“Hey, a medal,” the auditor replies, a wry but tired smirk on his face. “Super.”
The Captain faces me with a dour frown, sitting down and folding his gnarled hands together on the table. “As for you, Dare,” he says, his demeanor not noticeably more gruff or hostile than it normally is. “As for you and the reprehensible, unsanctioned, absurdly destructive escapade you’ve engaged in over the past weeks… ” He pauses, watching me, but I don’t give him the satisfaction of a reaction. “In light of details that have come up regarding the man you shot at the SCAPE Bank, it appears that your actions were at least partially justified.”
“The courier in the red hat had ties to Aaron Greenman?” It makes sense, but I’m surprised they’ve uncovered it already. Maybe the old man got sloppy at the end, figuring I’d be too dead to follow up.
“Essentially, yes,” Knowles answers, “We traced a payment he received back to a SCAPE slush fund. My guess is that the guy demanded to be paid in a hurry, so they had to do an electronic transfer rather than cash.” Getting himself back on track, he admonishes, “That said… I recommended that the prosecutor file charges against you for resisting arrest, obstruction of justice, trespassing, terrorism, and destruction of property. All of those are supported by sufficient evidence, and they’ve all been filed against you. You’re going to slide on manslaughter and murder on self-defense and necessity. You’re on unpaid administrative leave… not that the pay matters much at this point… and your sidearm and ride are being held by IA.” He pauses again, probing for a reaction, and again I don’t give him one. “However,” he says, “you’re to be released without bail, and I’ve been told the case is likely to be dropped in its entirety.”
I finally react, letting out an audible breath of relief, almost unable to believe it. Knowles is right. I broke a lot of laws, and they have to at least charge me. But somehow I doubt a conviction will come down. “That’s… that’s great news,” I mumble.
Knowles gives a dismissive wave. “Some stupid thing about public outrage.” He sighs, rubbing his forehead. Leaning closer, he looks at me, dropping his perfectionist attitude of disapproval for the first time I’ve ever seen. “You can have your job back if you want it, Dare, but I don’t know how long we’ll be in business around here. I guess we’ll see.”
I can sense some sadness in him, some uncertainty. He’s built his life on this work, and now there may not be a need for it. “I’m sorry, sir.”
He gives a slight nod toward Brady. “I’ve heard the recording the auditor made in the hangar. I know what you sacrificed. I’m the one that’s sorry.” He reaches a thick, gnarled hand across the desk, and I shake it. “Thank you for your service, Dare. I wish you the best.”
“You too, Captain.”
Knowles stands up to leave but pauses at the door. “Oh, Dare?”
“Yeah?”
“This is not goodbye. I need you back here at thirteen hundred hours tomorrow to go through your guncam footage.”
He leaves, and Brady and I are alone. “So,” he says, “the world comes crumbling down.”
“I was tired of holding it up anyway.” I stand, stretching my sore back muscles. “I’m out of here.”
Brady follows me out into the hallway. “You know,” he says, somehow without a hint of anger, “I went way out on a fucking limb for you, Taryn.”
“That kind of language is not befitting of a hero, Brady.”
He smirks. “So it’s Brady again. I guess that’s good.” As we step into the elevator, he asks, “Are you going to explain how we got here or what?”
I can’t help but mock him with a grin. “You mean you need an explanation? The Commerce Board’s new Junior Auditor hasn’t figured it out on his own?”
“Deputy Auditor. Seriously, how did you know it was the long haul food?”
“Lucky guess?”
“Fine, Taryn,” he snaps, stiff and dignified. “Fine.”
“I’m messing with you, Brady.”
The elevator opens at Dispatch, and we both get out. It’s the middle of the night, usually a quiet period, but right now it’s busy. The few Dispatchers on duty are struggling to deal with agents lined up with their safeboxes trying to cash in their takes, and a whole squad of fully armored heavies is arguing with their CO in the far corner. Some of the monitors at empty Dispatch desks are playing news feeds, headlines flashing about economic panic and market crashes and currency supply. The story must have leaked somehow.
Figuring I may as well give Brady his explanation now, I take him aside, leaning against the wall. “Here it is. Dr. Chan hired Troy Sales shortly after treating a SCAPE pilot, Frank Soto.” My logic seems to solidify for the first time as I voice it aloud. “Strangely, Chan didn’t have any records of what ailment Soto was suffering from. Chan got weevil cultures somehow, and the theory that made the most sense was that Chan discovered some illegal plot, and that he used his discovery of that plot to blackmail someone involved into giving him the eggs. Looking back at the timeline, I saw that the first time Chan saw Soto was just weeks before the three thousand unit payment to Troy Sales, and treating a weevil shuttle pilot for some unnamed medical problem seemed to be as likely a moment of discovery as any.” I take a breath. Looking back on it, I can barely believe I connected all these dots. “So when I started to suspect that what Chan discovered was a plot by the Commerce Board and SCAPE to remove calcium from circulation to keep the currency value up, that made me think Frank Soto’s unnamed illness may have been related to calcium intake. He would’ve been getting too much, rather than too little.” Almost as an afterthought, I add, “Must have been a kidney stone.”
Brady is speechless for a moment, astonished. “He was a long haul spacer before he was reassigned. Did SCAPE put him on the weevil shuttle to set him up as a patsy?”
A good point. I shrug. “SCAPE or the Commerce Board.”
Brady regards me for a moment. “Bravo,” he says, sincerely. “Bravo, Taryn.”
I hold back an involuntary smile, admittedly pleased with myself. “You’re supposed to say brava to a woman.”
“Pretty sophisticated,” he says, “for a farm girl.”
Before I can respond, a female voice calls out my name, “Taryn! Hey!”
I tense for a second, still on edge after nearly a full week of being hunted down by killers. But the voice is Myra’s, and she’s in civilian clothes coming through the doors. She walks up to us quickly, and I throw my arms around her in a hug. “Hi, Myra.”
She releases me, emotional. “You made it.”
“I did.” I can barely believe it myself. “Did you pick up a night shift?”
She shakes her head. “I was called in. They need extra help. For some reason a lot of agents are trying to cash out early.”
“You should cash out too, Myra,” I blurt out. “These people know something you don’t.”
“What?”
I nod toward the monitors playing the Brink Planetary News Service’s live feed. We step closer to one to get a better view. The tickers scroll financial data for the two major Brink markets and several off-world exchanges, and the video cuts among various live footage. “… crash is expected to become even more severe when markets open officially in the morning,” the anchor is saying in a serious but not particularly assured tone, the way they do when the news is breaking and the writing team hasn’t had time to give the show any structure. “Off hours trades are already tracking for a nearly eighty percent drop across the board. On the consumer side, meanwhile, some of Brink’s largest retailers are holding emergency meetings regarding pricing. Shoppers may expect to see higher prices on nearly every purchase item as soon as the opening of business tomorrow morning… ”