Hunger (12 page)

“Which is why I am here.” Evie looked at the uncomfortable expressions on all of the other women’s faces. “It’s OK. I don’t mind. I’ve lived on my own for the last five years. Like I said, as long as these walls are to keep things out, as well as me in, then I’m OK with it.”

“Nothing gets over these walls. And there will be a guard here most of the time, especially at night. You are safe,” Okil assured her.

“A guard? He’s not armed, is he?” she asked, worried if she did something wrong she might end up dead.

“Only with a communicator. If there are any problems, he will radio the tower and backup will arrive.”

“Now you make me sound as if I’m the president. All this security for me.”

“You are almost as important as the president; you carry part of the next generation in your womb. That is very precious to the Karal. Their prime days are numbered.” Celia had linked arms with her and they had all started to inspect the buildings.

“Prime days?”

“Yes, there is only a certain time in a Karalian’s life when he is able to father a child. This is why they are so desperate for us to come here. Soon they will increase the number … as soon as the uprising is quashed.”

“Uprising?”

“There are some who see us as a threat. The council wants that small minority quashed before they increase the numbers.” Celia pushed open a door and grimaced as a strange smell hit them, they moved on to the next house.

“You mean those like Ishk?”

“He is good at stirring things up. He will sink to any depths to get his way.”

“What do you mean?” Evie asked. Ishk might be set in his views about females, but she never thought he would do anything illegal to get his own way. But that was what Celia was hinting at, surely.

“Evie! This one looks in good shape and it’s close to the showers that have already been renovated.” Vanessa waved to them.

“Come on, forget I said anything,” Celia said and they went over to the building opposite, to join the others.

Vanessa was right; it was the most suitable. The four women, plus Okil, spent the day cleaning and making it habitable. As the afternoon wore on, another space cruiser arrived. For one moment she thought it was Ishk, but then she realised it was only Marin coming to collect the others. Although he had brought a new bed with him, for Evie.

“Thank you, Marin.”

“You need something clean to sleep on. I thought it would be better than anything you would find here.” He looked around. “But you have done a great job in making this look like a home.”

Elissa linked arms with him and stood admiring their work. “We’ve enjoyed it. Tomorrow we can start clearing another room or two. Perhaps you can persuade Lytril to allow Evie some other furniture.”

“I think there is some already being made. Okil, do you know anything about it?”

“Yes. I plan to pick up more over the next few days; I don’t think anyone thought the breeding house would be occupied so quickly and there was concern the furniture would be wasted. You’ll be moving to Grenvet before too long,” he reminded her.

“I don’t mind it here.”

“It’s like a prison. Grenvet is beautiful,” Vanessa said.

“But I’ll be even more alone. At least here you can visit often.” She tried to fight off the sudden loneliness. They were all about to leave, and she would be entirely on her own.

Elissa went inside the cruiser. “Here, I made you this. Marin warmed it before he came. It’s still good to eat. And here are some fresh fruit and vegetables; they can all be eaten raw.”

She passed them to Evie, who took in a deep, hungry breath. “That smells wonderful. Thank you, Elissa.”

“You are welcome, Evie.” Elissa hugged her goodbye, and then the others said farewell too.

“We’ll be back first thing. Then we can get started on making this a proper home for you, Evie. I think you are right. Stay close to us, for now. Perhaps soon there will be others to go with you to Grenvet.”

“Maybe,” she said, but as they left and the gates shut behind them, she doubted it.

The violet sky was tinged with purples and blues as the suns set over the horizon. He drove home, intending to go into his garden and catch up on all the weeding he had missed while on Earth. It was time to return to normal.

Instead, he found himself standing in his bedroom, trying to catch a scent of her hair. The shampoo she used reminded him of warm summer days when he would lie in the fields, surrounded by wild flowers, and look at the clouds skimming overhead. Next to him, his father would point and say something absurd about the shapes of the clouds, and they would play the game where you make the shapes into something they were not.

At this moment, he was trying to make his life back into something it was not. Like it or hate it, he had to admit he was different now. Whether he stayed different was perhaps his choice. Over time the effect Evie had on him would fade; he could block it from his mind, in the same way he had blocked the love for his father from his mind. It was easier to forget, easier to think that his species were better off without love. That the loss of one parent was bad enough and the death of two, two people you had loved your whole life, would destroy the children of Karal.

He had watched it, more clearly than most, as the fathers died; he had watched the mourning and then the way each had taken control of their emotions, just as they had been taught. It made Karal an easier place to live. But what if the death of two parents made that self-control harder to sustain, what if they lived in permanent colour?

Ishk looked down at his hands; he was living in semi-permanent colour now. He could hide it from his face, but not from the rest of his body, not without great concentration and control.

Evie had done this to him, one female. In only three days. What of their species, if the females lived with them all the time. Fights? War?

No, they had plenty of land and the Karal only bred one child. They would not fight.

Going to the window that looked out over his garden, he thought of the sim, he thought of its words, how the mothers would once have lived and worked alongside their mates. The way they lived now was wrong; this was not how it was supposed to be.

Was that the truth? Was there even a truth anymore?

No. There was just the now and a decision to make. Did he want to explore his feelings for Evie, or did he want to walk away from her forever?

His hands flashed red, a deep crimson as though his blood pumped so near to the surface it could be seen. It had been so easy to say the females should stay in the breeding house. It had been so right. Now it was his belief that it was wrong. Scientific data backed this up.

He, Ishk, member of the Hier Council had made a mistake.

“I, Ishk, of the Hier Council, made a mistake,” he said out loud to his garden.

Leaning forward, he rested his heated forehead on the cool glass. “I made a mistake.”

Evie went into her house, which still seemed like an absurd thought, and set the food out, ready to eat.

But her appetite had vanished. Instead she felt a bubble of laughter rising inside her. What the hell was she doing?

Only days ago she was trying to keep herself safe and out of harm’s way on Earth. Now she was on an alien planet, eating alien food with an alien child inside her. The laughter bubbled over and she had to sit down on the side of her new bed and let it flow.

This must be a dream. Sometime in the night she had been drugged and now she was hallucinating. She bet if she tried really hard she could break out of this drug-induced reality and find herself sucking a man’s cock, or getting raped. Was that what the incident with Ishk was, her being raped by some guy whilst her mind pretended it was an alien?

The laughter faded, she went outside to look up at the violet sky. It was darkening, the dual suns setting. Two suns, wasn’t that the most ridiculous thing she had ever seen. How could they be real?

Evie felt the laughter change to panic. The walls of her prison were closing in on her. There were ghosts here, she was sure of it, ghosts of the other females who had been imprisoned here. That thought made her want to wake up, but how was she supposed to break through this drug-fuelled haze?

She began to cry, deep sobs. “Wake up. Wake up, Evie.” What was happening to her body while she was experiencing this wonderful world?

Sinking to her knees, she repeated over and over to herself, “Wake up, Evie, wake up.”

“Evie?”

She looked up. In front of her stood the figment of her imagination who had brought her here. “Let me go, Ishk. Please let me wake up and go home.”

He came to her. “Evie, what’s wrong? Are you unwell?”

“I want to wake up.”

“You are awake.” He brushed her hair back from her face and then pressed his lips to her forehead. “I’m sorry you are here, but you are awake, it is real.”

She lay against his chest, shivering, until he bent down and picked her up, carrying her into the little house that was hers now. Inside the lights illuminated the room, the smell of the food assailing her senses.

“When was the last time you ate?” Ishk asked.

“I don’t remember. I don’t know how long I’ve been here. Two days, I think, you brought me here.” Nothing made sense. Her brain was a scattered mess of thoughts and memories.

“I think you need to eat, Evie.” He began to dish some of the food onto a plate, and handed it to her. She took it, but simply stared at it. She felt sick.

He picked up the fork, and guided it to her mouth. It did smell good, maybe just one mouthful... One mouthful led to another, and slowly her awareness came back to her.

“I can do it now, thank you.” She took the fork from him and ate hungrily.

“Did Darl examine you?”

“Yes,” she answered, clearing the plate and helping herself to seconds.

“Did he say everything was OK?” Ishk asked gently.

“The baby is too small to see. But I guess so.”

“I meant with you?”

Why do you care?
Oh yes, because she needed to be healthy to give birth to a healthy child. “Yes, although the mixing of our DNA can make me feel sick.”

“Do you feel better now?”

“Much, maybe I was just hungry.” She got up and poured herself some water. “Can I get you anything to eat or drink?”

“No. Thank you. I came to see if you were all right. If you had everything you need.”

“Yes, I think so. I have had plenty of help today, and tomorrow they are coming back to help me clean out the rest of the house.”

“I could help you,” he said, a little embarrassed.

“I thought the idea of me being here was so that you don’t have to live with a human female. It kind of defeats the object if you spend your time here with me.”

“Evie, I’m sorry.” He got up and went to stand at the doorway, looking out into the darkening night. “I was rude to you.”

“It doesn’t matter now, Ishk. Our relationship is over. I have conceived your child. You can go and spend your time fighting for all the women to be sent here. I know that is what you believe is right.”

He didn’t rise to her verbal attack. Instead he said, “The house seemed so empty without you.”

“Ishk,” she said, standing now, glad she was feeling better. “Please don’t expect me to feel sorry for you.”

“No, that’s not what I meant.” He turned to face her, the colours on his skin the same hues as the sunset. Evie wished she could read them, to know what they meant. But when he placed his hand on her cheek, she got some idea. His feelings for her were confirmed when he said, “I wish we had more time.”

“For what, Ishk? For you to enjoy making your child?”

“No. Not that I didn’t enjoy it, but you didn’t, did you? I went to the simulation today.”

“Why?”

“To run some data through the system. The sim reminded me I hadn’t seen how humans … like to be … touched. I thought … well, I don’t know what I thought.” He was quiet, trying to formulate his words; words that she knew were hard for him to say. “I thought that you weren’t
supposed
to enjoy it, that you were just a vessel in which I was supposed to plant my seed.”

“Your mothers weren’t compliant, were they, Ishk? So you thought that human females would be the same. Only part willing, in return for food.”

He shook his head. “No, they were anything but compliant. In the orphanage, the other boys would talk, they were from the mines, or their fathers were those sent deep into space to explore. They talked about our mothers as if they were animals. I was impressionable. I blamed the mothers for what we were. I blamed them for the loss of my father. A loss which cut into my heart so deep I thought I would die.”

His body shuddered and his colours turned blue, which meant sadness, she could feel it through his skin, her fingertips reading his emotions, such a deep well of loss. “You were very young, Ishk.”

“I paid special attention in the classes where we were taught to contain our emotions. I pushed them down, repressed them. All I ever thought about was getting back to the farming belt and being what my father had taught me. But when I did return, there was no real pleasure. I had learned to store my emotions in a box, within a box, the lid so tightly locked it was never to be opened.”

He continued, “And then the other fathers died, and I saw the sorrow. I lived through it, but couldn’t feel it. I was a voyeur to that sadness. And because I saw it with different eyes, I knew I had to do what I could to stop it happening again. So I worked my way onto the Hier Council, making sure that no orphan from the farming belt would ever have to go out of his community again. That the next generation should be kept in their own territory. I pushed for tighter controls on emotions, and when we discovered Earth and I saw what you were, I knew that it was my duty to stop your influence over us.”

“Why, Ishk, why do you hate us so much?”

“Because of who you are. What you are.”

“And we are beyond redemption? Because we have destroyed our planet, you think we deserve to become extinct?”