All rest and no work made Ern stir crazy. He finished Treasure Island and sampled other books. He tried going to the nonfiction section again, but those were even more full of lies than the fiction books, so he stuck to the stories. He found himself reading through one or two per day for the next few days. It was the only thing that kept him sane. Whenever Doc or Susan was around, he spent the whole time trying not to breathe wrong. If they had his helmet, they had to know who he was. They had to know ki...what he’d done to that slug, didn’t they?
Don’t be a rube, he told himself, they were just in town for a visit. They didn’t live there. They lived here. In this...warren or whatever it is. They wouldn’t be looking for you. They probably just hung the helmet in their transit shower so it would be there when you’re was ready to go out.
Such sensible thoughts did little to quiet his anxiety.
It was almost a relief when Doc woke him up with a serious look on his face.
“Hm...? What is it?”
“You’re ready to move,” Doc said in a clipped tone. “Time to get up. Get dressed. I’ve kept the library closed long enough.”
Just like that. Well, he should’ve expected that.
Ern got out of bed, cast about for his clothes, then remembered he’d left them tucked under the bed—no sense wearing them and getting them all dirty when he was just sleeping. He dragged them out, slipped them on, then picked up his rucksack.
“You won’t need that.”
Ern blinked. “I thought you were kicking me out.”
Doc looked puzzled.
“No. I’m just opening up the library. It’s not an all day-all night thing. But some parents might not like sending their kids in here to find a naked man laying around the place.”
“Kids come in here?” Ern didn’t know quite how to process that. He should never have read half the things he’d seen in the last few days here—he couldn’t believe they’d let children read any of this stuff on their own. Or at all.
Doc shook his head. “In this city,” he said, “the more you read, the better.”
“Like your son?” Ern said.
Doc flinched.
“You said he liked Treasure Island.”
“Yeah. Yeah, he did. Loved to read, that kid.”
“You knew him.” Ern said. “I mean...you really knew him? You spent time with him and everything?” He knew the slugs weren’t subject to Exile. While sure-born males served their time in Exile in South Nast, the slug males were consigned to the mines below the city, extracting the uranium and iron and cobalt that supplied the bulk of Nast Central’s trade portfolio.
“The Nast Cluster is a...special place. Just about everything there is different from anywhere else.”