Finch

by Jeff VanderMeer

  Low on ammo. They kept shooting it, and it kept taking the bullets.

  Knives out. Finch shouted the order to fix bayonets. Down to four. Against one. Reminded them not to let the bayonets get stuck in gray cap flesh. It would reel them in, finish each of them off. But, still-one man's rifle got stuck. Forgot to let it go. The gray cap jerked him forward, disemboweled him, then turned, stung by fresh cuts from all sides. Down to three men. Flesh sloughed off its body, but no blood. It did not wince. Kept shouting in its language. Sometimes mixing in human words. In a hissing, sibilant voice.

  They kept at their task. Too busy to be afraid. Too busy to scream. Inside, its flesh was black, accordioned. Crossley saw as he came in close at its back. As it bit and kept biting another man. Finch brought his hunter's knife down across the back of the gray cap's leg. Felt the blade cut through something hard and thick. He pulled it out, taking a wedge of black flesh with it. The gray cap limped away. No longer as agile. A snarl. Finch and the others shot it in the face, the chest, the arms, the legs.

  Still, it kept coming. Dancing in and out, its face a discolored mess. Eyes peeking out from the ruined flesh. Crossley lunging, driving his blade deeper into the leg as it turned to face one of his men. Dashed out as the creature tried to turn.

  There was a give, and a wash of purple blood.

  He stood back. Saw the gray cap standing on one leg.

  “Murderers,” the gray cap crooned. “Murderers. In our city.”

  Crossley wanted it dead in that moment. To shut it up. Caught in a blood lust so primal that the enemy looked fey and beautiful in the moonlight. Distant and removed from what they were doing to it.

  Now they converged, the three of them. It couldn't evade them. Did it weep as they tore it to pieces? Did it make any human sound to make them stop? No. All it did was stare up at the hard stars as if they were but an extension of its eyes. Arms hacked and pulled off. Cut at. Peeled away. Tossed to the side. The red of its leg. While still it stared. While a cloud of spores erupted from the top of its head, puffing away, disappearing. Hacked, too, at the torso until there was just a head attached to a wreckage of neck. Still the thing smiled. Still it seemed to live. The reflexive life of a gecko's tail.

  Now they cursed and sobbed. Unable, as the bloodlust left them, to understand how they had been brought to this. How they could have done this. Even as they still wanted to kill it. Screaming. Shouting. Not caring if an enemy could hear them. Just wanting to keep on killing it until it was dead.

  Finally, they burnt it, until it was just dead eyes laughing, asking if it had been worth it.

  Soon even that burst into spores.

  Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

  4

  othing remained of Finch when he was done with Wyte. Not really. Blood or something like blood drenched him. His left hand gripped the sword tightly, the guard thick with gore. Wyte wouldn't get a funeral. Wouldn't get much of anything. He'd already begun the short, sharp process of becoming one of the forgotten. Nothing anybody could've done to save him from that.

  Finch's left shoulder sang with pain from the blow Wyte had given it. Left knee unsteady from having his legs taken out from under him. Toward the end. One last reflexive lunge from a creature that didn't want to die. The whole time it had felt like it was happening to him. His steps were heavy from the weight.

  The sounds had been horrific. Something had lived inside of Wyte. When it came out, Finch shot it. Then sliced it apart as it squealed. Was it part of Wyte? Was it the remnants of Otto? Finch didn't care. He had just wanted it dead. Wanted to make sure Wyte wasn't coming back.

  No relation to the family man and husband Wyte had once been, before the Rising. No correlation between his life then and his death now. Something crazy. Something beyond prediction. Never sat on the stoop of Wyte's former house, drinking out of his silver flask, and said, casually, “You're going to turn into a monster, Wyte, and I'm going to kill you with a ceremonial sword forged by the Kalif's empire.”

  Would the resurrection of Duncan Shriek be the opposite of this? Better or worse?

  The phone rang inside Wyte's apartment as Finch was leaving. He hesitated. Went back inside. Closed the door. Locked it.

  The phone was in the kitchen. He avoided looking in the comer. The stillness was oppressive. The smell thick, physical. Had to pull his shirt collar to his nose.

  Picked up the phone with his bloody hand. Waited.

  “Hello. Finch?” Stark. Almost cheery.

  “What do you want?”

  “You sound a little shaky. What's wrong?”

  “What do you want?”

  Realized then that Stark's people had followed him there. Told Stark where he was. And that Stark knew Wyte's phone number.

  “It's not what I want,” Stark said. “It's what you want. And, apparently, you want me to keep hurting you. Apparently if I keep hurting you more and more, I'll get what I want.”

  A barking laugh from Finch. “The city's fucked. The Spit's destroyed. The towers are almost done. Whatever you want won't matter in a day or two.”

  “My dear Finch, that's exactly my point. You need to tell me everything you know-by the end of today. Otherwise, don't waste your breath lecturing me about the state of this shitty city,” Stark said in a silky voice. “Because what you should be worried about is: we could've gotten to Sintra easily enough. If you don't reveal all by nightfall, she's dead.”

  The same Sintra who betrayed me to the rebels. The one who is still in my head, fucking up my thoughts. Giving me this pain in my chest.

  “But you didn't get to Sintra yet,” Finch said. “Which means you don't know where Sintra is.” Any more than I do. Finch's voice had risen to a shout. The back of his throat hurt. Every part of him hurt. How had Stark known Wyte's number?

  A long, low laugh. “Finchy, I want whatever's in that apartment with Shriek. Today. So make it happen. Or Sintra's next. Or Rathven. I don't care which. Look what we did to Wyte. True, he was almost there already. We just gave him that final push. Want to know how? Look around before you leave. Maybe on the counter, maybe in the sink. Just take a look. Get a sense for just how desperate your friend really was. And who you're up against.”

  “There's nothing in that apartment but Shriek,” Finch said.

  “Then bring me Shriek,” Stark said.

  Finch hung up.

  Hated himself for looking, for taking Stark's suggestion. Found nothing on the counter. Nothing in the sink. In the garbage under the sink, though, he found a small white envelope and a note.

  In an embellished script, the note read, “Take these, Wyte. They'll help. As promised. Love, Stark.” Inside the envelope, the crumbly remains of something fungal. Something that hadn't helped Wyte at all.

  Forced himself to imagine it. Wyte. Terrified by the quickening change. Making a deal to trade information, even though Finch had warned him against it. Wyte maybe thinking that giving Stark some of what he wanted would take the pressure off of Finch.

  Then Stark had given Wyte some kind of mushroom he knew would drive Wyte over the edge. The note was dated two days earlier, so that meant Wyte had come back to his apartment two straight nights. Looked at Stark's note, the possible solution. Trusting it. Not trusting it. Desperate for something that might save him for a time. Driven to it by the gun battle. Driven to it by every careless, cruel comment by his supposed friends, Finch included. Wyte, too embarrassed, too ashamed, to tell Finch what he'd done. How stupid he'd been. Even at the end. Especially at the end.

  For a moment, Finch's self-disdain was boundless. Threatened to bring the ground crashing in on him.

  The phone was ringing again. Finch ignored it.

  Blood dripped down from his hairline into his eyes. His blood. A claw must've caught him in the scalp as Wyte was shifting from shape to shape near the end. Wiped it away. Went back to what remained of Wyte. Wasn't much. Already beginning to rot. But he rummaged in his jacket pocket. One last thing he had to do now. It wou
ldn't change anything. Not really. But it might, in the end, satisfy his sense of justice.

  Now it was time to take care of Stark.

  Ambergris Rules. Take out the immediate threat.

  Two hours later, Finch was done. He pulled the curtain back a sliver. Looked out with one eye shut against the glare. Dazzling sunlight. The grainy gray of the wall and a curving narrow strip of archway. Showing the street beyond. Weeds between sidewalk tiles. A row of dank, rotting warehouses on the other side. A lone tree. Crooked and bare of leaves.

  If he had watchers, they'd be impatient by now. They'd have to come in closer. Especially if they had another reason.

  Took out his gun. Fired a single shot into the room behind him. Lodged in the wall next to the kitchen. The sound was loud, like the others had been. Now they'd heard him with Wyte. Seen him come out, then go back in. Heard the shot. Followed by silence.

  That might be enough to bring them.

  Thirty seconds passed. Then two men came into view on the sidewalk. Dark clothes. The bulge of weapons under their jackets. Tallish. If Stark had a team on him, say four, they'd split up. Two would keep watch outside. Another one would walk up to the door, with the fourth covering him from the wall. Or they'd have one on the back window. Except Finch had checked the back, and there was no cover. Just a long, narrow alley filled with parts from motored vehicles. No one watching from what he could see poking his head out. Too dangerous. They probably didn't know the area, either. Might not even realize there was a back window. Beyond the narrow alley lay a taller building, more apartments.

  They'd be coming right about now. Imagined he could hear footsteps. He went into the bathroom. Stood on the toilet. Hoisted himself up and through the window, ignoring the ache in his shoulder. Dropped into a crouch in the alley. Surrounded by worn tires and metal viscera. Everything but the motored vehicles themselves. Smell of rubber. Distant smell of oil. The long, tall wall of the building next door close enough to reach out and touch. No one watching. Unless they waited out of sight.

  Gun drawn, heart beating fast, he made for the far end. The slice of blue sky above. The dull gray-brown of the buildings beyond. Made it, peeked around the corner. No one. Ran parallel to Wyte's apartment complex, into the streets beyond. Doubled back until he was looking around a corner at the wall of archways that hid Wyte's apartment.

  Just in time to see, in glimpses, broken up by the wall, a man come out the front, walk down the corridor. Short. Muscular. Looked oddly burnt. Then another man came out from around back, where Finch had just been. Taller, thinner, bald. Weapon out. Finch drew back into the shadow of a stoop until the man was safely past a line of sight where he could see Finch.

  The shorter man was now clutching at the front of the taller man's jacket. But the taller man gave way, and suddenly the shorter man was down on his knees, being sick into the ruins of the garden. Wyte had made an impact.

  A hand signal from the taller man brought the two lookouts to their side. A quick conference. A few nervous gestures. A head bowed in exasperation or pain or some emotion Finch couldn't interpret. Either way, they'd lost their man and now had to report their failure back to Stark.

  After a few moments, they headed off down the street, away from Finch. With as much stealth as possible, he followed. Erring on the side of too much distance between them rather than too little. Until the streets around them began to get more crowded. Mostly former camp prisoners. Still wearing their uniforms. Some had crutches. A few bandaged around the head or arms. Most with that pinched, withdrawn look around the eyes from hunger, stress, or worse. Birthmarks they'd picked up in the camps shone mossy and bright.

  They made it much easier. Buried. Following.

  As he walked, Finch saw hints of Wyte in the faces of passersby. It sustained his anger, and his grief. Living against the odds.

  Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

  5

  tark was using a mushroom house as his headquarters. Off of Aquelus Street. About a half-mile from Albumuth Boulevard. About a mile from Wyte's apartment. Maybe a little more back to the station. Positioned so Stark would also have a straight shot, as straight as he'd get, back down to the Spit. A route that meant nothing now.

  Using a mushroom house hinted at a rough genius in Stark, and a kind of insanity. It was three stories high. Light green with striations of metallic blue that gave it an ethereal sheen. Except for the tendency of the walls to curl and curve, the windows to flutter without a breeze, it shared a close resemblance to the normal houses on either side.

  Finch stood on the opposite side of the street. Four houses down. Hidden by the stoop behind him and in front by a few high bushes with leaves shaped like shovels. An F&L neighborhood before the war. Protected from the worst predations of the wars. A quiet street. Little foot traffic. The mushroom house had probably scared people off. Or Stark's people had done it.

  The men he'd followed had gone in. A few minutes later, Stark and Bosun had come from the opposite direction. They stood for a moment on the steps in front of the house. He couldn't hear what they were saying, but it sounded violent, like flames or swords. Then they went inside. He'd been waiting ever since. Going through the options. No way he could storm the house by himself. There were no guards at the front door, but that would've drawn too much attention. They'd even left garbage and debris out front. Let the fungus overgrow everything in sight.

  He could just see the shadow of two men sitting back from the windows on the third floor. More men inside, of course. Possibly in the house opposite, on Finch's side of the street. Watching. Finch didn't particularly care. You could defend whatever position you wanted, but if the enemy hit you somewhere else, you were still fucked. He cared more that most of Stark's men would be muscle bought after he'd arrived. Take care of Stark somehow and many of them wouldn't be too keen to hunt Finch down. Too busy looking after their own interests.

  An hour later, Stark and Bosun emerged from the house. With the short man who'd gone into Wyte's apartment. The tall man who'd come out the back. Headed his way, on the other side of the street.

  “You never gave me up, Wyte. I'll never forget that.”

  “I can't control myself anymore. There's not much of me left. The rest might fight back. But I don't mean it if I do.”

  Quick and neat is how he wanted it. But that's not quite how it went down.

  They passed by his position. He ran out firing, the sound so loud it shocked him. Put the bodyguards down. One shot in the chest, crumpling into oblivion. The other from a leg wound, blood spurting out. Screaming. Spasming.

  Bosun turned at the same time as Stark, in time to get clipped in the shoulder. Registered extreme surprise, but recovered. Took off running, hunched over, cursing.

  Bad luck. Finch didn't have time for another shot. Stark had about gotten his gun out. Finch smashed into Stark, twisted the gun out of his hand. Then hit Stark across the face. Saw the pain and anger as Stark bent to one knee.

  “Bosun!” Stark shouting it like an order.

  Slammed Stark against the side of the head. Started to drag him away as the other two lay on the ground. Grunted with the strain of Stark's bulk. Stark muttering, trying to get his senses back. Couldn't see where Bosun had gotten to. Had to get off the street quick.

  A bullet kicked up dirt near his feet. Turned with Stark partially shielding him, the weight more awkward than he anticipated.

  Bosun was across the street. Using a lamppost and a pile of junk for cover.

  “Let him go and I won't kill you!” Bosun shouted. Had a gun in each hand. And not shitty knockoffs. Looked like custom-made revolvers.

  Stark, muttering: “Go ahead, Bosun. Take the chance now.”

  Finch pulled Stark up. Shoved his Lewden Special against Stark's head. Other arm around Stark's waist. The man was still dazed.

  “I'll kill him,” Finch shouted back. “I'll kill him right here.”

  “You'll kill him anyway!” Bosun, anguished.

  Backtracki
ng toward the alley. Hoping nothing nasty waited there. Stark's weight awkward, hard to control. Didn't want to fall during this crude shuffle. Bosun would be on him in an instant.

  Bosun fired off a couple of shots over his head. “You're a dead man if you hurt him.”

  Could already hear a commotion coming from the mushroom house. It had all happened in a couple of seconds. But Stark's men were good.

  “Come after me, and I've got bullets enough for both of you, you bastard!” Finch shouted back.

  Made it to the alley. Got off a couple of rounds to keep Bosun back.

  The alley split into three directions just a hundred feet back. Hustled Stark around a corner. Pulled Stark's left arm behind his back. To the point of breaking as Stark groaned. Shoved the muzzle of his gun under the taller man's chin.

  “Just keep going. Keep walking.” Didn't want to talk. Didn't want to hear.

  Guided Stark through a welter of back streets as confusing as any number of doorways on the Spit. Until they were far enough away that Finch felt comfortable stopping. Bosun didn't know Ambergris as well as Finch. And he'd know he had to be careful looking for his brother.

  Finch released Stark face-first against a plain brick wall on a tiny side street. Windowless walls of fire-scarred buildings, rectangular and unimaginative. Crowding out the light from above. Stairwells running up their sides like rusting spines. Water on the pavement. A leering shelf of pink fungus jutting from the wall a couple inches from the ground. Stark's boots had cut into that ridge, the fungus staining the leather.

  Stark started to talk. Finch came at him from the side. Punched him in the kidneys. Stark crumpled forward, air driven from his lungs. Wobbled, regained his balance. Breathing heavy.

  “If you've killed Bosun, I swear ...” The verbosity had left him for the moment. As if he'd been playing a role.

  “Your brother was coming after me the last I saw. With just a nick in his shoulder. But you've got worse problems.”