In Every Eden (The Heroes We Can Afford)

Epilogue: East Into Nod

It was Khadija Safawa who first broke the silence.

“You blame me, don't you?”

Susan Ngn was a long time in responding. When she did it was almost too quiet to hear.

“Yes.” Her eyes never left Morgan's face.

“Thought you might.” Khadija paused and waited for an answer. When none came, she continued.

“You have to know it was all his choice to get involved in all this. I tried to turn him aside from it. But you knew Morgan, he never would be told, would he?”

“'Won't' be told. Will not. Present tense. He's not dead.” She reached out to lightly brush her fingers along the contours of the still mask of Morgan's face.

“No, I suppose not.” For the first time since she had entered the hospital ward Khadija let her eyes sink down to Morgan. He looked peaceful. But for the tubes in his nose and mouth, and the exaggerated, mechanical rhythm of his breathing, she would have thought him asleep.

“Perhaps it would be kinder if he was.”

“What? Say that again.” Susan's eyes snapped up to lock with Khadija's, red-rimmed but dry.

“No. If you're looking for a fight, keep looking. I won't fight you over this. Not here. Not now.” Khadija put up one hand, palm out. Susan rose up to her full height, no longer stooped over Morgan's bed, looking down at Khadija with eyes as black and empty as the space she would return to.

“So, its not enough for you, what you've already done. You want to finish it.” There was nothing of the question in her tone.

“I already told you...”

“I know. I heard you.” Her hand twitched down to the empty holster at her belt. Khadija tensed up, by instinct, although neither of them had brought weapons with them into the ward.

“But it was because of you, that he got involved in all this in the first place. He thought he had something to prove to you.”

“And you.”

Susan Ngn stiffened up, but was silent.

“You know, Morgan always defended you to me. He wanted me to get along with you, so I'm making the effort. For Morgan. To honor one of the best and worst men I've ever known.”

“He's not gone.” It was an awfully small voice to be coming out of a grown woman.

“Yes. He is.” Khadija forced herself to look at the face that used to be Morgan's, empty of anything that would have made him Morgan Gannis.

“The medicals say that they don't know if he'll ever wake up. And even if he does...”

She shook her head.

“He would have hated been like this. Helpless. He liked action. He was a...”

“Survivor.”

Khadija bit back on her reply and let silence reign.

“I'm his Captain, it's my decision.”

“Yes.”

“And I say he lives.”

“If you call this living.” She hadn't realized she'd said it out loud.

“I do.”

“Don't you think he should be free to take the next step? Free his soul to begin it's next journey?”

“There isn't one. We get one trip and I say that Morgan's trip keeps going. You owe him that.”

“We do owe him a great debt. Thanks to Morgan, the Mount Safa was close enough to Irkalla that our fliers could reach it in time.”

She reached out to put a supportive hand on Susan's narrow shoulder, but Captain Ngn shrugged it off and turned slightly away that seemed like ritual.

“And to you, I'm a little reluctant to admit. If you hadn't given Morgan those datalenses set to record and transmit, we wouldn't have known what was happening there in the first place. And I'm not certain we would have gotten those convictions, either.”

A shadow had been falling over Susan's face as Khadija spoke. She was bent back over Morgan's bed, although she wasn't looking directly at anything Khadija could see.

“You're thinking about your other crewmate, aren't you?”

“Hector Rukh's no crew of mine. He stopped being crew the moment he drew iron on Morgan.”

Khadija was patient and waited for her to continue.

“What are his charges?”

“Besides Assault and Attempted Homicide? Conspiracy to Willful Destruction of an Emergent Ecosystem, Sabotage to Frontier States equipment, both physical and electronic, and Illegal Importation of Dangerous Cargo. Just for starters.”

Khadija shook her head.

“I'm afraid that with the evidence we've got now, he's going to be breaking rocks on Julunggul for quite some time.”

“And Vasca?” Susan hissed.

“Orders.” She spat the word out like a curse. “The Innes Conglomerate has a lot of friends at the capital. He's to be sent back there for judgment, possibly extradition.”

“So. Nothing.”

“Nothing. That's how it always is with his kind. All I know is that he won't be back here again. I'm sending word back with him to my superiors that if I ever see the son of a dog again, I will send him to God myself!”

There was a venom in her voice that surprised Khadija herself.

Susan looked up, an eyebrow cocked in question.

“Oh, yes, I can do that much. Now that he's been proven himself an official Threat to Planetary Security, I can do any damn thing I please if he ever comes back to my world. War Powers, if you can believe it. Turns out they are good for something after all.”

They shared a brief laugh that had nothing of humor in it.

“I hate to leave him here.”

“Does your ship have the facilities to take care of him like this?”

“No.” Again, the significant little half-turn that turned her face away from Khadija. “You take good care of him. I'm coming back for him. I always do.”

Susan Ngn turned the rest of the way and started taking careful, measured steps towards the door.

“Where are you going?”

“Don't know yet. Only that I've got a long way left to go.”