Doctor Who_ Beyond the Sun - Matthew Jones [95]
He wasn’t guilty or embarrassed: he was furious.
‘You dare sit there and judge me,’ he snapped suddenly and then had to stop speaking to mop up some blood which escaped from the side of his mouth. He winced at the pain, but he must have wanted to speak more than it hurt. ‘You blame me for all that’s happened?’
‘You think this is somehow all my fault?’ Bernice said, genuinely surprised at the accusation.
‘Well, who was it who created this situation? Who was it who dragged my brother into this mess?’
‘He offered to help. You’re the one who sold him out.’
Michael ignored the accusation. ‘Of course he wanted to help. You don’t know him at all. He’s lived in a village all his life. Hardly ever seen the Sunless before you came. Spent his whole life talking politics out of his arse and idolizing Leon and all his long words. Then you dropped out of the sky and suddenly he’d got his noble mission, a cause. He’d got his chance to prove that he’s the great Ursulan he always boasted he was. And what do you do? We’re in the middle of an invasion here and you stroll around the city like tourists. You may as well have worn a pink neon sign saying “Profiteer: arrest me”. And you think your individualism is heroic. But your heroics over your dying friend just got Jock killed.’
‘Bernice didn’t kill Jock,’ Tameka shouted. ‘You did!’
Michael laughed coldy. ‘He was dead the second you took him out of the hospital. You’ve seen the Sunless but you don’t understand them at all. People have been murdered for far less than leaving their posts. People have been killed for thinking about resisting the Sunless. Jock could never have gone back to the hospital. He had nowhere to go. He was a dead man.’
‘Then what were you doing by informing on us?’ Bernice asked, feeling increasingly uncomfortable but still feeling angry. ‘Just making sure?’
‘Fourteen people had informed on you within twelve hours of you arriving in the city.’
‘What?’ Bernice couldn’t believe it. ‘Who?’
‘People in the dorm. People who’d seen you on the street. You stand out. You’re loud. You attract attention to yourselves. You egoize. And that’s dangerous. No one wanted you around them. No one even wanted you near them. They knew that you’d bring the Sunless down upon them.’
‘What are you saying? That you didn’t inform on us? That you’re not a collaborator?’
‘Oh I am a collaborator,’ Michael said, his voice dangerously low. ‘And I did inform on you. Only I asked Iranda to use her influence to allow me to get Scott out of there first. To take him home.’
‘Why would she do that?’
‘Because despite what has happened to her – what is happening to her – Scott is still her brother.’ He wiped the blood on his hand on the leg of his plain grey uniform, leaving a dark smear behind. ‘ Our brother.’
Emile had tucked himself under Bernice’s arm, resting his head on her chest. He only half heard the argument between Michael and Bernice, catching some words and phrases. He couldn’t follow much of what was being said and at the moment he didn’t really care. He felt safe and warm in Bernice’s embrace. He was alive and that was all that mattered.
He cradled his left hand in the palm of his right. His fingers were burning hotly, as if they were being attacked by a war party of chilblains.
In his mind’s eye he saw himself hurtling head over heels towards the gaping blackness – and then suddenly he had hit the floor of the hold, coughing and retching and desperately trying to get oxygen back into his burning lungs. His ribcage ached terribly – his whole chest was racking-cough sore.
That wasn’t the worst of it though. The most frightening thing of all – the thing he couldn’t get out of his mind – was the fact that he had almost died. Once he’d lost his grip on the side of the crate and been sent flying towards open space, he’d been absolutely sure that his life was over.
One hundred per cent sure.
Bang bang, Emile’s dead.
Despite everything that had happened