Prisoner Six

Part 4

Dave waited for Sam to speak, but she gave no response. It was her turn to be frozen. Paralyzed. Instead, she stared at the man whom she thought she knew. Now that his features moved and spoke, he seemed different, more alien-as his file suggested. Dave tried again.

"I'm sorry, I hope I didn't get us off on the wrong foot," he said slowly, as if still adjusting to the act of speaking-or to the unfamiliar idioms.

"You could hear me?" asked Sam, at last.

"Sometimes," said Dave. "Though, I suspect, not from the beginning. I don't know how I arrived or how long I've been here."

"Two years. We've been out here two years."

Dave's face fell at this news. He looked past her quietly, as if considering the time lost, the things missed, the loved ones gone...

Sam took this opportunity to reach for her tablet and access Dave's file. Unbeknownst to him, Dave was injected with a medical ID chip, which sent his location and vitals to the main computer. As expected, his sudden oxygen drop had deactivated the chip. There was no way to check his pulse, his blood pressure-and whether or not he was telling the truth. Sam could try re-activating it, but the automated self-destruct might be triggered now that he was out of his stasis container. Unless...

"That's a long time," Dave finally said.

"Yes it is," said Sam, affixing her tablet to the clear plastic barrier. "Would you mind placing your hand here? I just want to check your vitals. Make sure you're stable."

If Dave didn't trust her, he didn't show it. He placed his hand on the plastic barrier, but missed the tablet sensor. Sam approached and placed her own hand on the tablet.

"Like this," she said. He mimicked her, placing his hand against hers and activating the sensor. She read the results on the tablet. He was calm and stable, which was surprising given the shock he must have been experiencing.

"What else do you remember?" asked Sam, watching the tablet.

"A crash, followed by doctors, officials, and detainment. Then nothing. Just you. Talking." Sam looked up at Dave as he continued. "It was like being stuck in a dream, slipping in and out of consciousness. Trapped in the dark with only your voice. I was 'alone, but not alone.' Isn't that how you'd put it? When you talked about raising your sister. And your niece-"

"Enough," said Sam, removing her hand from the barrier. She felt exposed, embarrassed. Had she known he was actually listening, she never would have said those personal things. Or anything at all. It's just that she had no one else to confide in. She couldn't say these things to Vox or to her video log-where twenty scientists would comb through her words and write up reports. It had felt safe with Dave, confessing to a kind face in the void. Only now the void was talking back, repeating her words. And she didn't want to hear them.

She fell back on her old instincts instead: protocol and mistrust.

"If you heard everything, then you know why you're here, don't you?" she asked.

Dave leaned back, as if seeing the wall she'd just raised. "Yes."

"Tell me."

"You plan to leave my crew and I on a distant asteroid to die."

"Why?"

"Because you believe we tried to destroy your world."

"Didn't you?"

"I'm not what you think."

"Then, what are you?"

Dave paused, turmoil rising in him for the first time. He looked frustrated, even angry, but not at Sam. Finally, he answered: