Eagle X, Mission 15: The Singapore Incident

Part 12: Kent

Kent sat with the wounded, though he considered his own wounds superficial. He gingerly touched the bandage on his shoulder. The turbulence that shook the ship had thrown everyone from their seats. Angelique's finger squeezed her hair trigger when her arm hit the floor. The shot left a scorch mark in the booth's rug, but was otherwise ineffective. The Assassin Drone, however, fired upon registering the use of her weapon. There had been no order to take a kill shot so the machine, acting to disable the threat, hit Kent in the shoulder. The arm would be near useless until he received medical help.

Kent never learned who fired the third shot but it hadn't been him. He'd spent five years in preparation, five years training. When the moment came for The Free Labor Movement's first strike against the tyranny of The Board of Directors, he hesitated because he felt an imperative to save others. He manipulated his way into a private audience with his target, and again he hesitated. This time because his faith was shaken.

Sitting beside a colonial man with a head wound requiring constant rebandaging, Kent wondered what was damaged more: his arm or his beliefs. To realize he'd been lied to by everyone he cared about was jarring. The possibility that Angelique was the one lying occurred to him, but somehow her words felt the most genuine. Maybe she was just a better liar than Seth.

The whole mess was a lot to wrap his head around. Kent felt like a fool, a childlike fool with no concept of what it meant to be human. He had to be taught how to lie, and even then he lacked the guile to improvise. Kent saw then that to be human was to lie, to deal with humans was to be skeptical of everything you are told.

"I don't blame you for being in a foul mood, my friend. I've never been shot, but I hear it's painful." Giles Norman knelt beside Kent and offered a cup of water. Kent took the drink with his good hand and gave it to the injured man who thanked him and drank deeply.

"I'm not upset about being shot. I probably deserved it," Kent grumbled. He'd never felt so cross before.

"Deserved it? Don't be absurd. They say the CEO shot you by mistake. David has convinced the others that her weapons should be confiscated for everyone's sake. He's putting together a delegation to demand action."

Kent shook his head. At that moment he wanted someone to sedate David and shut him and his schemes away in a cubby somewhere.

"David is not a good person."

"He's not. He's never been, but he's ambitious and business savvy."

"Then why be his friend? Why associate with such a man?" Kent's eyes burned. He spoke of Giles and David's relationship, but his mind was on his own and the FLM.

"I would still be a pencil pusher in the textiles division if it weren't for him. I don't like him, sometimes I think I hate him, but he made me the man I am today. He did right by me, and I can't ignore that."

Kent nodded. He understood what Giles meant. He knew what it was like to be no one, and owe someone for molding you into something greater. Kent gritted his teeth. Before he'd agreed to abandon Wilson Nova_1103, he hadn't thought of himself as nothing. He was lost and alone, but he was still a free clone... Seth had sought him out. Despite words to the contrary, why would the Free Labor Movement have need for a valueless Vat Boy? Wilson had been more, but didn't know it. Kent was more.

"You're smiling now," Giles observed. "Did it just occur to you?"

"Yeah, it did. It really did." Kent felt a great weight lift from his shoulders. He was the man The FLM created, but he did not belong to them. He was more than just a tool.

"When we get back, you have a case against THE Chief Executive Officer. You are about to be very well paid, my friend. The universe is about to open her arms wide."