Too Like the Lightning

by Ada Palmer

  «Be careful,» I called to the air where he had been and might still be. «Don’t let the child touch you.»

  A subtle swish of something told me he had heard.

  I rose as soon as I was strong enough, and barely had time to smooth my uniform and hide the traces of Saladin’s nails with a smear of dirt before the police cars descended to block the alley before and behind me like barricades. Five armed police came with their commander, all uniformed in Romanova’s blue but with different cuts of jacket, a Mason here, a Brillist there, an Indian or Chinese Mitsubishi, like the many exercises of a tailor trying to pick a final form. Why five? Not because they thought that number could take me if I resisted, but because any fewer would be too scared to approach. Even with so many they seemed unhappy with the task, not nervous faces but those too-grim expressions the police adopt to keep you from sensing anything beneath. Only their chief at the center was relaxed, slouching as he drew from his satchel the special manacles the Utopians designed for me. He tossed them to his men as if pitching a baseball.

  “Morning, Papa,” I greeted in common English.

  Do not read too much into the nickname; everyone who knows him, from a Romanovan Praetor to the lowest clerk, uses that name for Universal Free Alliance Police Commissioner General Ektor Carlyle Papadelias.

  “Morning, Mycroft,” he answered. “What was it this time?”

  “Some kids ran by blasting Canner Beat.” It was an old excuse, and often true.

  “Will this do, Papa?” one of his backup called, tapping a steel beam which braced one of the buildings.

  Papa shook his head. “Car’s more reliable.”

  I kept my arms as limp as possible as they shackled my wrists to the squad car’s bumper beam behind me. I know the cops feel better if I make no contact, but I could not keep my fingers from brushing one’s wrist, and she recoiled as at the touch of burning coal. Sometimes I think Papa brings novices on purpose for these visits, as if facing Mycroft Canner were their baptism as true servants of the law.

  “All secure, Papa,” they reported.

  “Good.”

  The Commissioner General’s nod let the rest fall back to the periphery, while he settled in, leaning against the curved nose of a second car opposite me. Age seems to have given Papadelias more energy, not less, as fat and muscle waste away, leaving nothing to weigh down his skeleton but his ever-burning brain. He marked his hundredth birthday two years ago, but thanks to modern medicine he still has hair on his scalp and pink in his skin, and still sprints like a jackrabbit. In my mind his true title will always be Detective Inspector, for it was the rank he truly wanted, fleeing promotion like the plague for almost seventy years, but no pleading could keep Romanova from promoting the man who captured Mycroft Canner.

  «You’ve been a busy bee this week, Mycroft.» He used Greek now, childhood’s tongue for both of us, tender to my ear, though I don’t know how it sounds to those who don’t associate those tones with home and storybooks, and a mother so faded in my memory now that she is little more than a warm darkness muddled with images of Mommadoll.

  «It’s been a busy week,» I answered. «And before I forget, Happy Independence Day one day late.»

  Would you correct me, reader? It had been two days since Renunciation Day, but to us the true holiday was the Greek Independence Day, March twenty-fifth, when the four-century oppression of the Turks was finally thrown off, just in time for Greece to enjoy brief nationhood before nations became passé. A Servicer may not, but Papadelias wore his strat insignia, the Greek flag armband in vivid blue and white. Nation-strats like Greece or France or Mexico always offer less conspicuous alternatives, a bracelet or narrow ribbon, but it rankles when I see a Greek declare their pride with anything less than the full armband. Do you laugh, reader? Thinking that every nation-strat considers itself the most important in the world? Well, we are right. Rome was built from Greece, Europe from Rome, our modern world from Europe’s Union, and however many worlds Utopia may colonize they will all come from this one. So the triremes which defended Greece at Salamis defended Mars, too, reader, and every Hive, and you.

  «They’re trying to keep me off this Black Sakura case,» Papa began.

  «I know. Are they succeeding?»

  «I’m Commissioner General, you know what that means?»

  «You get an office in the Forum?»

  «Cute.» His eyes glittered, the brightness of the passenger within his age-thin frame. «It means I trump the law enforcement of all seven Hives. If one, just one, says they want me on the case, no power on this Earth can keep me off.»

  I’d learned over our many interviews just how to lean against the car to keep my hands from falling asleep. «You sent Martin in the first place, didn’t you?»

  «Yes, but I didn’t expect it to be an either-or, especially not now that it’s getting juicer. I’ve called all seven. Not just the seven, I’ve called Senators, strat leaders, secretaries, Tribunes, you-know-who.» He picked at his sleeves, always rolled up as if the rank stripes around the cuffs offended him. «The whole reason they forced me into the Commissioner General’s chair was to get someone they could trust there, but, no matter what I try, no change.» His eyes narrowed. «I called Martin Guildbreaker to help me help them, not to banish myself to paperwork mountain. The only reason to keep the police off a case is if you don’t want it solved.»

  «They don’t want it solved,» I confirmed. «They want it fixed.»

  «Are they stupid? There wouldn’t be this many tremors without something dangerous underneath. Do they even have a plan for if they find something they can’t just sweep under the carpet?»

  «I don’t know, Papa.»

  «See, even you don’t know. But that isn’t what really gets me. What really gets me is knowing the decision to block me was made in about five minutes in Ganymede’s parlor—somewhere I could’ve come if they’d called me!—but they didn’t.» He unleashed his frustration in a kick at an unoffending trashbot. «I thought for sure the Utopians would at least have the good sense to worry when all the others agree on something, but I got word back from them this morning: ‘It’s being handled.’ You can’t tell me they settled on that answer by themselves, it’s not even U-speak! If I had a euro for every time I’ve heard that sentence in the past two days I could retire on it.»

  «Twenty minutes,» I corrected.

  «What?»

  «It took them twenty minutes in Duke Ganymede’s parlor to decide to keep you off the case, and there were reasons for it. You’ve heard who is handling it?»

  «J.E.D.D. Mason.»

  I nodded. «You know J.E.D.D. Mason’s a good person. And you know Martin Guildbreaker’s a good person. If they find something that needs you on it, they’ll come to you.»

  A slow breath. «Hopefully. But then why block me from the case?»

  «I don’t know. I really don’t.»

  Papa shook his tired head. «Since when have they let politics be this openly incestuous, Mycroft? Tsuneo Sugiyama put Sniper instead of Ganymede on a Seven-Ten list and everyone’s acting like it’s the end of the world. Even thirty years ago you couldn’t find two Seven-Ten lists with the same top Seven, but when’s the last time you saw one of the Gordian Brain’bash members on there instead of the Headmaster, huh? Or a European other than the Prime Minister?» The guards around us were growing nervous hearing the Commissioner’s Greek so heated. «What worries me is that they aren’t even being subtle anymore. The Censor married the Cousin Chair and the Mitsubishi Hive leader is the Humanist president’s brother-in-law and no one’s crying conflict-of-interest? Do people really not care?» A deep breath. «It shouldn’t be this easy for them, Mycroft. The Death of Majority doesn’t help if the minorities come together and act like a majority again.»

  Do you still believe in the Death of Majority, reader? The First Anonymous’s first essay, lauding what they saw as the promise of eternal peace. After the Church War there was no majority race, no majority religion, no m
ajority language, no majority nationality. Mukta birthed a world so intermixed that no one anymore grew up among people mostly like themselves: the majority of Japanese people did not live in Japan, the majority of Greeks did not live in Greece, so too for every country in the world. Majority died with Church and Nation, the Anonymous proclaimed, and with it war and genocide died too, for they require a majority united, patriots, an ‘us’ and ‘them’ in which ‘us’ is normal, larger, more powerful, capable of overwhelming and defeating ‘them.’ I could ask any contemporary here, ‘Are you a majority?’ and I know what he or she would answer: Of course not, Mycroft. I have a Hive, a race, a second language, a vocation and an avocation, hobbies of my own; add up my many strats and you will soon reduce me to a minority of one, and hence my happiness. I am unique, and proud of my uniqueness, and prouder still that, by being no majority, I ensure eternal peace. You lie, reader. There is one majority still entrenched in our commingled world, a great ‘us’ against a smaller ‘them.’ You will see it in time. I shall give only one hint—the deadliest majority is not something most of my contemporaries are, reader, it is something they are not.

  «Couldn’t you ask to investigate on behalf of the Hiveless?» I asked.

  Papa shook his head. «Not if no Hiveless have been affected by the crime. So far none are. If the Saneer-Weeksbooth bash’ had kids who were minors I could use them as an excuse, but as it is … »

  «Dominic Seneschal is missing.»

  «Dominic Seneschal isn’t a missing person yet, they turned their tracker off themself and didn’t specify a duration after which they should be sought if they don’t check in. Thanks to a certain Mycroft Canner,» Papa nodded his mock gratitude, «we’re allowed to start search and rescue after five days without contact no matter what the person said, but that’s still a ways off. Besides, I don’t want to go in without at least one of the big Seven giving their stamp of approval, or I’ll bring them all down on my head. I need a way to make it look like I didn’t push for this, like one of them requested it.»

  «I see.» I glanced down at my Utopian manacles, their taut, gelatinous surfaces almost comforting after so many meetings. «You could try King Isabel Carlos. These days the others don’t have the heart to say ‘no’ to Their Majesty’s requests. If you get the King to support you it’ll be hard for the others to object, especially because Andō and Ganymede can never pass up a chance to piss on Casimir Perry.»

  «Spain?» Papadelias took a heavy breath. «Yes, Spain would do, though when the Bourbon dynasty is the least incestuous element of your politics, you worry.»

  We laughed together, and I feared the sight of Mycroft Canner laughing would drive the ghost-faced policewoman on my left to an early grave, but Papadelias calmed her with an authoritative nod.

  «And with that out of the way, shall we look at March nineteenth?» He did not have to specify the year. «There’s a discrepancy in your timeline here.»

  «I don’t have time today, Papa. I have jobs waiting.»

  «Just one question.» His lenses were already glittering with reports, though I cannot believe there were any details of my case left which Papa had not memorized. «That was a busy day for you, you grabbed Kohaku, Chiasa, Mercer, and Luther in one day.»

  I shrugged. «I had to move fast. The third body was about to be discovered, and two more bash’members were missing, it wouldn’t take you long to put the rest in protective custody. If I grabbed them then, I could finish them any time.»

  I wondered what topic the others thought we had moved to, these guards who stood deaf to our Greek but could see our body language grow more comfortable, more like family than enemies. No, I am dearer to this vocateur than family. Modern police work was invented by yet another Frenchman, Eugène François Vidocq, a son, not of the Eighteenth Century, but the Nineteenth. Vidocq’s exploits, with their disguises, great escapes, false identities, and lifelong rivals, are so spectacular one can hardly believe in them—indeed he seems more like one of Bridger’s miracles than real when one reads of the life which provided meat enough for Vidocq’s good friend Victor Hugo to base not just Valjean but Javert too on this one man. Between his exploits, Vildocq invented police networks, salaried informants, plainclothes detectives, all the vital tools of Papa’s trade, and Papadelias so idolizes this role model that he even forgives him for not being Greek. Deep down I know Papa longs for the Chinese curse of interesting times. To Vidocq Fate granted prison-breaks, fierce nemeses, an escape from galley slavery, and he made the most of tumults, creating false identities, infiltrating the very criminal world he worked to cage, and, after one great prison break, toiling for years disguised as his own successor in order to win a royal pardon for his former self and then unmask dramatically before the throne. But our present is too orderly to offer such adventures to poor Papadelias. By rights, at some point in his eight decades’ toil, Providence owed Papa a multidecade sparring match like Javert and Valjean, or at least the few precious years Holmes had with his Moriarty. But, alas, when Papa’s longed-for Master Criminal finally came, our battle only lasted two short weeks; you will indulge us if we won’t let those two weeks end.

  «Here’s today’s question.» Papa’s eyes sparkled, like a poor poker player’s unable to disguise a good hand. «If you’d spent the whole previous day doing jug-and-funnel water torture on Makenna Mardi in Bunker 2, and feeding Leigh Mardi to lions in the Great African Reservation, when did you have time to go back to the Αlps and refill the tank for Jie Mardi’s Chinese water torture? It only held two hundred gallons, that wouldn’t have lasted three whole days.»

  «I didn’t have to refill the tank,» I answered instantly. «It had already been two days, Jie had gotten used to measuring time by how far the water level rose. If the water supply ran out they would pass out as soon as the dripping stopped, and then when I refilled it and the drip started again they’d wake up and not think any time had passed, since the water hadn’t risen. If no time has passed psychologically it doesn’t break the spell.»

  «But the body recovers during sleep, the mind too.»

  «Not enough to matter.»

  «I see.» He didn’t like that answer. He had that itchy look, like he would go back to his notes and brood, then call at four A.M. with some loophole. In fact, he had one now. «How’d you feed your dog, then?»

  «What?»

  «Your dog, you can’t have taken it with you where the lions were. You left it in the Αlps?»

  I smiled. «I left it gnawing on Laurel’s left arm. Plenty of meat for two days. But that was already two questions. Are we done?»

  Papa gave me a wary, probing squint. «For now.»

  Sometimes I almost wished Papa would find it, the one elusive question I would have no answer for. He smelled something unfinished in my tale, my seamless web of answers. How did I do it? How did I strike so many, so far apart, such complex tasks, so fast? If nothing else, then, twenty, thirty years hence on his deathbed, Papa deserved to hear me whisper: Saladin.

  CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIFTH

  Madame’s

  “The Six-Hive Transit System welcomes you to Paris. Visitors are required to adhere to a minimum of Gray Hiveless Law and to Parisian city regulations. For a list of local regulations not included in your customary law code, select ‘law.’”

  Where else could the heart of all have been, reader? In the Enlightenment, Paris was the crown and capital of all things, as if Romanova, Alexandria, and La Trimouille were rolled in one. To live there was to live where all that mattered in the universe could be strolled to in a day, and to be banished thence was to be banished to mud and haystacks. Such a power does not lose its grip upon the world in a mere six hundred years.

  “Over here!” Thisbe waved Carlyle over to her table at a corner café, where she had drawn him with the simple lure:

  Despite his late night, Carlyle had risen full of strength that day, for March the twenty-sixth was the birthday of th
e Great Sage Zoroaster, and the Synaxis of Archangel Gabriel, a day on which men honored their Creator in ages past, today, and honor also those who give us access to Him. “I couldn’t find out any more about this ‘black hole’ than its location,” he said. “Eureka was right about it being very secret.”

  Thisbe beamed pride. “I found a service entrance. Shall we?”

  They were already at the steps when I realized I hadn’t checked on Carlyle in a while, and found his tracker signal in the worst place in the world. With a hybrid of Papadelias’s clearance codes and J.E.D.D. Mason’s I hacked into Carlyle’s camera feed at once, and saw the stairs before him, period laundry flapping on the lines above. Blame came first. I blamed Ockham for consenting to let Martin’s team investigate the Saneer-Weeksbooth bash’. I blamed Papadelias for sending them. I blamed the thief behind the Black Sakura affair. I even blamed Julia Doria-Pamphili, as if Carlyle stumbling in on Bridger four days earlier had somehow been her fault for sending him. I blamed myself above all. I did not, oddly enough, blame Carlyle or Thisbe—Carlyle in my mind was like a child’s ball tossed toward a pit, helpless unless another player intervenes. And Thisbe was … Thisbe by nature could not resist the scent of secrets. How could I stop them? That was my only question. There had to be a way to stop them.

  It was an old town chateau, vast in its way but cramped between its neighbors, as if the wings of a sprawling palace had been picked up and stacked within one crowded lot, like building blocks carefully packed to fit back into the box. Rows of arched or pedimented windows had not been altered since the days when architects worked with sketches of ancient temples on one side of the desk and tracings of flowers on the other. The columns, moldings, and tracery were fluted stone, the doors and windows ornamented with ivy-fine iron. Double and triple staircases waltzed one around another up the façade like the petaled fabric of a wedding dress. Humans have decorated things ever since cave dwellers first learned to weave, or to fire clay to hardness, gracing a pitcher with figures, a shawl with stripes. I think an ancient craftsman considered each creation a capsule of his immortality: so long as future ages see this work and speak its maker’s name, I am eternal. Only in the ages when we slogged through labor eager for our play did we degenerate to mass-production and boring houses. The men who crafted Madame’s façade made for themselves a respectable immortality.