He gaped. “You’re insane!”
“If you cannot supply an advocate of your own choosing the court will supply one for you except, oh yeah, they’re all fucking dead!”
He tried to rush past her but she whipped him round and pulled his arm behind his back. He was strong, but she had the edge of training and desperation.
“You — don’t have — jurisdiction!” he gasped.
“Call it a citizen’s arrest if you like.”
“This is assault!”
“This is justice.”
“What do you want…?”
She jerked him back and he gasped as she shouted in his ear. “Three billion people are dead!”
“How do you — what do you think you can do?”
She gritted her teeth.
“What are you going to do with me?”
She didn’t have an answer.
“They’ll send more security… You have to let me go! I understand… I understand you’re upset, you’re traumatised, I will not press charges!”
“You know, don’t you?”
“I don’t know anything!”
“I saw it in your eyes.”
“Please, what do you want?”
“I want the truth!”
Instead, they both heard a gentle hissing sound. “What’s that?” she demanded.
“Tranquilliser gas… if we’re the same species… should work the same…”
“I can hold my breath.”
“Please… give yourself up…”
But it was too late. The first wave of grogginess hit them both.
“Oh fuck. Skin absorption?” she muttered, disgusted. They sank to their knees. She released her hold, but he found he lacked the strength to crawl away, and collapsed. Liss held out a little longer.
“Vawlin…” she murmured with a hoarse voice. He looked around, barely conscious. “Give my parents a message.”
He stared back at her.
“Tell them they’re dead to me,” she said, as she fell forward.
He didn’t nod. He didn’t have a response. He just looked back at her with the eyes of a shocked animal, until they closed and blackness took him.
13. Henni Ardassian
I was on my way to pick Liss up when I was ordered to present myself at Henni Ardassian’s office instead. Liss was being held by the Diplomatic Service security section, and I got the basic details of what happened from Mykl Teoth while my car whisked me through the streets to the gold and silver castle of the Refugee Service HQ.
Henni didn’t get up when I went in. She had a look of barely controlled exasperation. She drummed her fingers and watched me sit down, like a cat allowing a mouse to take a seat before pouncing. She didn’t pounce, though. Instead, she stroked a control and brought up two images on the screen behind her: an official spokeswoman from the Quillian Embassy, and the text of a letter of complaint below the Quillian Supranational Government crest on the right. Henni let the video begin part of the way through.
“—object most strenuously to this premeditated entrapment of one of our officials who was acting in a purely humanitarian capacity. We are particularly unhappy that this has happened while we are preparing to place enormous material resources at the disposal of the Refugee Service. We therefore demand an apology and explanation for this incident and expect your reply within forty eight hours.”
Henni paused the spokeswoman at the moment she finished, still with a look of official displeasure printed on her face. Henni’s own look of displeasure was greater, if anything.
“Did you know about this?”
I shook my head. “She wanted to find out about her parents…”
“And that’s what she told you.”
“Yes.”
“And you believed her?”
“I had no reason not to.”
“After all the lies she told before? Are you out of your mind?”
“I judged—”
“I don’t give a damn for your judgement! Did you hear what they said? That’s diplomatic language for ‘We’re incredibly pissed off and we’re going to throw our toys out of the stroller if you don’t do what we say.’ Your judgement might cost us sixty ships we could have used in the evacuation! And pilots to go with them! And doctors, and medical supplies! They could save a million people all by themselves!”
“They wouldn’t do that—”
“Oh, wouldn’t they? Would you like to take that risk? Would you like to leave a million people to die?”
“They can’t!”
“Are you sure? Really? Well I’ll just call and tell them to jump in a lake. Shall we see what happens?”
“But they’d look — I mean, people would think—”
“You reckon they want people to think they committed genocide?”
“No, of course not, but—”
“Well I can’t take the risk. I need those ships. And I don’t have any more time for your experiment, nor do I have the resources. I’m transferring you to the triage team on the Lift. You can do some good up there rather than giving me grief down here.”
I paused a moment. “I won’t leave them.”
“You can have a week to hand over to another therapist.”
I tried to find some steel to put in my voice. “I arranged for entirely adequate supervision. It was the Quillians who insisted on meeting at the Negotiation Centre. What happened was not my fault. I will not abandon my patients and you can’t force me.”
“I can put you on indefinite medical leave.”
My gut clenched. “What…?”
“You’ve already put in the request for leave of absence for medical reasons. Now I can see why. Your lack of judgement has led to serious embarrassment for this service. So you can go away and make yourself better and take as much time as you like doing it, or you can go to the Lift and do your job. Any questions? No. Now get out of my sight. Mykl will arrange for another therapist to take the group. I don’t care who. Talk to him about the handover.”
Henni picked up a pad and scrolled through another document. I stood up. But I couldn’t go. My hands were balled in fists. I stood there and waited until Henni had no choice but to address me again.
“You’re still here, Dr. Singh. Do you want me to have security throw you out as well?”
I tried to keep my anger in check. “What if she’s right?”
“I’m sorry?”
“I said: what if she’s right?”
“I don’t care.”
“You say they might save a million lives. But they might have murdered billions.”
“They did murder billions, Dr. Singh, but Ilfenard was a long time ago.”
“They might have murdered three billion more just last year!”
“That’s an accusation, not a fact.”
I swallowed. “Yes. And Liss has the right to make that accusation before the Interversal Criminal Tribunal.”
Henni put her pad down. She was about to yell at me but put a hold on herself for a moment and considered her words more carefully. “I am trying to save a species, Dr. Singh. People who are still living. I can’t bring back the dead.”
“They need to be investigated.”
“Do they need to be investigated now?”
“Yes.”
“You really think this is a good time?”
“There’s never going to be a good time. There’s always going to be another evacuation.”