Finch by Jeff VanderMeer (20 page)

Finch felt the smooth glide of the boat through thickish water.
The way the deck gave a little under his weight. Like he was lying
on top of another body.

No gun. No shoes. Just what was left in his pockets, because Bosun
didn't want it.

Stark: "I'm here to fucking clean house."

Heretic: "A skery is not as bad for you as what I could bring with me."

Bliss: "You look familiar to me, detective. Do I know you?"

And the dead man laughing at all of them.

Beside Finch's head, Wyte's feet. In black boots dirty with algae-like
fungus. A tiny community. A miniature of the city. Finch imagined he
could see creatures there. Creatures who lived out their unaware lives
in a state of naive happiness. A sharp smell, like petrol mixed with
pepper. The friction of their discourse on that slick black hillside.

He turned his attention back to the sky. Ignored the three crimson
tendrils coming out from under Wyte's overcoat. The weariness wasn't
from confronting Stark. The weariness was from continually being
threatened.

"Wyte. Just so we're clear-you're not thinking about making a deal
with Stark. To replace Davies and your other Stockton contacts?"

"No." Didn't sound convincing.

"You're so full of shit, Wyte." Exasperated because back in the
day Wyte was the one lecturing him about being naive. Telling him
not to trust the ship captains at the docks when what was in their
hold didn't match the invoice. Always warning him about getting
fooled.

"I'm not going to make any deals!"

Pressing: "What did Stark's people talk to you about then, Wyte?
Scratch that-who are Stark's people?"

"Nobody! No one," Wyte protested. "They didn't talk to me. I had
a hood over my head. I never even saw them. And how do I know you
didn't decide to trade information with Stark?"

"Because I didn't, Wyte. You know why? Because he's not like your
Stockton contacts from before. You can't really deal with someone
like Stark. He'll cheerfully sell you a knife and then slit your throat
with it before you've even given him the money."

"I know that. Tend to your own house."

"Fair enough."

A silence that spread and spread until it reached the sky. Not
really mad at Wyte. Mad at Stark for making him powerless. For
humiliating him.

Thick stalks of green appeared at the left edge of his vision.
He turned his head. It was the underside of the two towers. The
cross-section of scaffolding and support. It seemed alive. Made of
vines wrapped around sinews that convulsively wove and rewove
themselves together. Thought he saw a dead fox in there. Thought
he saw a face.

Then they were past, and it was just the gray again.

Everyone has a theory about the two towers. Finch has heard them
all, mostly at the detectives' nameless refuge. When they first
decided on the location, they'd had to take the bell out of the bell
tower to make more space. A grunting, straining ordeal. To get it
down. To shove it out of the one window without destroying the
place. It had sunk slowly. Much to their mutual amusement. "It
should've sunk like the stone it is," Blakely had said. "Something about the clapper," Wyte had said. "The air trapped inside?" Finch:
"Bullshit. It's just being difficult." Could still see it in the water
below. Dark and rippling. A shape like the bullet head of some
monstrous fish.

Talk of one tower had led to talk of the others.

Skinner: "I hear the towers are being built over the ruins of the old
gray cap library. For some ritual."

Wyte: "I heard it's a power source for more electricity. When it's
done, the whole city will be lit up again. They're nothing if not
practical."

Gustat, snorting his disdain, "Lit up for sure, because it's a weapon.
Why else out in the bay? From there, it looks over the whole city. It'll
shoot out some kind of energy. Another way to control all of us. First
thing they'll do is destroy the Spit."

Blakely: "You're full of shit. It's a huge statue to their god. Or a
memorial. Whatever, those are just its legs."

The "island" around their refuge is just floating debris that has
matted round. Encouraged by them. Camouflage. Stability. Some day,
the whole thing is going to rot. They'll have to go elsewhere. Or
maybe by then the city will be theirs again and they'll have their
pick of pubs. Won't have to be part of the same chain gang, the same
galley crew.

One day they might even get around to building a bridge. But for
now, the detectives have built a place to moor a boat, and used the boat
to bring across an amazing amount of booze. Salvage from every murder
scene. Every call of domestic abuse. A history of Ambergris in alcohol,
from Smashing Todd's to Randy Robert's. A smell like sweat and beer.
Better than the smell of the station. No electricity, but they've hidden
an icebox in the waters below the rotting floorboards at the far end
of the main room. Keeps cold enough. They bring food as they have
it. Stock the place with gray cap rations too. Tastes like crap, but the
food-if that's what it is-never goes bad.

Gustat: "What god? They don't worship a god. They're too practical,
like Wyte says."

Albin: "Too practical? By what measure? This is just them working
up to another Silence. Better hope the rebels get to it first."

Dapple, uncertainly: "Not true. They can kill us all now if they
want to. They don't need more help."

Albin: "Not enough of them for that."

Blakely again: "Some people think it's some kind of gate. They
swear late at night you can see things moving through it. That you
can see strange stars."

The detectives never talk about work. But, rumor? Rumor is like
news from some far distant, more exciting place. Especially about the
two towers.

Once, Finch offered his opinion. "They've got limits, first of all. You
can see that already. They couldn't control the effects of the HFZ.
They need help from the camps to build the towers. When the towers
go faster, they put up fewer other buildings. The electricity goes out.
Or their radio station goes silent. They have limits."

Blank looks. Not getting it. Much easier to think of the gray caps
as some implacable force. Like the weather. Something that can't be
fought. Because the fact is: if the gray caps want, they can disappear
your friends, your family. It doesn't take unlimited resources to do that.

Wyte and Finch aren't allowed at the hideout anymore. Once it
became clear Wyte would never really get rid of his affliction. Ever
since Finch decided to back him anyway.

inch and Wyte returned to the station in time to witness the end of
a rare fight. Blakely and Dapple had gone at it. Under the glow of
spectral lamps, the gaze of the tiny windows. Not caring if the gray caps
were watching.

Blakely faced them. Standing on the mottled green carpet right
where it reached the desks. Nose bloodied. Dapple with his back to
them. Hair rising in tufts like he'd been startled. Fists up, too. Albin
watching from his desk. A peculiar look of interest and boredom on
his face.

Back when it had mattered, Dapple had been a Hoegbotton man.
Blakely had been with Frankwrithe & Lewden. Both stared at each
other now across a battlefield of other people's betrayal.

The other detectives gathered around.

"I won't do it," Dapple was saying.

"You've done it plenty of times before. Looked behind the curtain,"
Blakely said with a kind of cruel confidence. "What's different now?"

"I was forced to those other times. None of you did anything to help."

Finch doubted the fight had started there. Or that either remembered
what it had really been about. Blakely was famous for baiting others.
Daring them to look behind that damned curtain. Enter the haunted
house. Walk through the graveyard at night.

After Stark and Bosun, Finch felt like he was watching Blakely and
Dapple from on high. Children or midgets. Heard Wyte mutter from
behind him, "Dumb fucks."

Blakely saw them first. Lowered his hands. Tension losing out to
puzzlement.

"What happened to your shoes, Finch?" Said with contempt.

Dapple turned, looked too. His eyes were red.

"Nothing as exciting as what was happening here," Finch said,
pushing through them, Wyte tightlipped behind him. Over his shoulder,
"Whatever play you're practicing for, I'm not paying to go see it."

That got a laugh, though not from Blakely or Dapple. Spared Finch
from having to talk about his shoes.

As he and Wyte sat down, Finch tossing Stark's file onto his desk,
they got plenty of stares. Looks that said you'll get questions later.
For now, though, the Blakely-Dapple spat was still more interesting.
Skinner was already trying to get them going again, asking Dapple,
"Are you just going to take that from him?"

On top of the clutter on Finch's desk: a note to call Rathven.
Felt a spark of excitement. Picked up the receiver. Dialed the
number. Waited while it rang. Stomach growling. Didn't think he
could take more gray cap rations, though. Might wait to eat until
he got home. Hunger focused his thoughts. Made him sharper. For
awhile.

Still ringing.

Wyte, searching through drawers: "I've got an extra pair of shoes
somewhere. Too big, but..."

Still ringing. He'd try later.

"If you find them, I'll take them," Finch said. No hesitation. Didn't
want to take another step without something on his feet. Too easy to
pick up something nasty. Sudden memory of his father kneeling to tie
his shoelaces. Eight? Nine? Saying, "Mud between your toes in the river,
no one cares. Set one foot outside this house onto the street, I'll never hear
the end of it." Sounds of his grandparents in the background, arguing
about something long forgotten. Father's bristly face inches from his,
mouth transformed by a smile. "Let's go for a walk, shall we?" Never
knew when that meant his father had to meet someone, or if it really
was just a walk.

Finch called another number. A number Sintra had given him.
None of the phones on their way back had worked. Felt a helpless
need to tell her she might be in danger. That "a man named Stark"
might be following her.

Experienced an odd relief when no one picked up. Because, really,
how could he tell her? Without telling her too much?

All you have to do is play along with Stark and he won't touch her.

How had Stark known about Sintra? Bosun casing the hotel? Then
following her home? Along with the unworthy thought: Maybe that's
what you should do.

A perverse pang of jealousy.

A sound of triumph from Wyte, who had produced a scuffed old pair
of shoes. "Socks still in them!"

Wyte tossed them at his feet. Wyte had left his fingerprints all over
the socks. Blotches of red and black. With a grimace, Finch put on the
socks, then the shoes. Too big, but they'd serve.

"Thanks."

"Sure." In a whisper: "Now we just have to get new guns. There might
be some in the supply cabinet, but Skinner has the key on his desk."

"Lost your guns, too?" Never live it down.

Finch shook his head. "No. I'm going to get a real gun. Something
more reliable. I'm done with guns that leak."

Wyte raised an eyebrow at that. "You sure that's a good idea?"

"If I put a bullet in Stark, I want it to count."

"If you put a bullet in Stark, make sure you've got a good reason.
And that you've taken care of his men," Wyte said.

Finch had no answer for that. He looked around. Blakely was by the
coffee-maker. Laughing at something Gustat had said. Dapple was hiding
behind his desk, pretending to work. Trembling. Let the gray caps figure
that one out from their surveillance. Skinner and Albin had disappeared
for the moment. Good. No one except Wyte was watching.

Picked up the file. Opened it. Saw the Stockton logo. "TOP
SECRET" stamped in red across the top. Scrawled note from Stark, in
a spidery script: "My gift to you, Finch. Let me know when you crack
the case. If it doesn't crack you first." Bastard.