Silhouette (6 page)

Love, fear, anger— it all boiled to the surface. Silhouette’s skin burned and her muscles tensed, her rage urging her to break open his cell and run away with him to freedom.

The blue lights of the chambers blinked and were replaced with a lime green; then the white ceiling lights brightened. Silhouette’s rage dropped away in an instant, replaced by adrenaline. The Burmin in the corner of the room grunted and stood from its seat.

Silhouette crawled to the furthest corner of the room and squeezed behind a dusty holding tank. She watched the Burmin as it approached the occupied chambers with a box held between its left arm and torso. It walked up to one of the occupied cells and pressed a series of buttons which opened a small slot next to the chamber’s glass wall. The imprisoned man’s anger and frustration bellowed into the room as he stuck his fingers out through the slot, reaching for anything he could. The Burmin smacked the man’s hand hard with a metal rod and he cried out in pain. The Burmin then slid a gelatinous brick through the slot and pressed another button to close it again.
Is that supposed to be their food?
Silhouette wondered.

Next the Burmin gave a brick to a woman who eyed the flat, beige rectangle with repulsion. The block of food rested neat and untouched on a small shelf inside of the cell beside her.

The other three prisoners accepted their food and ate it, none looking pleased about it. Silhouette’s Ocu recorded the button combination pressed on her brother’s cell and she watched as he bit into his bar and chewed methodically, without pain or pleasure. The lights of those who ate faded back to their blue status. The man who at first resisted soon gave in and ate his brick, his light then fading to blue as well. The woman stood by her refusal of the meal, and after some time another Burmin walked into the room to join the first, both of them standing at the woman’s cell like they were waiting for something.

The woman’s defiant demeanor withered as discomfort and pain set in. She cringed and grabbed her gut, and soon she crumpled over in agony, tears streaming down her face and mucus dripping from her nose. The woman looked to be wailing in pain, but no sound escaped her cell. She reached up for her food brick and took a large bite, chewing through her sobs. After a couple more bites, her weeping lightened and the pain on her face morphed into a sorrowful look of defeat and regret, but she continued to eat until the bar was gone. The recently arrived Burmin left the room and the other returned to its seat in the corner as the woman’s cell faded back to blue and the room lights dimmed.
 

Silhouette remained in her position for the rest of the day, examining the room and her brother. The lone guard fed the prisoners once more late into the night, then it left its post and did not return until morning. Davi woke only for food, and otherwise slept. He was broken. There was not any fight left in him.

* * *

Silhouette returned to her dwelling and rested until the next evening. During the quiet night hours, she made her way to the commissary and pocketed an assortment of queer snacks. She tried each of them and put a few of the tastiest ones aside, eating her fill and then putting together a small package for her brother, along with a note. The food had to be simple: no wrapping, no mess, no leftovers. She encased it all in a spongy, flat bread-like food.

The prison was left unguarded at the late hour, as Silhouette had expected, and so she strolled between the rows of cells until she reached her sleeping brother.

Silhouette repeated the button sequence she had witnessed the previous day and the slot opened. She slipped her package into the slot and then hit the button that closed it. Davi woke at the sound and looked at the package as if he was seeing something that was not quite there, or should not have been.

She stood in front of his cell, watching him rub at his eyes and blinking to clear them. Davi took no notice of his sister as he poked at the package, and then he opened it with one finger, seeing the note and pulling it to his eyes.

Eat this. Stay strong. I will bring more. Signed, a friend.

Silhouette watched with a heavy heart as Davi grabbed the food and devoured it. She took off her headpiece, letting loose her white hair.
 

Davi consumed every last crumb, reveling in the taste. The note caught his attention again and so he grabbed it and studied it, tracing the handwriting with his fingers. Sue placed a hand on the cell wall and she started to cry. Davi crumbled up the small piece of paper into a tiny ball and ate that too, and then looked out in her direction. She looked into his eyes and noticed that there was something different in them, different then yesterday after she watched him eat his gelatin brick. He leaned back and kept his eyes open, looking upward, pondering. Susan watched him until he fell asleep again, then she put on her headpiece and returned to her dwelling.

This continued for weeks. Silhouette did not communicate with Davi, other than the occasional note which encouraged him to build his strength, and she continued to watch him. One day, when his cell light had turned green, he refused his meal brick, but, like the woman Silhouette had witnessed before, he had become overwhelmed by a gut-wrenching pain. Eating the bland bar was the only relief.

Silhouette continued to feed her brother and soon Davi’s eyes no longer glazed over, instead they shined with life. He eagerly awaited his nightly package and spoke to his anonymous gift giver through the slot when it was opened. His voice was deeper than she remembered, rougher, and it melted her heart. She was unsure how to respond to him so she avoided it, as painful as it was to do so.

One night Davi grabbed her fingers as she put the food into his cell, and he held tight, demanding that she speak.

“Davi,” she said.

“You know my name?” he replied. “Who are you?”

“Davi,” She caressed the tips of his fingers with her thumb. “It’s Sue. Your choti behan.”

“My little sister?” Davi bent at the waist and lowered himself as much as he could in the tight cell. It was uncomfortable, but he managed to get low enough to see out of the slot. “Show me.”

She crouched down to be even with Davi’s face. Silhouette slowly peeled off her headpiece, revealing her cinnamon eyes and white skin which glowed blue in the chamber’s light. “Davi. I…”

“Sue. How? We thought you were gone. I missed you so…you have to get out of here. What are you doing?”

“Davi, it’s ok. I’m here to help. I’ll catch you up on the details another time, but I’m capable of handling myself. I’m safe. Don’t worry. Uh… you. You look so…old. And tired.”

“Yeah, thanks. You have a couple of extra creases around those red eyes yourself.” Davi stood up and rubbed his shoulder. “Going to get a crick in my neck if I stay down there any longer.”

Sue put her headpiece back on, but remained crouched at the slot to chat. “How long have you been locked up?”

“Maybe a week before you left me that first note. I don’t know for sure. They caught me a few times sneaking away from work, but I guess this last time was my final strike. Might as well live as a slave somewhere else. Wouldn’t be any different.”

“Why would you start acting up? What were you doing?”

“Spending time at Baap’s grave. Well, the landfill where they throw the bodies.”

“Dad’s dead?” Her eyes welled up. She was not prepared for that.

“Since a year ago. The two of us were in Vix together on a supply run and some guy grabbed a bag of food off of our cart, so I chased him down and tackled him. Punched him a few times and took the bag back from him but I guess a Burmin on the road saw the whole thing. It ran over and grabbed me and took the bag out of my hand. I guess Dad came up from behind and tried to pull the Burmin off of me and we all started shouting a bunch of crap at each other. The Burmin swung his arm around and clocked dad in the head. He was knocked unconscious and went into a coma, and a few days later I was told that he was dead. I don’t think the Burmin tried very hard to save him.”

“I, uh…” Silhouette turned away from Davi and leaned her back against his cell. A decade of hope and planning and he was already dead; her father was gone, both of her parents were, all because of the Burmin. Tears blurred her vision and she could not decide whether to grit her teeth or let loose the sobs that swelled inside of her. She put a hand over her mouth to hold in the cries. Her thermal sight detected a body marching down the corridor toward the prison entrance and all emotion drained from her in an instant. Silhouette turned back to her brother. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Davi.”

“Sue, wait!” And the slot closed. Silhouette melted into the shadows and the Burmin entered the room. She sidled along the walls and slipped through the doorway as the Burmin inspected the prisoners. It was not until she returned to the crawlspace that she allowed her tears to fall freely.

* * *

During the weeks since Silhouette had first entered the prison, more humans had been locked into the cells. She had witnessed multiple occasions where unconscious bodies were dragged through the corridors and heaved into their solitary confinements. She continued to return to the prison with meals for her brother. As time went on she started to feel the eyes of the other prisoners watching her as she walked between the cells, and she often glanced over her shoulder expecting to see them all staring at her. They could not see her, she knew. It was her own conscience staring her down from inside of the cells, filling her with guilt, making her turn to look down at the small amount of food in her hands and question why she had not grabbed more. The people around her were wasting away, either writhing in agony or going insane with boredom, but she could not help them all. Not right now. Not in this way.

Silhouette approached Davi’s cell and saw that he was much different than the others. He was clearly bored as hell, but his mind was still alert, he looked healthy, and his eyes were bright. She could save him; that is what she was capable of.
What the hell was the Presider thinking? Sending me on a mission to save a world, to take down a Burmin command ship. Ridiculous.
She could save Davi, she had to, and everyone else would have to die if it came down to it.

She opened the slot and slipped the food through.

“When they take you and the other prisoners to the command ship for distribution, I’m coming with you,” she said.

“Don’t be stupid,” said Davi through a mouthful of crunchy vegetables.

“That ship is going down, and I’m going to be the cause of it. You’ll be escaping with me.”

“This isn’t a fairy tale, Sue. You can’t possibly expect to disable the friggin command ship and ride away unscathed like a superhero white knight or something.”

“You don’t know what I have become, Davi. I am not the little girl you grew up with.”

“Yeah, ok,” Davi took another bite of a carrot. “You’re going to get yourself killed and I’ll still be sent off and sold to the highest bidder on some faraway planet. An escape plan I could entertain, but this? Why would you try and take down the command ship?”

“I am just one little cog in one big machine,” said Sue. “All I can do is my task and hope that all of the other gears turn in unison. This is not just about you, or me. I could say more clich
é
things like all of humanity is on the table and it’s all or nothing, but then I would be mixing my metaphors. Samjha?”

“No, I don’t understand,” said Davi, “but I guess any chance at escaping is better than staying a slave.”

“Good. I want to give you some direction.”

“I can’t do anything, Sue.”

“Yes, you can. You are still strong, so much more than the other prisoners. You can’t see it, but I can. You’re going to need to help me rescue you, Davi. Keep eating everything I give to you, flex whatever muscles you can, and just keep active, somehow. The Burmin are weakening you so that you can’t resist in any way. The other prisoners will be too weak to do anything and I need you to not give up like they have. I need you to be strong. I need you to be ready to act.”

“Well I feel alright, but it’s not like I can do any exercises. I can clench my butt, but what else?”

“Figure it out. Push against your cage. Toe raises. Do math equations in your mind. Anything to keep yourself from deteriorating.”

“Ok, but I don’t know what you’re going to have me do. Those Burmin are strong and I don’t know my way around a spaceship.”

“Don’t worry about any of that until the time comes. When you are taken onto the ship you may not see me, but I’ll be on board with you. In the meantime I’m going to kill the Burmin responsible for dad’s death, so tell me everything you can.”

* * *

Davi did not have a name for the Burmin, of course, because Burmin did not have names, not as far as humans understood. He had enough knowledge of the Burmin’s schedule and position to give his sister a good chance at pinpointing the correct one. The unique vertical slits in the Burmin’s floppy ears made it all too easy once Silhouette crossed Davi’s recollection of the creature with X’s data. Slits. That was what she would call the thing that murdered her father. Slits was as good as dead.

Was it petty? Perhaps, but she needed something to do until the next transfer ship came to take Davi away. No thrills, no frills. She knew that this had to be clean and simple because she was in enemy territory. Blowing her cover and endangering the mission was not an option.

X placed Slits’ office near the qoot field, whatever that was. Silhouette built a plan and fed Davi once more, telling him that he might miss some of his extra meals over the next several evenings.

That night Silhouette moved far down to the opposite end of the compound, staying close to the exterior walls. The qoots were locked in their pens for the night. They were large slug-like creatures, bigger than any livestock she had seen before, and their skin was rough and dry, not slimy like she had expected. A slaughterhouse was located near the pens. Was that the meat she had been eating?
Gross
.

Just beyond the slaughterhouse was an airfield and Slits had an office overlooking the entire area. Silhouette entered the building, approaching the doorways and stairwells with caution, but there was no one around to see her.