Renegades, page 36
“By ‘let him go,’ I assume you don’t mean set him free?” Jerrick said with a smile. Becca shook her head. “You’re convinced they’ll vote to execute?”
Becca nodded. “Petra convinced me. She made me think about it.”
“Well, there are three options. Execute, keep him locked in his cell, or turn him out into the public, which would be a death sentence unless they don’t care.”
Becca sighed and closed her eyes. “That’s exactly right, but that can’t happen. We can’t hide this. We have to make what he did clear to the people. Now, when we do that, the real problems start. That’s when it would be easier to just hang him publicly.”
“That could sow division,” Jerrick noted.
“If we don’t, it could start a mutiny. I don’t know these people well enough to guess which would be more likely.”
“Well, this is just a mess, isn’t it?”
“Heavy is the head that wears the crown,” Becca said with exasperation.
“Sorry?”
Becca shook her head. “It’s an expression from Earth. It just means that leading people can be difficult. We haven’t been in charge for a full day yet, and it’s already stressful.”
Jerrick nodded and rocked back in his posture. “I think we identify what cannot happen, and make sure we control those things. As for the rest, you need to make the best decisions you can, and we’ll deal with the consequences as they come.”
Becca nodded. “Okay. You’re right. I think I have a plan, then. Okay. Thank you, Jer.” She stepped back and turned, walking after Todd.
6
After recruiting three young men and speaking with Becca after she had finished with Jerrick, Todd stepped into the jailhouse with his three helpers in tow. He walked to the center of the room, but the three paused in the doorway, staring at the stacked bodies.
“Unnerving, isn’t it? This guy was busy before we left. If he talks to you, just ignore him,” Todd said to the helpers, gesturing toward Ander.
Ander cleared his throat. “Unless your plan is to starve me to death, I’m going to need to eat. Another concern, and at this point an emergency, is that I need to use the bathroom. Immediately.”
Todd nodded. “Okay, Ander.” He looked to his three helpers. “We’re going to let the abductor use the bathroom. If he tries anything, you men have my permission to pound him into pulp. Any problems with that?”
The three men shook their heads. The tallest of the bunch, with jet black hair hanging in his eyes, grinned and rapped a fist into the open palm of his left hand.
Todd nodded and drew the cell key from his pocket. “Go ahead, Ander.” The door slid open, and the former Ambassador of Nations shuffled across the floor to the single bathroom in the jailhouse.
The exercise went without incident, and once Ander was locked in his cell again, the four free men began carrying the bodies out of the jailhouse, two by two. After the first twelve girls went out, the men took a break to catch their breath. Ander stirred.
“Where are you taking them?” he asked, unable to contain his curiosity.
“Ultimately,” Todd said, “The big building down the way from here. We are setting up a nice place for them where they can be safe and monitored. But for now, for right now, we’re setting up the exhibition.”
Ander’s face twisted in confusion. “The… what?”
“The Commander doesn’t want there to be any misunderstanding. She wants your crime to be clear to all. To be visual. Your cell won’t be your prison after this morning, Ander. It will be your refuge.”
7
Although Osa had a twelve-degree tilt that produced regular seasons of warm and cold weather for most of the planet, as well as periods of short days and long days depending on the time of year, Orris and every Lance ever built maintained a strict fourteen-hour day and fourteen-hour night. The transitions lasted an hour; one in the evening to simulate sunset, and one again in the morning for sunrise.
Becca waited for the conclusion of the sunset phase before approaching the jailhouse with a population of one. She walked slowly up the steps and then through the sheriff’s office, pausing to, once again, drag a chair into the holding area.
Ander’s voice rose from within the darkness before she had even stepped fully into the room. “Monster. You’re the monster, now.”
“Ha! Hardly, Ander.” Becca parked the chair in front of his cell and sat. “You may be an evil, horrible man, but you’re not stupid. I believe you can look at our situation from a bird’s eye perspective and acknowledge that I’m the one in the right, here.”
Earlier that day, she had instructed Todd to remove from the jailhouse and place the bodies of the girls Ander had abducted on the soft lawn that lined Washington Avenue in front of the sheriff’s office. Two hundred and four bodies stretched far beyond the property occupied by the building, and Todd and company had untied each knot and pulled the bags down, revealing the head and shoulders of each of Ander’s victims. It was a disturbing sight. It was an image that evoked emotion, as Becca had intended.
“No. Not at all. What you did with your… your little spectacle was to tell a tale that was not true. You made it look like I butchered those women. Like they were all brutalized and then murdered. Nothing like that happened, and you know it.” Becca could not see Ander, and he could not see her. It was lamp black in the jailhouse, but Becca could hear him get up and approach the bars. “We put them to sleep, and then we moved them. That is all. Not a hair on any of their heads was hurt.”
It was Becca’s turn to stand and approach the bars. “You abducted them. You tore them from their families and destroyed their lives. You wrecked the lives of their parents and everyone that knew them. All for your disgusting plans to use them like animals. No, Ander; I am not the monster. It’s you. It has always been you. You are a manipulator, and it was my job to break that part of you. So, I poisoned the well. I shined the truth onto the people you would have manipulated before you had the opportunity. I can’t underestimate you, Ander. I can’t ever let myself be comfortable around you. You are capable, and you are dangerous.” Becca listened as her statements hung in the air, waiting for Ander to reply, but he was silent. After several seconds, she could hear him take the three steps back to the bench, and it creaked as he sat.
“So, then, why are you here? What do you want?” he said finally.
Becca returned to her chair and sat again, facing his general direction. “I want to know if we should keep you, Ander. I came here to ask if you wanted to live, or to die.”
Ander snorted. “What the hell kind of question is that?”
“It’s a very serious question. It’s important to me, and I would think it would be extremely important to you.”
“It’s a ridiculous question. You seem juvenile in asking it.”
Becca chuckled. “Saying that reveals more about you than me, Ander. It’s become clear to me that you don’t understand the reality of your future. You have no good option. If you choose to end it, then I will honor that, and we will move on without you. If you decide to live, then it gets complicated for you. First, I need you to give me a damn good reason. You need to be useful to me, to us, because maintaining your existence is going to consume resources. Second, you have to come to terms with the fact that you’ll be in that cell for the rest of your life, with few exceptions. I have made it impossible for you outside. The population wants you dead, so escaping would be akin to committing suicide.”
Silence. Becca stood. “Live or die, Ander. But freedom is off the table for you, forever. We’ll be in the Milky Way galaxy in a few days, and we’ll be stranded there. This ship and these people are all there will ever be for you. Even if we make it to Aila, you’ll still be locked up. Think about it, and if you choose to live, remember that you need to give me a reason. I’ll be back tomorrow night.”
Ander did not reply, and Becca walked out.
8
Petra was never a heavy sleeper, and she was up early the next morning before most of the people on board, including Reggie. The stress of another day passing without Reggie eating, drinking, or interacting with anyone was taxing, and she made it her mission to snap him out of it that morning. He had not left the bed once the previous day, and she concluded that the only reason he had not wet himself was that he was severely dehydrated. Dangerously dehydrated.
After showering and going through the rest of her morning routine, she woke him up and pulled him upright. Gripping his left hand in both of hers, she pulled him off the bed and he followed her into the kitchen, where she pushed him gently onto a stool. He was not looking at her. He only stared out into the distance, not seeming to focus on anything.
“Reggie, we’re going to have some juice. Do you want some juice?” she asked. Reggie did not move, did not acknowledge her question at all.
Petra retrieved the carafe of pressed fruit juice, a rare luxury on the Lance, and poured it off into two large glasses. She placed one in front of him and put her hand on his shoulder. She squeezed. “Reggie, drink your juice.” Nothing. “Reggie! Drink it!” Still, nothing. Petra lifted her hand and smacked him across the face. “Reggie! Juice! Drink it now!” Reggie blinked twice and inhaled deeply. His absent gaze shifted to the glass, and he picked it up and drank all of it.
“Good,” Petra said, and kissed his temple. “Good.” She rubbed his back. “That’s a good start, Reggie. We’ll get you back in no time.”
Satisfied with her accomplishment but wanting to push him further, Petra got him up and back out of the apartment, down the hall to the officer’s lounge. With him seated in his usual place at the massive wooden table, she placed the schematics he had been studying back in front of him and waited. He made no move to look at them, just stared out into nothing. Petra got up and prepared herself a cup of coffee and then prepared one for Reggie, just the way he liked it.
“Hello?” a voice said. It was the young girl Becca and Jerrick had brought back with them the night before, and she had her even younger brother with her.
“Good morning. My name is Petra. What are your names?” Petra had no experience with children and was not exactly sure how to act, but she thought she may have been acting too nice, so nice it seemed fake.
“I’m Corrine, and this is my broth…”
“I’m Clive!” The young boy said, stepping out from behind his sister.
“Ah! Well, how old are you two, Clive?”
“I’m seven and my sister is thirteen,” Clive said.
“I’m fourteen!” Corrine corrected.
“Not until tonight, you’re not.” Clive said, sounding oddly more intellectually mature than Petra expected. Clive walked over to Reggie and looked down at the schematics in front of him. He stared at them for a long time while Corrine explained to Petra how she and her brother ended up on Lance 5 and their parents on Lance 10.
“Are these recirculation pipes?” Clive was pointing to a part of the top schematic sheet while nearly shoulder to shoulder with Reggie. The young boy didn’t look up and seemed to be asking the whole room.
“I don’t know, Clive! I just know numbers, not all that crazy mechanical stuff!” Corrine said, exasperated with her young sibling. She looked at Petra again. “He’s really smart for a little kid.”
Petra nodded and sat next to Reggie, opposite Clive. She placed one hand on Reggie’s back and the other on his forearm. “Only Reggie knows. Reggie? This young man asked you a question. Are those recirculation pipes? Don’t be rude, Reggie. Answer him.”
Petra did not expect any reply from her husband and was shocked when he started nodding his head.
Reggie cleared his throat. “Yes. Yes, that’s exactly what they are. Why do you ask?”
Clive ran his fingertip along the route of the pipes and then stopped and tapped an image next to them. “They run right past the preheat coils, but there is no heat sink. There is a loss that could be captured.”
Reggie pulled the schematics closer and stared at the portion the youngster had pointed out, but then shook his head. “No, the exhaust gas needs to stay hot, or it will add to the entropy.”
Clive slid his fingertip to the other side of the large sheet of paper. “Not if you increase the size of the reservoir.”
Petra was thrilled that Reggie was engaging with the young boy, but she was shocked again when he started laughing, hard. Clive looked confused, and his sister looked bored.
When Reggie finally calmed down, he spoke again. “Yes, young man. Theoretically, that could work. But it would also increase the volatility of the system, a lot. It could explode. If that happened, the ship would surely depressurize, and we would all be dead.”
The young man took his finger off the paper but continued to stare at the schematic. “Oh. Well, that’s not good.”
Reggie burst into laughter again.
9
While she was uncomfortable in her leadership role, Becca embraced the responsibility. She had several meetings throughout the day as she and Jerrick identified and then pressed into service the renegades who had skill sets appropriate for managing a wide variety of needs, from farming and keeping livestock to maintaining the plumbing and air recyclers. That afternoon, she and Jerrick even went out to the agricultural zone to watch the groundbreaking of the first field to be tilled and seeded.
The daytime hours had switched to twilight as they walked in silence back to the living center, but when they were approaching the populated area, Jerrick spoke. “Have you decided?”
Becca did not need to ask what he was talking about; it was the elephant in the room. “I’m giving him a chance to contribute to the decision.” Jerrick frowned. “I know that seems odd, but I’m not sure what to do, as you know. If there is a big drawback to hanging him that I just can’t see right now, he’ll be the first one to point it out to me. If there’s not, then he’s going to squirm and make excuses, but regardless of all of that, there’s no harm in asking him.”
“You know what he’s going to say. He’s going to play his tricks and…”
“He has no power over me, Jerrick. He never has, and he knows it. He may try to beguile me, but I don’t expect him to put much effort into it. He’ll never trick me. Never.”
“Absolutes are dangerous, Bec.”
Becca nodded and stared at the ground in front of her as they walked. “I know,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ears. “I know.”
“When are you going to talk to him?”
“Now. I’m going there now.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
“No. The relationship we have is delicate. I don’t want to add anything that would throw off the balance.”
Jerrick smirked and shook his head. “Your relationship,” he said under his breath.
“What is that supposed to mean?” she asked, frowning.
“Nothing, Becca. It’s none of my business.”
She took his arm and stopped walking, turning him toward her. “This whole situation is messy, but I need you, Jer. I don’t want any anxiety or distrust between us. We can’t have anything like that. So, if you have questions, then let’s talk. Let’s get it all out there. We have to be a solid team. I can’t do this without you.”
Jerrick smiled and nodded. “Not now. I have your back, you can rely on me, we will talk, and I promise it will be uncomfortable, but not now. You have work to do, I have work to do. Let’s go do it, and we’ll talk soon.”
Becca sighed and nodded. She slid the hand that was holding his arm down to his hand and started walking. Jerrick moved to pull his hand away, and she tightened her grip. “Please don’t,” she said without looking at him. He relaxed and matched her pace.
10
Becca stepped into the jailhouse without the chair and with more light than in her first two visits with her prisoner. She could see Ander sitting on the floor and leaning into the interior corner in the back of his cell. He did not look up.
“This is torture,” Ander said quietly, scratching at the concrete with his fingernails.
“That’s nice,” Becca said. “Have you decided? You need to give me an answer now.”
Ander rolled his head toward her and closed his eyes.
“Yes or no? Live or die? What’s it going to be, Ander? I’m not going to spend all night here.”
“What if I choose not to participate in your childish ga…”
“Then I have the gallows built in the morning and you hang in the evening. I can be decisive, but I’m trying to be smart. If you don’t wish to participate, then this gets easy for me very fast. What will it be?”
Ander hung his head and exhaled. He clasped his hands on his lap and looked up at her, his expression still lost in thought. “Live.”
