The Abyss of Time

Chapter Thirty

     "Rankins disease," said Miller when Lucy told him what had happened. "Well, I wish I'd known that earlier. It would have made things a lot simpler."

     That wasn't the reaction Lucy had expected and she gazed at her father suspiciously. "What do you mean?" she asked.

     "Pretty much everyone wants him dead. I had to exert every ounce of authority I had to keep him alive. If I could have let them kill him in some painless way and sold it as a mercy killing..."

     "I don't believe I'm hearing this!" his daughter declared furiously. "He's going to suffer a horrifying, agonising death and all you care about..."

     "It's my job to care about it," Miller told her wearily. "I have to get these people to the Alpha site without them turning into a disorganised mob. Giving Rogers a mercy killing would not only spare him the painful progression of the disease. It would placate the more bloodthirsty members of our little procession and, hopefully, allow us to come together as a more unified, harmonious group."

     "Except it won't," Lucy told him. "Now they want him to suffer. If you try to kill him now, they'll fight you."

     Miller reached a hand up to his head, as if to run it through his hair, before remembering he was wearing a helmet. "Then we'll let him live," he said. "If that's what it takes to maintain peace and harmony."

     "You're willing to let him endure agonies, just to avoid having to face down those vicious bastards?"

     "Look, when his symptoms begin to manifest themselves, maybe we can find a way to give him an overdose of something to, to end his suffering. With his consent, of course. We can let people think he died naturally. We won't even be breaking the law. The law allows euthanasia where this disease is concerned."

     "You'd still be lying to people. Or letting them come to the wrong conclusion, which is the same thing."

     "Whatever it takes to avoid conflict. You've seen what some of them are like. You called them vicious bastards and you're right. Buford, Benwell. Dorelis, because of what happened to his son, and I'm not sure about your friend Rolf either. Four of them, ready to step up and use force to get their own way, turn this into their own private dictatorship. And if we arrive at the Alpha site with them visibly in charge and me forced to wheedle and cajole to get them to agree to anything, there are a hundred others who'll be encouraged to join them. My position as leader is tenuous. I have to tread very carefully."

     "You've got people on your side as well," Lucy told him. "Jack for one. Dundee practically worships you, and Pangiran'll stand by you as well. I'm sure of it. So will Bradley and Gilbreth if it comes down to it. They wear the uniform and you're their Executive Officer. That gives you six to their four, and I'm not sure Rolf would stand with them. He's an annoying little twit, but I can't see him getting involved in something like that."

     "He was ready to join in with a lynching," his father reminded her. "He wouldn't have the courage to start an insurrection, but he's the type to go along with it once it gets going. When you're up against that kind of opposition, sometimes you've got to throw them a bone to keep them happy. Keep them in line."

     "So that's what Rogers is to you? A bone you can throw to Buford to keep from having to face him down squarely?"

     "In effect, yes. Rogers forfeited the right to be treated as a human being when he tried to give us to the cyborgs." He put a hand on her shoulder. She started to back away, but then changed her mind and allowed it.

     "Don't worry, Luce," her father assured her. "I won't let him suffer. When his symptoms begin to appear we'll find a way to ease his suffering. Hopefully whoever's in charge of the colony by then will be secure and confident enough to do it openly, but if we have to fake a natural death then that's what we'll do. Either way, he won't suffer. I promise."