Chapter 14

Almost as soon as she'd left the bedroom, Shaw wanted to take it all back.

The silence behind her was deep and absolute. He hadn't spoken a word, just given her the most stricken look she'd ever seen on a man's face, all signs of his former pleasure erased in a fraction of a second. With the ship deathly-quiet around her, it almost seemed as if she'd killed him and was alone on the lifeboat.

Nonetheless, she waited until he wouldn't be able to see her before she let her body relax and gave into the limping gait her legs really wanted to walk with. Her actions had been stupid on multiple levels, and she was going to be sore for a while. She still had no idea how Zamin would fare in locker room competitions among his own kind, but he'd handily win most of them on Earth. If it hadn't been for a gag gift a friend of hers had given her, as subtle, joking encouragement for the idea of divorcing Charlie, she wouldn't have been able to take him at all. As it was, she was probably going to bleed a little. Maybe more than a little. She should probably be grateful that she was now an even faster healer than ever before.

The anger that had driven her was gone. Instead, she kept getting hit by harsh twinges of guilt, twisting at her guts. What she'd done to him had been absolutely cruel.

And what he did to me wasn't? she demanded silently. Why was her conscience siding with him?

From the other room, she heard the soft rustling of the bed sheets as he finally showed signs of life. There was no sound of springs creaking, of course – Peter Weyland would never have permitted a noisy bed into his masterpiece of a ship – but Zamin was finally rising. She braced herself, trying to figure out what she'd say to him, but there was no soft pad of his footsteps. Instead, a moment later, she heard the faint sound of the shower turning on.

The rage she'd felt when she'd seen him standing outside of the stall, staring at her and sporting an obvious hard-on, now felt nonsensical. And the more she thought of her response, the way she'd treated him, the more she cringed inside. What the Hell was she going to say to him when he came back out into the main room?

Nothing, she decided. She needed to cool off and get her emotions under control first. Unfortunately, the place she'd have ordinarily retreated to, to do that, was the suite he occupied now. She'd have to figure out somewhere else to go.

She'd picked a few books out of the bookcase and located a likely retreat on the upper level when she heard the water turn off. Her body protested as she hurried up the service stairs to the left of the med lab, but she ignored its objections. Another confrontation with Zamin had to be postponed until her head was clearer. If she saw that look on his face again, she'd probably turn into a blubbering mess.

"Why Miss Vickers, how you've shrunk," David said to her as she tip-toed past him in the upper level. Surrounded by the tangle of cables he was repairing, he'd been almost invisible in the low light.

She stopped, confused, before glancing down at her clothes.

The dark green coverall was standard Weyland Industries issue, but she'd had to roll the cuffs on both the legs and the sleeves because it had been intended for someone almost a foot taller than her. The name tag on the chest pocket, she noticed for the first time, said VICKERS. Not that Peter Weyland's aloof daughter would have stooped to wear such a thing, in all likelihood. It had been one of only a tiny handful of items in the dressing room that had looked like they might fit her.

Had David just made a joke?

She was pretty sure that, under normal circumstances, she'd have laughed. As it was, all she could manage was a pained smile. "I guess I have. I'm sorry, David, I'm just not very good company right now."

"Ah. Yes." His eyes flitted over to the stairs she'd just come up. He must have heard everything, she realized, but he said nothing else on the subject. Peter Weyland appeared to be completely submerged right now, and David's tact was back in full force. "Would you like me to go back downstairs?"

"No, you're fine. I'm going to just shut myself up somewhere quiet for a while." She gestured at the small storage room she'd identified. "If there are any problems, though, you can let me know."

"I'll endeavor not to disturb you," he told her, nodding his head graciously. She could see why Weyland would have wanted a servant like him, and why the new robotic line was so popular with people who could afford one. Now that he was in possession of himself, his understanding and discretion were comforting and felt genuinely kind. She wondered how long it took before other owners of Series 8s started thinking of them as people.

As they should, she reminded herself.

The storage room was even smaller than it had appeared on the schematic, little more than a roomy closet, but the crates inside had been secured with strong webbing and none of them had shifted during the crash-landing. With the lights on, the aisle between the rows of crates would serve as a nice little nook to sit in and read for a while, until she had her composure back. Just in case she lost control completely, though, she locked the door. David could be trusted to go away if she asked him to, but Zamin might insist on barging in. She needed time away from his allure.

It was addictive. Even now she kept feeling the urge to go back downstairs and curl up in his arms, to switch off her worries, her griefs, and her inhibitions and give herself up to the moment. And, of course, apologize for being so horrible to him. Assuming he'd let her, she suddenly thought. If Charlie had ever done such a thing to her, it would probably have been the last time she'd have let him touch her. She'd feel too betrayed. She'd feel violated.

She wondered if Zamin felt that way now.

Her attempts at reading were getting nowhere; she'd found herself rereading the first paragraph of the top book in her small pile – something called The Far Pavilions – for the third time without absorbing even one word of it. She had no idea if it was any good at all. Flipping through it, her eyes settled on a page toward the back and she tried to make herself focus, making herself read the words aloud.

"Perhaps one day, when he was old, he would take down that first volume, and blowing the dust from it, leaf through its pages and re-live the past in memory—fondly, and with no regrets. But for the moment it was better to put all that away and forget it. Ab kutum hogia." Her voice cracked, understanding the final words without looking at the footnote. Now it is finished.

Everything led her back to the confrontation downstairs. She wondered if that was how Zamin was feeling about her… about them.

She almost got up, almost went downstairs to ask him, but forced herself to stay put. There was a part of her that was still so angry with him, a part that felt every bit as betrayed and violated, and which might lash out at him again if they were face-to-face. It was the part of her that had flown into a rage at the sight of his erection – as if, she scolded herself, men had conscious control over such things, as if they were never embarrassed by having them at inappropriate times and places – and had wanted to punish him for reacting sexually to her while she was still so upset.

It was the part of her that didn't want to admit that, had their roles been reversed, she might have done the very same thing.

If we'd found the Azalla when Charlie had been ill, she asked herself, and I'd known that giving it to him might condemn him to eternal life and probable madness, would I have held it back and watched him die?

She knew the answer. It wouldn't have mattered that she had already begun planning their upcoming divorce in her head. She'd still loved him and she wouldn't have been able to stand seeing him suffer that way if there was something she could do to stop it. She'd have kept pouring doses of Azalla down his throat until his screams of pain had ceased, until the damage stopped progressing and began to reverse. She might have kept feeding it to him even then, just in case the prior dosages hadn't been enough. The hypothetical horrors looming in his distant future just wouldn't have compared to what he was going through in front of her.

So why would that have been all right, but it wasn't all right when Zamin had done it to her?

Because, the angry part of her responded… and then lost steam. Because he barely knew her? Because he hadn't asked? Because he was immortal too? While she could see herself giving Charlie the Azalla to save him from the horrible death he'd endured, she couldn't see herself drinking it down too, to keep him company forever. She'd been planning on leaving him.

Was that it? Was she afraid that Zamin had somehow tied her to him forever? That she'd end up feeling about him the way she'd come to feel about Charlie, trapped by obligations that this time she hadn't even naïvely chosen for herself? Planning on breaking her until death do us part vows to Charlie had eaten at her conscience for years and kept her in the marriage long after she should have left it. How much worse would it be, realizing that she'd given herself to a relationship that couldn't work, if there wasn't even death to end it?

But he hasn't tried to tie you to him, she argued back at her angry self. He just said he never wanted you to think of him as a mistake. No matter where you end up.

Still, she remembered the way he'd crouched before her as he offered her the second dose of Azalla, and how it had almost felt like he was a suitor with a ring box. But that sent another pang of guilt through her. Had he been silently making a commitment to her there, one that he wasn't actually expecting her to necessarily reciprocate? To stay with her for as long as she needed or wanted him?

Then I'm yours, he'd told her before she'd fallen asleep. He hadn't asked for any promises in return. He never had, not even once.

The last of her anger sputtered and died. She set her books down and rose to her feet, walking over to the storeroom door and unlocking it. She needed to apologize to him right away; she only hoped he'd forgive her.

David had been busy. The last tangles of cables that had fallen into the main room were gone, hoisted back into the upper level. All four of the light pillars were functional again, glowing a steady pale blue. The crystals in the chandeliers had been straightened as well, cascading asymmetrically and catching the light exactly as they had the first time she'd ever seen them. She wondered why he bothered; they'd have to leave this beautiful but impractical lounge behind when it was time to escape their prison moon.

The place was silent.

"Zamin?" she called softly. "Where are you?"

"He's gone," David said, emerging from the med lab, "to the Towers."

"What? But—" Through the tiny airlock windows, there was solid darkness. "But he wasn't going to leave until tomorrow at first light!"

"I thought so, too, but he said it was best if he started when he did." David had a large tray of jumbled surgical implements in his hands. Carrying it the same way a butler might carry a main course tray, he walked over to the repaired table near the airlock and set it down, taking a seat in front of it. "He said that there was something in the towers that could help us solve my problem. And he said to tell you that he'd be back, but he didn't say when."

She pulled a chair out and sat down in it, her whole body feeling heavy. David was sorting through the implements, dividing them into piles of damaged and undamaged equipment. "How long ago did he leave?" she asked, wondering if she'd just missed him. Maybe she could catch up with him and get him to come back for the night—

"Two hours and thirty-seven minutes ago," David said, still sorting. He lifted up a pair of surgical scissors that had been mangled almost beyond recognition, examined it for a moment, and then set it aside with a few other ruined implements.

"What?" But she'd only been upstairs for a little while… hadn't she? "David, how long was I upstairs?"

"Four hours and eight minutes," he replied, and rose from his seat. "Excuse me just a moment, please."

"Yes, of course," she said absently. Had that much time really passed? It had felt as though she'd barely gone up there. Had she really spent four hours just… spinning her mental wheels? "Ab kutum hogia," she whispered. He hadn't even said goodbye before leaving.

Had she really expected him to?

"What is finished?" David asked, carrying a deep pan full of clear liquid over to the table. The sharp smell of disinfectant reached her nose as he set it down. He started lowering the undamaged surgical implements into it, one at a time.

"I don't know," Shaw sighed. "Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. I made a ruddy mess of things, David, I really did."

"Your argument with Zamin? He did seem… troubled… when he left." David selected a bent scalpel from the pile of damaged implements, bringing it close to his face. As she watched, he used his bare hands to bend it back into an almost-perfectly straight shape. It was a little frightening to realize just how strong David really was, and how much damage he could potentially do if Peter Weyland took control of him.

Zamin was incredibly strong, too, she reflected. He'd let her take control of their …encounter… from beginning to end, in every way. Had that been his way of trying to apologize to her? Giving her such absolute control? She winced, realizing that he hadn't understood what she was up to at all, until it was too late. How could he have? What she'd done had been abominable. She'd never have expected it from a lover, either.

"If I may ask," David broke in on her thoughts, "why do you find the idea of living forever so horrible? Mr. Weyland seemed to think that it was, to invert Shakespeare a little, 'a consummation devoutly to be wished.'"

"But it isn't, David. That's the point. Shakespeare got that part right." And Shaw, who had always hated recitations in school because memorization was almost impossible, found the whole speech flowing into her mind. "'To say we end the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to; 'tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.' Life is supposed to have a conclusion. It's not meant to go on forever."

"And yet, for some, it does," David pointed out. "Shakespeare also has Hamlet fear 'what dreams may come' in the realm of the dead, too. Perhaps the afterlife, if it does exist, is a fearful place for some."

She wondered if Peter Weyland's obsession with immortality had had less to do with an awakening spirituality than a sudden dread that his many sins would catch up with him. God, she was pretty sure, wouldn't just wipe all of the debts off of his ledger in return for a favor. Those kinds of deals pointed people to a very different gate from Heaven's.

"I'm not afraid of it," she told him. Not that it mattered anymore whether she feared it or didn't. "I was… looking forward to seeing my family again. I didn't want to go there yet; there was still so much I planned to do… but I knew my ultimate reward would be that reunion, in a place of peace and love. And now…" Her eyes and nose began to sting with suppressed tears. "Now I'll never get to."

"You still believe in your God, and in your Heaven, after everything that has happened?" David asked her. She glanced sharply up at him, but his expression had no calculation, no hint of Weyland in it, just genuine puzzlement.

"I… don't know. I want to. I… sometimes get hints that Zamin believes in something similar, some kind of afterlife that he's lost. But I'm not sure what he believes in, and he may never tell me now…" Her voice broke and she closed her eyes, struggling against the tears that kept welling up.

"Why wouldn't he?" When she opened her eyes, David's expression was one of simple, gentle inquiry. Of course. He'd heard them argue over immortality, and might even have heard them having sex soon after, but how would he have any idea that she'd assaulted Zamin, and used him the way she had? At most, all he'd be able to deduce was that it hadn't helped them make up, not that it had made everything a thousand times worse.

"I…" She couldn't bring herself to explain it. "I was really horrible to him. I don't think I've ever been that cruel to anyone in my life. If he'd done to me what I did to him, I'd never want to speak to him again. So I can't really expect him to feel any differently, can I?" The tears escaped. She covered her face, feeling monstrous and stupid.

"But he's in love with you," David told her, as if he were stating something as obvious as the color of the sky.

"Maybe he was. I doubt he will be now."

"If you could forgive me for my crimes against you, what could you possibly do that he wouldn't forgive you for?" David's voice was so gentle, so reasonable. The whole time, he continued straightening medical instruments with his dangerously strong fingers, and lowering them into the disinfectant bath.

"It's a little different," she sniffled. "Yes, I've forgiven you, but… it's going to take me a while to feel comfortable eating or drinking things that you've handled, and the next time I go into cryo, I'll probably try to put some security blockers on my neural interface." She gave him a wry, half-apologetic look. "Sorry."

"That's quite all right. So, am I to understand that you don't think Zamin will be able to trust you now, even if he forgives you?" David still looked baffled, though. He probably just couldn't figure out when she'd had the opportunity to commit a heinous enough crime to warrant her dramatic claims. It amazed her just how little time, and thought, it could actually take.

"If the situation were reversed, I know I wouldn't be able to." With every passing moment she only grew more appalled at herself, and what she'd been capable of.

"Trust can be re-earned, can't it?"

"Yes, but I don't exactly have the excuse that an elderly megalomaniac is trying to take over my brain. I did all of this on my own." She wiped at her face.

"Well, I wouldn't give up on things just yet. Zamin might surprise you. He's surprised me several times, after all." David smiled at her, and she noticed that it seemed to reach into his eyes. "There's a saying I often hear people use, but I think it's actually very wrong."

"What is it?" she asked, her curiosity piqued. Had he known that it would be, and that it would loosen the grip of her pain a little? He was very perceptive.

"It's 'love means never having to say you're sorry.' I think that must be terribly wrong, because Miss Vickers and Mr. Weyland never apologized to each other for anything, and their relationship was quite unpleasant. From what I've seen, I think the opposite must be true. Perhaps love actually stops when the apologies do. Or, at least, is damaged a little more each time an apology should have come. I can't be sure, though. My understanding of love is almost entirely theoretical, and I'm unsure about most of my observations of things that have been labeled as love."

David was right, or at least she thought he probably was. What he'd said made sense to her in a way that most of the pithy pieces of advice about love never had. "But you said before that Zamin's in love with me," she said after a long, speechless moment.

"Yes. That's one of the things I do feel sure of. Just as I know you loved Dr. Holloway even if you were probably going to leave him. When he was in pain, so were you. And every time you've been in pain, Zamin has been too. It makes me wonder how humans can stand loving at all, much less glorify it the way they do." David looked so puzzled, like an old-time anthropologist describing a painful tribal ritual whose meaning and sacredness he couldn't fathom from so far outside.

"Because we get to feel the rest together, too. We get to share in each other's joys. We can…" How could she explain it? "When love is working well, we can use our joys to lift each other up. And when one of us is hurting, sharing one another's pain also helps us lift each other up. Having someone to share your pain with makes it… easier to bear. It can make the pain less. But having someone to share your joy with only makes the joy greater."

It sounded so simple, put like that. There was so much she'd left out, though. Love could only take people so far if they stopped really sharing with one another, if other aspects of life got in the way and broke into that connection. Charlie had had so many little secrets, little things that he hadn't wanted to talk about. She hadn't really minded at first, assuming that everybody had parts of themselves that they shared with no one – there were things she wasn't keen to share, herself – but the secrets had begun to multiply, many of them intruding on the parts of their lives that were supposed to be shared. She'd met Charlie during his evangelical phase and had thought that he was even more devout than she was – and many people before Fifield had called her a crazy zealot – but it had only been that, a phase for him, the tattoo on his shoulder going in a matter of years from a point of pride to a source of embarrassment. He'd hidden his loss of faith from her instead of even once discussing it with her, and she had honestly missed his transformation into a lapsed Christian, and then an agnostic, and finally an atheist, until the hostile mocking of her faith had begun shortly before their first separation. She wondered now if those phases had had anything to do with his connection to the Weyland family. But somehow, in spite of never sharing his evolving or devolving beliefs with her, he'd been offended that she hadn't joined him on that journey and still believed in God as strongly as ever.

"You look troubled," David said. "What you described was very beautiful, so I don't understand why you now look distressed."

"Sorry," she told him. "I was thinking about Charlie. When love isn't working well, people don't share important things. Charlie and I turned into strangers, in too many ways. He had a lot of secrets."

"Yes. He did." David's voice sounded odd. "I think Mr. Weyland just tried to intrude into my mind, Elizabeth. There's a video that I suddenly find myself wanting to show you. It's a security video of a meeting that Mr. Weyland, Miss Vickers, and Dr. Holloway had just a month before the Prometheus launched. I… am not sure why I would wish such a thing, and I'm wary of it because Mr. Weyland's intentions toward you don't seem innocent to me. I can't understand why a copy of it would have been on board the Prometheus in the first place, but I know the file number."

It must have had to do with secrets, she thought. David was right to be wary of anything Weyland tried to contribute to the conversation, but her curiosity was piqued. The bait was already swallowed now that she knew the video existed. "I'd like to see it."

"Are you sure, Elizabeth? I can't think that it can be anything good."

"Maybe not, but it sounds like it's something I still need to know about. Please, David. Play it for me."

He hesitated, possibly weighing her request against Zamin's stipulation that he wasn't to do anything that could cause harm. Finally he nodded in acquiescence. "Very well. If it becomes distressing, please tell me and I will stop playing it immediately."

"Thank you, David."

She followed him over to the console and watched as he called up the file. The interior of a huge, elegant office appeared on the wall screen. Two people were in the room already: Charlie and David. David was busying himself over an elaborate tea service, preparing cups and plates of food. Charlie was studiously ignoring him, examining the scenery outside of the floor-to-ceiling windows, the paintings on the walls, the statues in niches, and various artifacts on the book shelves. Something prickled at the back of her neck as she watched him, but she wasn't sure why. Something was wrong. Under the veneer of civility and cultivation, something in that room was absolutely wrong. But she couldn't see what it was.

She'd never been in that room. Her meetings with Mr. Weyland had taken place elsewhere. Would she have felt this same sense of wrongness if she'd physically been inside the room? Would she have been able to identify its cause?

The door opened and Meredith Vickers entered. She paused, as for a split second a look of surprise crossed her face before vanishing behind her chilly, businesslike façade. "I see my father's still up to his old tricks," she said, walking over to David and the tea service. He served her in silence, and she didn't thank him. Shaw glanced over at the corporeal David beside her, wondering if she'd honestly been the first human to say please and thank you to him since his incept, and if that might have been another contributing factor to his obsession. Were all of the Series 8s being treated this way? How horrible.

"I can't imagine what you mean," Charlie said, his voice a little mocking. He stayed away from her, though, and Shaw realized that Vickers was keeping David in between them, a humanoid shield that she must have known Charlie would prefer to avoid.

"I mean, why am I in this room with you? We had a deal." The look on her face was one of distaste. If there had been any worries in the back of Shaw's mind that Vickers still loved Charlie, they vanished with that look.

Charlie shrugged, his overeducated beach bum persona in full, vivid force. "I'm just here because the old man said he wanted to talk about a few things. I don't know any more than you do."

"Riiiight." Vickers sneered. "And will your wife be joining us?"

Shaw gasped. Was that hostility aimed at her or at Charlie? She couldn't tell, but the words had been snide and mocking.

"We wouldn't be meeting in here if she was," Charlie answered, his smile casual and… sneaky?

"What?" Shaw asked quietly. "What are you playing at?"

"Do you want me to stop?" David asked her. His frown was concerned.

"No, no. I'm all right, thank you. I'm just… confused. Something's happening here, but I'm not sure what." She got up out of her seat and walked closer to the screen, wishing that she could move around in the office itself and examine everything more closely, feel the undercurrents in the air…

"Of course we wouldn't," Vickers replied on the screen. Her expression was scornful. "If she knew you even half as well as I do, she'd—"

"Ah, there you two are," Peter Weyland rasped as he entered the room. The small dog that had accompanied him on his welcome holograph followed him in and, upon spotting Vickers, raced over to her feet. It danced on its hind legs until she reached down and picked it up, showing the first tenderness Shaw had ever seen her display as she rubbed its back and neck. "Has my daughter been keeping you entertained, Charlie?"

"She's a laugh a minute." Charlie's dude act was still in high gear. Beneath it, though, she could see his hurt pride. Vickers' dislike was getting to him.

"May I go now?" Vickers asked. "I think Sekandar would like a walk."

"He named his dog Sekandar?" Shaw asked, laughing.

"Yes," David replied. "Is that funny?"

"Very." She couldn't stop giggling.

"You must explain it to me later, please."

"I was hoping that Charlie here could convince you to join us on our pilgrimage," Weyland said. It was clear, from both his posture and Vickers', that she wouldn't dare leave unless he gave permission, and he was taking pleasure in withholding it. No wonder David had called their relationship unpleasant.

"How about it, Mere?" Charlie obligingly asked. "Just like old times? Could be fun."

Vickers, though, had the look on her face of someone who'd just discovered dog feces on the underside of her shoe. "Pilgrimage? I wasn't aware that wild geese had become holy. I'm pretty sure they're still just nuisances. And as I'm not one for nostalgia or ménages, I think I'll sit this trip out. But thanks for thinking of me." Her delivery of her final words was amazing; what should have been a polite thank-you had been transformed into a clear wish for Charlie to drop dead.

"I really do wish you'd reconsider, Meredith," Weyland said, a hint of iron in his words. He wasn't delivering an order, but he clearly did not want to be refused. Vickers' face flinched, just a little.

"I'll take it under advisement," she told her father, her voice brittle. "Now, I really think I should take Sekandar for a walk before he has an accident on your lovely Persian carpet. Don't you?"

Weyland waved his hand in a gesture that both conveyed permission and annoyance. "If you must, you must."

"It was nice to see you again, Mere," Charlie said in a mocking tone as she stalked toward the door.

She stopped by one of the alcoves and turned back toward him, frowning. "Next time you decide you want to see me, bring the little missus along, why don't you?" She sneered at him, holding Sekandar to her in one arm and running her other hand along the figurine in the alcove. "I'm sure she and I would have a lot to talk about."

"Oh," Shaw gasped. It was the sound of someone's breath escaping them as they were punched. "Oh God."

Now she could see it. Now she could see everything.

She knew that figurine. She knew most of the artifacts in that room. The screen went blank as she collapsed to the floor and then David was beside her, wrapping his arms around her to steady her.

"Elizabeth? Are you all right?"

She wanted Zamin's arms around her. She wanted to bury her face in the warm, sweet-smelling strength of his chest and cry while he held her and stroked her hair. Please come back, she thought helplessly. I'm so sorry. Please come back. I need you so much.

"Elizabeth! Can you hear me? What's wrong?" David sounded frantic.

"It's… it's…" She gasped, trying to speak around the sobs that kept escaping. "That mother-fucking son of perdition… he…"

"Who?"

"CHARLIE!" She screamed. "How long has he been stealing from digs!?"

If David answered her, she didn't hear him over the sobs that felt as if they were tearing her chest to pieces. But she already knew that it was at least as long as she'd known him. Now she knew why Meredith Vickers had left him, why she'd quit archaeology, and why she'd hated him enough to burn him alive.

"I'm so sorry, Elizabeth," David murmured as he held her. "I never should have showed you that. Please forgive me. I'm so sorry."

Please forgive me, she thought silently as she cried. Please come back, Zamin. I need you so much.

Notes: So! First, a huge thank you for everybody who has been reading and leaving reviews, because you guys are awesome, you not only stuck with me through the horrors of the last chapter, but you had some wonderful analyses of what you'd read and what it meant that were really cool to read. It's always a huge boost to know that people are getting the themes you're trying to convey, and you definitely are, so I just love all of you to death. :D

There's not a whole lot of vocabularyish stuff in this chapter – Shaw-POV chapters tend to be light that way – but this seems to be Literary Allusion Day, so I probably should give you guys a glossary of those.

The Far Pavilions is a novel by M.M. Kaye, and the main character in it is in a similar predicament to Lawrence of Arabia, because he's an English nobleman who was raised in India under circumstances that resulted in him being caught between two cultures, and more sympathetic to his adopted culture, in some of the same ways that Lawrence was. Since I've linked David's interest in Lawrence to a similar interest that Weyland had (and he did quote the film in his TED talk) I decided it would be fun to give David a literary figure that he could swap in. So there may be more references to the book in future chapters. It's an awesome read, by the way, absolutely huge, but if you've already followed me along this far you can totally take it and you'll probably have great fun with it.

Hamlet! Who doesn't suffer through Hamlet at least once in their academic career? But the "To Be or Not To Be" speech is absolutely wonderful for touching on all of the conflicting points of both desiring and fearing death. Plus it's amazing how many times, places, and ways people will talk about "consummation(s) devoutly to be wished" without realizing they're referring to death.

Pithy sayings… I haaaaate "Love means never having to say you're sorry." I think sayings like that are half the reason the divorce rate is so freakin' high. You heard it right here. ;)

Sekandar is the Persian name for Alexander the Great. A lot of cultures in the Middle East produced romantic fables about Alexander and his adventures of discovery throughout the world, including his quest for an elixir of immortality, which he failed to find.

"Son of Perdition" is my favorite swear. I totally stole it from the Adventures of Sayf Ben Dhi Yazan (more awesome Middle-Eastern epic literature) and I love it forever because it's a wonderful non-anything-ist insult to toss at someone.

Sorry again to Charlie fans, for making him Roast Villain. And I think that's enough notes for now!