I wanted to grab his cigarette from his rough lips. I wanted to burn my flesh—any cigarette-sized section of flesh—with it. Then, for just a second, I wanted to burn his flesh instead. Perhaps I wanted to see physical pain in his eyes because I couldn’t see my own pain, not really, not clearly. I was horrified by my thoughts, but my horror did not quiet them.

I reached down, picked up a small stone, and put it on the table between us. “If I could analyze this and tell you all that it was made of, would that mean I’d made up its contents?” He didn’t do more than glance at the rock. He kept his eyes on me. “So what did you analyze to get Earthseed?” “Other people,” I said, “myself, everything I could read, hear, see, all the history I could learn.

But it’s something, when you think about it, how many babies were brought into those places, with rats as big as cats, roaches the size of mice, splinters the size of a man’s finger, and somehow survived it. You don’t want to think about those who didn’t; and, to tell the truth, there’s always something very sad in those who did, or do.

‘Man, I know what you’re saying. And I appreciate it. But you don’t know – the worst thing, man, the worst thing – is that they can make you so fucking scared. Scared, man. Scared.’

He is young, very, very young, but also very old; but not old in the way that she had expected him to be. She had expected the age of corruption.