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I look up at him and I ask the question that rises immediately and unignorably to mind.
“Are you going to kill me?”
He cocks his head and looks at me with a slight smile. “Are you going to give me a reason to?”
“No,” I say. “My ship would miss me.”
“Your ship.”
“She has a neural chip. She’s practically a person, and she’s up there orbiting around the planet lonely, no doubt. Probably mourning me.”
“Ships don’t mourn their pilots, human.”
“My name’s Lyssa.”
He sits back. “You are a single human female with a sentient ship, landing on a planet designed to destroy life before it can emerge. Finding yourself to be captive of the monster you’d been sent to hunt, you introduce yourself with your name and worry about the emotional state of a ship?”
Manik
Does she fear me? She should. She is in a terrible predicament, having gone from bad to worse in record time. Some might argue that her situation reached its peak somewhere around the time she caught on fire. So far, she has not annoyed me in a way that would make me want to hurt her, but one never knows.
Our conversation is very interesting, an attempt on both our parts to feel the other one out. She is trying to determine if this is an experience she will survive. I am trying to determine the same thing, but for different reasons.
“So,” she says. “Are you the victim of some kind of conspiracy? Or maybe a plot to smear your name?”
Her question is polite but laced with desperation. It’s a combination I have become quite familiar with over the years of terrorizing all life everywhere.
“You’re hoping I didn’t do what I am accused of doing because if I can tell you that, then you don’t have to worry that you’ve trapped yourself in a cave with a violent maniac.”
“Yes.”
I lower my voice into a dominant, dark drone of pure intimidation. “I have done everything I have been accused of, and worse.”
“Well,” she says, sucking in a breath. “Just as well I’ve arrested you, then. We’re all much safer now.”
I laugh. She is funny. She smiles a little, revealing her nervousness, but keeping it in check. She must be struggling desperately not to break down completely.
“Do you have any idea who I am?” I ask the question out of curiosity. I don’t feel as though she has any idea about me. She has a bounty, and perhaps some kind of indication that I am a violent and terrifying criminal. But I don’t think she knows who I am for myself, or for anyone else. I’m a bounty. A number. A warning. A creature. What fun.
“I know you’re wanted by the…” She makes an adorable attempt to pronounce ‘Interstellar Justice Commission’ with that implant I know she must be using. It gives her a slight but noticeable speech impediment that I find very cute.
“Yes. I am wanted. But do you know why?”
“For a lot of murderous behavior.”
Technically correct.
“Does the weather change on this planet?” She changes the subject with an inoffensive question.
“You mean, will there be a break in the weather so you can get out?” Her questions are amusingly transparent.
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Oh.”
She tries to come to terms with her situation. I have always found people’s reaction to adversity interesting. Survivors adapt. Those who will inevitably lose their struggle with existence tend to enter into blunt denial or general flailing.
