John Scalzi - Zoe`s Tale

"You still took a big risk," Enzo said.

"Yeah, I did," I said. "But the only other alternative was to kill him and his friends, or have them kill all of us. Or all of us kill each other. I guess I hoped I could do something better. Besides, I didn't think it was too big a risk. What he was doing when he was keeping the others away from you two reminded me of someone I knew."

"Who?" Enzo asked.

"You," I said.

"Yes, well," Enzo said. "I think tonight marks the official last time I tag along with Magdy to keep him out of trouble. After this he's on his own."

"I have nothing bad to say about this idea," I said.

"I didn't think you would," Enzo said. "I know Magdy gets on your last nerve sometimes."

"He does," I said. "He really, really does. But what can I do? He's my friend."

"He belongs to you," Enzo said. "And so do I."

I looked over at him. "You heard that part, too," I said.

"Trust me, Zoë," Enzo said. "Once you showed up, I never stopped listening to you. I'll be able to recite everything you said for the rest of my life. Which I now have, thanks to you."

"And Gretchen and Hickory and Dickory," I said.

"And I will thank them all, too," Enzo said. "But right now I want to focus on you. Thank you, Zoë Boutin-Perry. Thank you for saving my life."

"You're welcome," I said. "And stop it. You're making me blush."

"I don't believe it," Enzo said. "And now it's too dark to see."

"Feel my cheeks," I said.

He did. "You don't feel especially blushy," he said.

"You're not doing it right," I said.

"I'm out of practice," he said.

"Well, fix that," I said.

"All right," Enzo said, and kissed me.

"That was supposed to make you blush, not cry," he said, after we stopped.

"Sorry," I said, and tried to get myself back together. "I've just really missed it. That. Us."

"It's my fault," Enzo started.

I put a hand up to his lips. "I don't care about any of that," I said. "I really don't, Enzo. None of that matters to me. I just don't want to miss you anymore."

"Zoë," Enzo said. He took my hands. "You saved me. You have me. You own me. I belong to you. You said it yourself."

"I did," I admitted.

"So that's settled," Enzo said.

"Okay," I said, and smiled.

We kissed some more, in the night, outside Enzo's front gate.

The conversation Hickory was having with Dad about the Conclave and the Colonial Union was really interesting, right up until the point where Hickory said it and Dickory were planning to kill my parents. Then, well. I sort of lost it.

To be fair, it had been a really long day.

I had said good night to Enzo, dragged my butt home, and could barely think straight enough to hide the stone knife in my dresser and fend off Babar's lick attack on my face before I collapsed onto my cot and passed out without even bothering to get all the way undressed. At some point after I lay down, Jane came home from the medical bay, kissed me on the forehead and slipped off my boots, but I barely remember that other than murmuring something to her about how happy I was she was better. At least, that's what I was saying inside my head; I don't know if my mouth formed the actual words. I think it did. I was very tired at the time.

Not too much after that, though, Dad came in and gently nudged me awake. "Come on, hon," he said. "I need you to do something for me."

"I'll do it in the morning," I mumbled. "I swear."

"No, sweetheart," he said. "I need you to do it now." The tone of his voice, gentle but insistent, told me he really did need me to get up. I did, but with enough grumbling to maintain my honor. We went to the living room of our bungalow; Dad steered me to the couch, which I sat on and tried to maintain a semiconscious state that would allow me to go back to sleep when we were done with whatever it was we were doing. Dad sat down at his desk; Mom stood next to him. I smiled sleepily at her but she seemed not to notice. Between me and my parents were Hickory and Dickory.

Dad spoke to Hickory. "Can you two lie?" he asked it.

"We have not yet lied to you," Hickory said. Which even in my sleepy state I recognized as not being an actual answer to the question that was asked. Dad and Hickory bantered back and forth a little about what being able to lie brings to a conversation (in my opinion, mostly the ability to not have to argue about stupid things it's just better to lie about, but no one asked me), and then Dad asked me to tell Hickory and Dickory to answer all his questions without any lies or evasions.

This finally woke me all the way up. "Why?" I asked. "What's going on?"

"Please do it," Dad said.

"All right," I said, and then turned to Hickory. "Hickory, please answer my dad without lying to him or evading his questions. All right?"

"As you wish, Zoë," Hickory said.

"Dickory too," I said.

"We will both answer truthfully," Hickory said.

"Thank you," Dad said, and then turned back to me. "You can go back to bed now, sweetie."

This annoyed me. I was a human being, not a truth serum. "I want to know what's going on," I said.

"It's not something you need to worry about," Dad said.

"You order me to have these two tell you the truth, and you want me to believe it's not something I need to worry about?" I asked. The sleep toxins were taking their time leaving my system, because even as I was saying this I realized it came out showing a little more attitude to my parents than was entirely warranted at the moment.

As if to confirm this, Jane straightened herself up a bit. "Zoë," she said.

I recalibrated. "Besides, if I leave there's no guarantee they won't lie to you," I said, trying to sound a bit more reasonable. "They're emotionally equipped to lie to you, because they don't care about disappointing you. But they don't want to disappoint me." I didn't know if this was actually true or not. But I was guessing it was.

Dad turned to Hickory. "Is this true?"

"We would lie to you if we felt it was necessary," Hickory said. "We would not lie to Zoë."

There was a really interesting question here of whether Hickory was saying this because it was actually true, or whether it was saying it in order to back me up on what I said, and if the latter, what the actual truth value of the statement was. If I were more awake, I think I would have thought about it more at the time. But as it was, I just nodded and said, "There you go," to my dad.

"Breathe a word of this to anyone and you're spending the next year in the horse stall," Dad said.

"My lips are sealed," I said, and almost made a lip-locking motion, but thought better of it at the last second.

And a good thing, too, because suddenly Jane came up and loomed over me, bearing her I am as serious as death expression. "No," she said. "I need you to understand that what you're hearing here you absolutely cannot share with anyone else. Not Gretchen. Not any of your other friends. Not anyone. It's not a game and it's not a fun secret. This is dead serious business, Zoë. If you're not ready to accept that, you need to leave this room right now. I'll take my chances with Hickory and Dickory lying to us, but not you. So do you understand that when we tell you not to share this with anyone, that you cannot share it with anyone else? Yes or no."

Several thoughts entered my mind at that moment.

The first is that it was times like this when I had the smallest inkling of how terrifying Jane must have been as a soldier. She was the best mom a girl could ever have, make no mistake about it, but when she got like this, she was as hard and cold and direct as any person could be. She was, to use a word, intimidating. And this was just with words. I tried to imagine her stalking across a battlefield with the same expression on her face she had now, and standard-issue Defense Forces rifle. I think I actually felt at least three of my internal organs contract at the thought.