Finch by Jeff VanderMeer (24 page)

One of his father's first tasks was to get the Hoegbotton army across
the Moth in a way that allowed quick return. He accomplished this with
boats, with floating bridges that could be taken apart and reused in other
ways. From there, "the Fixer," as he came to be called, participated in
more than a dozen battles. Helping take defensive positions. Solving how
to get across supposedly impassable mountains. Whenever they needed
an engineer, he was there. And he had the photographs to prove it,
the ones Finch had since consigned to the flames: his lean, cleanshaven figure posing in front of a canyon, a cityscape, a smoldering
tank. If the posture seemed more stooped, more resigned, the smile a
little more faded as time passed, it could have been the natural process
of aging. If not for Finch knowing that, eventually, what his father had
found there would kill him.

He'd told Finch one day that he'd imagined he would be able to
quit the military, take on the civilian projects that he preferred. Saw,
he said, a grand new age of architectural expansion, as in the days of
Pejoran. A city reimagined and rebuilt in a way that meant more than
just restoration or renovation. Mineral deposits that fueled a war effort
could fuel a peace effort.

But it didn't happen that way, as if the dust of empire that slowly
changed his father had changed Ambergris, too. House Hoegbotton's
race to acquire territory in the name of Ambergris meant not engaging
insurgents at its exposed flanks: holding cities but not holding land.
Until, finally, a slow collapse back to the River Moth, leaving behind
as evidence of their passage more than a few half-breed children,
abandoned equipment, and all of Finch's father's engineering projects.
His father had had photos of these, too. In a separate album. He used to thumb through it at night with Finch on his lap, as if to deny what
had happened next.

Images from some other life. A few of a woman with the distinctive
features of the west. Faded. Worn. Lost.

His father had returned to an Ambergris exhausted in some ways,
with House Frankwrithe eager to resurrect itself in people's hearts
because House Hoegbotton neglected the home front to focus on the
Kalif. Food shortages, electricity shortages.

In the decade that followed, Finch's father rose to become a strangely
neutral figure. As the divide between Hoegbotton and Frankwrithe
became narrower, as the city devolved into regions and factions and
neighborhoods, he found himself working in government as a former
war hero. For bridges. For reconstruction of roads. For anything that
could bring back, even for just a month or a year, stability to a district
or side.

"It was like fighting a guerilla war of engineering," he told Finch
once. "I'd rebuild it. Someone else would smash it."

Finch believes that being found out was a kind of relief for his father.
To give up the exhaustion of playing sides against each other. Of having
to find work. Of having to be so secretive. Being a fugitive didn't weigh
on him as heavily.

Thinks about this as he struggles with the mystery that is Duncan
Shriek.

Is Duncan Shriek the dust, coming down across a century, that will
kill him?

ould be a twin. Could be a great-great-grandson. But wasn't.

Finch walked up the stairs to his apartment, holding the two
books. Rath had tried to get him to stay longer. As if she didn't want to
be alone with what she'd found out. But he had to be alone with it.

Still at a loss. You could plod along for years thinking you were
holding on, that you were doing okay. That you might even be doing
a little good. Then something happened and you realized you didn't
understand anything. A sudden shuddering impulse for Sintra that he
understood was reflexive. Wasn't real. Was about forgetting. Even
though he needed to remember.

The stairs seemed to go on forever. Like a throat swallowing him up.

Finch had shielded Rath from his confusion. Asked her to do more
investigative work. Suggested there was a rational explanation. Even
though he didn't believe it. Even intimated he knew something he
couldn't share.

How long until Heretic knows? Maybe he already knows.

He came to the seventh floor. Saw that his apartment door was
open a crack. Which drove Duncan Shriek from his mind and brought
Stark back. Stark and Bosun. Unless it was Sintra?

Would she have left the door open?

Strange, how calm he felt. Had he played out the scenario of intruder
in his mind too often to be surprised?

Finch placed the two books on the floor. Took out his Lewden Special
and released the safety. Nudged the door wider. Saw the gray and black
silhouettes of his living room furniture, the kitchen beyond, and the window
directly ahead of him. A hazy green-white light came from outside.

No one there.

No sign of anyone having been there.

Maybe they'd already left.

Maybe he'd forgotten to close the door. Not likely.

Slowly, Finch entered, sighting along the gun's barrel. Still felt like
ice water ran through his veins. Saw even the darkness in preternatural
detail.

Stood to the left of the window. In the shadow of bookcases. Listening.

Heard someone breathing in the next room. Someone moving around.
What if it is Sintra?

Decided to wait there. Let whoever it was come out into the living
room. Now, finally, his heart pounded. Images of mistakes flashed
through his head. Of Sintra with a bullet hole through her forehead.
Or Wyte.

The bedroom door opened. Out came a shadow. Finch couldn't see
the face. Couldn't see a weapon, either.

"I've got a gun. Stay where you are, or I'll shoot," Finch said.

The shadow stopped, quick glance toward him. Then ran for the
window.

The window?

Already moving forward, Finch squeezed the trigger. The roar of the
Lewden Special. A thick splintering sound from the bookcase opposite.
He'd missed.

The figure leapt. Closing the distance, Finch leapt with him. A circle
of green light had appeared. Rimmed with fiery gold. Shot through
the middle with purest black. The figure went through the circleand Finch went too, slamming into the shadow's back. Grabbing hold
of the shoulders. Gun still in his hand.

The blackness extended. Past the floor.

Gasped, screamed. Overcome by the sense of falling. Held on to the
figure, which was trying to throw him off. Finch's face felt like it was
burning. The blackness was absolute.

Falling into the throat of a skery. Falling into nothing. Falling
through the window. To their deaths. His stomach kept dropping and
dropping. He kept screaming and screaming.

And still they fell.

Nothing lost.

All lost.

I: Why do you hate Partials?

F: I don't hate them.

I: We all have a job to do.

F: I don't like cameras.

I: Where did you go during the party?

F: Nowhere. Home. I went home.

I: You were seen on the street after curfew. By a Partial.

F: It was someone else. No. No. Please. Don't! [sounds of weeping] I
didn't go anywhere. I don't remember.

I: Who was it? Stark? The Lady in Blue? Bliss? Someone else?

F: All of them. None of them. Doesn't matter what answer I give. Your
answer is always the fucking same.

I: 1 can make you remember.

ight. Blinding him. They both fell heavy and sprawling across
some unforgiving surface. Gun skittered out of his hand. A
shooting pain in his left leg, ribs. Cried out. Lost his grip on the man's
shoulders. Every scrap of skin crawled. As if he'd passed through a
cloud of hornets. Spasmed for a moment, his muscles not obeying his
commands. Brain on fire. Worse than the skery. Came to rest gasping.
Rough stones with something soft between them. An intense clapping
sound rose up. Faded.

The other man rolled to the side. Started to get up. Finch reached
out. Caught a booted foot. Pulled the man back down toward him. He
opened his eyes just a slit against the terrible light. Saw the man's face.

"Bliss! Bliss!" Finch hissed. Still in the grip of darkness. He dragged
Bliss closer as the man kicked, struggling to get free. Jumped on top of
him. Punched him in the kidneys. Once. Twice. Three times. Knuckles
aching. Bliss grunted. Finch delivered an elbow across the face, through
Bliss's guard. Bliss went limp. Saw the man's eyelids flutter, his eyes
almost roll back into his head.

Finch got up, staggering. What did you do to me? Keening. Kicked
Bliss in the ribs. A bark of distress and Bliss curled onto his side.

Meant to launch another kick, but was brought up short. The
ground around them had caught his attention. Dull red tiles. Yellowgreen weeds thrusting up between them.

Looked up. In a sudden panic, he realized that the terrible light
was the sun. He stood in the middle of an empty courtyard. A rusted,
crumbling fountain. Blank azure-amber eyes of some long-dead hero
astride a rusting horse. Mottled brown fish spouting air beside him.

Above the wall facing him: the looming white dome of one of
the camps. Took a quick glance behind. The green shimmer of the two towers just visible through an archway leading out. A flock of
pigeons circling. The clapping sound.

He was between the Spit and the Religious Quarter.

On the other side of the bay from his apartment.

The sun was out.

In the middle of the night.

Finch began to shake. Fought down nausea.

Said, gasping the words, "What the fuck did you do, Bliss?" Almost
couldn't stop saying it. Taste of grit in his mouth. Skin still twitching.

Bliss raised his head, still on his side. Through blood-greased teeth:
"Don't be frightened. We went through a door. Like any other door."

Finch kicked Bliss again for that. This time he didn't cry out, just lay
there. Found his gun. Squatting beside Bliss, Finch shoved the muzzle
against the man's left cheek. Forced Bliss's face against the stone.

"Answer my questions. Answer them without any bullshit," voice
calmer than he felt.

This wasn't the first time he'd put a gun to someone's face. But he
was threatening a man who, in his former life, had made speeches
and led parades. A man now reduced to snooping in apartments
after dark.

"I'll answer them! Stop hitting me." Startling bloodshot white of
Bliss's eye trying to look up at Finch from that extreme angle. Face
already darkening with bruises like a stormy sky.

"Get up," Finch said. He pulled the smaller man to his feet by one
arm. Looked around. Two exits. The archway behind him. Another
on the far side. Didn't trust the broken windows blinding him with
the sun. Anyone could be watching.

Finch dragged Bliss into the darkness of the nearest archway. The
contrast of shadows after the extreme light almost left him blind
again. Black sunspots everywhere.

Pushed Bliss up against a whitewashed wall turned gray. Bricks
exposed through the mortar like dark red teeth in a rotting mouth.
Got close to Bliss so he could force the gun under the man's jaw.
Pinned him to the wall with a fist wrapped around his shirt collar.

His hands were steady now. Shock hadn't set in yet. Maybe it never
would.

Bliss was wheezing from the pressure of the Lewden Special against
his windpipe. Trying to swallow.

"Now. Tell me what just happened." He eased up on Bliss's throat.

Bliss coughed. Managed, in a hollow voice, "Like I said, nothing to
panic about. We just went through a door."

Something switched on in Finch. Stark threatening him. Heretic and the
skery. Falling through darkness with Bliss like moving through the doors on the
Spit, like traveling through the gullet of a skery large as a behemoth.

Smashed Bliss across the face with the Lewden. Felt a satisfying
give as metal met flesh and laid open Bliss's right cheek. Bliss made
a sound more like surprise than pain. Began to slump but Finch held
him up. Blood flowed down the side of Bliss's face. Spattered onto his
shoulder. Another puzzled sound. Like he couldn't believe Finch was
doing this to him.