess there, crumbling into gluey morsels that stuck to my fingers. I sighed again and started cleaning them off with my tongue.
“That’s a girl! We’ll get over this rough spot. Things are gonna work out here, you’ll see. Try to think positive.”
“Think positive,” I mumbled around a mouthful of food, shaking my head with disbelief. Only Jeb…
Ian came back then. When he walked into our circle of light and saw the food in my hand, the look that spread across his face filled me with guilt. It was a look of joyous relief.
No, I had never intentionally caused anyone physical pain, but I had hurt Ian deeply enough just by hurting myself. Human lives were so impossibly tangled. What a mess.
“Here you are, Jeb,” he said in a subdued voice as he sat down across from us, just slightly closer to Jeb. “Jared guessed you might be here.”
I dragged myself half a foot toward him, my arms aching from being motionless so long, and put my hand on his.
“Sorry,” I whispered.
He turned his hand up to hold mine. “Don’t apologize to me.”
“I should have known. Jeb’s right. Of course you fight back. How can I blame you for that?”
“It’s different with you here. It should have stopped.”