The sentence went unfinished. Falk’s eyes flared angrily, and he crossed the little room in three quick bounds. Towering over the much smaller Warshow, he grabbed the commander by the shoulders and shook him violently. “Get out!” he shrieked.
Warshow smiled apologetically, took one step backward, and slid his stunner from its place in his tunic. He gave Falk a quick, heavy jolt, and as the big man sagged towards the floor, Warshow grabbed him and eased him into a chair.
Thetona was crying. Great gobbets of amber liquid oozed from her eyes and trickled heartbreakingly down her coarse cheeks.
“Sorry,” Warshow said. “It had to be done.”
It had to be done.
It had to be done.
It had to be done.
Warshow paced the cabin, his weak eyes darting nervously from the bright row of rivets across the ceiling to the quiet grey walls to the sleeping form of Matt Falk, and finally to the waiting, glowering visage of Psych Officer Cullinan.
“Do you want to wake him?” Cullinan asked.
“No. Not yet.” Warshow kept prowling restlessly, trying to square his actions within himself. A few more minutes passed. Finally Cullinan stepped out from behind the cot on which Falk lay, and took Warshow’s arm.
“Leon, tell me what’s eating you.”
“Don’t shrink my skull,” Warshow burst out. Then, sorry, he shook his head. “I didn’t mean that. You know I didn’t.”
“It’s two hours since you brought him aboard the ship,” Cullinan said. “Don’t you think we ought to do something?”
“What can we do?” Warshow demanded. “Throw him back to that alien girl? Kill him? Maybe that’s the best solution—let’s stuff him in the converters and blast off.”
Falk stirred. “Ray him again,” Warshow said hollowly. “The stunning’s wearing off.”
Cullinan used his stunner, and Falk subsided. “We can’t keep him asleep forever,” the psychman said.
“No—we can’t.” Warshow knew time was growing short; in three days the revised departure date would arrive, and he didn’t dare risk another postponement.
But if they left Falk behind, and if word got around that a crazy Earthman was loose on Kollidor, or that Earthmen went crazy at all—
And there was no answer to that.
“Therapy,” Cullinan said quietly.
“There’s no time for an analysis,” Warshow pointed out immediately. “Three days—that’s all.”
“I didn’t mean a full-scale job. But if we nail him with an amytal-derivative inhibitor drug, filter out his hostility to talking to us, and run him back along his memories, we might hit something that’ll help us.”
Warshow shuddered. “Mind dredging, eh?”
“Call it that,” the psychman said. “But let’s dredge whatever it is that’s tipped his rocker, or it’ll wreck us all. You, me—and that girl.”
“You think we can find it?”
“We can try. No Earthman in his right mind would form a sexual relationship of this kind—or any sort of emotional bond with an alien creature. If we hit the thing that catapulted him into it, maybe we can break this obviously neurotic fixation and make him go willingly. Unless you’re willing to leave him behind. I absolutely forbid dragging him away as he is.”
“Of course not,” Warshow agreed. He mopped away sweat and glanced over at Falk, who still dreamed away under the effects of the stunbeam. “It’s worth a try. If you think you can break it, go ahead. I deliver him into thy hands.”
The psychman smiled with surprising warmth. “It’s the only way. Let’s dig up what happened to him and show it to him. That should crack the shell.”
“I hope so,” Warshow said. “It’s in your hands. Wake him up and get him talking. You know what to do.”
A murky cloud of drug-laden air hung in the cabin as Cullinan concluded his preliminaries. Falk stirred and began to grope towards consciousness. Cullinan handed Warshow an ultrasonic injector filled with a clear, glittering liquid.
Just as Falk seemed to be ready to open his eyes, Cullinan leaned over him and began to talk, quietly, soothingly. Falk’s troubled frown vanished, and he subsided.
“Give him the drug,” Cullinan whispered. Warshow touched the injector hesitantly to Falk’s tanned forearm. The ultrasonic hummed briefly, blurred into the skin. Warshow administered three cc. and retracted.
Falk moaned gently.
“It’ll take a few minutes,” Cullinan said.
The wall clock circled slowly. After a while, Falk’s sleep-heavy eyelids fluttered. He opened his eyes and glanced up without apparent recognition of his surroundings.
“Hello, Matt. We’re here to talk to you,” Cullinan said. “Or rather, we want you to talk to us.”
“Yes,” Falk said.
“Let’s begin with your mother, shall we? Tell us what you remember about your mother. Go back, now.”
“My—mother?” The question seemed to puzzle Falk, and he remained silent for nearly a minute. Then he moistened his lips. “What do you want to know about her?”
“Tell us everything,” Cullinan urged.
There was silence. Warshow found himself holding his breath.
Finally, Falk began to speak.
Warm. Cuddly. Hold me. Mamama.
I’m all alone. It’s night, and I’m crying. There are pins in my leg where I slept on it, and the night air smells cold. I’m three years old, and I’m all alone.
Hold me, mama?
I hear mama coming up the stairs. We have an old house with stairs, near the spaceport where the big ships go woosh! There’s the soft smell of mama holding me now. Mama’s big and pink and soft. Daddy is pink too but he doesn’t smell warm. Uncle is the same way.
Ah, ah, baby, she’s saying. She’s in the room now, and holding me tight. It’s good. I’m getting very drowsy. In a minute or two I’ll be asleep. I like my mama very much.
(“Is that your earliest recollection of your mother?” Cullinan asked.)
(“No. I guess there’s an earlier one.”)
Dark here. Dark and very warm, and wet, and nice. I’m not moving. I’m all alone here, and I don’t know where I am. It’s like floating in an ocean. A big ocean. The whole world’s an ocean.
It’s nice here, real nice. I’m not crying.
Now there’s blue needles in the black around me. Colors…all kinds. Red and green and lemon-yellow, and I’m moving! There’s pain and pushing, and—God!—it’s getting cold. I’m choking! I’m hanging on, but I’m going to drown in the air out there! I’m—
(“That’ll be enough,” Cullinan said hastily. To Warshow he explained, “Birth trauma. Nasty. No need to put him through it all over again.” Warshow shivered a little and blotted his forehead.)
(“Should I go on?” Falk asked.)
(“Yes. Go on.”)
I’m four, and it’s raining plunk-a plunk outside. It looks like the whole world’s turned grey. Mama and daddy are away, and I’m alone again. Uncle is downstairs. I don’t know uncle really, but he seems to be here all the time. Mama and daddy are away a lot. Being alone is like a cold rainstorm. It rains a lot here.
I’m in my bed, thinking about mama. I want mama. Mama took the jet plane somewhere. When I’m big, I want to take jet planes somewhere too—someplace warm and bright where it doesn’t rain.
Downstairs the phone rings, jingle-jingle. Inside my head I can see the screen starting to get bright and full of colors, and I try to picture mama’s face in the middle of the screen. But I can’t. I hear uncle’s voice talking, low and mumbly. I decide I don’t like uncle, and I start to cry.