“You’re gonna wanna back off, Doc,” Alice said, with a thoroughly unpleasant smile. “We’ve got a real friendly working relationship at the moment. I’m sure you have the best intentions, but you aren’t coming off very well right now. Push any further and I might start asking all sorts of questions. I don’t need to say anything more, do I?”
Dr. Graaf pulled his arm free of Mr. Windsor’s grasp, glaring at both of them.
“Very well,” he snapped, straightening his jacket and tossing aside his mangled cigar. “There is no need for us to continue. I understand the situation – and my place – very well now, thank you. Let us act as if the matter had never been raised, then, shall we?”
“An excellent idea,” Gerald agreed with a smile. “I think that would be for the best.”
“Then, if you do not mind, I have some pressing business in the Biology Lab that I must attend to,” Dr. Graaf said, making a curt bow and then turning his back. “Do enjoy the rest of your evening.”
Alice Gallow and Gerald Windsor watched him leave in silence, Alice staring after him while Gerald smoked thoughtfully.
“Okay, Gerald,” Alice asked, once she was sure he was gone. “What the fuck was that?”
“Old ghosts,” Gerald Windsor answered, an expression of melancholy briefly crossing his face. “How much do you remember?”
They both knew what he was really asking – how much she read from her diaries. But Alice appreciated his diplomacy nonetheless.
“Very little,” Alice admitted. “I was bluffing. Mostly rumors and a bad feeling he gives me.”
“Ha! Well played, Miss Gallow. I would never have suspected.” He paused to tamp down the contents of his pipe before continuing. “Paul Graaf was one of the most brilliant students the Academy ever graduated. Along with Vladimir and the Director, he was instrumental in a series of experiments that violated a number of the basic tenets for experimental science in Central – while simultaneously pushing nanite-related science forward further than any individual on record since the Founder.”
“You mean – Gaul and Mitzi’s implants?”
“Indeed,” Gerald confirmed. “He and the Director were responsible for the physics and the biological work that led to such procedures, while Vladimir provided the engineering and surgical expertise. The result of their experiments were the implants you mentioned – along with a number of unfortunate deaths. The Board demanded an Audit, and all three received reprimands. Paul took it the hardest, and resented Gaul for accepting the punishment so readily, and then recovering from it so quickly. He tends to put people off...”
“I noticed that.”
“Gaul’s advancement through the ranks was, at worst, slightly delayed. Vladimir’s talents were indispensible, and he enjoyed Gaul’s protection. But Paul Graaf could never let go of the implantation experiments, admit guilt, and move on. He didn’t agitate against the ruling, but he made it very public the he disagreed, which held back his advancement, despite his revolutionary work with the Ether and inanimate materials – the same work that eventually led to that amazing power plant, by the way. His attitude and his status as a political liability kept him from gaining a position at the Academy. Instead he joined a floundering mini-cartel in the Hegemony, and transformed it into the genesis of what we know today as the Far Shores.”
“Huh. Not as bad as I was prepared for...”
“What I have told you already are the facts. The final part of the story, however, is mostly, shall we call it, informed speculation.” Gerald Windsor tapped the burning embers of his pipe onto the sand, then ground them out with the heel of his shoe. “A few years after the formation of the Far Shores, another cartel in the Hegemony decided to start applying their own radical eugenic precognitive theories on their children...”
“Oh, fuck,” Alice moaned, putting her head in her hands. “Thule, right?”
“Yes.” Gerald’s voice was unchanged, but his expression was troubled. “They started screening potential Operators, and hording nanite injections for the ones deemed most exceptional. Naturally, this led to a reduced membership and an extraordinarily high death toll in their cartel, but the Operators who survived were extraordinarily powerful, capable of operating multiple disparate protocols. Now, if one simply provides an Operator with multiple nanite injections, not only are the results unpredictable, they are very often fatal. While the Thule Cartel had a high mortality rate, it was not nearly as terrible as modeling predicted. And the survivors, when examined, appeared to have received implants – similar in theory but radically different in design from the one residing in the head of our beloved Director. An Audit was decreed, but a source for the implant technology was never discovered. The Thule Cartel avoided being declared Anathema, and, though no blame was officially cast in their direction, the Far Shores membership in the Hegemony was severed, and they were relocated to their present-day facility.”
“Shit. That’s...fucked.”
“Yes. Rather.”
They both regarded the blank sky in silence.
“Gerald?”
“Yes, Alice?”
“I’ve been over Alistair’s notes, and all the records, but I’ve never understood. How did the Thule Cartel avoid being declared Anathema? It seems like a textbook case...”
“I’m afraid I can’t answer that question. Because I don’t know myself.”
“Hmm. I see.”
Gerald tucked his pipe back into the narrow wooden case he carried in the inside pocket of his jacket.
“If you are curious, though, I can offer one piece of advice.”
“Which is?”
“If you really want to know the answer to the question, as well as how the Far Shores came to be what they currently are, then I would suggest you take your question to the architect of that particular solution...”
“What? Oh. No.”
“Yes, I’m afraid so.” Gerald Windsor smiled at Alice, but there was no joy in his expression. “You will have to ask the Director, Alice.”
***
“There you are,” Alex said, taking a seat beside Eerie on a log that had been dragged to the vicinity of the fire pit to serve as crude seating. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“Me too,” Eerie said, nodding and offering him a wrapped package on a popsicle stick. “Here.”
“Um. Okay.” Alex took the paper-wrapped ice cream from her. “And this is?”
“An ice cream bar.”
“Oh. Thanks.”
Alex started to unwrap it without enthusiasm. He was half-drunk already, and ice cream didn’t really sound that good on a cold beach, even with a roaring fire nearby.
“It’s not for you,” Eerie corrected. “It’s for me.”
“Ah. Then, why did you...?”
“I need you to eat the chocolate off the outside.”
“O-okay. But, ah, why?”
“Because I don’t like chocolate,” Eerie explained, shaking her head. “Alex is stupid.”
“Oh. Right.” Alex finished the process of removing the wrapper and tried to figure out exactly how to remove the chocolate shell without disturbing the ice cream beneath. “You don’t? I mean, I thought you loved candy...”
“Not all candy. Chocolate is gross. And bad for you. Margot...Margot said it made you fat.”
Alex left aside the question of why Eerie would worry about fat, when she seemed to consume a diet made up entirely of refined sugar, and wanted the ice cream portion of the frozen treat. Actually, he decided not to bring up the dead vampire girl either. It was a sore subject to say the least. He had approached it poorly in the past, and had not, as of yet, devised a method he was totally certain would be respectful to address it.
Which was too bad. Because sometimes he felt that one of the things he and Eerie truly shared was a mutual sense of loss over Margot.
After a few abortive experiments, Alex settled for cracking the chocolate coating with his front teeth, causing large chunks of it to break off, whic
h he ate because it seemed wasteful to simply dump them on the sand. The chocolate was cold and tasteless, with a waxy texture.
“You are wearing your hat,” Eerie observed shyly. “It looks good.”
“I like it,” Alex said, pausing to swallow a mouthful of lackluster chocolate. “Thanks for rescuing it.”
“I’m glad you like it.” Eerie’s strange voice was hardly audible over the crackling of the fire, and she clutched her hands between her legs, her skirt just long enough to preserve her modesty. “Alex, can I ask you something?”
“Sure.” He finished peeling the chocolate off, returning to Eerie a rather naked-looking rectangle of white ice cream. “Whatever you want.”
“Do you – do you like it here?”
“At the Far Shores?”
“Yes.”
Eerie licked the side of the ice cream bar like a popsicle, which struck Alex as a very peculiar way to go about eating it. He considered saying something, but decided that it was really none of his business. His gaze drifted off to the roaring fire while he answered.
“I guess it’s okay. It’s not…not like the Academy. I mean, Katya’s here, but I don’t have, you know, friends here or anything. It’s not as fun, I guess – though I don’t really have too many classes, either. Just training. So that’s a bonus. Why do you ask?”
“Um, no reason.” When Alex glanced at Eerie, she had a precariously leaning bar and ice cream on her nose. “It’s just…that doctor guy. He told me that I could stay here, if I wanted.”
Alex was startled by the suggestion, but Eerie didn’t notice his expression, as she was too busy attempting to consume the remainder of the ice cream before it melted off the stick. He didn’t trust Dr. Graaf – and not just because of Katya’s unrelenting suspicion. There was something vaguely off about the Far Shores, and the way Dr. Graaf had stared at Eerie after she rescued his hat from the Ether.
“Would you want to do that?”
“Don’t know,” Eerie said, licking the last of the ice cream from the stick. “Maybe. We could spend more time together.”
She looked at him hopefully, while he tried to compose a response that would convey his unease without sounding like he was rejecting her, or trying to hide something.
“Huh. That would be…well, wouldn’t you miss the Academy? I mean, I do, and I haven’t been there half as long.”
“Dummy,” Eerie scolded, tossing the stick into the fire. “Maybe that’s why.”
“Oh. Yeah. I guess that…that makes sense. But, I don’t know…”
“Alex.” Eerie slid closer to him on the log, so that their legs were touching, her bare leg against his jeans. No matter how many times he saw it, Alex was still puzzled by Eerie’s resilience to the cold. “Do you not want to see me more often?”
“No, that’s not it,” Alex said forcefully, shaking his head. “Not at all. It’s just…this isn’t a nice place, Eerie. And I’m not sure…”
He found himself avoiding her dilated eyes, staring at the fire instead as it crackled and hissed. On the other side of the pit, Haley and Min-jun were feeding more unnecessary logs into the fire, chatting and looking a bit tipsy. Eerie took his hand with her mitten and waited.
“I’m not sure I like what I do,” Alex said finally, not entirely sure where the words came from. “Working for Audits, I mean. I’m not sure I would want you to see more of that.”
“Why?”
“I’m…I’m not proud of it. I’m not always sure that we are doing the right thing.”
“Like what?”
Alex shook his head, trying hard not to remember the body floating in the sea off the coast of China.
“I can’t, well, I’m not supposed to talk about it. It’s secret, or whatever. But I’m sure you can guess, right?”
Eerie nodded slowly.
“If you don’t like it, then why do you do it?”
Alex shrugged.
“Because someone has to, I guess. Because I can. Central took me in when no one wanted me. This is my home. And I want to be…useful, I guess.” Alex frowned, trying to put words to something he didn’t fully understand himself. “I don’t know. That sounds all wrong.”
“I get it.” Eerie squeezed his hand. “Nobody wants to be useless.”
“It helps that I’m not entirely hopeless at it. And the Auditors are important. I didn’t really understand that until the Anathema made it to Central.” Alex rubbed his forehead with his free hand, trying to figure out exactly what the fuck he was trying to say. “They hurt people I cared about. For a while, I thought they hurt you.”
“Alex – do what you need to do. But do it for yourself.” Eerie patted his head affectionately. “I don’t need protecting. I don’t need you to save me.”
“I know. Damn it, I know. I haven’t forgotten. It’s just, doing this, it feels meaningful, like I’m doing something worthwhile. I wouldn’t want you to be part of it, though. You’re better than that, Eerie. Whatever you do, it’ll be a lot better than the violence of the Audits department, I know that much. Anyway, the time I spend with you, away from this shit, is what keeps me sane.”
Eerie kicked her heels against the log they were sitting on, staring into the fire with her mad eyes. Alex wondered what she was thinking, the way he always did. He wondered if he would ever achieve any real understanding of her, of what went on in her head. Probably not, he figured – particularly when he didn’t even understand himself.
For perhaps the first time, Alex wondered how much responsibility he bore for the strangeness between them.
“You don’t want me to come here, then?”
“Not for me. Not unless you want to.”
Eerie was silent for a moment. Then she leaned her head against his shoulder.
“That,” she said quietly, “was a good answer.”
Alex blushed and grinned at the same time.
“I miss you, you know?” Alex blurted out the words. “All the time.”
“I know.”
Eerie held his hand tighter, and they remained that way, watching the fire, for what seemed to him like a long time. Then she stood up partway and leaned in to whisper in his ear.
“Alex, do you want to take a walk on the beach with me?”
Alex took her hand and followed her into the darkness, away from the twinkling lights of the Far Shores.
***
Dr. Graaf was seething, though there was no way anyone could tell simply by looking. He had the same pleasant, nonspecific expression that he always wore, but inside, he could hardly contain the raging anger that consumed his thoughts. He let himself into the deserted administrative building and headed directly to his own office, the lights turning on automatically as he activated the motion sensors, then going dead a few moments later as he passed.
It was hard to believe – no, that wasn’t entirely true. He had fooled himself into believing that things at Central had changed, that the years of selfless work he had performed at the Far Shores would have created a certain amount of positive feeling toward him, or failing that, at least mitigated the distrust with which he was viewed. Clearly, however, that wasn’t the case – Rebecca Levy, Gerald Windsor, Alice Gallow – they had all forbidden him from even asking the Changeling if she would care to assist him in his research. And on what basis? Because of an experiment that was a product of his youth!
There was no justice in the world, he thought, gritting his teeth behind his placid expression. Gaul and Vladimir bore equal responsibility for the implantation experiments, and one was at the pinnacle of Central’s power structure, while the other ran the science division at the Academy. Yet here he was, in unofficial exile at the very fringe of Central, viewed with suspicion despite everything he had done since. It wasn’t even as if the implant experiments had been a total failure – Gaul had been the first patient, after all, and he was the Director. Even Mitsuru Aoki was an Auditor, despite the crimes she had committed!
It was personal, he decided. It must
have been. He had taken pains to be certain that his professional record had been spotless, since that early unfortunate misstep. His accomplishments since had certainly rivaled those of Gaul and Vladimir – hadn’t he solved the power quandary that had choked off Central’s growth since the time of the Founder? His pioneering work in materials science and Etheric application was the basis for the entire infrastructure of Central, but he was looked upon with suspicion nonetheless.
Before he even reached his office to discover the lights already on, Dr. Graaf had made up his mind. There was only so much a man could take, after all, before he had to accept the reality of his position, and act accordingly.
Fourteen.
“What I am even doing in Kiev? I don’t speak Russian.”
“Ukrainian,” Miss Aoki chided him, clinging to Alex’s arm for balance on the icy ground, made even more treacherous by the unlikely red stilettos she wore. “They speak Ukrainian in Kiev, Alex. At least, they do since Euromaidan. As you should recall from the briefing, at the moment you do speak Ukrainian. One of the telepaths implanted it in your brain before he deployed. I should have had someone implant the ability to walk in these shoes.”
“What? No way,” Alex said doubtfully, tugging fitfully at the neck of his tie. “I can barely speak English.”
“I know,” Miss Aoki responded sourly. “You and Rebecca both sound as if you were raised on one of those reality TV shows she loves. For the sake of argument – tell me, what does that sign say?”
Alex looked at the unintelligible mass of Cyrillic characters. Or, at least, he had expected them to be unintelligible.
“Holy shit,” Alex said quietly, amazed. “It says ‘Restaurant and Bar’!”
The Far Shores (The Central Series) Page 37