The Broken Universe (34 page)

“I…”

“What?”

“I just don’t want to be by myself anymore,” John Superprime said.

“That I can help with,” John said. “Pack your stuff. You’re probably not coming back.”

*   *   *

A city of a thousand. John was not a citizen. Oh, he was welcomed. He was lauded, even. He was listened to, but he did not belong. Which he found was fine with him. The responsibility of governing the New Toledoans would have been too much for him. He was happy to have created the place, to have seeded the population and let it go.

But when the first crime occurred, it was he who was asked to carry out the justice. It was he who decided the criminal’s fate.

*   *   *

It was rape. A man from Winter forced himself on an Alarian. He claimed the advances were encouraged. He claimed it was a game of sexual dominance. She claimed … to remember nothing. The marks claimed otherwise.

The mayor of New Toledo invited John and Grace to her office to discuss the problem. Melissa had been elected to a one-year term in December. One year was as far into the future as the burgeoning community dared plan for.

“We don’t have a judicial system,” Melissa said. Her office was in one of the new buildings spreading down the Ottawa River from the original settlement. It had a view of the brown river from a small rise. “Who thought we’d need one?” She stood by the window looking at the river, a spot where she probably spent too much time. John wondered if she was enjoying her job. Englavira was her vice mayor.

“What have you done with him?” Grace asked.

“Nothing,” Melissa said.

“Nothing?”

“Yes, it’s Amalona’s word against Jason’s,” Melissa said. “He says it was consensual. She says it wasn’t. They were both drunk.”

“Drunk?”

“Yes, drunk. Someone has been smuggling hard liquor in,” Melissa said. That was something John had never considered, cross-dimensional smuggling in their daily shipments to New Toledo. Someone was sneaking alcohol across. He wondered if drugs were coming through too. The magnitude of what they had created threatened to overwhelm him.

“I guess the foibles of human society will follow us anywhere,” he said.

“You can’t stop humans from being humans,” she said. “Shit, that came out wrong. If she was raped, he needs to pay.”

“It seems like you’re unable and unwilling to have a trial,” Grace said.

“We can have a trial. No doubt. He has witnesses that say she was coming on to him. She … has remained remarkably quiet once she made her accusation.”

“She’s an Alarian,” Grace said. “She’s been the victim of sexual abuse from puberty. Of course she’s confused.”

“Yes, I know,” Melissa said. “I’m not unsympathetic—”

“You’re sounding like a politician,” Grace said.

“There are more sides to this than the woman’s,” Melissa said. “Shit! I know he probably did it. But what about innocent until proven guilty.”

“We’re not in the United States,” Grace said. “We don’t have a constitution.”

“We don’t have much of anything,” Melissa said. The only rules they’d come up with were practical ones for making sure everyone was working on the things that needed to be done. “The Council meeting notes, but how formal are those? We’ve been using peer pressure to get things done. We don’t have any police. We don’t have any judges. We’ve been pretending at this.”

“So what choices do we have?” John asked.

“It feels like a cop-out having you here, like we can’t do this ourselves. But you two are outsiders. You can have a neutral perspective. And the community looks up to you, John. Heck, most people worship you around here.”

“What?”

“You’re here enough to know it,” Melissa said. “But if you needed a chair, half the settlement would get on their hands and knees so you could sit on their backs.”

“I hope you’re exaggerating,” John said.

“A little,” Melissa said. “But the point remains. If the justice comes from you, it might be easier to swallow.”

John shook his head. “Me? That’s a lot of responsibility. Deciding the fates of these two people…”

Grace snorted. “You decided the fate of everyone out there.” She waved in the direction of the New Toledo town square. “You, and no one else. You can’t back out now.”

John sighed. Grace shrugged at him, as if to say that, yes, indeed this was your idea.

“Tell me everything about this Jason Grayborn,” John said. “And everything about Amalona.”

Grace snorted. “Fair and balanced, sure,” she said. “She might have a history of false rape allegations.”

“Grace,” John said.

“Right, right. Innocent until guilty.”

“He’s a third degree,” Melissa said.

“What?”

“Third degree of separation from Devon and Jane,” Melissa said. “I’ve started thinking of our community as it relates to our first settlers from 7538. The Alarians and Devon and Jane and the two girls are zero. Anyone they recruited that they knew are one degree. Those recommended by one degrees are twos, and so on. The farther out the separation, the less likely the recommendation gets acted on. Family takes priority over friends.”

“I didn’t realize it was so complicated,” John said.

“Recommended immigrants are placed up for additional positive or negative recommendations. Three negatives will sink you. Ten positives will get you a visit from the emigration team. Jason Grayborn was recommended by a second degree, Cecil Inkster. He received ten positives by other third degrees who may or may not have known him. He has EMT skills, which made him a strong candidate. We still don’t have a doctor and just a single nurse. If a murderer had an M.D., he or she might still get ten recommendations. Jason Grayborn emigrated in January, and has been a productive member of the settlement until now, as far as I know.”

“And you keep track of how many people personally?” Grace said.

“I manage by exception,” Melissa said. “Whatever comes to my attention, I deal with.”

“And Amalona?”

“She’s twenty-five, sweet, kind, and twisted from ten years in the Alarian seraglio,” Melissa said. “She works in the greenhouse. She commutes to Universe Ten one day a week for an agriculture class. Otherwise not on my radar.”

“And what happened?”

“We have a problem in the ratio of men to women here,” Melissa said. “It started with the Alarians, and we haven’t managed to balance it out. There are two females for every male here, and some of the men think they can have the pick of the litter.”

“There have been other incidents like this?” Grace said.

“No, no, nothing like this,” Melissa said. “But there’s an attitude that any man can get the woman he wants, or at least, a woman. And I’m not willing to lower our threshold to get more men just so everyone can have a date on Saturday night.” She sighed. “Anyway, last Friday evening, there was an impromptu party. Liquor was available. I’m still not sure where it’s coming from. Nor am I sure it’s breaking any rules. At least not until the Council makes a decision on alcohol. Jason shows some attention to Amalona. Witnesses say they danced. All in fun according to some. A little hot and heavy according to others. Jason and Amalona disappear and no one really notices when. No one really notices when Jason reappears and Amalona doesn’t. Two days later, Englavira comes to my office saying she has a problem.”

“Amalona never came forward?” John asked.

“Why does that matter?” Grace said.

“I’m just asking a question, Grace.”

“She didn’t. Englavira said she was chipper, same as always, went to work the next day. Came back. No one noticed anything. Until she happened to run across Grayborn in the cafeteria. She collapses, hysterical, and Englavira doesn’t get anything out of her until she sedates her. Then Amalona explains that she had ‘performed poorly,’ which I have come to find out is Alarian male code for a generic reason to beat and torture an Alarian female.”

“Shit,” Grace said.

“Englavira checks her out. She has bruises on her inner thighs—”

“According to Englavira,” John said. “Did anyone see them?”

“John,” Grace cried. “How can you—”

“No. No one else saw them,” Melissa said. “But Englavira said she was bruised on the throat as well. Handprints around her throat.”

“He doesn’t deny the sex?” Grace said. “He doesn’t deny that?”

“No,” Melissa said.

“Fry him,” Grace said.

“Grace,” John said.

“You chicken. You’re scared of doing the wrong thing. You males are all the same.”

“Grace, we have to be sure!” John said. “We have to know for sure.”

“And when we know for sure?” Grace said. “What do we do?”

John shrugged. “I don’t know. Send him away.”

“We can’t send him back to Winter,” Melissa said. “He knows too much.”

“Some other universe?” John said. “We have a lot of choices. We can banish him for suspected wrongdoing, can’t we?”

Grace looked at him and shook her head. “Make it someone else’s problem? No dice, John. No dice at all. He doesn’t get to do this to some other woman. I won’t allow that.”

“What are you saying, Grace?” John said.

She stared him in the eye. “We end his life,” she said. “If he’s guilty of this, we end his life.”

John felt his body weakening. He sat heavily in the chair across from Melissa’s desk.

“Execute him?”

“If we know for certain he did it, yes.”

“And if we don’t?”

“If you can’t convince yourself he did it,” Grace said, “then you can banish him to some random universe.”

“I don’t know if I can—”

“Then who? Prime? Henry? Some other you?” Grace said. “You started this game, Rayburn. You gotta play the hand.”

“How about you?” John said.

“Don’t even suggest it,” Grace said, a grim grin on her face. “He’d never stand a chance of justice from me.”

“Okay,” John said. He stood and looked out onto the river. “I’ll do it. Tell Grayborn I’m meeting with him tomorrow. He can have anyone he wants with him.”

*   *   *

John met with Jason Grayborn and Cecil Inkster the next morning. Grace refused to be there, not even to take notes. John used a cassette recorder to tape the interview.

“So what the hell is this all about?” Jason said. He was a tall man, undoubtedly handsome to women. Dark-haired, sharp-featured. His face was symmetric and thin. He moved fluidly, gracefully as if he could have been a gymnast in college or high school.

“I think you know,” John said.

“It’s bullshit, is what it is,” Cecil Inkster said. He was shorter, pudgy, a dull-looking man compared to his friend. He and Jason had been roommates in college. Cecil was a friend of Devon’s brother.

“It must be something if the legendary John Rayburn is here,” Grayborn said.

John felt himself recoil at the flattery. Would it have worked if the man’s life wasn’t in the balance? No, it seemed so insincere, in all respects.

“Jason, I need to tell you what you’re up against,” John said. “If you raped that girl—if you raped Amalona, the penalty is death.”

“What?” Grayborn cried. “That’s bullshit! Did she say it was rape? Did she say that? Because she was coming on to me!”

Cecil stared with dark eyes in his pudgy face.

Grayborn stood up then. “Screw this! I’m outta here.”

He stood and pulled open the door, stopping short as he saw John Superprime standing there with a gun in a holster. John had asked Superprime to be his master at arms.

“Interview ain’t over yet, Grayborn,” Superprime said.

“Sit back down, Jason,” John said. “We have to do this.”

Jason turned, a look of rage on his face.

“Ask what you want, Rayburn,” he said. “My story is the same. She wanted it. I gave it to her. Anything else that’s said is a lie.” He sat on the chair.

Cecil wrung his hands, nervous at what he was suddenly a part of.

“Tell me what happened.”

“When?”

“On the night you and Amalona had sex,” John said.

“She was into me. I was into her. It was clear from the get-go,” Jason said, his inflection flat. “We danced. We drank. Then we found a dark corner in one of the barracks. She initiated it. She reached into my pants. We had sex. It was pretty hot.” He nudged Cecil, who only returned a blank stare. “Then I came back to the dance. That’s it.”

“She had handprints around her neck,” John said.

“You’ve had sex. I’ve seen you with that Casey girl. You know that things happen. It got a little wild. It happens.”

“She was bruised.”

“Things … happen,” he said, enunciating each word slowly.

“Did she say stop?”

“Never.”

“Did she try to get away?”

“The door was open,” Jason said. “She could have left.”

“How do you explain her reaction to you in the cafeteria?”

“Post-traumatic stress syndrome,” Jason said. “You know what crap those Alarians have been through. Normal sex with a normal man probably was too alien for her. How should I know?”

John stared at him. He was too smooth. He had easy answers for everything. As if he’d been through this all before.

“Who else have you dated here?”

“Dated?”

“Who else have you had sex with?”

“Oh, no. That doesn’t work. You can’t use details from another case for this one. That’s inadmissible evidence.”

“You sound like you’ve been through this before,” John said.

“Bite me, Rayburn.”

They sat staring at each other for a long minute. John knew Jason’s story wasn’t going to change. He’d have to talk to Amalona next.

“Don’t go near her or another woman,” John said. “Not until the investigation is over.”

“Or what, Rayburn?”

“We’ll banish you, as far away as we can get you.”

*   *   *

Dark circles banded Amalona’s eyes. She sat hunched on the chair in Melissa’s office. He had met her once, other than the mass escape from the seraglio. He couldn’t recall her being anything but a happy young woman. Now she looked haunted.

As he watched her sitting there, John decided that he would make Jason pay if she agreed he had raped her. Impartial judge be damned.

“Tell me what happened between you and Jason Grayborn,” John said.

Amalona looked at him with blank eyes. “Who?”