Tangle's Game

by Stewart Hotston

  ‘I’m okay, I’ve been flying all day.’

  ‘For sure,’ said Ule. ‘I want to start by saying that you’re although you’re a person of interest to me, you’re not under suspicion of being a threat to European security; nor am I interested in detaining you.’

  ‘Sorry?’ started Amanda. ‘Who are you exactly?’ She waved her hands in mock apology. ‘It’s just that my flat’s been mistaken for Piccadilly Circus today and we should finish up before the next set of visitors arrives.’

  ‘I work for European interests.’

  ‘European interests,’ repeated Amanda back at her, not sure what it meant. ‘What exactly are “European interests”, and why should I answer your questions if you won’t tell me? More to the point, why are you here?’

  ‘You were sent a package whose contents threaten stability across the Eurozone. Except it wasn’t delivered how everyone expected. Tangle took precautions.’ She was telling Amanda more than she needed to.

  Ule picked up the book and Amanda thought her heart would burst out of her throat. She flicked through the pages without mentioning the giant hole carved out of the centre and returned it to the table.

  ‘By now you’ve got to know what’s in your hands. I’d really like to take it off your hands and make it safe, before someone else comes looking for it. We want that no-one uses it.’

  Amanda shifted awkwardly on the other side of the table.

  Ule didn’t flinch or frown. ‘I’m late, you are home several hours later than I expected. But at least those two meatheads who assaulted the concierge weren’t destined for your flat; I was worried I’d be breaking the door down to secure the package from them.’

  ‘I’m still not sure what you expect me to do. I have a whole bunch of confidential material here and access to a lot more. I work for a bank. What exactly do you want from me? As much as I like your shoes, that’s about as familiar as we’re going to get.’

  ‘I want the information Tangle Singh sent to you. Assuming you haven’t already given it away.’

  Amanda thought about it. Ule was a much easier prospect than Crisp, with his psychotically calm satisfaction with violence.

  ‘You know I’d not cross the road to help him, right?’

  ‘What does that matter?’ asked Ule. ‘He sent you something whose importance you don’t understand. Whether you’re a jilted lover, some self-important bitch working in sales for a large international bank, or both, a rational person would see it’s got nothing to do with them. It’s all about the information.’

  ‘Which whoever holds profits from,’ said Amanda, stung.

  ‘Or perhaps we’re just trying to stop someone else profiting at our expense,’ said Ule.

  ‘Half the Union’s at war with the other half,’ said Amanda. ‘One of the lessons I’ve learnt in dealing with powerful people is that you don’t take anything they say at face value.You’ve all got an agenda, you’re all angling for something you’re not telling us.’

  ‘Just like everyone else,’ said Ule, her voice shortening the words as she grew visibly agitated, her fingers lacing and unlacing. ‘The separatists won’t win. The Union is bound to itself, no one can break it apart.’

  ‘You wouldn’t think that from the bombings and riots. Have you seen Milan? Amsterdam? I was half a mile from the last one. I heard the explosion. I was one of those who ran away.’

  ‘We’re not the English, we won’t allow the narrow-minded to break us apart. We’ve not forgotten what happens when you let the populists win.’

  Amanda laughed. ‘Twenty years ago we thought the same thing. Now look at us, backs turned to you and desperate for an America broken in two to uphold world trade rules while it’s burning people alive on street junctions in Texas and California because they were on the wrong side of the divide when the second secession hit.’

  ‘I’m going to have to ask you to give me the package Singh sent you,’ said Ule, pushing at the book with her fingers.

  ‘I’m going to have to refuse,’ said Amanda. If she could deny Crisp, she could turn Ule away as well.

  Rolling to the balls of her feet, Ule came away from the wall and gave Amanda a look of distaste.

  ‘I don’t want to take it from you. You don’t want me to have to do that. Please, give me the package. I’m being true to you when I say I am the best option you have; that I’ll keep it safe.’

  ‘We have a problem then,’ said Amanda. ‘Because I have no reason to give it to you.’

  ‘This is frustrating. I thought you’d understand.’ She stepped away from the wall, coming around the table toward Amanda, who backed away, carving out an awkward dance.

  ‘You’re going to take it,’ stated Amanda.

  Ule nodded. ‘Where is it?’ Gathering her back foot, she shuffled forward without seeming to move, closing the gap with Amanda until they were close enough to kiss. ‘One last chance. Tell me where it is.’

  Amanda tried to step away, but the kitchen counter was at her back, pressing into her flesh. She reached behind her, fingers searching the surface for a knife, a fork, a cup, anything she might use to defend herself.

  Ule reached out, her hand finding the inside of Amanda’s biceps and pinching hard. All the strength went out of her, the pain sudden and intense. She grunted with the shock of it.

  ‘Please,’ said Ule. ‘Give me what I want and I’ll be gone and you’ll have made the world a better place.’

  ‘The world I want doesn’t have people like you in it,’ said Amanda through teeth that didn’t want to part. Ule pushed, forcing Amanda away from the counter. She scanned the surface, perhaps expecting to find the package there, but quickly returned to Amanda.

  ‘The world has always had people like me.’ Amanda could see Ule was more frustrated than angry, that she wasn’t dismissing her, that her concerns lay elsewhere. ‘It’s not as if you’ve ever done anything to help others.’

  The sense of accusation, of blame, cut through the pain of her grip.

  ‘Perfect life, perfect credit score, perfect social score. Trusted, rich, educated and privileged. The world burns around you, but you’re alright, so why feel anything for someone else?’ She fixed Amanda with a stare. ‘Have you ever been passionate about anything? Have you ever been angry at the world?’

  Amanda shook her arm but Ule’s grip didn’t waver. ‘How dare you? What the fuck do you know about me? You think some file compiled by an AI tells you what I’ve faced? What I’ve had to do? I’m a woman. In banking. I’m brown, but only on the outside. I get Indians demanding why I don’t speak Hindi, others outraged I don’t speak Urdu. White people don’t look past the skin colour either. I exist in the liminal, stuck between two worlds who can’t see how I exist as I do, both demanding I become what they expect when they see me.’

  The pain stopped and Ule stepped away, around her, checking the kitchen draws. ‘Seems to have done you no harm,’ she said, not paying Amanda proper attention. ‘No glass ceilings. Maybe people aren’t as bad as you think.’

  ‘You don’t get to judge,’ said Amanda firmly. ‘Not me. Not my choices.’

  Ule stopped, looked at Amanda. ‘Says who? Why shouldn’t I? Even if I believe you, what have you done about it, except make sure you’re alright? Did you drag anyone up with you? Did you challenge the culture? What possibilities have you shown others?’ Phrased as questions, delivered as accusations.

  And Amanda had no answers.

  ‘Give me the package.’ Ule abruptly grabbed Amanda by the hair, a fist full of it, enough to pull her head down and smash it against the granite worktop. Amanda’s vision closed up, blurred and refused to come back into focus. She would have fallen down, but Ule’s grip on her head kept her upright. Blood ran into her eyes and she struggled to swallow, her breath coming in gulps.

  ‘I really hate this,’ said Ule, beating Amanda’s head against the granite a second time before letting her fall to the floor.

  Amanda lay staring at the white ceiling as she co
ughed, trying not to move. Ule moved out of sight, rifling through one of the draws, then came back into view.

  A potato peeler was hung just above Amanda’s eyes. ‘Have you ever peeled your finger by accident?’ Ule asked before straightening. ‘The pain is extraordinary for such a minor injury.’

  Amanda started to whimper.

  ‘Just tell me where you’ve hidden it and I’ll go.’

  Amanda wanted to hurt her, for the pain to stop, but most of all she wanted to find a way to defy Ule. She shook her head, hearing her own moan at the pain.

  ‘Really?’ asked Ule, her voice full of a corroded surprise. ‘I’m going to start with the back of your hand, then move onto your face if you are still not convinced. Imagine now what it will be like to arrive at work and see people staring at you. They tell us that how we look doesn’t matter, but how many women are on your quant desk? How many in structuring? Or are you all in sales?’

  Ule crouched down, picking up Amanda’s unresisting arm and resting her hand on her own palm. ‘This isn’t going to hurt straight away. Your body won’t know what’s happened. It’s going to feel cold, then you’ll get this strange sensation of your hand being open; it’s an odd feeling. After that it won’t matter, because all you’ll remember is pain. That’s when I’ll start on your face. In the end, you’ll give me whatever I want. You could still give it to me now.’

  Nothing. Amanda closed her eyes, thought of a programme she’d watched on mindfulness where a guru had talked about how to ignore any kind of sensation. She pictured herself on a beach, walking, the feeling of sand under her feet, tried to imagine each and every grain as it passed between her toes and stuck to her soles.

  A pulling sensation on the back of her hand, like someone had pinched her, then a raw chill, like static, or the total white of a snowstorm.

  ‘Don’t do this,’ she said.

  Ule didn’t respond.

  She didn’t need to. Amanda felt as if the back of her hand was open. She wanted to scratch the skin, to rub it, wipe away the wetness she could feel. The chill was replaced slowly by heat without differentiation across the back of her hand. The heat grew until it was enough to make her cry out but it didn’t lessen, it only increased, persistent and without mercy.

  ‘Tell me where you hid it,’ said Ule, her voice gentle, her free hand caressing Amanda’s forehead as she writhed against the fire of her hand.

  ‘Miss Back answered you already,’ said Stornetta from the hallway. Behind him Amanda made out Haber, heard his feet stamping on the carpet.

  ‘Who are you?’ asked Ule, pulling away from Amanda.

  ‘I ain’t choosing fucking curtains with you, I’m telling you to leave. Now.’

  Amanda rolled onto her side, bringing her injured hand up to her chest. A small slice of skin an inch wide and half inch long had been taken from the top of her hand. The flesh underneath was exposed, raw as steak, bright red and glistening, blood beading into pools as she watched.

  ‘You alright there, Amanda?’ asked Haber.

  A sound of something moving through the air, a smash of crystal against a wall.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ burst Stornetta as Ule charged straight at him, following closely behind the vase she’d thrown.

  Amanda pulled up onto her knees, backed into the kitchen before levering herself up to her feet by the sink. In the time it took to do that, Ule had managed to floor Haber and was throwing savage jabs at Stornetta’s face.

  The brute had hands up in a boxer’s defence, taking her punches on his forearms but falling back into the hallway. Haber ran at her from behind. Sensing his approach, Ule ducked down, kicking out a leg that connected with his knee, knocking him sideways into a cupboard against the wall.

  Stornetta took the opening and flung out a booted foot. Ule flinched, but wasn’t quick enough to avoid him, his kick glancing off the side of her face. She spun away, but didn’t fall into a heap. She rolled with the blow, rising back to her feet, a little unsteadily, but with space between her and the two men.

  Amanda grabbed one of the mugs she’d washed out, her mind telling her to throw it at Ule’s head but her body refusing the command; a soldier uncommitted to the fight. She expected them to talk again, but they moved in silence, slowly, deliberately, reading one another, watching their space, their stance.

  Haber drew a long knife, simple and functional, from the band of his trousers at the small of his back. Stornetta inched back into the room, going left along the wall but keeping his distance.

  Haber’s knife led him toward Ule. He held it like a tennis racket, thumb resting along the top of the blade. Finding his measure, he slashed at Ule, who leaned back at the waist as the blade whistled past her chest.

  Haber tried again, his eyes fixed on her, his body flailing as it filled the space of a man twice his size, but Ule was just out of reach each time.

  Amanda saw a smile on Ule’s lips, an expression of immense satisfaction. She followed the third slash with a twist of her own body, her hand coming to rest lightly on Haber’s wrist. She followed through on her turn, and Haber was suddenly falling forwards, out of control and off-balance. Ule curved into the movement, her elbow arcing up into his nose with a wet cronk. A bend of Ule’s hand forced Haber’s hand backwards against its normal range and the knife went flying from his fingers.

  Amanda watched all this, mouth open, mug held absently in her fingers.

  Stornetta wasn’t so stunned. Coming up behind Ule he swept out his arms and gathered her up into a massive bear hug just as she raised a foot to stamp down on Haber’s baffled face.

  Her legs spasmed but she couldn’t wriggle free. She went still as Stornetta leaned in to whisper something in her ear. As he did so she snapped her head forward, then with an awful-sounding crunch back into his face. The two of them collapsed to the floor.

  Ule climbed back to her feet to find Haber, blood streaming from his nose, standing between her and Amanda.

  The two of them prowled around each other, one step right, one step back. Stornetta was rolling on the floor, hands on his face.

  ‘Get up, you fecking eejit,’ said Haber.

  Ule looked down at Stornetta, then back up at Haber. Turning on the balls of her feet, she ran out of the kitchen, down the hallway and was gone.

  Haber held his pose, as if worried she might come flying back like some avenging banshee the moment he let his guard down.

  ‘Fucking fuck,’ said Stornetta over and over again from the floor, mumbling through the cotton wool of his broken nose.

  ‘You owe her money too?’ asked Haber when it was clear the three of them were alone.

  ‘I don’t owe you money!’ shouted Amanda, making Haber jump. On impulse, she pulled the drive from her pocket. ‘She wanted this.’

  ‘What the hell is that?’ asked Haber. Stornetta was climbing up onto a kitchen chair, pulling at the table to drop himself onto the seat.

  ‘I literally have no idea,’ said Amanda, sliding it back into her pocket.

  ‘I can help with that,’ said the fridge.

  ‘It’s not a bottle of milk,’ said Stornetta.

  ‘And I’m not a fridge,’ said the fridge.

  ‘Tatsu,’ said Amanda, ‘meet Haber and Stornetta.’ Finding the mug was still in her grasp, she placed it on the counter and pulled open a drawer, from which she retrieved a first aid kit.

  ‘Thanks, love,’ said Haber.

  She held up her hand so he could see the wound. ‘You’ll survive,’ she said and set about binding her injury rather than pushing the kit his way.

  The two men watched her, exchanging glances that she ignored. ‘If you’ll excuse us,’ said Haber, ‘we’re more used to people collapsing into a gibbering mess after what she did to you.’

  Amanda looked up. ‘I work in an environment where people take up boxing just to experience a lower stress level.’ She held up her hand, trying not to look at it. ‘I’m a woman in that world. I’ve had to be harder than them.’ Stornet
ta nodded his respect, but she saw Haber eye her uncertainly. She lowered her hand quickly, held the skin around the wound as gently as she could and swallowed, hoping she wouldn’t be sick all over the floor.

  ‘I have located someone who can unlock the drive for you,’ said Tatsu. ‘However, you will need to go to them, and they are in Tallinn. Before you suggest there are people closer: you are correct, but none of them could do this with the requisite discretion. Mr. Singh was adamant that this be done in a way that couldn’t be traced. They are known as the Grey Rose Collective.’

  Haber looked from Amanda to the fridge and back again.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ she said, ‘I’m going to pay you.’

  ‘Really?’ asked Haber, as Irish as a Leprechaun to Amanda’s ears.

  ‘But I have a condition.’

  ‘Here it is,’ said Stornetta, rubbing at his chin, his fingers itching towards his shattered nose but staying just clear of any move that would cause him pain.

  ‘Are you sure this is wise?’ asked the fridge. ‘These men are known for being law breakers, committing violent acts and associating with those of low social credit.’

  Amanda ignored them all, sitting down at the kitchen table with a square of liniment on her hand while with the other she ripped open an opaque plastic pouch with her teeth. The spray bottle inside tumbled out onto the table and she retrieved it, flipping the top off with her thumb, removed the bandage and sprayed it onto her wound. She hissed with pain, tears springing to her eyes; she closed them tight as if to make the world go away. The sting helped with the shaking just under the surface and gradually she calmed down.

  Haber and Stornetta waited in silence until she opened her eyes again. She examined her hand, touching it gingerly with the very tip of her forefinger. The wound was gone. New skin, slightly off-colour with her own but seamless despite that, deformed under her touch but offered no pain.

  She shoved the first aid kit in their direction then fixed them both with a stare. ‘Take me to Tallinn and the money’s yours.’

  Stornetta and Haber stood nonplussed before her, looking at one another and taking in each other’s injuries.