Mr Andrews
“How do you feel?” asked the suit, pausing on a page in the Bible and smiling at it. “I hear you’ve had quite the day.”
Kani didn’t speak.
He smiled, nodded, kept flipping pages.
“Radiation can be very painful the first time around,” he said. “The body adjusts over time, but that first dose is the one you remember. Rips your guts out, makes you wish you hadn’t been born.”
He laughed to himself, turned and started checking around the room, staring at random objects that weren’t even hers.
“Hadn’t been born,” he said. “Tired expression, I’m sorry. Did you take the pills like they told you to?” He checked over his shoulder. “You didn’t, did you?”
She clenched a fist.
“They wouldn’t help you anyway. Not on such short notice. Don’t believe them if they say otherwise. It’s a popular lie. It takes weeks to build enough to do you any good. And you haven’t had weeks, have you, Kani?”
He turned, leaned against the cupboard across from her, scratched his chin. His hair was red, fiery, intense.
“I’m Mr Andrews, by the way. I’m on your side. Not in the generic sense, either. Your side. I hope you understand the distinction.”
“What do you want?” she asked.
“Ah, a voice! Well done. Let’s keep this progress going.” He stopped at the foot of her bed, played with the Bible again. “I want you to have children, Kani. I want you to get past this day, and have kids running around you some day. And you still can, but you need to stick to the regimen they’ll prescribe today. Stick to it to the second, because you’ve still got a chance.”
He cocked his head.
“Didn’t they explain the risks to you? They didn’t clarify things? Oh dear. Oh dear.”
He closed the Bible.
“Here’s what I think happened to you today, Kani, and you can tell me how close I am.” He clasped his hands, stared up, as if reciting a speech he only half-remembered. “Stacey is your schoolmate. Your friend, maybe. She got mixed up in some bad things, with some bad people, and she’s in trouble. Present tense. She’s in serious trouble.”
Kani shuddered.
“You want to help,” Mr Andrews continued. “You’re a good friend. You’ve done more than any friend would: you’ve actually gone on a mission to help her. You’ve strapped yourself in and done what no one would ever expect of you. You’ve seen Earth from a distance. Maybe it was beautiful. But it was the biggest mistake of your life.”
Kani looked away, and he wheeled the stool next to her, perched at the edge.
“I see a lot of people going up there, Kani, for so many reasons. So many reasons, and most of them seem noble. Oh, you know… poverty, fighting injustice, starving children. For every out-of-cash pirate, there are ten more out there that think they’re saving the world when they put on that helmet. They’re saving the world. And maybe they are. It’s not my job to decide.”
He wheeled across the room suddenly, and she turned to watch him go. He seemed to enjoy the ride.
“Your teammate, Spastik. He nearly killed a hundred thousand people when he lost control of a freighter over Victoria. Showed no remorse. Did he seem troubled to you? Or Chenne. She’s disabled a shop in such a dangerous place, the pilot nearly ran out of oxygen before they could get him back to the space station. Think of that. Think of being in that cockpit, knowing you’re going to die. Think of what that’s like.”
Kani could. She really could.
“Rook has fired on unarmed cargo ships from law-abiding companies. There are politics to it, as I’m sure you’ve learned. For all the passion, no one wants a death in space. It brings the whole conflict to a whole new level. Something no one can control.”
He stood up, walked back, and started flipping through the Bible again.
“These aren’t the statistics you hear in the news, Kani. These aren’t dressed up to bother the public. Inflated, sensationalized. These are real. This is the life you’re on the brink of.”
He stared directly at her, and she couldn’t tear her eyes away. He was looming over her from across the bed.
“Honestly, Kani, the companies aren’t perfect. And it’s not a just world, either. I’ve seen enough things to make me doubt humanity. But when you put your faith in the kinds of people that dustrunning attracts, you’re putting your faith in the basest of human nature.”
He turned his head suddenly, squinted into the heart monitor.
“Do you know where the word ‘dustunner’ comes from? Most don’t. I know ‘pirate’ is more en vogue these days, but if you’ll forgive my diversion… the ‘runner’, as you know, refers to bringing contraband across enemy lines. Blockade runners were famous in the American Civil war. Gun runners, what have you. The ‘dust’ refers to the loose particles outside the freighter when they reach cruising speed. Floats around the ships like a cloud. Dust. It’s poetic, don’t you think?
Kani looked away, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“You’re trying to save Stacey,” he said. “You’re not one of them. You’re trying to do what’s right, and it’s killing you. And I know… I know why you’re not answering. You don’t know who you can trust. They’ve got you scared of everything. It’s part of the game. Paranoia. More dustrunners commit suicide than are caught, did you know? Terrible statistic. Entirely avoidable.”
He threw the Bible onto the bed, startling her.
“I don’t know any passages that cover this,” he said. “God has never been my strong suit. I represent something more basic. Something man-made, and powerful. And I want to help you, Kani.”
She reached for the emergency call button, hand trembling. He didn’t move a muscle.
“You can protect Stacey,” he said. “The police will find her, and if you tell them what they need to know, they might find her faster. That’s within your power. That’s something you can do.
“I know it’s hard to trust, but if you don’t do this, you’ll be an accomplice, and the longer it goes on, the less sympathy anyone in law enforcement will have for what you’ve gone through today. Everything you’ve done so far, we can call it fear, or shock, or just plain old desperation. But everything from this moment on? That’s you. It’s all on you.”
Their eyes met, and his smiled disappeared.
“If you co-operate, none of this will be on your record in the morning. We’ll make up any story you like, and everyone will believe it.”
She inhaled, said nothing.
“Or,” he said, smile coming back. “If you prefer, I am prepared to offer you assistance in the form of advice and material support — fifty thousand to start — if you will consider working working for me instead.”
“Who are you?” she asked.
“I am one of the good guys, Kani.”