Page 39 of Survival Instinct

“How about we play a game?” she suggested afterward.

“What kind of game?” The only games his people played were war games. He did not wish to play those with her.

“Card games, checkers,Monopoly.” She shrugged. “If you can’t read,Scrabbleis out, and there isn’t enough time for you to learn chess well enough to have fun at it.”

They played all three of the ones she suggested. After a few losses in poker,he had the cards memorized and won every hand.

“I’d take you to Vegas—if it still existed,” she said. “We’d clean up.”

Remembering what had been played and discarded, and what remained was easy.

He won most of the checker games, too.

Laurel read off what was printed on theMonopolyboard and its game cards, but even though he’d memorized everything, he still lost, since much of the outcome relied on chance. By a roll of the dotted cubes, Laurel snapped up BOARDWALK, PARK PLACE, and PENNSYLVANIA, NORTH CAROLINA, and PACIFIC avenues. Then she filled her squares with little green houses and red hotels and bankrupted him.

“I don’t like this game,” he said petulantly when she scooped up all his play money and the deeds to his properties. He lost his hotels, his houses, and the MEDITERRANEAN and BALTIC avenue properties themselves.

“You don’t like losing.” She laughed.

“Winning is better,” he agreed.

Monopolyreminded him of the galactic campaigns. Winner took all. Except in the Earth version, the Progg had owned hotels on Broadway, and Earth had the low-rent Baltic Avenue, and Earth still won. Because of a random roll of the dice had produced a virus.Go to jail. Go directly to jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.

“What kind of games do children from your world play?” she asked.

He cleared his throat and then took a sip of water. “Children do not play.” Sometimes children would be caught playing, but adults would quickly punish the behavior.

“What do children do?”

“They attend school to learn how to be adults and serve the empire.”

“That’s…sad.”

“Why is it sad?”

“Because it sounds like children don’t get to be children.”

“Why would anyone want to be a child?”

“Because it’s a time of wonder and freedom!”

“Wonder and freedom—”don’t secure victoriesor build empires. He hated to spoil the convivial mood with the brutal truth. “Wonder and freedom…are insignificant in the grand plan,” he said.

“Only because you haven’t experienced them.”

“I can’t deny that.” But he failed to see how wonder and freedom would have improved his life.

As the day marched on, and the inevitable separation drew closer, his ebullient mood took a dive. The thunder and lightning had ceased, and the rain had slowed to a light mist. There would be no more reprieves.I should have been more specific in my request to Zok.

For dinner, she opened a couple of pouches. He atevegetarian vegetable soup; she hadmacaroni and cheese.

They played a few more games, but he couldn’t concentrate, obsessing over his impending departure. Then came the moment he’d been dreading—she announced she was tired and was going to bed.

He was tired, too. A heavy weariness enveloped his entire body, yet he hated to sleep because the time would woosh away, and then he would wake to morning and be forced to leave.

“Good night, Grav,” she said as she climbed into bed. It wasn’t goodbye, not yet, but it sounded like it.

“Good night, Laurel,” he replied dejectedly.

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