Achilles only laughed. "You're a stubborn liar, aren't you?"
"I'm not lying when I tell you that if I have to keep riding with these corpses in this compartment, I'm going to get sick." .
He smiled. "Vomit away."
"So your pathology includes a weird need to hang around with the dead," said Petra. "You'd better be careful-you know where that leads. First you'll start dating them, and then one day you'll bring a dead person home to meet your mother and father. Oops. I forgot, you're an orphan."
"So I brought them to show you."
"Why did you wait so long to shoot them?" asked Petra.
"I wanted it set up just right. So I could shoot the one while he was standing in the doorway. So his body would block any returning fire from the other guy. And besides, I was also enjoying the way you took them apart. You know, arguing with them like you did. Sounded like you hate shrinks almost as much as I do. And you were never even committed to a mental institution. I would have applauded several of your best bon mots, only I might have been overheard."
"Who's driving this van?" asked Petra, ignoring his flattery.
"Not me," said Achilles. "Are you?"
"How long are you planning to keep me imprisoned?" asked Petra.
"As long as it takes."
"As long as it takes to do what?" ."
"Conquer the world together, you and 1. Isn't that romantic? Or, well, it will be romantic, when it happens."
"It will never be romantic," said Petra. "Nor will I help you conquer your dandruff problem, let alone the world."
"Oh, you'll cooperate," said Achilles. "I'll kill the other members of Ender's jeesh, one by one, until you give in."
"You don't have them," said Petra. "And you don't know where they are. They're safe from you."
Achilles grinned mock-sheepishly. "There's just no fooling Genius Girl, is there? But, you see, they're bound to surface somewhere, and when they do, they'll die. I don't forget."
"That's one way to conquer the world," said Petra. "Kill every body one by one until you're the only one left."
"Your first job," said Achilles, "is to decode that message you sent out."
"What message?"
Achilles picked up his gun and pointed it at her
"Kill me and you'll always wonder if I really sent out a message at all," said Petra.
"But at least I won't have to listen to your smug voice lying to me," said Achilles. "That would almost be a consolation."
"You seem to be forgetting that I wasn't a volunteer on this expedition. If you don't like listening to me, let me go."
"You're so sure of yourself," said Achilles. "But I know you better than you know yourself."
"And what is it you think you know about me?" asked Petra.
"I know that you'll eventually give in and help me,"
"Well, I know you better than you know yourself, too," said Petra.
"Oh, really?"
"I know that eventually you'll kill me. Because you always do. So let's just skip all the boring stuff in between. Kill me now. End the suspense."
"No," said Achilles. "Things like that are much better as a surprise. Don't you think? At least, that's the way God always did it."
"Why am I even talking to you?" asked Petra.
"Because you're so lonely after being in solitary for all these months that you'd do anything for human company. Even talk to me/"
She hated that he was probably right. "Human company apparently you're under the delusion that you qualify."
"Oh, you're mean," said Achilles, laughing. "Look, I'm bleeding."
"You've got blood on your hands, all right."
"And you've got it all over your face," said Achilles. "Come on, it'll be fun."
"And here I thought nothing would ever be more tedious than solitary confinement."
"You're the best, Petra," said Achilles. "Except for one."
"Bean," said Petra.
"Ender," said Achilles. "Bean is nothing. Bean is dead."
Petra said nothing.
Achilles looked at her searchingly. "No smart remarks?"
"Bean is dead and you're alive," said Petra. "There's no justice."
The van slowed down and stopped.
"There," said Achilles. "Our lively conversation made the time fly by."
Fly. She heard an airplane overhead. Landing or taking off?
"Where are we flying?" she asked.
"Who says we're flying anywhere?"
"I think we're flying out of the country," said Petra, speaking the ideas as they came to her. "I think you realized that you were going to lose your cushy job here in Russia, and you're sneaking out of the country."
"You're really very good. You keep setting a new standard for cleverness," said Achilles.
"And you keep setting a new standard for failure."
He hesitated a moment, then went on as if she hadn't spoken. "They're going to pit the other kids against me," he said. "You already know them. You know their weaknesses. Whoever I'm up against, you're going to advise me."
"Never."
"We're in this together," said Achilles. "I'm a nice guy. You'll like me, eventually."
"Oh, I know," said Petra. "What's not to like?"
"Your message," said Achilles. "You wrote it to Bean, didn't you?"
"What message?" said Petra.
"That's why you don't believe he's dead."
"I believe he's dead," said Petra. But she knew her earlier hesitation had given her away.
"Or else you wonder-if he got your message before I had him killed, why did it take so long after he died to have it hit the news? And here's the obvious answer, Pet. Somebody else figured it out. Somebody else decoded it. And that really pisses me off. So don't tell me what the message said. I'm going to decode it myself. It can't be that hard."
"Downright easy," said Petra. "After all, I'm dumb enough to end up as your prisoner. So dumb, in fact, that I never sent anybody a message."
"When I do decode it, though, I hope it won't say anything disparaging about me. Because then I'd have to beat the shit out of you."
"You're right," said Petra. "You are a charmer."
Fifteen minutes later, they were on a small private jet, flying south by southeast. It was a luxurious vehicle, for its size, and Petra wondered if it belonged to one of the intelligence services or to some faction in the military or maybe to some crime lord. Or maybe all three at once.
She wanted to study Achilles, watch his face, his body language. But she didn't want him to see her showing interest in him. So she looked out the window, wondering as she did so whether she wasn't just doing the same thing the dead psychologist had done-looking away to avoid facing bitter truth.
When the chime announced that they could unbelt themselves, Petra got up and headed for the bathroom. It was small, but compared to commercial airplane toilets it was downright commodious. And it had cloth towels and real soap.
She did her best with a damp towel to wipe blood and body matter from her clothes. She had to keep wearing the dirty clothing but she could at least get rid of the visible chunks. The towel was so foul by the time she finished the job that she tossed it and got a fresh one to start in on her face and hands. She scrubbed until her face was red and raw, but she got it all off. She even soaped her hair and washed it as best she could in the tiny sink. It was hard to rinse, pouring one cup of water at a time over her head.
The whole time, she kept thinking of the fact that the psychiatrist's last minutes were spent listening to her tell him how stupid he was and point out the worthlessness of his life's work. And yes, she was right, as his death proved, but that didn't change the fact that however impure his motives might have been, he was trying to save her from Achilles. He had given his life in that effort, however badly planned it might have been. All the other rescues went off smoothly, and they were probably just as badly planned as hers. So much depended on chance. Everybody was stupid about some things. Petra was stupid about the things she said to people who had power over her. Goading them. Daring them to punish her. She did it even though she knew it was stupid. And wasn't it even stupider to do something stupid that you know is stupid?