Page 48 of Cloverleaf Station

Elenus’s nostrils flared slightly, like he’d just smelled something off. “I already told you—I’m going to turn him over to the authorities on Gania as soon as—”

“No.” Kieron watched Elenus’s facile mouth flatten into a hard line. “Tell me the truth.”

“That is the truth.”

“It isn’t. Not the complete truth, at least. I haven’t looked down in the containment room where you’re keeping him,” Kieron said, feeling tired. He didn’t want to ruin the happy, comfortable thing they had together, but he wouldn’t be doing his job if he didn’t figure out the truth. Cloverleaf Station, for now, was under his command despite his “boss” being there. “But I will if you don’t tell me what you’re doing to him.”

There was a long pause, and then— “Nothing. Yet. He’s in cryo for the moment.”

That made sense. The cryo containers in the storage areas were capable of holding everything from complex living beings to deadly viral strains if necessary. “And after the cryo?”

Elenus smiled. It wasn’t a beautiful smile. It certainly wasn’t a happy one. “After the cryo? Well, when he finally wakes up, I plan on having relocated his brain and spinal column into a rudimentary, bio-compatible bot. Probably one shaped like a box that I can shove into a corner and sit on. I’ll give him rudimentary senses and particularly good vision, but I’ll take away all of his physical autonomy, and then I’ll use him like the good-for-nothing piece of shit he is, so he can see how he likes being at someone else’s mercy.

“And when I’m done playing with his emotions and have done my level best to drive him insane, I’ll jettison his box into space and let him float in agony for as long as his batteries keep his brain alive. That’s my plan.” He spread his hands. “What are you going to do about it?”

***

Oh. That was … quite the plan. Even as Kieron’s brain cringed from contemplating the absolute cruelty of it, he automatically took in Elenus’s body language—aggressive verging on attack—and adjusted his own into something non-provoking. He let his shoulders fall forward, ducked his chin down, lowered his eyes, and turned his body slightly away—all things that indicated he had no interest in confrontation.

“It’s okay,” he said softly, some of the earliest lessons that had ever been beaten into him coming effortlessly to the fore. “It’s going to be okay. I’m not going to stop you from doing what you’ve got to do, I promise.”

“Really?” Elenus’s voice stayed angry, but at least he dropped his hands. “Then you’re going to let me get away with something that any Alliance planet would throw me into prison over?”

“No.”

Elenus scoffed. “Then you need to explain this to me, babe, because where I come from, two plus two equals four. I’m not about to let Gania throw Deysan into a comfy prison house for the rest of his life or, even worse, let him out on good behavior in ten years because ‘he only stole a ship.’” Elenus’s face twisted with anger. “Even if they recognize Catalina as a living entity, the law hasn’t advanced enough yet to get the same sort of justice for mistreatment of an AI as it has for flesh and blood. It doesn’t matter that he took a toddler into danger and abused her for weeks and would have made her into a slave, all they’ll see is intellectual property violations and theft. It’s not enough. I won’t have it. I won’t.”

“That’s not what I’m suggesting,” Kieron said.

“Oh no? Fine.” Elenus sat back on the edge of the table, leaning his weight on his hands. Like this, he and Kieron were almost the same height. “Then tell me what you’ve got in mind, and you should know in advance that if it doesn’t end in death, I don’t want to hear it, and you can fuck right off.”

Kieron took a deep breath. “Catie is your child, isn’t she?”

Elenus rolled his eyes. “Have you not been listening? Has nothing I’ve been saying penetrated your—yes, she’s my child!”

“Then you need to set a good example for her.”

“I am. Self-defense is—”

“You’re not talking about self-defense,” Kieron interjected firmly. “You’re not talking about justice. You’re talking about torture.”

Elenus slapped the tabletop with one hand. “So what if I am? He tortured her!”

“And what are you teaching her, if you show her that the best justice is an eye for an eye?” Kieron shook his head. “I grew up with teachings like that, and all it did was take away all the love and trust and faith in each other that everyone on Hadrian’s Colony once had and replace it with suspicion, anger, and ruthlessness.

“Catie is smart, so smart, but she’s still young. She’s relying on you to help her figure out her moral compass. Is that the direction you really want to push her? To make it okay to justify any atrocity as long as someone else did something terrible first?”

Elenus, to his credit, didn’t immediately start speaking. He perched there, dark eyes fixed on Kieron’s face for a long time, before he finally said, “I can’t let him go. I just can’t.”

“You don’t have to,” Kieron assured him. “There’s another way.”

“There isn’t.” Elenus shook his head once then again as he continued, “No, there isn’t! I’ve already been in touch with Ganian authorities, and they’re adamant about taking him in alive and ensuring his welfare, and I’m going to have to give them video footage documenting his fucking ‘well-being’ in another week, and I just … I’m not going to do it. If I have to lie to them and say he died in an accident, then so be it, because I won’t let him keep breathing after what he did to my baby.”

“I didn’t say he had to keep breathing.”

Elenus paused, his ire settling as his gaze turned questioning. “What? I thought you … you said …”

“I said I didn’t want you teaching your daughter that torture is a good answer to being wronged,” Kieron interjected, a little exasperated. He stepped forward, not quite close enough to touch but far enough that Elenus could see how earnest he was. “I never said he gets to live. But you don’t have to be the one to kill him.”