Finch

by Jeff VanderMeer

  “A long shot.” But he admired her for having a process.

  “Yes. At the same time, I also started checking names from the past thirty years with what city records still exist. But I didn't get far.”

  “Why?”

  Rathven leaned forward, balancing on two chair legs. “Because I came across information about one of the names on the list. Someone who lived in that apartment a long time ago.”

  “Who?”

  Rathven said the name. It meant nothing to him, but rang in his head like a gunshot.

  “Duncan Shriek,” he repeated. “Who was he?”

  “Good question. It took some research, but I thought I'd heard the name before. Not sure where. I had to borrow a couple of books to find out.”

  “And?”

  She seemed reluctant to answer, which made Finch reluctant, too. As if he needed her to go slow to protect himself. From a feeling that had begun to creep up from his stomach. Tightening his chest.

  She sucked in her breath, continued: “And I did-I found out a lot about him. Shriek was a fringe historian. He had some radical ideas about the Silence. About the gray caps. They wouldn't seem radical to us now. They'd seem mostly right. But by the time anyone would've been able to see that, he was gone. Disappeared. Over a hundred years ago.”

  Suddenly, Finch felt disappointed in her.

  “What's the connection to the here and now? How does this help me?”

  Rathven leaned back again. “Take a look at the two books on the table.”

  The feeling in his stomach got worse. Finch looked at her. Looked at the table. Back at her. Straightened in the sofa chair. Picked up the books gently. Felt the dust on his hands. Turned to the title page of the first. Shriek: An Afterword, written by Janice Shriek with Duncan Shriek.

  “Janice? His wife?” A strange emotion was rising now, unconnected to the feeling of dread. A formless sadness. A watchfulness.

  “No,” Rathven said in a flat tone. “No. His sister.”

  “Is it fiction? Nonfiction?”

  “A kind of memoir by Janice with comments by Duncan. She was an art gallery owner. A major sponsor of many artists back then. She went missing, and so did her brother. Both around the same time. But it's the other one you really need to look at.”

  Finch put down Shriek: An Afterword, picked up the other book. “Cinsorium & Other Historical Fables,” he read. “By Duncan Shriek.” Felt a twinge of irritation or resentment. Couldn't she get to the point?

  “Look at the inside back cover. Of the dust jacket,” Rathven said.

  Turned to the back. Found the author's photo staring out at him. A confusion overtook him that snuffed out rational thought.

  The man could've been forty-five or fifty, with dark brown hair, dark eyebrows, and a beard that appeared to be made from tendrils of fungus.

  “Fuck.”

  The man laughed again. Blindingly, unbelievably bright, a light like the sun shot through the window. The night sky torn apart by it.

  The photo was ancient. Stained. Falling apart. But it didn't lie. The face in the back of the book matched the face of the dead man in the apartment.

  Lightheaded. Cold. He sat back in the chair, the books in his lap. Cinsorium closed so he didn't have to look at the photo. Never lost.

  “When did he live there? Show me the entry.”

  Rathven reached down to get the list. “It's already folded right to it.” Handed it to him.

  SHRIEK, DUNCAN, OCCUPANCY 17 MONTHS, 5 DAYS, 15 HOURS, 4 MINUTES, 56 SECONDS-WRITER AND HISTORIAN; LEFT SUDDENLY, DISAPPEARED AND PRESUMED DEAD.

  “That's impossible,” Finch said, letting the list slither out of his hands to the floor. “That's impossible.”

  Felt exposed. Vulnerable like never before. The semi-automatic at his side was no protection at all. Stark, lips drawn back in a leer. Bosun and his psychotic carvings. Bliss as a young F&L agent staggering across the Kalifs desert. A dead man talking to him, flanked by a cat and a lizard.

  Rathven nodded. “It's impossible. But it's him.”

  The books felt too heavy in his lap. “Or his twin. Or his great-greatgrandson.”

  “Do you really believe that, Finch?” Rathven asked.

  “No.”

  No, he really didn't. Not in his gut.

  Suddenly, the double murder had a sense of scale that expanded in his mind like Heretic's list. A timeline almost beyond comprehension.

  How to escape this?

  I am not a detective.

  He understood Rathven's look now.

  Haunted.

  Being haunted had started for his father during the war against the Kalif's empire, in the engineering arm of the Hoegbotton army. Something had gotten into his lungs during that time. The doctors at the clinic, toward the end, still couldn't find a solution. Something about dust. Different kinds of dust. Dust from the road to empire, thousands of years old. Dust from the retreat. Dust from trying to hold Ambergris together. Dust from betraying it.

  Earlier on during the campaign there had been a feeling of optimism, a heady confidence. House Frankwrithe had been beaten back to Morrow. The gray caps seemed once again in decline, and because of the war effort Ambergris now had a powerful military.

  As his father had said once, “They didn't want it to go to waste. And they feared that the young officers might be too ambitious left at home. And there was this kind of claustrophobic restlessness hard to understand now, perhaps. People wanted to be part of Ambergris, but to be out of it at the same time. They felt cramped, hemmed in-and the eastern flank of the Kalif's empire was so close, and the Kalif spread so thin, defending all of that territory. It was too tempting. Too easy.”

  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 himsel
f 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?

  Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

  8

  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.

  Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

  THURSDAY

  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.

  Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

  I

  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 Fi
nch 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.

  “You already said it was a door, Bliss. Tell me something new.”

  Bliss's head drooped toward his chest. Finch slapped him lightly.

  “Stay with me, Bliss,” Finch said. Released his grip on Bliss's collar. “Here.” Handed him his handkerchief. “Keep it.”

  “Thanks,” Bliss said, with more than a hint of something deadly behind the words. He held the handkerchief to his face, the graywhite soon soaked with red.