"They were in the eyes of humanity."
I shook my head. "No. That's not what happened."
Reginald shrugged. "They aren't here, are they?"
"No, but..."
"They aren't even allowed to come back."
He was deliberately misunderstanding. "Wait a minute that's not..."
He spread his hands wide. "In fact, now that one of the hostiles jumped through and closed the fah'ti for good, we don't even know how to get back to them at all. The aliens have deliberately stolen almost thirty of our own good people. Turned them into slaves. Why right this very minute, I bet they're torturing those scientists to get humanity's secrets and..."
I snapped. "That's not true!"
"Isn't it, Jake?"
"No! It's not like that at all." How could I explain? "We invaded them. We went to their galaxy, their home. We were the hostiles in that situation."
"And did we try to attack?"
"You know we didn't. But that..."
"Did we harm a single one of them?"
Once when I was throwing stones across the top of the sea with Ashnahta my rock hit a wave wrong and bounced back and hit Ashnahta's guard in the temple. It left a bruise. That's not at all what he meant. "No," I answered honestly. "But..."
"Stop with the buts, Jake, and take a look at the cold hard facts. We happened upon an unexpected race. When we wanted to exchange information and have a mutual learning from each other, the other race acted in an openly hostile manner. Our very best scientists were captured, and when one little child and a washed up Captain got out, meaningless people of no consequence as they very well knew, they sent an assassin through space and time itself to make sure we would have absolutely no way of rescuing them. Tell me how to sell that to the people Earthside in a way that wouldn't have Ashnahta's head on a platter. Go on. I'm all ears."
My stomach dropped. He was saying quite simply that it didn't matter. The truth did not matter. In cold fact, it really did sound bad. "We invaded them," I said again quietly. The truth might not matter to a world who wouldn't listen, but it sure as hell mattered to me.
"We did," he quickly agreed. "We went traipsing through the neighbor's daisy field without permission and got caught. I know that. You know that. And believe it or not, there really are a fair amount of people on Earth who would understand that important detail, too. But it doesn't matter what we know. It matters only what they will believe. The majority would panic and demand her head. And even a fair amount of ones who are happy that she exists would gleefully chop her up to study. The governments would want her dead, the scientists would want her dissected, the people would want her tortured to make up for the perceived wrongs of her people... Hell, I'd bet the only ones who'd accept her carte blanc right now would be the fashionable trend setters looking for the next latest craze." He stopped and pursed his lips. "Actually, that would be the place to start, wouldn't it? The court of public approval." He sighed. "I suppose that'll be a matter for my successor. It'll be a long time yet before the world is ready for the Ashnahtas of the universe."
I hated to admit he was right. No, really. It made me seethe with anger at the close mindedness. Long hours later when I was staring into the bleak Mars night in the south observatory, I had to admit he was right. I wanted to find fault with his argument. I wanted to find an excuse for humanity, like I was so quick to do for the Qitani. But he was right. I saw firsthand how people treated me, and I was a full blooded human.
Even though the meeting went better than I could have expected, I was still in a fine funk when I finally stopped ignoring Ashnahta's mental request for company. Reginald had given me a new pass. I was no longer confined to the small set of rooms deep below the surface. He said it really didn't matter, anyway. "We live in a bubble. It's not like you can escape again."
True. How bitterly true.
You are in a bad mood again. Did you show such disrespect for your primary?
I wasn't even to the room yet and already she was questioning me. I was tempted to turn right back around. While she could still poke and prod, it was much easier to ignore if I wasn't right near her. I hesitated for a second, then sighed. I opened the door and found her in bed. "Why are you in bed? We're going to have dinner soon."
The machine doctor told me to lie down.
Instantly I regretted even thinking about avoiding her. I pulled up a chair. "Is something wrong?"
"Do not avoid my question," she said aloud in Qitani. "Were you disrespectful to your primary?"
"No. I took his yelling like a man. Now, is something wrong with you?"
She sighed heavily. I felt her annoyance. "You were disrespectful. You lie terribly."
"I wasn't disrespectful. I just didn't agree with everything he was saying." I felt her searching for my internal record of the conversation and closed that part off. Her annoyance grew. "Why does the doctor have you resting?"
A test I'm to have this evening. Later.
A bot nurse entered with a pill. She instructed Ashnahta to swallow it down, saying it was preparation for the test.
"What kind of test needs a pill?"
"A mild sedative," the bot nurse assured me with the unchangingly pleasant little bot smile on her little bot face. God, those give me the creeps.
Ashnahta took the pill and swallowed it down with some water. I grow tired of these tests.
Our medical field vastly surpasses that of her native people. At first she panicked at the things that were being done. However, the bot Bradley was actually very good at explaining the principles to Ashnahta in the terms of absolute reasoning she was used to. She rarely put up any kind of fight as long as she understood what the test was, what it was for, and how it could be of benefit to her. I believe the cream he offered for her dry skin went a long way to winning her over, too. He had teamed up with De. Karl to come up with a concoction, and it was working well. It greatly improved her overall mood. It was hard to be amiable when you're itchy.
The Bradley bot was quick to enter after the nurse left. "I have it on authority that you have swallowed the pill," he said in nearly flawless Qitani. Hearing it out of another mouth shocked me.
"When did you teach him that?"
"The machine learns with great speed." Though he cannot inspeak. His brain is simply wires.
Bradley sighed. He couldn't hear her, but the insult she spoke out loud was enough. He hated to be reminded he wasn't human. "In less than fifteen minutes you will start to fall asleep. I will return and collect you then."
"What kind of test is this, doc?" I asked.
"It is not a test, so much as a trial of an implanted oxy filter. It will aid in the regulation and assist in her slow adaptation to our natural oxygen content."
I looked at her quickly. I didn't know you were having trouble breathing.
Why should you?
It was projected in her most regal of tones. What she tried to pull off was the idea that I was common. I was a male. I was beneath knowing the intimate details of someone like her. It was a sign of her fear. I didn't try and fight it. I just took her hand and sat with her until the pill she swallowed made her rigid exterior relax and watched as her eyes softened. Just before she drifted off, she allowed me to understand how scared she was. I held her hand tighter until I felt the thoughts and feeling fade. When I was sure she was out, I went to the hall and called for Bradley.
"How bad is her breathing?"
He gave a sniff, a programmed quirk from the real Bradley. "If this filter works, it will be of no consequence. There has been no measurable damage, and no reason to believe that any will become apparent in the future. But too much oxygen is just as bad for any organism as too little. It's a drug to the body. It's causing her organs to perform above optimum efficiency. In one whose life span is so short, I feel it's pertinent to take this surgical risk." He glanced at his watch. "And we are about to be off schedule, so if you would excuse me." He didn't actually wait to see if I would excuse him. In seconds, he and two bot nurses had Ashnahta on a gurney and wheeled her down the hall. As I did with every scary procedure, I took a seat outside the closed operating room and opened my mind in case some part of her called out for me.