Day Eight #3
“We’ll do a full debrief with the professionals as soon as they finish back there,” said Baz.
“But—about the whole arson thing. You’re going to get a fair trial, and my lawyer says your position’s not as bad as you think.
The arson’s the only big charge here. The grand theft of intellectual property was pretty plainly done under duress, and you turned informant about it, so even though that’s a big crime on paper—and even though it is ridiculous that you got yourself into that situation—you’re not looking at much beyond a slap on the wrist. As for pirating information and disseminating it to minors, well, you were a minor yourself.
The only time we come down hard on that law is when an adult’s breaking it with a certain kind of intent, you know?
Sexual enticement or political agitation, or when we need to make an example out of somebody. ”
“Okay.” Kelli furrowed her brow, trying to assimilate all this. It was a lot of crimes at once, some old, some new. “But I was a minor for the arson, too.”
“Yeah. Now, the arson’s a violent crime. You set the whole colony into a panic, you shut the whole economy down for a few days, you permanently disabled a few people—we take that seriously regardless of age. But we have to consider your mental state.”
“Right,” she said, “because, Elaine . . .”
She trailed off.
Ten years ago, before the safety doors sealed themselves behind her, she’d dared to look back for a second.
She’d seen an awful inferno like the inside of a furnace.
Blazing flame. Roiling smoke. And those letters that she’d written in permanent marker on the glass, Justice 4 Elaine—already melting.
Dripping down, in that awful heat, into an unreadable smear.
Kelli had wanted to send a message, and the fire was the wrong way to get that message across.
Even if it hadn’t been evil, it’d never have worked.
But maybe she was about to get the chance to say it another way.
Maybe she would finally stand up, in front of a jury of her peers, and say Justice 4 Elaine to the whole moon in grown-up words.
The way that she should have done all along.
“No,” Baz said impatiently, “not just that. Look at the whole picture. You weren’t just a minor, you were a minor with a diagnosed condition which is known to affect the capacity for empathy and moral reasoning, and which is associated with violent outbursts under stress.”
“That’s not quite how it—” said Kelli, befuddled now.
Autistic people had meltdowns when they got overwhelmed.
Sometimes everything got too loud and too fast and too painful, and at times like that all Kelli could do was melt down, scream, cry.
That was autism. Even the fights she’d had with teachers were autism.
But setting a fire on purpose, gathering the materials from across the colony, going through the steps with grim determination—that wasn’t autism.
That wasn’t a meltdown. That was a choice she’d made.
“So you had that,” said Baz. He was walking faster now; she nearly tripped over herself trying to catch up with him.
“And you were in shock. You’d just lost a friend to suicide; that’ll do a number on anyone.
It doesn’t excuse what you did, but we’re looking at a clear case of not guilty by reason of insanity.
Now, the question is, temporary insanity or permanent?
That’s what your fate is going to rest on, here. ”
Kelli swallowed hard. She took a long breath.
“I wasn’t insane,” she said. Maybe this was one of the things that could and would be used against her.
She didn’t care; it was important for Baz to understand.
“I was grieving, I made a really bad choice, but I wasn’t insane.
What happened to Elaine was wrong. I wanted justice.
And—I thought the fire would make people understand.
It was the wrong way to do that, but I did it for a reason—didn’t you read my message? ”
“I did, but between you and me, Kelli—we’re going to want to downplay that.
It was a bad decision. Kids make bad decisions for all kinds of reasons—that’s the important part, that you were just a kid and you weren’t thinking straight.
We’re not going to want to talk about the other reasons any more than we have to. ”
Kelli balked like a horse and stopped entirely.
She couldn’t even have said why she’d stopped. But there was something wrong with all this, and getting wronger by the minute, something she didn’t quite understand but could feel. This wasn’t how getting arrested was supposed to go.
“We?” she said, furrowing her brow. “But I’m the one who broke the law, not you.”
“That’s true. I misspoke. Sorry; it’s been a stressful few days for us both.
” Baz rubbed his forehead. “But yeah, the reasons, that matters a lot. Like, when that cop back there said terroristic intent, did you understand what that means? If we found out one of our script supervisors had hurt someone as a kid, just on a dare, or because they were drunk or mad at their ex or something—I mean, we still cancel them when that happens. But you can salvage some of it. You can take their fan-favorite characters and give them to a new supervisor, maybe with some light editing. We can’t do that with a crime like yours.
That’s the word from upper management. Cancel Ship of Fools, destroy the kernels, retcon all of it out of existence.
Ship of Fools never happened. Do you understand? ”
That hurt a lot, but Kelli had been expecting it. She’d seen shows get retconned before. Orlando and his pirate friends were fictional anyway; they were parts of her, so they deserved this.
It hurt, but it wasn’t the part that was freezing her up.
“No,” she said, “I don’t understand. I set the fire because I wanted justice. You’re saying if I didn’t have a reason—if I’d just hurt all those people for fun—you’re saying that would be better?”
“Yes, I am.” Baz spread his hands. “Kelli, to put it bluntly, you set the fire because you disagreed with Inspiration’s policies.
You’re telling me now that you still disagree with those policies.
And for the past, I don’t know, almost a year, you’ve had a hand in creating Inspiration’s media.
Our language model does the very best it can to ensure that every AdventureVerse show is objectively the best show for its audience.
That the individual, selfish perspective of a single human writer doesn’t enter in.
But perspective is subtle. Even in the old days, when writers were allowed to do whatever the hell they wanted, they still didn’t consciously understand all the feelings and personal traits that went into their work.
Those things can slip in sometimes, even with things as subtle as grammar patterns.
Now, Inspiration owns the Jovian system, but it’s not the only system where we operate.
We’re still dependent on older systems, governments on places like Earth and Mars, which aren’t always as progressive as we are.
We couldn’t operate out here the way we do without their regulatory cooperation and their venture capital.
And they give us those things because they know what we stand for; they know we don’t pose any threat to them.
If they find out someone like you had a hand in one of our most popular new shows, this whole time, do you think they’ll still believe that?
Do you think they won’t act? Of course they will, and our business will suffer, and when our business suffers, the whole colony does.
It’s not even about what I think of the fire, morally.
It’s a matter of public policy. It’s business. ”
Kelli stared at him. Despite herself, she felt a weird, broad smile creep over her face.
The robot had used to tell Kelli that she had inappropriate facial affect.
When people talked about something happy, she glowered, distracted by a sensory irritant or a worried thought; on sad occasions, sometimes, she thought of a weird joke and smiled.
That’s how it was now. She felt awful, but she couldn’t help smiling, because she finally understood how absurd this was.
“It’s just business,” she repeated.
“That’s right,” said Baz, harried. “Now, come on, can we go?”
All those months she’d worked for Inspiration, so proud of herself, so careful to be good.
Rowan had expected her to try to put queer and subversive things into her shows, and she’d never dared.
She knew the rules. She knew where her righteous anger could lead if it went unchecked.
After the fire, Kelli had tried to be good, by Inspiration’s standards.
She’d been good for so long, and it didn’t matter.
Because Inspiration was barely even angry about the fire.
What really bothered them was that she was a lesbian, that she cared about other people like her, that she wanted things to change.
Even though, the whole time they employed her, she’d never been brave enough to do a single thing about it.
The fact that she wanted it was already too much to forgive.
Rowan had been right about this part all along.
Kelli had never been good, and she never would be, because good according to Inspiration and their robots and their policies was an absolute steaming pile of bullshit.
They didn’t care about the fire. They didn’t care about the injured firefighter with his hands bound up or the frightened parents clinging to their children in the Basic Arena.
They cared about business. They cared about placating their investors.
They cared about money.
And they certainly did not care about Elaine.
“It’s just money,” Kelli repeated, smiling and shaking her head. “It’s just business. It’s just money.”
Baz took a step toward her. “Kelli—”
But just then, as if on cue, an alarm went off.
It was loud. It was so harsh and sudden that Kelli almost smacked herself in the nose, trying to clap her cuffed hands over her ears.
It was slightly different from the alarm on Callisto—the pitch a little lower, the timbre slightly askew—but Kelli, of all people, knew a fire alarm when she heard one.
“FIRE IN QUADRANT BETA-THREE,” said an artificial voice, different from the one on Callisto. “ALL WORKERS, EVACUATE IN AN ORDERLY MANNER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. FIRE IN QUADRANT BETA-THREE.”
Kelli stared at her upraised hands, stunned. She hadn’t set this one. But Zhaleh had talked about setting one. Zhaleh, the strategist, had winkingly told her just where she might go on this platform if she wanted to set fire to it, and Kelli had declined, and she’d said—
If you want something burned down, do it yourself.
Kelli had an awful, wonderful, creeping feeling that she knew exactly what had just happened.
Setting a fire didn’t take special skills.
Anyone could do it if they dared. But Zhaleh had told Kelli about the weakness in the fuel lines as if daring her to do it.
Zhaleh had wanted a fire, and she’d known how to do it, but she’d preferred for Kelli to do it, or for Kelli to have thought about doing it.
Zhaleh hated Conchita Quixada, for reasons she’d hinted at and for reasons that Kelli would probably never grasp—but, even though it meant betraying her boyfriend, she’d told Conchita Quixada about Kelli.
Because she’d wanted a fire set—and she’d wanted it set at the right moment, when there was someone around who was infamous for setting fires.
Someone who’d just been wronged, very loudly, very badly, in front of everyone.
She’d wanted a scapegoat.
Kelli had been played. Again. She wasn’t even mad about this one.
She’d tried to stop Zhaleh from getting under her skin, but Zhaleh’s play wasn’t about that.
It wasn’t about Kelli’s thoughts or Kelli’s feelings.
Only about having Kelli here. Having everyone look at her, for a crucial moment, and not at Zhaleh.
A weird little laugh escaped Kelli’s lips.
Fuck all these people, actually. Kelli normally didn’t let herself swear, even on the inside, but now it slipped out.
Fuck Inspiration, who pretended to care and didn’t.
Fuck Conchita Quixada, who used people however she liked and dressed it up like it meant they were family.
Maybe so did Zhaleh—or maybe Zhaleh was on the right track, seizing the opportunity, burning both sides down.
It didn’t matter what was going on with Zhaleh, because either way, fuck all these people.
Except one.
All this passed through Kelli’s head in one blinding flash. She was thinking a million miles a minute.
Baz took another step toward her. “Kelli?”
“You’re right about me,” said Kelli, staring through him.
“Okay, that’s good, but—that’s a fire alarm, Kelli, okay? We gotta get going now.”
Just through him, just past him, she saw Rowan, who hadn’t been called Rowan back then. She saw her memory of Am, ten years ago, terror and elation in his young eyes. There was a fire in you. I saw it, Kelli. I always knew.
“You’re right,” said Kelli. She smiled up at Baz. There was no point explaining any further.
Baz reached to grab her, but she was ready for him. She pulled her cuffed hands back and elbowed him hard in the face. As he reeled, she turned on her heel and ran back the way she’d come.