seem like a nightmare, but we aren’t going to wake up from it. We’re going to have to deal with it.
“I’m not going to apologize to any damned one of you for trying to save myself, so if you’re waiting for it, don’t hold your breath! If you think snubbing me and giving me nasty looks is going to hold me back for one second, don’t hold your breath. This isn’t a popularity contest. It’s survival.”
Silence reigned for a while. Gradually, so subtly Miranda didn’t even notice at first, the women began to drift in her direction.
“What do you think we should do?”
Miranda, who’d been deep in her own thoughts, lifted her head at the question
and discovered she’d been surrounded by the other women. It was Carol who’d spoken, however. Mildly alarmed at the realization that they were looking to her for answers when she didn’t have any, she scanned the faces around her. Frowning, she considered the question carefully. “I couldn’t begin to guess what their real motives might be. I don’t understand these people anymore than any of you do. Let’s suppose, though, that they’re people—not monsters—and that they’re at least somewhat like us in ways besides the physical similarity. If we can suppose that, then we can also suppose that they’re motivated by pretty much the same things we are—wants and needs.
“They bought us. There’s no point in arguing that we weren’t for sale. It
happened, and there wasn’t a damned thing we could do to prevent it. Looking at it from THE SPAWNING Kaitlyn O’Connor 49
that viewpoint—and the suspicion that we cost a lot—they’d want to take care of their investment, right?”
“That damned lizard didn’t seem to give a damned how well he took care of his
investment,” Joy Freemont pointed out.
Miranda thought about it and shrugged. “True, but he was a trader. One, they don’t get attached to the things they trade—it’s only valuable for the trade. I doubt he saw us any differently than he does anything else. He doesn’t worry about how the things he trades feel , just about whether or not they’re intact when they arrive at the trade place.
“Two, he isn’t like us—or the Hirachi. He said we weren’t physically
compatible, so he didn’t see us in the same light as he might have if we had been.
“To the Hirachi, we have a different kind of value. They didn’t buy us for trade.
They bought us for their own comfort.”
A note of hysteria had entered the clamoring voices of the women as they
responded to Miranda’s comments, which had actually been as much an attempt on her part to try to reason through the puzzle as to inform—maybe more to get her own mind straight. She was used to it. Whenever she was working on a case, she, and whomever she was working with, usually just her partner, Calvin, bounced their thoughts back and forth while they worked out the mystery they were trying to solve.
The babble was hard to decipher, but she got the general idea.
She shook her head at them, but she didn’t make any attempt to bring any kind of order to the discussion. She wasn’t their leader. She didn’t want to be their leader. She didn’t want to be responsible for anyone but herself—not in this situation.
In her job, she’d been responsible for people just like them, but that had been matters of law. This was a whole new playing field—in every way. They didn’t seem to grasp that none of their laws meant jack-shit here. The only reason they had back on Earth was because of the system, which each level, more or less, supported. Here, there was no system. She could spout law at the top of her lungs and nobody was going to back her up. She didn’t have an army behind her—other cops, prosecutors, judges, or jails.
“You’re saying you think we should just do whatever they want?” Deborah
demanded finally when she didn’t share any input in the discussion.
Miranda shook her head at them. With an effort,
“I’m not going to apologize to any damned one of you for trying to save myself, so if you’re waiting for it, don’t hold your breath! If you think snubbing me and giving me nasty looks is going to hold me back for one second, don’t hold your breath. This isn’t a popularity contest. It’s survival.”
Silence reigned for a while. Gradually, so subtly Miranda didn’t even notice at first, the women began to drift in her direction.
“What do you think we should do?”
Miranda, who’d been deep in her own thoughts, lifted her head at the question
and discovered she’d been surrounded by the other women. It was Carol who’d spoken, however. Mildly alarmed at the realization that they were looking to her for answers when she didn’t have any, she scanned the faces around her. Frowning, she considered the question carefully. “I couldn’t begin to guess what their real motives might be. I don’t understand these people anymore than any of you do. Let’s suppose, though, that they’re people—not monsters—and that they’re at least somewhat like us in ways besides the physical similarity. If we can suppose that, then we can also suppose that they’re motivated by pretty much the same things we are—wants and needs.
“They bought us. There’s no point in arguing that we weren’t for sale. It
happened, and there wasn’t a damned thing we could do to prevent it. Looking at it from THE SPAWNING Kaitlyn O’Connor 49
that viewpoint—and the suspicion that we cost a lot—they’d want to take care of their investment, right?”
“That damned lizard didn’t seem to give a damned how well he took care of his
investment,” Joy Freemont pointed out.
Miranda thought about it and shrugged. “True, but he was a trader. One, they don’t get attached to the things they trade—it’s only valuable for the trade. I doubt he saw us any differently than he does anything else. He doesn’t worry about how the things he trades feel , just about whether or not they’re intact when they arrive at the trade place.
“Two, he isn’t like us—or the Hirachi. He said we weren’t physically
compatible, so he didn’t see us in the same light as he might have if we had been.
“To the Hirachi, we have a different kind of value. They didn’t buy us for trade.
They bought us for their own comfort.”
A note of hysteria had entered the clamoring voices of the women as they
responded to Miranda’s comments, which had actually been as much an attempt on her part to try to reason through the puzzle as to inform—maybe more to get her own mind straight. She was used to it. Whenever she was working on a case, she, and whomever she was working with, usually just her partner, Calvin, bounced their thoughts back and forth while they worked out the mystery they were trying to solve.
The babble was hard to decipher, but she got the general idea.
She shook her head at them, but she didn’t make any attempt to bring any kind of order to the discussion. She wasn’t their leader. She didn’t want to be their leader. She didn’t want to be responsible for anyone but herself—not in this situation.
In her job, she’d been responsible for people just like them, but that had been matters of law. This was a whole new playing field—in every way. They didn’t seem to grasp that none of their laws meant jack-shit here. The only reason they had back on Earth was because of the system, which each level, more or less, supported. Here, there was no system. She could spout law at the top of her lungs and nobody was going to back her up. She didn’t have an army behind her—other cops, prosecutors, judges, or jails.
“You’re saying you think we should just do whatever they want?” Deborah
demanded finally when she didn’t share any input in the discussion.
Miranda shook her head at them. With an effort,
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