Now Heretic’s message vibrated atop writhing tendrils.
Finch leaned over. Grabbed the pod. Slimy feel. Sticky.
Tossed the pod onto his desk. Pulled out a hammer from the same drawer where he kept his limited supply of dormant pods. Split Heretic’s pod wide open. Spraying slime.
Beside Finch, Wyte winced, got up for some coffee.
Disgusted, or was it too close to home?
“There’s no pretty way to do it, my friends,” Finch called out. “Just look away.” No one acknowledged him this time. Too usual. Even Finch’s refrain.
In among the fragments: a few copies of a photograph of the dead man, compliments of the Partial.
And a message.
Pulsing yellow. An egg of living paper. He pulled the egg out of the shattered pod. Began to massage it until it spread out flat. Kept spreading, to Finch’s surprise. Then began to unspool. Like a long, wide tongue. And kept on growing.
That was unusual enough for the other detectives to gather round.
“What in the hell is that?” Blakely asked, Gustat beside him. Dapple shyly peeked over Blakely’s shoulder. Albin and Skinner were out on a call or they’d have been right there too. Anything to waste time.
“Looks like Heretic’s given you a long to-do list,” Gustat said. Too young to have known anything but war and the Rising.
Finch said nothing. By now, the pliant paper had grown to drape itself over both sides of Finch’s desk, sliding into his lap. Clutched at it. Saw the rows of information in the reed-thin, spidery print common to gray cap documents. He let out a long, deep breath.
“It’s the records of everyone who ever lived in the apartment of the double murder I was at this morning. Going back…” He checked as the paper finished unspooling. “Going back over a century. More.”
Pulse quickening. How am I supposed to investigate that?
MORDEN, JONATHAN, OCCUPANCY 3 MONTHS, 2 DAYS, 11 MINUTES,
5 SECONDS—WORKED IN FOOD DISTRIBUTION IN THE CAMPS …
WILDEN, SARAH, OCCUPANCY 8 MONTHS, 3 DAYS, 2 MINUTES, 45 SECONDS—NEVER LEFT THE APARTMENT EXCEPT FOR GETTING FOOD. HAD THREE CATS. LIKED TO READ …
* * *
A sudden panic. Smothered by the past. Lost in it.
Tried to get a grip. Wadded the paper up, pocketed the photographs. While the other detectives gave out nervous laughs. Returned to their desks. Frightened again.
No one wanted this kind of case.
A sudden anger rose in Finch. Did Heretic really think that this list would be helpful? It was scaring the shit out of him.
Wyte had been standing behind the others, holding his coffee mug. Loomed now like an actor from backstage, suddenly revealed.
“A lot of information,” Wyte said.
Finch glared at him. Hands splattered with yellow and green. “Find me a towel.”
Wyte put down his coffee, rummaged in a desk drawer.
SILVAN, JAMES, OCCUPANCY 15 MONTHS, 3 DAYS, 1 HOUR, 50 MINUTES, 2 SECONDS—COLLABORATOR WITH A SPLINTER REBEL FACTION …
HUGHES, SHANNA, OCCUPANCY 1 MONTH, 2 WEEKS, 3 DAYS, 10 MINUTES, 35 SECONDS—KILLED BY A FUNGAL BOMB …
“Maybe they got it from the old Bureaucratic Quarter?” Wyte whispered out of the side of his mouth as he leaned over to give Finch the towel. Smell of sweat mixed with something sweeter. “Maybe they just copied it down?” Returning to his desk, receding into the background.
“It’s half encrypted with their symbols, Wyte,” Finch said. Tried to correct for the disdain in his voice. “It contains surveillance information. They collected it themselves.”
From underground. Using a million spore-eye cameras. Somewhere, he knew, in one of a series of images captured by the gray caps: evidence of his past that Heretic didn’t know about. Finch as a Hoegbotton Irregular fighting against Frankwrithe & Lewden in the War of the Houses. Finch standing side by side with F&L soldiers against the gray caps before they Rose. What he’d done.
Except the gray caps didn’t have the time to pore over that many images unless given a good reason. And Finch hadn’t. Only Wyte knew the truth.
GILRISH, MEGHAN, OCCUPANCY 10 MONTHS, 3 WEEKS, 6 DAYS,
14 HOURS, 15 MINUTES, 6 SECONDS—OWNER OF A GROCERY STORE …
BARRAN, GEORGE, OCCUPANCY 2 YEARS, 1 WEEK, 5 DAYS, 7 MINUTES, 18 SECONDS—DIED OF OLD AGE …
Finch stared at the first rows of names on the paper. The sheer density of information defeated him.
Kept thinking about the bodies. Saw them lying there on the floor of the apartment. They dropped in out of thin air.
Why there?
A riddle wrapped in a puzzle. Perversely comforting, that the memory bulbs might hold the answers.
Never lost.
Bellum omnium contra omnes.
Never lost.
Said it three times under his breath. Wondering if Wyte was staring at him. Still didn’t dislodge an answer.
“Well,” Finch said, out of the corner of his mouth, “do you know what those words mean? Bellum omnium contra omnes?”
But Wyte was done talking to him about the case.
Sometimes the overlay of reality seemed a sham. One day, he would turn a corner on a rubble-strewn street. Pass through an archway into a courtyard. Be back in that other, simpler world. When he worked in the same building but as a Hoegbotton courier. Not as a detective. When he worked for Wyte, not with him.
Am I dead? he thought sometimes, walking down that green carpet he remembered from a different city, a different time. Am I a ghost?
* * *
Six in the afternoon. Time to leave. He packed Heretic’s list in a satchel and holstered his miserable gun. Watched Blakely and Gustat put on spore gas masks “just in case.” Just in case of what? Just in case there’s one fungus in the whole damn city you haven’t been exposed to yet?
A nod. A handshake or two. Muttered goodbyes to Wyte. Then they dispersed. The night shift would arrive soon. Partial patrols outside started in only two hours. Curfew. Gray caps lurking. You rarely saw more than one, but that was one too many. A detective’s badge might help or it might not.
The others headed north, up Albumuth. Wyte was a hulking shadow hanging back at the rear. Finch went south, but not home. Not yet. First, he had to pick up the memory bulbs from the crime scene. But he also had decided not to trust the Partial. Wanted to interview some of the residents of 239 Manzikert Avenue himself.
A different route than that morning. Late-afternoon sun like dark gold against brick walls. The street sloped on an incline before following a gentle curve downward. Tight high walls of shoved-together tenements and lofts. Hoegbotton territory, before the Rising. Finch brushed by a man or woman covered up in robes. Another person ducked into a doorway, face made a question mark by an old gas mask that might or might not keep spores out. Stain of blue-green lichen in the gutter. A rancid quality to the air.
Faintest hint of the bay from the cross street. Mostly obscured by mansards and rubble. Glimpse of the two towers. Did the sky match? Or was it darker between the towers? Had a bet going with the other detectives about the purpose of the towers. To dull the fear.
A hint of shadow moved behind him as he rounded a tight corner. It made him cautious. It made him paranoid. He stopped a minute later. Pretended to tie his shoe. Managed a backward glance. Nothing.