“And then it turns out you’ve been collaborating with the Yagizba Conclaves in treason. Treason, Kane! Without access to your boat, they wouldn’t have been able to churn out copies. They’ve got a whole war effort based on technologies that you gave them! And now hundreds, thousands of people are going to die because of a war you helped start.”
Kane was looking grey. “Katya, it’s not…”
“No!” she spat at him. “Shut up! I liked Captain Zagadko. I liked Petrov. I liked Tokarov. I loved my uncle. Unless you can bring them back, then shut up. You have nothing to say to me.” She wanted to cry but she would not, not in front of him. Later, she would discover that she could not cry at all and she would hate him for that too.
Kane sat silently, looking unblinkingly at his empty cup. Then he glanced up at the chronometer on the wall and back down again. “The Vodyanoi will be standing off the auxiliary locks by now. It will take me five minutes to get there, five minutes to get aboard, ten minutes to get out of the sensor cordon.” He nodded in the direction of the corridor leading into the administrative area. “There’s an FMA office just down there, first on the left. You can go and make a report there after you’ve finished your coffee. If you nurse it, it might last twenty minutes.” He looked up but he couldn’t meet her eyes. “Would you do that much for me?”
Katya didn’t reply for a long moment. Then she said, “Go.”
She didn’t see his eyes widen as he remembered the last word of the Leviathan, and finally realised whose voice it had been spoken in.
Abruptly, like a man who’d forgotten something, he climbed to his feet and walked quickly away without looking back. Katya watched him until he turned the corner to the auxiliary facilities sector and was lost to sight. She sipped her coffee. It was cold and she couldn’t taste it anyway.
It took her twenty-five minutes to finish her cup. Then she ordered another.