Anna finds Dax Schmidt on the stairwell that leads to the main Apex control room. He’s with Doctor Arroway, their heads close together, conferring in low voices.
She moves in quietly, on the balls of her feet, and neither of them realise she’s there until she puts a hand on Arroway’s shoulder, spins him around and slams him against the wall.
Arroway shouts in protest, shoving her away. He’s stronger than she is, but he isn’t ready for what Anna does next, which is to grab his hand and twist. Hard.
He grunts, the force bringing him to his knees, his arm twisted up at an awkward angle. Anna’s used the move a few times before, usually on whoever tried to jack her cargo. She knows how painful this little hold is–and from here, a further twist coupled with a strike to the elbow will snap Arroway’s arm. She doesn’t do that. She needs him talking, not screaming.
“You’re going to tell me what’s going on,” she says. “And you’re going to tell me right now.”
Arroway looks at Dax, as if pleading for help. Anna adds a little more torque to the twist, making sure Dax sees it, making sure he knows not to come any closer. “He can’t help you. Start talking.”
Fury crosses Dax’s face. “Let him go.”
Anna actually smiles. “There’s an astronaut outside the station–I don’t know how they got out there, but they did. And you.” She spits the word at Arroway. “You’re packing your bags, like you’ve won the lottery already. What do you know that we don’t?”
Neither of them respond. Arroway is still squirming a little, but the stairway is silent, save for the hum of the station.
“Anna,” Dax says again. “Let the doctor go, and I’ll tell you.”
Anna hadn’t realised she was breathing so hard. She makes a conscious effort to slow down, but doesn’t let go of Arroway’s wrist.
“Please,” Dax says.
After a moment, Anna lets the doctor go. He staggers to his feet, trembling. Anna looks at Dax, folding her arms and raising her eyebrows questioningly. He looks over one shoulder, as if to check that they really are alone.
“You’re right, OK?” he says, leaning in and lowering his voice. “We sent one of our men outside.”
“Dax,” Arroway says, hissing the word.
“Shut up, Elijah.” Dax holds Anna’s gaze. “He took one of the escape pods. Once he was outside the station, he put on one of the pod’s space suits, then he did an EVA.”
Anna frowns, not understanding. Why launch yourself in a pod if you were just going to climb out of it?
Dax sees her confusion. “We had him use the thrusters on his suit to manoeuvre the pod back inside its launch bay. Nobody would know it had ever been launched, and we’d have a man outside the station.”
“What about the fire? Was that part of it?”
“We had to get people out of the gallery area.”
Anna stares at him in disbelief, as much for his candour as anything else. “You could have got everybody killed.”
“Well, we didn’t. We were always going to put the fire out. That wasn’t the issue.”
“What did you do? Turn off the suppression systems or something?”
“Just for long enough to get our man where he needed to be.”
Anna closes her eyes, remembering the tech on the night of the fire. No wonder he was cursing. He must have been wondering why chemicals weren’t spraying out, when the system was perfectly configured. That must have been why he tried to get into the power boxes, thinking the fault was inside.
“OK,” she says. “Where is he now? Your astronaut?”
Dax takes a shaky breath. “We sent him to the dock. Or what’s left of it. His mission was to secure one of the tug ships. Each one has plenty of emergency rations, plus a water reclaimer, so he can live out there for quite a while if he needs to.”
“A tug?” Anna says, frowning. That doesn’t make any sense.
“We think—” Dax says. “I mean, my advisers tell me that there’s a way to construct a rudimentary heat shield on one of the tugs. Something that would ablate the heat of re-entry.”
Arroway groans. Anna just keeps staring at Dax. This wasn’t the confession she was expecting–although, in hindsight, she’s not sure what she was expecting.
“But this is good,” she says, after a moment. “If we can put heat shields on the tugs, then more people can escape. Right?”
“There’s only enough heat-shield material for one tug,” Dax says. “We made it out of epoxy and a type of copper alloy. We still had some in one of the labs.”
“Then just hold the lottery now,” Anna says, hating the pleading sound in her voice, hating how young it makes her feel. “If there’s a way to escape, we should take it before the reactor…”
She trails off, her eyes wide. How could she have missed it? Why didn’t she see it before?
She shuts her eyes, screwing them tightly together. “There isn’t going to be a lottery, is there?”
Dax’s voice is quiet, gentle. “What would you do if you were in my position?”
Anna opens her mouth to speak, but no words come out.
“We’ve picked engineers, Air Lab techs, doctors.” He glances at Arroway. “The best and the brightest. We’re giving ourselves the best possible chance of surviving once we reach the ground. Something like this…”
He pauses, tries again. “It’s too important to be left to a selection of random people. We’re talking about the survival of our species.”
Anna raises her eyes to meet his. “And council members?”
“What?”
“You’re going, too. Aren’t you?”
He shrugs. “Someone has to lead. We’re going to need structure and order down there.”
For a long moment none of them moves. Anna wishes she wasn’t seeing things so clearly, wishes she wasn’t filling in the gaps. They’ll take the escape pods–all of them. Jordan is probably in on it–probably the one who started the fire. Dax and his friends will need the suits, after all, to transfer to the modified tug. Everybody else will be left behind. Even if they’re still alive by the time the Tenshi gets there, they won’t have any way to make it on board.
Eventually, Dax says, “We can try and get you a space on the tug, if that’s what you want.”
It’s his solicitousness, his reasonable tone, that finally kicks Anna back into action. She almost snarls, backing away from them. “I’m going to tell everyone,” she says. “They’re all going to hear what you’re doing.”
She regrets the words the instant they are out of her mouth. She’s still alone with the two of them. What if Dax has a gun? What if he tries to stop her?
“If you put a hand on me, I’ll break every bone in your body,” she says.
“Gods, Anna. No,” Dax says, horrified. “Who do you think I am? Oren Darnell? Nobody’s going to touch you.”
“Doesn’t mean I’m going to keep this a secret.” Anna is already thinking ahead. She’s still going to run, as fast as she can, right to the main amphitheatre. Her dad. She needs to find her dad. He’ll know what to do.
“You’re free to tell whoever you want,” Dax says. “But understand this. If you let everyone know that we’ve got the means to escape now, there’ll be anarchy. Complete breakdown. People will die.”
“Yeah. Like you.”
“Yes,” Dax says simply. “But then what happens? You think things will go back to normal? You think this will be resolved peacefully?”
It’s impossible for Anna not to think of Achala Kumar. Of her desperation to reach her son.
Dax smiles sadly. He walks past her, gesturing for Arroway to follow him. The doctor looks back at her, fear crossing his face.
“Think about it,” Dax says. “It’s up to you. But you’d better be sure you’re making the right decision.”
He and Arroway walk away, leaving Anna alone in the silence of the stairwell.