She had no idea how much time passed. She found herself thinking of Sam and Ayre, her husband and son, both taken from her before the Oankali, before the war, before she realized how easily her life—any human life—could be destroyed.
There had been a carnival—a cheap little vacant-lot carnival with rides and noise and scabby ponies. Sam had decided to take Ayre to see it while Lilith spent time with her pregnant sister, It had been an ordinary Saturday on a broad, dry street in bright sunshine. A young girl, just learning to drive, had rammed head-on into Sam’s car. She had swerved to the wrong side of the road, had perhaps somehow lost control of the car she was driving. She’d had only a learner’s permit and was not supposed to drive alone. She died for her mistake. Ayre died—was dead when the ambulance arrived, though paramedics tried to revive him.
Sam only half died.
He had head injuries—brain damage. It took him three months to finish what the accident had begun. Three months to die.
He was conscious some of the time—more or less—but he did not know anyone. His parents came from New York to be with him. They were Nigerians who had lived in the United States long enough for their son to be born and grow up there. Still, they had not been pleased at his marriage to Lilith. They had let Sam grow up as an American, but had sent him to visit their families in Lagos when they could. They had hoped he would marry a Yoruban girl. They had never seen their grandchild. Now they never would.
And Sam did not know them.
He was their only son, but he stared through them as he stared through Lilith, his eyes empty of recognition, empty of him. Sometimes Lilith sat alone with him, touched him, gained the empty attention of those eyes briefly. But the man himself had already gone. Perhaps he was with Ayre, or caught between her and Ayre—between this world and the next.
Or was he aware, but isolated in some part of his mind that could not make contact with anyone outside—trapped in the narrowest, most absolute solitary confinement—until, mercifully, his heart stopped.
That was brain damage—one form of brain damage. There were other forms, many worse. She saw them in the hospital over the months of Sam’s dying.
He was lucky to have died so quickly.
She had never dared speak that thought aloud. It had come to her even as she wept for him. It came to her again now. He was lucky to have died so quickly.
Would she be equally lucky?
If the Oankali damaged her brain, would they have the decency to let her die—or would they keep her alive, a prisoner, permanently locked away in that ultimate solitary confinement?
She became aware abruptly that Nikanj had come into the bathroom silently and sat down opposite her. It had never intruded on her this way before. She stared at it, outraged.
“It isn’t my ability to cope with your physiology that anyone questions,” it said softly. “If I couldn’t do that, my defects would have been noticed long ago.”
“Get out of here!” she shouted. “Get away from me!”
It did not move. It continued to speak in the same soft voice. “Ooan says humans won’t be worth talking to for at least a generation.” Its tentacles writhed. “I don’t know how to be with someone I can’t talk to.”
“Brain damage isn’t going to improve my conversation,” she said bitterly.
“I would rather damage my own brain than yours. I won’t damage either.” It hesitated. “You know you must accept me or Ooan.”
She said nothing.
“Ooan is an adult. It can give you pleasure. And it is not as … as angry as it seems.”
“I’m not looking for pleasure. I don’t even know what you’re talking about. I just want to be let alone.”
“Yes. But you must trust me or let Ooan surprise you when it’s tired of waiting.”
“You won’t do that yourself—won’t just spring it on me?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“There’s something wrong with doing it that way—surprising people. It’s … treating them as though they aren’t people, as though they aren’t intelligent.”
Lilith laughed bitterly. “Why should you suddenly start to worry about that?”
“Do you want me to surprise you?”
“Of course not!”
Silence.
After a while, she got up and went to the bed platform. She lay down and eventually managed to fall asleep.
She dreamed of Sam and awoke in a cold sweat. Empty, empty eyes. Her head ached. Nikanj had stretched out beside her as usual. It looked limp and dead. How would it be to awaken with Kahguyaht there instead, lying beside her like a grotesque lover instead of an unhappy child? She shuddered, fear and disgust almost overwhelming her. She lay still for several minutes, calming herself, forcing herself to make a decision, then to act on it before fear could silence her.
“Wake up!” she said harshly to Nikanj. The raw sound of her own voice startled her. “Wake up and do whatever it is you claim you have to do. Get it over with.”
Nikanj sat up instantly, rolled her over onto her side and pulled away the jacket she had been sleeping in to expose her back and neck. Before she could complain or change her mind, it began.
On the back of her neck, she felt the promised touch, a harder pressure, then the puncture. It hurt more than she had expected, but the pain ended quickly. For a few seconds she drifted in painless semiconsciousness.
Then there were confused memories, dreams, finally nothing.