What I would do for you I

Curro was taken to the bridge, and a chair from the mess hall was brought for him to sit in, while Brigham sat in the Capitan's chair across from him. The rest of Lupus was behind Brigham and at a distance from Curro, to avoid another Ana situation, this questioning was going to be done the right way.

Emidio handed the papers that contained all of the evidence to the captain. Brigham went over them and started questioning Curro. The suspect spoke very casually and even jovially. He deflected all of the questions and started talking about something else, dodging seriously answering anything definitely.

Brigham started losing his patience and started more aggressively pressing Curro, "This is not a joke Curro, you are a suspect in the bombing case, you will answer my questions!"

"Sheesh," Curro chuckled, "You seriously don't think it's me do you?"

"Answer the questions!" Brigham yelled at him, "Stop playing around. Why is there a 13-minute gap in your entry logs? Why didn't you enter any commands and calculations in that time frame? What were you doing?"

Curro squinted his eyes and adjusted in his chair, "I went to the bathroom…"

Brigham rubbed his eyes, "That's not good enough, you know it's protocol to turn on the AI autopilot when you leave your post to the bathroom, Mok said as much. What did you do in those 10 minutes?" Brigham thought to himself, please Curro just give me some kind of reason or explanation. Something? Anything, any reason for me not to think you're guilty.

"Why is it suspicious that I went to the bathroom?" Curro started to get angry. "I seriously can't believe you think any of what you said is damning evidence. I was joking around because of how laughable these accusations are."

"You left your post and didn't activate the AI auto-pilot!" Brigham yelled. "I know you well, you wouldn't do something so irresponsible."

"Let me ask you a question?" Curro exhaled, "Emidio is accusing me, you know the guy that actually used the AI mode, why isn't he being questioned?"

"I stood up for Ana," Emidio said. "If I was the culprit I would have let all of you kill her. The majority were in a riled-up mob and were about to do it. That's the best-case scenario for the culprit, someone innocent gets murdered without the proper process, an angry mob you were a part of may I remind you."

"I wasn't the only one" Curro nervously laughed, "How does that absolve you of any guilt? What about the rest of the crew and their alibis? Why don't you question the others who were a part of the angry mob too?"

Brigham snapped his fingers, "You are deflecting, we are not here to discuss Emidio or anyone else, we are discussing you. Why didn't you activate the AI-assist mode?"

"I don't know, I guess I forgot," Curro shrugged.

Brigham shook his head, "You didn't activate it because you needed an alibi, and you didn't think any of us would check your input logs."

"Again so what?" Curro bit his lip, "I didn't input any commands because I saw everything was in order."

"Looking at all of your computer logs, that is the only moment on this entire trip, where you have such a large gap." Brigham clenched the papers out of frustration, "There isn't a single other gap of time while you were officer of the main computer other than that moment, which happens to be the moment you could have placed the bomb."

"You idiot! I saved your life!" Curro looked almost offended. "I hacked the engine room door and I saved you, Brigham! How can you think I am the culprit? If I was the culprit I would let you die."

Brigham made a sad look, "Considering the bomb didn't kill any of us, except indirectly Mok by accident, clearly it was never the objective to kill us, if it was there were plenty of other chances later and the bomb exploded in such a way that it killed Ovis and Serpens by marooning them on Hrkar. The engine room door is sealed by the Solatium Corporation and only their repairmen can open it. Not even Mok could do it, only a skilled hacker. Someone like yourself. Saving me was what gave you away…"

Curro opened his mouth but he didn't say anything.

"Please," Brigham stood up from his chair and approached his restrained best friend, "Tell me why. Why did you do this?"

"I guess there is no getting out of this huh," Curro exhaled, "My confession won't impact the plan and since I am a goner either way, I might as well confess."

All of Lupus could barely contain themselves over this sudden confession, the students started getting rowdy but Brigham had shut them all up. The captain sat back into his chair and gave the floor to Curro to speak. Why had his best friend committed such a heinous crime, how could he have not seen it? Brigham wouldn't be able to move on if he didn't get a concrete answer. Curro knowing it was all over, decided to give the full story, the restrained boy spoke uninterrupted:

I can see most have you have made up your mind that I am the culprit, no use in hiding it. Yes, I am the culprit, I hacked the engine room door, I set the bomb and I made it explode. Now with the boring part out of the way, I am assuming all of you want to know why. I suppose I have nothing to lose so I might as well tell you.

I hate that you were right on your assumptions, yes I am part of a legitimate ideological group, a secret society many of you would consider a cult, even though it is much more than that. The Green Dawn with my father Celio, as its leader. I have been a part of this group since I can remember. What do we want? To depose the disgrace of a politician, President Micki, and transform the society of Nova Occasio.

My father fought with his body and soul for our country and colony. He gave everything in our independence war, the Pioneers were going to create a truly just and free society. He believed with all of his heart that the pioneers, which he was proudly a part of would construct a society that humans on Earth in all of their history had failed to achieve.

Planet Spark was going to be a place where humanity was truly going to thrive, but it ended up turning into business as usual. Micki was not exceptional and neither was the society he ended up leading. Nova Occasio was not very different from the countless other nations on Earth and no revolutionary change happened.

The worst of all was the administration's failure to fully guarantee the Dominion's neutrality. Micki subscribes to the quaint and dangerous idea that with a well-equipped military and good diplomacy, you can remain neutral. Roy's and Ana's stories of the Sutra and Hope colonies show what happens to neutral planets and countries that aren't prepared, they get invaded and conquered. You need to be a fortress if you want to be neutral and not get invaded. Everyone is your potential enemy and you have no friends.

My father had pleaded countless times to expand the number of schools like ours, more military academies, lower the conscription age, a larger weapons industry… The president thinks our defenses are enough, what a fool. Nova Occasio needs to be more prepared and all outsiders should be considered enemies.

The Green Dawn has been planning for a coup d'état and takeover of government for years. Once in power, my father would centralize power, every school would become a military school, and children as young as 7 would be taught how to defend themselves. It is necessary with the Cold War and the world we live in. These new schools would instill patriotism, none of you are sufficiently patriotic and loyal to Nova Occasio. Some of you would lick the boots of the Americans and Russians. All citizens would be a part of the military in some way.

My father as the new leader, could finally build the just and fair society that humanity deserves as it stepped into the cosmos. Obviously, there would be many who disagree, we would need to expand the capacity of the Carcer prison and build more prisons and labor camps for anyone who would dare be against the state and the glorious society we would create.

I guess none of you are that interested in the Green Dawn program so I will go over the thing that interests you more. Why the bombing of our ship? It's simple. My job was to plant a bomb that would destroy our ship and kill all of you, right before the explosion I would enter one of the escape pods. After that I would most likely be picked up by Ovis or Serpens, I would play the traumatized survivor and they would call for help.

The outrage the populace would feel over 8 dead children and one instructor would wake us up to how ill-prepared we are for our enemies as a nation. In this moment of chaos the Green Dawn, with my father in the lead, would successfully instigate a coup and remove Micki from power. Riding the wave, my father would blame the attack on both the Americans and Russians, and finally, they would implement their agenda. In a year we will be living in the greatest, most exceptional society in human history which was promised with Nova Occasio's founding and the original mission of the Pioneers.

Many of you look at me with confused faces, yes I know, it did not go according to plan. I didn't kill any of you with the bomb, instead the bomb's explosion knocked Ovis and Serpens on Hrkar. I had decided to change the plan of my own free will. I guess that was my key mistake, but no matter what happens to me, the dead schoolchildren on Hrkar will fuel the propaganda my father needs, it's possible that before we arrive at the Lepoglava space station, Nova Occasio became privy to their deaths and the revolution has already started while we were still in the cosmos. Our long-range communication relay being disabled in the explosion was an accident though.

You still have confused looks on your faces, I can see. Why are we still all alive then is what you are probably thinking. Why did I change the plan? Why did I modify the bomb to merely knock us off and kill Ovis and Serpens instead of Lupus?

I did because of you, Brigham. No matter how outstanding Nova Occasio was going to be under the Green Dawn and my father, I couldn't imagine it without you. I couldn't live with myself knowing I killed you, especially with our promise to change to world together. You have the spirit of true change, I couldn't be the one to put it out. In fact, with how earnest and determined you are, I sometimes thought you were even better than any Green Dawn member I've ever met, including my father.

There were countless times when I wrestled with the idea of revealing my identity and our agenda to you, I wanted you to be a part of our project. However, deep down I knew you would reject such radical and violent ideas, it's not in your nature. When my father told me about the plan, I suggested an alternative but he had set his mind to doing it one way.

I had to choose between my family or you Brigham, and I chose you. I thought you should know that.

I still went through with my version of the plan and killed double the number of schoolmates than I would have in the original plan. Still, everything I did, I did because of you.