The coals of the dying fire laid strange tints of color on Kyla's face and shoulders and the wispy waves of her dark hair. Now that we were alone, I felt constrained.
"Can't you sleep, Jason?"
I shook my head. "Better sleep while you can." I felt that this night of all nights I dared not close my eyes or when I woke I would have vanished into the Jay Allison I hated. For a moment I saw the room with his eyes; to him it would not seem cosy and clean, but—habituated to white sterile tile, Terran rooms and corridors—dirty and unsanitary as any beast's den.
Kyla said broodingly, "You're a strange man, Jason. What sort of man are you—in Terra's world?"
I laughed, but there was no mirth in it. Suddenly I had to tell her the whole truth:
"Kyla, the man you know as me doesn't exist. I was created for this one specific task. Once it's finished, so am I."
She started, her eyes widening. "I've heard tales of—of the Terrans and their sciences—that they make men who aren't real, men of metal—not bone and flesh—"
Before the dawning of that naive horror I quickly held out my bandaged hand, took her fingers in mine and ran them over it. "Is this metal? No, no, Kyla. But the man you know as Jason—I won't be him, I'll be someone different—" How could I explain a subsidiary personality to Kyla, when I didn't understand it myself?
She kept my fingers in hers softly and said, "I saw—someone else—looking from your eyes at me once. A ghost."
I shook my head savagely. "To the Terrans, I'm the ghost!"