No. I refused to let down my guard with him. Not now.

Probably never.

"I'm being ridiculous," he said. "Why should I mind that you look so beautiful?"

Beautiful. He found me beautiful.

"Jelca," I said. "Did you kill Eel?"

He was silent a moment, then nodded.

Accidents and Reality

"It was an accident," he said.

I sat down on the rock, separated from him by only an arm's length. The stone was cold beneath me… very cold, despite its exposure to the long day's sun.

"An accident," he repeated. "A mistake right from the beginning." He glanced at me. "You probably think I'm shit."

I didn't trust myself to say yes or no.

"There's no point trying to justify myself," he said. "When I met Eel and Oar, I was just looking to vent myself. Vent everything I felt about being heaved into exile with a piss-hole like Kalovski… and there were Eel and Oar. Looking so perfect it made me furious. Artificial people — like all the artificial people in the Fleet and everywhere. So I…"

When he didn't finish his sentence, I said, "You either raped or seduced them."

He shrugged. "I either raped or seduced them. Couldn't tell you which. They didn't put up a fight, but they didn't understand what was going on either. It happened, the two of them together that first time, because I couldn't stop myself. Well, no — because I couldn't bother to stop myself. I couldn't think of any reason that made it worth the trouble."

"Eel and Oar themselves should have been enough reason."

"You'd think so," he admitted. "But the truth is, they weren't real women. None of them are real human beings. They're glass models of human beings… or what the League of Peoples believes humans should be. Beautiful dead ends, just as most people in the Technocracy are beautiful dead ends.

"You know what I once thought?" he went on. "I thought the whole Explorer Corps was a training program for real people. Everyone else was pampered and spoiled, but we were real. The Admiralty wouldn't let doctors cure our problems because they wanted us to develop strength of character; they needed a small band of individuals who had to fight for respect so that we'd gain depth. Then one day someone would tap us on the shoulder and say, 'Congratulations. You've made it. Everyone else is useless, but you've learned all the painful lessons of life. You've won. Now we'll cure your trivial little scalp condition and make you someone important, because you've earned it.' You see? I had this daydream that everything was planned. That all the crap we've suffered had a point, and we'd be properly compensated in the end. Not dumped on a planet populated by empty people with nothing to contribute."

"You're underestimating the people of Melaquin," I said. "They may be different from humans, but—"

"Save it," he interrupted. "I know all the arguments. And you're right, I shouldn't dismiss them. Eel and Oar deserved better than I gave them. But I didn't have it in me. They kept reminding me of all the shallow 'beautiful people' who make the Fleet a hell. So I used them and used them and used them until I couldn't stand the sight of them anymore."

"Then you killed Eel," I said.

"That was Ullis's fault," he replied. "If she'd just let me leave quietly… but she grabbed Eel and forced me to explain things. I tried rational discussion, I really did. I told Eel that Ullis and I had a duty to join the other Explorers; I told her that she and Oar would feel out of place if they came with us. Eel wouldn't listen. She had the mind of a child. She didn't want to be left out. Finally, I had no option but to…"

He lapsed into silence, so I finished the sentence for him. "You shot her," I said. "And even though the regs made you carry a standard-issue stunner when you landed, you must have amplified the pistol as soon as you knew you were stuck on Melaquin."

"True," he admitted. "Everyone knows the guns are underpowered…"

"They're underpowered because anything more could be deadly," I snapped. "I can imagine what high intensity sonics did to a woman made of glass."

"You think she shattered like crystal?" He shook his head. "Nothing so dramatic. These people aren't real glass; you know that. Eel stayed on her feet a long time. I kept shooting and shooting and she wouldn't fall down. And I swear I didn't believe the gun would really damage her; she was so tough, you could pound her with a sledgehammer without making a dent. But something inside her body was vulnerable to sonics. Something must have… cracked. Maybe her brain, maybe her heart, I don't know. But the instant she fell, she was dead." He shook his head as if this was an incomprehensible mystery. "So I dragged her into the woods and stuffed her under a pile of brush."

"And now you're a murderer," I said. "A dangerous non-sentient being."

"Maybe." He didn't sound convinced. "But it was just an accident. Sometimes I think it'll be all right if I get on the starship with everyone else. I didn't mean to kill her. And if I don't go on the ship, I'll be stuck on Melaquin, won't I? No better than the criminals and other scum the council banished here…"

"I won't be leaving either," I said. "I'm a murderer too."

And I told him everything.

Releasing Pressure

I confessed because of the pressure to tell someone. I confessed because he was Jelca. I confessed because we were both unforgivable.

He had killed a sentient woman for the sole reason that she was inconvenient. Don't think I was deceived by Jelca's excuses. He shot Eel because he didn't want to face the fallout from exploiting her for six months. Maybe he hadn't expected the stunner to kill her. He should have considered the possibility, but maybe he didn't. Instead, he blasted her again and again until her glass vitals cracked into shards.

Jelca was a murderer and so was I. I had butchered my partner and left him to rot in a log. That was a fact, and intentions be damned.

I told Jelca the facts as clearly as I could without choking up. Neither of us could possibly leave. I didn't know how I felt about staying with him, but we owed it to the others not to jeopardize their escape.

When I finished my story — when I had told him how I sliced Yarrun's throat with my scalpel and spilled his blood over my hands… when I had reminded him that League of Peoples laws are more inescapable than entropy — after all that, Jelca laughed.

He laughed.

"What a wimp-ass murder," he sniggered. "What a wimp-ass excuse for a homicide."

I was speechless.

"You think the League will bar you from space for that?" He snorted in disgust. "You think surgeons are labeled murderers if they lose a patient? Wake up, Festina! You tried to help, and it didn't work. That's all."

"He would have lived!" I insisted. "If I'd left him alone, he would have lived. But no. I tried to be a hotshot, performing emergency surgery when I couldn't see straight. He died because of me!"

"Yes he did," Jelca agreed. "So you think you should be punished. You want to believe the League regards you as non-sentient, that you deserve exile. But that's just guilt talking, not common sense. You thought you were doing what had to be done to save Yarrun's life. That's blatantly sentient, Festina… and it would be ludicrous for you to stay on Melaquin and die because of it."

Something in his tone caught my attention. "What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"Nothing." He looked me straight in the eye. "It's just stupid to spend the rest of your life in this hellhole."

I met his gaze. It was the first time he'd looked at me and not my cheek. I knew it meant he was lying. Some people are like that — naturally evasive until they put on an act of being forthright.