That was it, he thought. Someone to take care of me. We're taken care of - well and lavishly. We're sheltered and guarded and pampered - that was it, pampered. And for what reason?
Any minute now they'd tire of their game and come back into the circle of the firelight.
Maybe, he told himself, I should give them their money's worth. Maybe I should act scared, maybe I should shout out for them to come and get me, maybe I should glance around, out into the darkness, as if I were afraid of those animals that they talked about. They hadn't talked too much, of course. They were too clever for that, far too clever. Just a passing remark about existent animals, then on to something else. Not stressing it, not laying it on too thick. Not overdoing it. Just planting a suggestion that there were animals one could be afraid of.
He sat and waited, not as scared as he had been before, having rationalized away the fear that he first had felt. Like an Earth campfire, he thought. Except it isn't Earth. Except it's an alien planet.
There was a rustle in the bushes.
They'll be coming now, he thought. They've figured out that it didn't work. They'll be coming back.
The bushes rustled again and there was the sound of a dislodged stone.
He did not stir.
They can't scare me, he thought.
They can't scare -