“I’m sorry about yesterday,” he says. “There were certain pressures from above to experiment with a new technique. It had nothing to do with you, it was just a means of interrogation. Everything is as it was. You were one of the subjects selected by lot. I know that it must have been difficult for you.”
“Do you mean that I went through this for experimentation purposes?”
“Unfortunately yes,” my therapist says. “I fought very long and hard against such abuses but not too successfully, I’m afraid. The enclosure, you see, is very expensive. It has cost our economy a great deal to support the project in this fashion and because of this there are certain political elements which feel they are free to use the enclosure for any political purposes they desire. I can’t possibly explain our politics to you, of course; anyway you probably apprehend them already. In your wisdom you apprehend everything, you know that.”
But this time I am no longer to be led by that fool’s line. I feel a strange stirring of rage within me; I have felt hopelessness so long, resignation, unwillingness to be baited that anger is almost inexplicable but, nevertheless, there it is, and say, “You put me through all of that for experimentation?”
“I had nothing to do with it. I resisted that line of inquiry from the start. I—”
“What do you people want of us?” I say and spread my hands in a gesture very reminiscent of theirs. “I don’t understand you. Every one of you must be insane. We have come to you, been imprisoned, turned over to you every single secret of technology and the behavioral sciences which you have asked, have put in your hands the ability to manipulate your destiny as you desire . . . and you experiment on us as if we were domestic animals? What do you think of us? What kind of people are you?”
“Yes,” my therapist says, “yes, I understand exactly what you mean. We are not a very creditable race in many ways; you must have sympathy for us. But we have made progress, strides—”
“You bumbling fool,” I shout, the rush of my anger quite disconcerting me, even more than he and he flies backward behind the desk, his little legs kicking and straining at the floor as his chair hurtles into the wall with a crash, “where is your sense of integrity? Can’t you protect us from these sadists? Are you totally controlled by the politicians?”
“You don’t understand. The appropriations situation—”
“Don’t tell me about the appropriations situation! I am notinterested in your politics! We have turned over immeasurable wealth to you, incalculable riches—”
“I’m sorry,” my therapist says. He looks around him rather frantically, then snakes his fingers toward a knob on his desk, trying to conceal the gesture from me. “If you’d like to end the session and take a rest today—”
“Keep your hands off that!” I shout at him, leaning forward, making a threatening gesture and his hand falls back uselessly; he squirrels further against the wall. “Don’t give me any of that nonsense! I’ve been humiliated and imprisoned for almost two and a half of your years but I don’t need your self-serving pap.”
“I don’t think you realize,” the therapist says in a different tone, “that perhaps you’re going a bit too far now. I can understand your anger; in fact I respect you for it but I have my responsibilities too. The enclosure isn’t being run for your convenience, it’s being run for ours and you will cease intimidating me at once.”
But it is too late. My temper has been controlled for all this time; lately I thought that it was channeled into images of escape but now, confronted by the face of one who more than any other has collaborated to make my life this way, I find that I am uncontrollable. “I could kill you,” I shout, feeling the futility of this as the words, no less than the thought, trail away from me the instant spoken, “I could kill you for this. How much of it can we take?”
I move upon him. I do not know quite what I have in mind, but it has something to do with the pain I went through yesterday; I want to give him a small taste of this pain. But I have never touched him and the conditioning is too strong; my fingers scrabble and then hang in the air as if nailed, and I cannot close the gap. Slowly, slowly, he slides from my focus of vision, off the chair and around the room, circling. “Stop it Quir,” he says but this is unnecessary; various blocks of which I have never been aware have gone into effect and I am quite paralyzed. “Stop it, I say!” and I try to turn, tell him that I am helpless and cannot move but as I try to speak my throat feels blocked, a choking sensation overtakes me and the paralysis spreads into the lungs; for several moments I feel that I cannot breathe and this indeed is true, only small whiffs and grunts of breath to allow me to continue respiring and when the paralysis finally lifts it only does so because I have moved away from him and am sitting limply in the chair assigned to me, keeping my mind entirely removed from any thoughts of aggression. He circles me slowly as if I were a devout object, then finally reclaims his own seat and leans back, keeping the chair in place this time, not moving toward the wall.
“I could have told you, Quir,” he says. “If you had only listened to me, I could have told you all of this. It is impossible for you to attack any of us. You are conditioned so. You came to us in that way. You cannot do us violence. Are you ready to listen now to reason, to what I have to say?”
I shake my head, grunting. It is very hard for me to speak but I do the best I can. “No,” I say. “You have betrayed me. Never. Not at all.”
“That must be your decision, then. You understand you will only get another therapist then, one who would be less sympathetic to you than I.”
“I’ve had another therapist,” I say. Carefully I concentrate on my rhythm, the slow, recollected gestures of inhalation. Exhalation. Pause. Inhale again. A passing flutter of rage distracts me; I imagine my hands around his throat. Respiration stops entirely and then begins slowly again. I gasp for breath, slowly recover a heartbeat. “I’ve had another therapist,” I say again. “Once was enough. What can you do to me? What do you want of me?”
“Only your cooperation. For you to be reasonable. We’re trying to get you from the enclosure.”
“No you’re not,” I say. “You will keep us here as long as you can use us and then we will be killed. Why don’t you admit that?”
My therapist shrugs. “Why should I? Whatever I say will not be believed anyway. Now look what you’ve done to yourself, Quir, and I could have saved you from all of that if only you had asked. You cannot hurt us. We will not tolerate that.”
“I want,” I say, easing the words out of me one by one now, cautiously, pausing for breath, “I want. To. Go back. To my room. Now.”
“That is permissible. If you want to do that it can be done. But we will have to make up this session later.”
“Later,” I say. “Very well. Later.”
“I’m sorry that this happened. I thought that we had a good relationship. I thought you trusted me and believed that I would never do anything against you unless I was forced. You have hurt me, Quir.”
I am submissive, docile. Now I only want to terminate the session and leave, find the relative quiescence of my room where I can consider the issues in peace. Blocks have been implanted within us (by our own scientists or by the aliens; it is impossible to be sure) which make it impossible for us to strike them. In terms of that information, I will have to reevaluate the escape plan which among other things involves a physical attack, if necessary, upon the guards. But the escape seems very far away, very abstract now. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”
“I wish I could believe you.”
“You can. Believe me.”
“There was no need for that, Quir. I explained to you that the circumstances were beyond my control. I can’t run the enclosure, as much as I would like to. We too have to take orders. We are subordinates.”
“Yes.”
“I could have promised you that they would not hurt you again. Your responses were satisfactory. They were very pleased. They were convinced that you held nothing back.”
“I held nothing back.”
“But now I will have to make a full report of this incident. I have no choice. Our sessions are closely observed by cameras and if I were to make no reference to this I would jeopardize my own position. My ability to protect you.”
“I understand. That.”
“Do you have anything else to say, Quir? Anything to justify your behavior?”
“No,” I say. “I have. No justification.”
“Because this will probably end our relationship. They will not permit us to continue together after what has happened today. You will have a new therapist—a less tolerant one.”
“Yes,” I say. “I understand. That.”
“This is not my choice, it is theirs. There was no excuse for it.”
Staggering, I get to my feet. Otherwise it appears that the interview will never terminate. “I am truly sorry,” I say. “I lost myself momentarily. I apologize. May I leave? Now?”
“Only if you want to, Quir.” He rubs his palms together, leans back, places his feet on the desk, a picture of total ease. It is impossible to believe that not five minutes ago he was scuttling back against the wall, his eyes round with terror. The transformations, the ranges of possibility are always astonishing with these aliens; they have a far greater emotional range than we do.
“I want to leave,” I say.
“Then leave,” he says. He brings his feet sharply down from the desk. “Of course, if you wanted to stay and continue the session, I would try to put things in a better light. I would point out that this was a momentary out burst and not characteristic of your behavior. That you were able to resume the session afterward.”
“I can’t breathe,” I say. This is at least partially true. My lungs feel constricted and I wonder if there is some sort of atmospheric difference after all that becomes apparent under stress. “I must leave.”
“Should I get you a physician? I’ll do the best I can; our knowledge of your illnesses is very limited since you never seem to get sick but I can try—”
I try to shut off his babbling, once and for all time. “It’s nothing,” I say. “It’s an emotional disorder. I am shocked and upset. I must leave now. I apologize for everything which has happened and sincerely regret that I attacked you but it was all a mistake. And I must leave now.” I turn, move toward the door, pause by the door. He makes no attempt to stop me. I open the door and walk through. Still I hear nothing. I close the door behind me and only then do I hear his voice beginning again talking, inexhaustibly talking.
I make my way down the hall grimly, my arms at my sides, looking at the floor. I am vaguely aware that there are others in the hall; attendants and shipmates, but I do not acknowledge them or they me. I return to my room which, I notice, has once again been thoroughly (and this time not so carefully) ransacked. I close the door behind me. I wish there were a lock. There is no lock. I lean what furniture I can against it and lie on my bed, contemplating. I think about what has happened and about nothing at all. At any instant I expect attendants to come, to stun me from the bed and take me forcibly for some strong rehabilitative therapy. But nothing happens. The sounds of the enclosure drone on; now it is the mid-day feeding time. I miss the feeding. I miss the free hours of the early afternoon. I stay on the bed. I blank my mind. I think of my respiration,in-out,in-out , the rhythms which I have always, so very foolishly, taken for granted. I think of the glitter of my therapist’s glasses as I reached for his throat. I think of the escape plot hatching tonight. I think of Nala, the boards of muscle under her flesh sliding underneath my hands in the dark as, for the fifth time that strange night, I entered her.