—Who. Do. You. Want. Me. To. Kill? Do you have a hearing problem, Samaritan?
—I—No. I don’t want you to kill anyone.
—Sure you do! You wanted to make decisions for me—you didn’t think I forgot about that, did you?—well, now’s your chance. You can either pick Graham, the accountant—
—No, not me! Please, sir!
The redhead. He wants to kill the redhead.
—Shut the fuck up, Graham. Or Andrew Andrew Shaw and his designer shit. Your choice.
He wants to kill the redhead or the kid. I don’t know what he expects from me. I won’t do what he asks.
—I won’t do that. I won’t choose.
—Goddamn it, Samaritan! THERE ARE RULES! Tell me what the rules are.
—I…
—The rules! Oh, you haven’t heard the rules yet, have you? My fault! I apologize. It’s just—there’s a lot going through my mind right now. You know how it is. Anyway, here are the rules. Every fifteen minutes, I pick two people and you tell me which one to kill. I kill that person. Simple enough!
—I told you. I won’t do that. I’ll do everything you want, but not that.
—Oh, come on! I’m doing the hard part. I’m the one with the gun. We can switch if you want, but I tell you: I’d rather be in your shoes. You just pick someone. It’s a simple thing. Door number one, or door number two. That’s it! You just tell me who to kill, and I do it… OR… I forgot about that part. It’s kind of important. OR, I kill them both…. See! You’re saving someone, really…. Who’ll it be? Older guy with boring job, or fatty here with really bad taste in clothes. Is that fucking cashmere?
—I won’t choose.
—Why?
—I can’t. I can’t tell you to kill someone.
—What do you mean, you can’t? You can’t just now, or like ever?
—Yes.
—Yes, ever? Like on principle?
—Yes.
—That’s bullshit! Like, if someone’s holding a gun and he’ll kill two people unless I tell him to kill one of them I won’t do it? That’s not a principle. That’s just… some shit you came up with right now. Come on! Stop wasting my time.
—I’m sorry, sir. I—
—Now you’re just pissing me off. I’m going to make this easy on you, Samaritan. I’m going to count to three, then I’ll pull the trigger if I don’t have an answer. Did you get that? One, two, three, then they die.
—No, I—
—Here we go. One.
The hostages are looking at me, not him. I can’t look at them. They look at me like I’m really deciding which one of them will live. I’m not. I can’t help them. He’s in control, not me. He’s taunting me, messing with my head. He just wants to know if I’ll do it or not. I won’t. I’m not a killer. I won’t make that choice.
—TWO!
He won’t do it. He won’t…. Even if he does, even if he kills them both. That’s him, not me. I’m not responsible for this. It’s his choice. Not mine. He wants to kill people. I choose love. I choose life.
—Three. Did I say on three? Oh, fuck it.
Don’t d—
**TAK**
**TAK**
—NOOOOOO!!!!
The sound of bodies hitting the floor. I can’t look.
3.
DOZENS OF COMPUTER SCREENS light up the control room. In the back, behind a glass wall, four people are sitting at their stations, viewing 3D scans of Idir’s family and mapping their faces onto mesh bodies. In the centre, two people—a woman and a man—are sitting at a desk. Both are staring at a large screen showing Idir crawling on the floor, tying his shirt around the injured man’s leg. On a smaller screen to the left, Idir is lying in what looks like a hospital bed, immobile. There are electrodes on both his temples. His eyes are closed and his eyelids are twitching.
The woman is white, early fifties. Her name is Laura. She wears a government-issued grey jumpsuit. She looks at the screen, unfazed by what she sees, and takes some notes on her data pad. This isn’t new to her; she’s overseen more than a hundred of these simulations. The job has taken its toll on her, but she still takes some pride in it. Only a handful of government employees can administer the BVA—the British Values Assessment.
The man is much younger, about half her age. His name is Deep. First in his family to be born in the UK, he picked up some of his parent’s Indian accent but hides it very well. Deep isn’t nearly as calm as his supervisor. This is his final evaluation, his last day as a trainee. First-generation citizens don’t often get this job, and Deep is well aware of it. He is fidgeting in his seat. His eyes keep going from the screen to the BVA manual sitting on his lap.
—Ten points, right?
Laura doesn’t hear him. She’s looking at Idir’s vitals on the small screen. Deep asks again.
—He stopped the bleeding. He gets ten points for trying to save that man, right?
There’s half a smile on Deep’s face. He forgot all about section three, paragraph four the first time he watched. Few people will risk their life to help the man in the baseball cap. But he remembers now.
—Five.
—What?
—Five points. He has medical training.
—He’s a dentist!
—Read subparagraph four point four again.
Deep is angry at himself. He doesn’t need to read 4.4 again. He knows the manual doesn’t make the distinction.
4.4 The total number of points earned in section one under paragraph four is equal to the number of points earned under paragraph four, subparagraphs one to three, multiplied by 1 if any of the following conditions are met:
(a) the test subject does not hold a degree in nursing from a recognized institution. (see appendix 3)
(b) the test subject does not hold a graduate degree in a medical field from a recognized institution and multiplied by 0.5 if neither condition (a) nor condition (b) are met.
Small mistake. Deep is still feeling reasonably confident about his evaluation. He tallies up Idir’s score for section one.
Perfect score on politeness and courtesy. There are lots of small tests hidden in the BVA simulation. None are worth a lot, no more than one or two points each, but they add up. It’s rare, but these small details sometimes make the difference between citizenship and deportation. Idir is very courteous. He opened the front door for the old lady. He thanked the receptionist and the person who walked him to the test room. Neither are designed to be particularly endearing. He let the man in the baseball cap walk in before him when they went through the door. Most people move out of the way—the man in the baseball cap is rather large—but many lose that point with a complaint or a derogatory comment afterwards. Idir didn’t. He even got up to get napkins when the man in the baseball cap spilled his coffee. Five points.
No penalty for sexism. Idir didn’t laugh at the crude joke in the waiting room. No reaction at all. Not a guffaw followed by an apology. He didn’t even smile. He didn’t make a face or give the man a reprimanding look.