Redemption Ark

Thorn remembered the police piling into the woman with bad teeth. ‘Can you make sure they all get out all right?’

‘No one will be detained. That’s part of the plan.’

‘I mean it. Those people don’t deserve to suffer just because there had to be witnesses, Ana.’

She applied more disinfectant. ‘They’ll suffer a hell of a lot more if this doesn’t work, Thorn. No one will set foot on those shuttles unless they trust you to lead them. A little pain now is worth it if it means not dying later.’ As if to emphasise her point she pressed the wad against his brow, Thorn groaning at the needlelike discomfort.

‘That’s a cold way of looking at things,’ he said. ‘Makes me think you spent more time with those Ultras than you told me.’

‘I’m not an Ultra, Thorn. I used them. They used me. That doesn’t make us the same.’ She closed up the medical kit and slammed it back into the desk. ‘Try to keep that in mind, will you?’

‘I’m sorry. It’s just that this whole business is so Goddamned brutal. We’re treating the people of this planet like sheep, herding them to where we know is best for them. Not trusting them to make their own minds up.’

‘They haven’t got time to make their minds up, that’s the problem. I’d love to do this democratically, I really would. I’d like nothing better than a clean conscience. But it ain’t going to happen that way. If the people know what’s going to happen to them — that what they’ve got in store, other than remaining on this doomed fuckhole of a planet, is a trip to a starship which just happens to have been consumed and transformed by the plague-infected body of its former captain, who incidentally happens to be a totally deranged murderer — do you think there’s going to be a stampede for those shuttles? Throw in the fact that rolling out the red carpet when they get there will be Triumvir Ilia Volyova, Resurgam’s number-one hate figure, and I think a lot of people will say «thanks, but no thanks», don’t you?’

Thorn said, ‘At least they’d have made their own minds up.’

‘Yeah. A lot of consolation that’ll be when we watch them getting incinerated. Sorry, Thorn, but I’ll take the bitch option now and worry about ethics later, when we’ve saved a few lives.’

‘You won’t save everyone even if your plan works.’

‘I know. We could, but we won’t. It’s inevitable. There are two hundred thousand people out there. If we started now, we could get all of them off this planet in six months, although a year is more likely given all the variables. But even that might not be enough time. I think I’ll have to consider this operation a success if we save only half of them. Maybe fewer than that. I don’t know.’ She rubbed her face, suddenly looking very much older and wearier than she had before. ‘I’m trying not to think how badly this might all go.’

The black telephone on her desk rang. Khouri let it ring for a few seconds, one eye on the silver cylinder. The lights stayed green. She motioned to Thorn to stay quiet and then picked up the heavy black handset, holding it against the side of her head.

‘Vuilleumier. I hope this is important. I’m interviewing a suspect in the Thorn inquiry.’

The voice on the other end of the phone spoke back to her. Khouri let out a sigh and then closed her eyes. The voice continued talking. Thorn could hear none of the actual words, but enough of the voice’s tone reached him for a certain rising desperation to become apparent. Someone sounded as if they were trying to explain something that had gone awfully wrong. The voice reached a crescendo and then fell silent.

‘I want the names of those involved,’ Khouri said, and then placed the handset back on to its cradle.

She looked at Thorn. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘What for?’

‘They killed someone, when the police broke up the meeting. She died a few minutes ago. A woman…’

He stopped her. ‘I know which one you mean.’

Khouri said nothing. The silence filled the room, amplified and trapped by the masses of paperwork surrounding them; lives annotated and documented in numbing precision, all for the purposes of suppression.

‘Did you know her name?’ Khouri asked.

‘No. She was just a follower. Just someone who wanted a way to leave Resurgam.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Khouri reached across the desk and took his hand. ‘I’m sorry. I mean it, Thorn. I didn’t want it to begin this way.’

Despite himself he laughed hollowly. ‘Well, she got it, didn’t she? What she wanted. A way off this planet. She was the first.’

CHAPTER 25

Armoured in black, Skade strode through the ship that was now fully hers. For the time being they were safe, having slipped undetected through the last shell of Demarchist perimeter defences. Now there was nothing between Nightshade and its destination except empty light-years.