Defenders by Will McIntosh

should he think of it as the interrogation room? Not that there was much interrogating going on.
    It wasn’t only claustrophobia that made him want to get back to the world. Oliver wanted to get home to Vanessa. He was worried Vanessa would use his absence as an opportunity to spend time with Paul.
    To spend time with.
What a pathetic euphemism. The truth was, he was afraid Vanessa would use the opportunity to fuck Paul. That was the crux of it, wasn’t it? He was afraid she was having an affair.
    A few of Five’s eyes were tracking Oliver as he paced. He needed to get his mind off his marital problems, focus on the much, much larger problem at hand. How criminally narcissistic was it, to be thinking about his wife’s suspected infidelity when he’d been entrusted with a task that could help save the entire human race? He needed to stay focused, to find a way to extract useful information from this Luyten.
    “Why Earth, of all the planets in the galaxy?” he asked the Luyten. “Does your kind just enjoy a challenge?”
    You’re right, you know. Your wife is having an affair.
    Oliver was so shocked by the words he very nearly cried out. “What did you say?”
    When she dropped you off at work, her mind was close enough that I could hear it. She is having sex with Paul.
    “You can’t—” He was going to say ‘You can’t know that for sure,’ but he checked himself. Yes, it could. “You’re lying.”
    As she was driving off, she was thinking about taking Paul’s penis in her mouth while they drove to—
    “
Shut up.
” Oliver could imagine her, breathless, telling Paul the things she wanted to do to him when they got to his house.
    A voice message came through the comm, fed directly to the earbud connected to his comm, although they might as well have broadcast it aloud, for all the secrecy it afforded them.
    “What’s happening down there?” It was Ariel. “Your heart rate is one-twenty. Can it inflict harm psychically?”
    “No,” Oliver answered. “I’m okay. I’m just adjusting to what Kai described—the unpleasant sensation in my mind when it speaks.” He didn’t want to air his dirty laundry in front of who knows how many agents and operatives, and didn’t want to get pulled out when he was making progress.
    To address your spoken question, it never occurred to us this planet would be inhabited. When we arrived it was too late. Either we settled on Earth, or our kind would die out.
    “We would have given you asylum, if you asked.” He dragged a hand down his sweaty face, still not able to banish the image of Vanessa going down on Paul in a car.
    No, you would not have.
    “You don’t know that.”
    Yes, I do.
    “If you were oblivious of us, why did you take such pains to stay hidden behind various celestial bodies as you approached? For God’s sake, you parked behind the moon. You did that so we wouldn’t detect your approach.”
    It felt childishly satisfying to bring up the Luyten mother ship. Humanity’s one real victory had been sending a motley collection of weaponized space vehicles and shooting their mother ship out of the lunar sky.
    When I say “when we arrived, it was too late,” I don’t mean when we arrived in your solar system. We detected your existence well into our trip, through your SETI transmissions, but long before we reached your solar system. We took precautions once we were aware of your existence. Some of the musical compositions included in the SETI transmissions were quite interesting, by the way. We enjoyed Bach.
    Ariel’s voice intruded through the comm. “Get to the questions we prepared, before it goes mute again.”
    “Christ, it knows everything you’re saying as soon as I do.” Oliver gestured emphatically at the speaker on the wall. “Just speak through the goddamned speaker.”
    It doesn’t offend me
, Five said.
Though needless to say, I don’t intend to answer any of those questions.
    “No, I didn’t imagine you would.” He glanced