“Please don’t," Margaret whimpers.
"Do you want me to inject this, or the doctor?”
“The doctor," she says after a brief hesitation.
“Then sit in the chair and let him give it to you, or I will be forced to play doctor and I do not think you will enjoy my bedside manner.”
She sits down obediently. I lock eyes with her and keep her there through force of will. I do not know if she even notices the doctor applying the drugs. She is too busy gazing into my face until those eyes of hers glaze over.
“There,” Haut says. “She is now an open book. Ask her what you like.”
“Margaret?”
“Yes,” she replies with a dreamy tone. She is very much relaxed, a state I have not seen her in except for after orgasmic interludes. It makes me wonder if I could simply have given her a series of orgasms to achieve the same result. Probably not.
“Are you an assassin?”
“Hm.” She tips her head to one side, and then to the other. I look over at the doctor with some annoyance.
“I thought she wouldn't be capable of lying or obfuscating with this drug.”
“She's thinking about it," he says. “Give her a moment.”
“Occasionally,” she says, apparently unconcerned with my growling complaints.
Occasionally. What a mild and inoffensive little word to herald a confession which has been weeks in the coming. I should have done this immediately upon capturing her, but we would have missed so many enjoyable interludes if I had.
She is very relaxed. Any concern she may once have had for consequences of memory is clearly gone. She lies back with a little smile on her face, as if she has been caught being ever so slightly naughty.
“How occasionally?”
“Oh, now and then,” she says. “I would really like some tea. Something with a wedge of lemon. Do you have lemons here, Mr Mean Alien?"
I glance over at the doctor and notice that he is trying his very best to hide what can only be described as a smirk.
“It is normal for human affectations and typical emotions to be suppressed," he explains. "She may not seem concerned now, even while describing very disturbing acts. Do you want me to probe more deeply, or...?"
“I have more questions.”
"I really want tea," she says. “And I don't want to answer any more questions. Whatever I did I did because I had to. Mark threatened to kill my family if I wouldn’t…”
She continues, “Mark was the assassin. But he liked to make me do it too. He would watch and touch himself. He liked it when I killed. He liked it even more when I cried. I’m very glad you killed him as planned.”
"As planned?"
"Mark had a way to hide himself from everyone. It was a little device that would sit beside the bed and block his signal. I turned it off after the assault on your world. I didn't kill the lady. Mark always killed the women. He liked killing the women. Eventually he would have killed me. That's why I had to turn him in. I never actually thought an alien would come, not so quickly."
She continues to spill the truth with a casual tone which belies the horror of her confessions. I knew she was trapped in a bad marriage. I did not know she was the prey and pawn of someone who was probably more monster than man.
"You're my hero,” she says. “I owe you my life, and everything in it. I hope one day you impregnate me, and I have a little blue baby with your eyes."
“Is that so.”
“It is so. But I hope you love me too. If you are capable of it.”
“You don’t think I’m capable of loving you?”
"I don't know if you're capable of loving anything other than control. You would give up everything and anything for it.”
I look at Dr Haut, who is pretending to organize medical things.
“I think that is enough," I tell him.
“Yes. Of course. Would you like me to restore these memories to her consciousness, or…?”
“I don’t think she needs to remember this. Erase it. Erase it all. Let her think she is a helpless little blameless human captive.”
“Are you sure?”
“Very sure. These acts were unwilling and terrible. There is no reason for her to be burdened with the memory of them.”
"As you wish,” he says, preparing another syringe. This time Margaret has no complaints or fears. She accepts the needle without argument. The antidote is slung into her system, and the memories are locked back behind chemical doors.
“Give her a few moments. She’ll snap back pretty quickly."
“Tusk?”
She looks at me with her usual expression. Hunted. Concerned. Afraid. I miss her sedation almost immediately. She knew everything and was at peace. Now she is back to being haunted by the shadows of her mind.
“What happened?”
“Nothing happened. You were right. You were entirely innocent. I must have made a mistake.”