You found it hard to believe aliens could be worse than what you'd met.
"Shut up!" Evan's voice, out of the dark. "Just shut up, all of you."
Evan's parents were dead too, probably. And Shane. Maybe they'd died together, protecting engineering.
All those bad thoughts floated in your head and you just wanted them to stop.
All those thoughts stank like the room. You'd seen a toilet and a sink when the hatch had opened, but it was hard for the boys to aim in the dark. You hadn't eaten in more than a shift, probably, because you didn't want to use the dirty toilet.
You sat with your arms around your knees and rocked to pass the time. Every now and again Sano would call, "Jos?" And you'd answer, "Yeah." So they knew you were alive.
Then one shift you woke up to silence. You'd slept hard, harder than normal, like that time a couple years ago when Daddy gave you an injet after you fell off the bed and knocked your chin. That injet had made you sleep hard too, and took away the pain. Now you were starving and couldn't even hear breathing.
"Evan?" Darkness and silence. "Tammy? Sano?" One by one you called their names but nobody answered. You felt something building inside that went far beyond fear. A scream that would never be loud enough.
"EVAN! TAMMY! SANO! ADALIA! MASAYO! WHELAN! PAUL! KASPAR! INDIRA!"
At the top of your lungs. A plea. A chant. Until you had no voice left, until their names became desperate whispers on the verge of dying.
V.
Was there ever a time you didn't feel afraid? You couldn't remember. You had to eat. When the bread and soup came you ate. You used the dirty toilet. You no longer smelled the stink. Mama and Daddy were dead. They'd left you in this place and all the crying in the universe didn't change a thing. You got used to the drives of this ship, the higher whine than Mukudori's. You learned the cadence of the thumps and screeches that was the sound of this ship moving through space. Sometimes in your sleep you thought you heard voices. Sometimes light appeared behind your eyes. But you knew it was a lie. You knew your world was only darkness.
VI.
The hatch opened when you were sitting on the toilet. The man there laughed and swore and waved his hand in front of his face.
"Wipe your ass. Let's go."
You washed your hands slowly because you didn't want to go with this pierced, pale man. The light in the corridor blinded you. He grabbed your arm because you couldn't walk steady.
The corridors looked the same as the last time you'd seen them. Ugly. Battle worn. Were you the only kid here? Probably. If not, they were probably all in small rooms like the one you lived in.
The man took you up the loud, rattling lev and in front of a hatch with a strange red emblem on it, then hit the commpanel there. A voice you recognized said, "Enter."
The man dragged you in and left you there with Falcone.
It was a small room. A gray desk, a narrow bed, and webbing for storage. Two cabinets high on the wall. Falcone sat on the bed with a slate in his hand. He looked at you with the flame-blue eyes you remembered, that you were never going to forget.
"Joslyn Aaron Musey." He smoked. He flicked ashes into a small tray beside him on the blankets. "Looking worse for wear."
You didn't know if you had a voice. You weren't sure how long it had been since the others were taken or since you'd last spoken. It seemed many shifts. But it didn't matter; you didn't want to talk to this man.
"I suppose you're wondering where your friends are."
You stared at a pockmark in the floor.
"Yes? You want to know where your friends are?" Impatient.
So you said, quietly, in a hoarse voice, "Yes."
"I sold them. They're gone. Poof. On other ships. Maybe dead by now. They got me a good deal. Mukudori knew how to raise kids, I give them that. And they were a little challenge to take—for a merchant."
You said nothing. It wasn't anything you hadn't figured out already.
"Want to know why I didn't sell you?"
Say what he wanted to hear. "Yes."
"Come here."
No. In your head you said no. You couldn't move. You said no.
"Come here, Jos." He stubbed out the cigret.
You moved. Don't feel. Don't think back. Don't.
He took your arm, looked at it.
"Have you been eating?"
"Yes."
"Are you afraid?"
". . . Yes." What would be the point of lying?
"Afraid of me?"
You stared at his leg. Then you looked up into his face. No feeling. Shouldn't feel.
He smiled. "You're a tough one. What I thought." The smile widened and he put his hand in your hair and rubbed. "Go take a shower, Jos. Right there." He pointed to a narrow door you hadn't noticed because of the webbing on it. "Go on." He let go of your hair and patted your bottom. Like Daddy used to do.