Ern’s face was streaked with tear tracks when he knocked on French’s door. His bags were packed. He had enough money in his pocket to last a little while out in the acid, maybe long enough to get another job. He couldn’t stay here, he’d decided. He wasn’t that sort of person. Who was he to say that everything he’d ever been taught about right and wrong was a lie? Nobody, that’s who. And besides, he’d be alone. Maybe he hadn’t been homesick just from being away, but he’d certainly gotten homesick the moment he started thinking about what he would have to do for his job.
Home wasn’t his mother’s house, or his school, or even his friends. Home was what he knew to be right and wrong. That was what did it.
And why?
That part had taken him a while to figure out, but he had figured it out. It was because, deep down, he knew that if he became advantaged—like French wanted—he couldn’t go home again. Ever. Right now, it didn’t matter how much trouble he was in. Eventually the trouble would die down. CARE would start caring about someone else. Something else would occupy the popular imagination—another sensational crime, another advantaging that destroyed the public trust—and when that happened, he could go home, and they’d just flog him and ship him off to South Nast, and everything would be okay. He’d see Mom, he’d be in South Nast with Hoyle and Jeryl. He wouldn’t be alone.
That’s why he couldn’t stay. That’s why French’s world wasn’t his world. That’s why he had to find another way.
“Come in,” French said. Then he kept talking to someone who was already in the office.
Ern lifted the latch and pushed the door in. Inside he found Phil and three other people clustered around French’s desk. Ern closed the door behind him and squeezed into the spare space between the crowd and the wall.
French was hunched over a ledger with a pencil. “...ucker decided to go on the grift on my dime.”
“You want we should send him to Blister Park, boss?” said one of the men, a short mean-looking one with a squarish head.
“I want to talk to him first. Get your ass to Marino and get him before he jumps planet. Bring him back. Tell him he’s due for a bonus. I got a special assignment for him.”
Phil chuckled as if he’d just heard the world’s funniest joke.
French sighed. “Keep your eyes skinned. We’ll need two new guys now, not just one. Your boy washed out, Phil.”
“No? Damn. Seemed like a tough li’l bastard.”
“Eh. Completely whipped. Hopeless case. Some fish you gotta throw back.”
Phil dug into his pocket and passed a handful of something forward to the unseeable French.
“Thank you,” French said. “I trust I’ll be handing this back soon.”
“Will do my best.”
“Which one you knocked on the door? Make it quick, I’ve got about...”
The four men turned around and slid apart, leaving a tunnel open between Ern and French. French looked up to see Ern, then glanced at his wristwatch. “You were supposed to be gone an hour ago. I should charge you rent.”
“I just...” Ern swallowed, then stopped. He’d meant to come and say goodbye and thank you and things. It was the polite thing to do, after all.
“Spit it out, kid.” French waited half a second. “Phil? It’s your fault he’s here.”
Phil cracked his knuckles with relish. “Yes, boss.”
“I just came to...” Ern erped as Phil grabbed him by the lapels and jerked the door open. “What did you mean you said you need two instead of one?”
“Get him out of here.”
“Wait wait wait,” Phil yanked Ern toward the door. “You meant enforcers, right?”
“Hold on Phil.” French said. Then: “You know someone who wants your job?”
“Yeah,” Ern said. “Yeah, I think I might.”
“Who?”
Ern swallowed hard. When he opened his mouth again, his ears were as surprised as French’s at what came out:
“Me. And a friend of mine. You gave Phil some kind of bonus for finding me? I want the same for finding him.”
“What makes you think we want him?”
“Cause he helped me beat that slug to death.”
French kicked him out into the street with a: “Come back with him and you get your bonus. Come back without him and you’re going to Blister Park.”