That’s top level emotional self-understanding/responsibility, Gerek, I think you’ve done some therapy.
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Running, Gerek said to Audri and Val, “Come on!” Indicating an airlock he said, “Quickly! In here!” And then indicating an escape pod, he said, “And go in there I just need to…” and he pressed a button and the doors to the escape pod closed and locked, leaving Audri and Val inside the escape pod, and Gerek outside. Audri yelled, “Hey! What do you mean by locking us in here?!” Val said, “Yeah! What are you doing?!” Gerek said, “Saving you.” Audri yelled, “What do you mean, ‘saving us’?! We don’t want to be saved if you’re not saved with us!” Running away, Gerek said, “Not my problem.” Audri yelled, “What do you mean, ‘not my problem’?!” Val said to Audri, “Read his lips, Audri. Our feeling bad that we live and he dies is not his problem.” Audri yelled, “What do you mean, ‘lips’?!”
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I was going to say it’s weird that the escape pod has a locking mechanism like that, but (a) the design of the ship is ducked up and (b) I can think of uses for that, such as needing to rescue uncooperative children and then go back for more…
(How much you think Val and/or Audri count as uncooperative children is your concern.)
Given that they supposedly have at least a day until the ship flies into the sun, Gerek’s urgency here suggests he just wants those two liabilities safe and out of the way whilst he goes and does something heroic and/or stupid.
Also I suspect he might see the hundreds or thousands of homeless people onboard as actually people, and attempt to rescue them too.
I mean, with a little time, a bit of violence, and some help from the programmer, it would seem feasible to set the ship on another course.
Heroic and/or stupid sounds about right for Gerek. He’s lived on the edge so long, what’s another long cut in a sensitive area? I just wonder if he’s thought about where everybody’s going to end up when he’s done the thing he’s doing.
I wonder if they’ll let him help them, given the universal (and mostly justified) fear of Bollycks.
And if they don’t want to let him help, that’s not his problem either.