by Graeme Hurry
Leveen glanced at the desk, which was covered with research papers, monographs and collections on Flesh manipulation. Two manuscripts caught his eye: “The Ethics of Flesh Manipulation: Does the Gabel Risk Factor Matter?”, unpublished as far as Leveen could tell, and an opinion piece for The Gentry Herald, criticising Professor Principal Dr Anak Gabel’s remarks in an interview he had given to The Herald on the third of Sunspawn.
“Does my work interest you, Inquirer?” Leveen started at Serin’s voice, glanced behind him to find her dressed in a tailored black suit, a long wool overcoat. She was pulling a pair of black leather gloves over her hands. There was a hint of a smile on her face.
“You don’t approve of Gabel’s research, I take it, Doctor?” Leveen remarked, collecting himself.
“‘Approve’ is the wrong word, Inquirer,” Serin’s smile lingered, “We work in the same field. In fact, he supervised my doctoral thesis.”
“So these papers?” He gestured at the manuscripts.
“Professional disagreement,” she said after a pause. “Gabel believes that all forms of Flesh manipulation with a high Gabel Risk Factor are immoral. It is why he is opposed to the Flesh Exploitation Bill. I think that the Risk Factor and morality have nothing to do with each other.”
“So you are in favour of the Bill?” Leveen looked surprised.
“I did not say that.” Serin shrugged. “I could not care less about legislation, and I do not think Gabel should either.”
After a few moments of thought, Leveen fixed her with a long, satisfied stare. “Well, that’s a pity,” he almost tutted. “Right now he is examining the work you did on Miss Bekin’s body. I imagine professional disagreement will make this a good deal more difficult when you meet him.”
He watched her smile disappear.
They stepped out into the poorly lit hallway that connected the flats on this floor of the building. There was an odour of mildew. Old newspapers, discarded post and crumbling plaster littered the floor. At the far end of the hallway furniture had been stacked and covered with a dusty sheet. An eviction notice was fastened to it, most of the writing faded with age.
Serin’s boots crunched over the plaster as she walked; she was reminded of beetle husks and thought of her laboratory as a doctoral student. Beetles, flies, spiders, worms—her work was much simpler back then. She closed her eyes at the memory and could not say if she missed it.
A motorised carriage waited outside. A small cabin, assembled out of Crywood panelling and carrying the Council seal, was suspended within a series of interlocking rods, springs and pistons. Two large wheels swept above the sides of the cabin and a smaller one was fastened to a steering mechanism at the front. A low ticking, almost clockwork sound came from a collection of tubes, pipes and grills welded to the suspension. A cluster of Kishek flies flittered around it like angry dust motes.
Serin lingered before climbing into the carriage, watching the insects. When she was a student, test subjects were still fed to Kishek flies. A large swarm could devour a human body in minutes. Back then it was less illegal than incineration, and cheaper than using acids, but it was difficult to watch.
“Doctor?” Leveen leaned out of the carriage.
“Yes, of course.” She climbed in.
* * *
The motorised carriage came to a halt on the outskirts of a small yard. A door swung open and the cabin rocked inside its suspension frame as first the Council Guards, then Serin and finally Leveen stepped out. Serin surveyed the scene.
Dawn brought a light rain that covered Arwall in a grey film. The buildings were sweating, the effluvia from the industrial districts trickling down the walls, collecting in the gaps between the cobbles, dribbling into rusty drainage grids. An area in one corner of the yard had been cordoned off by several barriers with “Official Investigation—Keep Out” painted on them in thick black font. An inspector stood just outside this area, interviewing someone and occasionally making notes on a small pad of paper. Another inspector, within the cordon, was hunched over two bodies, gently prodding one of them with a gloved hand. Next to her squatted Anak Gabel—Serin recognised him instantly—gesturing at the bodies and explaining something to the inquirer, who nodded slowly. One of the bodies was naked and straddling the other, hands gripped firmly about the latter’s neck, but otherwise collapsed in a heap. It looked, Serin noted, very much like when she had removed the Flesh wards on Bekin’s body last night: a discarded sack of flesh. Several figures huddled under umbrellas at the far end of the yard. As soon as they sighted the carriage, they rushed towards it.
Leveen winced and motioned to one of the Guards. “Get them out of here. I was hoping we could keep the newspapers away from this until we got our story straight,” he glanced at Serin and sighed, “Nothing for it now. After you, Doctor.”
While the Guards pushed the surging figures back to the far end of the yard, Leveen and Serin made their way inside the cordon. There was a stiffness and deliberateness to her movements that betrayed her anxiety.
The inspector that crouched over the bodies stood up and looked Serin up and down with barely concealed hostility. “Doctor,” she nodded, but made no move to offer a hand.
Leveen gestured at the bodies. “Go over the details for us, please.”
“We believe the Doctor’s body here,” the inspector flicked a thumb at the naked corpse, “got up from the table at the station morgue at around two in the morning, smashed through one of the windows, walked here, found Mrs Urona Sornik,” she pointed at the other body, then down an alley, “who was making her way back from a bar down there, pushed her to the ground, straddled her, strangled her and then collapsed in a heap. We found them as you see them. Plenty of witnesses, so can’t really do much about it.”
Leveen rubbed his jaw meditatively. “Any thoughts?”
“The working hypothesis—although it’s pretty much established—is that during the examination at the station last night Doctor Serin used a Flesh ward with a high Gabel Risk Factor, Miss Bekin’s body retained some of the—how do you say it—re-a-ni-ma-tro-pic,” she separated out the syllables, “force from the ward, and earlier this morning, driven by this force and a memory of what Mrs Sornik had done to Miss Bekin, her body found and strangled Mrs Sornik,” she paused and glanced at Anak Gabel, who merely nodded. “Professor Gabel tells me this is a textbook case of illegal Flesh manipulation.”
Serin crouched down beside Bekin’s body. Under the sheen of rain the skin had started to yellow with decay. Slowly, she stretched out a gloved hand and ran it across Bekin’s arm, watching the water drip from the body and collect in the creases of her glove. “Yes,” she nodded.
“Yes?” Leveen was incredulous, “Am I to understand, Doctor, that you intentionally conducted illegal Flesh manipulation?”
“Yes,” Serin answered simply.
“And the risks?”
“I was aware of the risks, Inquirer.” Serin felt that, now that she knew what had happened, she could detach herself from it. Her anxiety had gone.
“Then why?” Leveen gestured, almost helplessly, around him.
Serin did not reply. Leveen looked from her to Gabel, who looked on impassively, back to her. After a few moments, he said, “Fine. Here is what’s going to happen. There is an emergency Small Council session in one hour. I have to provide a statement about this. They will want a full report tomorrow. You will come with me to provide that report, Doctor. By that point you will have a full account of what you did and why you did it.” He turned to Gabel, “Professor, please oblige with a written statement of your professional opinion by tomorrow as well.”
Serin watched Leveen walk back and climb into the carriage, the door swing shut, the engine exhale a plume of viscous smoke and the carriage disappear down one of the streets. Presently, she felt a light touch on her shoulder.
“Can we talk?” Gabel was reaching for her hesitantly. He looked uncomfortable, frightened even.
Serin’s calm cracked. She
brushed away his hand with barely concealed disgust. “We have nothing to talk about.”
“You must realise I understand why you did it,” he said, his tone suddenly urgent. “Maybe you were pressured or bribed, but that wouldn’t have mattered. You were curious.” Imagining that he sensed an opening, he quickly added, “I still know you, Yana.”
Serin did not reply. She looked down at Urona Sornik’s body, wet and crumpled under the weight of the naked corpse straddling it. Its eyes, blue and bulging from the pressure of the two hands clasping its neck, were wide with surprise. They glittered in the rain like glass beads. She watched a Kishek fly land on the right eye, knead its legs, scuttle into a tear duct, where the rain collected in tiny pools of dirty tears. For a moment Serin seemed to stoop—exhaustion, struggle and isolation seemed etched into every muscle—then, just as quickly, collected herself.
“This is collateral,” she said, gesturing at the bodies, “But it is my responsibility. I would ask you to make that very clear in your statement to the Head Inquirer.”
Gabel shook his head. “It’s a complicated question. We know the body retains some semblance of consciousness and free will when it’s manipulated, so it’s moot whether the manipulator or the body carries responsibility for its actions.” He tried to affect sympathy. “You don’t need to feel guilty for this.”
“I do not,” she shrugged. “But I am responsible. There is a difference.”
Gabel ran a hand through his hair. “Look, I’ll smooth this over with the Council. My opposition to the Flesh Exploitation Bill has made things difficult, but my name still carries some weight and it’s an easy sell: poor earnings from freelance work, pressure from wardens, scientific curiosity—”
He stopped short, realising his mistake. He could almost feel the contempt radiate from her.
“This is the first time we have met in ten years,” she said, and it was plain that she was struggling to keep her voice level. “And you offer me patronage after all that time of burying my work?”
“Decisions are taken by panels, Yana,” he was almost plaintive. “Your work just wasn’t good enough, I’m sorry.”
“You sit on every one of those damned panels as the pre-eminent expert,” she almost spat. “Do you think I am a fool?”
He said nothing for a time. Eventually, he motioned at the two bodies. “So this is revenge then?”
She almost laughed this time. “No, this was an experiment. Flesh memories are difficult to invoke; I wanted to see if I could do it.”
They stood in silence for a while, and then she left him and walked back to the flat. There, many hours later, stacks of papers, books and manuscripts rested within a small cone of yellow light from a table lamp. Serin sat in the reclining chair by the window, just outside the light. She watched twilight settle over Arwall. It looked like a fire had been lit behind a wall of fog, but its edges bled and ebbed into the silhouette of the city, slowly melting to nothing. After a while, she slipped into a fitful sleep.
* * *
The Arwall Council building was an inverted pyramid of white stone, glass and bronze. It swept up in tiers, with clusters of cubical shapes hiding small windows set into metal frames. Serin stood inside a large circular chamber that was somewhere in the centre of the pyramid. There were several floors above and below, and layers of corridors and rooms around it—a security measure—but a series of mirrors gave the impression that the streets were immediately outside. Serin swept her gaze across the black silk tapestries, the glass lamps set into silver brackets at even intervals, the long polished Palawood table that curved around one side of the room, the chrome and leather chairs, to the protesters and wardens reflected in the mirrors. She could make out the muffled noise of violence, and there were banners. Someone had stitched “Family is not Flesh” onto one; someone else had responded “Flesh is not Family”. The newspapers had reported that the happy wife of a well-respected merchant had met with a brutal demise at the hands of the Flesh-manipulated body of her husband’s mistress, and the social conscience of the city now manifested in small groups of protesters in the streets.
Presently, Serin heard someone in the room clear their throat; she glanced back at the Councillors. They looked very much the same—ageing men in black suits with black cravats and cold, cruel, capable faces—she could not say which one had tried to draw her attention.
“Doctor Serin,” one of them said. He was seated in the centre, eight of his colleagues to either side. Serin remembered that he represented the Borough of Shalebridge, the part of the city that housed Kayle Factories, Worrin and Sons, Sotton Supplies. “Your views are difficult. But our concern is for interests of the inhabitants of this city, and we believe your views fit those interests.” He paused, letting the significance of his words settle in.
Serin hesitated. Her face creased into a frown. “You would like to make a deal.”
The Councillor raised his hand slowly and deliberately. “Don’t be naïve, Doctor. We will dictate some terms; your choice will simply be whether to accept them.” He leaned forward, removed a monocle and rubbed beneath his eyes wearily. He could have been reading a sanitation report, for all that his gestures, posture, tone or expression suggested. He was as accustomed to this as Serin was not.
Eventually, she said, “What are the terms, Councillor?”
“Naturally, you might consider them distasteful,” he shrugged. “But I’d like you to remember that it is an opportunity you would not otherwise have, Doctor.” He looked around at his colleagues, who nodded slowly, some of them clearly dozing, others absorbed in paperwork.
“We would like you to Implicate Professor Anak Gabel in Miss Bekin’s case,” he continued. “If you refuse, we will have to follow due process and you will end up in Arwall gaol. If you co-operate, there will be a position for you at the Free Research Institute.”
Serin was suddenly appalled by the banality of the blackmail, the routine boredom with which it was being conducted. She thought back to her conversation with Gabel yesterday morning. She told him that she had not acted in revenge, and yet here she was with an opportunity to exact it. She would have delighted in the irony, if it had not reduced a decade of scientific labour to political play.
“Why?” she asked.
“Yes, I suppose you are entitled to that question.” The Councillor sighed, clearly irritated. “You must be aware that the Flesh Manipulation Bill would legalise procedures with some very high Gabel Risk Factor scores. Reanimated manual labour, infantry. Professor Gabel has been a very vocal and active opponent of the Bill, and his voice carries a lot of weight.” The Councillor shrugged. “Your views are compatible with the Bill.”
Serin studied him carefully. This had been planned and the initial steps had already been taken, she realised. The rift between her and Gabel was not public knowledge, but it was known, and the transcript of her failed Principal Doctorate examination, which Gabel presided over, could be easily obtained. It was no accident that she had been asked to reanimate Bekin, and no accident that Gabel had been called to examine her work. She wondered if he suspected what he had set in motion. And how much else had been orchestrated: the deliberate brain rot that necessitated the invocation of a Flesh memory, the murder even? One so easily slipped into conspiracy theories.
Serin sighed, glanced at Leveen, who was sat behind and to her left. He was watching intently, but gave nothing away in his expression. It was not clear if he had been involved in planning the blackmail, or just ran errands for the Council.
“I need time to think about this, Councillor,” she said at last.
“You have until the end of the day, Doctor. Unfortunately, the newspapers have a great deal less patience than we do.”
Serin was led out of the Council building through a back exit, to avoid the protesters. Even so, as she walked, she could hear their shouts and the occasional whistle blown by a warden. A while later she saw a motorised carriage, similar to the one that had collected her the day bef
ore, but in a carapace of thick steel plates, scuffed, scratched and dented by stones and other missiles. It was towing a hand-operated water cannon that trailed a fine line of sludge through the streets from a leaking hose. Later still, she passed Council Guards in riot armour marching in the direction she had come from. They carried rifles with Crywood handles that were polished to a dark greasy sheen from frequent use. Serin wondered how frequent; how many had been maimed or killed with those rifles? And then suddenly, with immediate clarity, she realised that she had misunderstood the deal she had been offered. If the Council could order Arwall’s citizens to be shot in the street, it could certainly arrange the removal of an academic, however senior. The question before her was not whether she could bring herself to end Gabel’s career, but whether she could bring herself to be involved in its end. A subtle difference, and yet all the difference in the world.
* * *
“Gabel’s ethics tell us that we should always consider the Gabel Risk Factor when we decide whether a particular Flesh manipulation is morally permissible. If the Risk Factor is sufficiently low, then, all other things being equal, the manipulation is permissible. If the Risk Factor is too high, the manipulation is impermissible. The problem is that neither Gabel nor any of his followers have been able to define what “sufficiently low” or “too high” mean. In reality, they have appealed to their own pre-conceived morality when making their decisions. That is no way to design an ethics; we must reject arbitrary distinctions. So let us say that if some Flesh manipulation is permissible, then all is. And if some Flesh manipulation is impermissible, then all is. Of course, we already believe that some Flesh manipulation is permissible, so we should believe that all is. So now I come to answer your question, sir: do I believe that the Flesh Exploitation Act is ethical? Yes I do, for the reasons just outlined.”