Flesh and Silver

by Stephen L. Burns

  “So glad to see you… my dear doctor,” Fist wheezed, gazing up at Marchey with what passed for a friendly smile. The Grim Reaper had that sort of smile.

  “Of course… I should be glad… to be able… to see anyone.” He chuckled, a wet, tubercular, hacking sound.

  Marchey’s guard went up. He rested his hand on the touchpad, but withheld accessing the ’bed’s systems. “How are you feeling?” he asked, telling himself to watch his step. Fist was up to something.

  The old man’s thin, blue-gray lips peeled back from his sharp white teeth. “Probably about… the way I look.”

  Marchey let the opening pass. “Any pain?” The neural field created by the Schmidt crystals should be keeping the worst of the pain suppressed, but with Form V you couldn’t count on it. Not that Fist hadn’t earned some suffering by forbidding medical care for his former subjects because it pleased him to hear them praying to be healed. Surely such cruelty ought to be repaid.

  “Does my pain… truly disturb you? Or does… it seem just?” Fist asked sweetly, as if he had read Marchey’s mind. “What would you do… if I said… I was in agony?”

  The safest course was to ignore the first two questions and take the last at face value. “I’d increase the anesthetic field to emergency strength. If that didn’t take care of it, I’d keep you under the sleepfield fulltime since I’m out of superaspirin, syndorphins, and paraopiates.”

  A slight nod. “As I thought.” That awful grin widened. “No pain… I cannot endure. Your agenda… will not be spoiled… by my infirmity.”

  Marchey almost asked him what he meant, but caught himself at the last moment. Fist was finessing him for some reason, trying to lure him into something like a fly into a pitcher-plant. So he said nothing.

  “What agenda is that… you ask?” Fist wheezed. His voice dropped to a conspirational whisper. “What do I have… hidden away? What passphrases and… code keys unlock it? I may… tell you.” The ghost of a shrug. “I may not. It depends… on you.” He stared up, smugly expectant.

  Well, here we go, Marchey thought glumly, not surprised that Fist knew what he wanted and intended to use it to his advantage. But this was an uncharacteristically straightforward approach. Of course, when dealing with Fist the most dangerous trap was the one you didn’t see. There was sure to be one, probably already under his feet. One wrong word would make it snap shut.

  He stared back at Fist, doing his best to maintain an impassive, indifferent expression. After a moment the old man nodded, and smiled.

  “You are… an apt pupil, Doctor. Caution is… an admirable virtue. But a one-sided conversation… is no conversation at all.” Fist released him by looking away. Marchey swallowed a sigh of relief. Yet this small victory felt hollow. Fist was handling him with kid gloves, he was sure of it. But why?

  “We have… been friends,” Fist said quietly, stressing the word friends with smirking sarcasm, “For only… a short time. Still, you are… not a stupid man. You have been trained… to observe… to make deductions… on the basis… of those observations.” He turned his head back to look up at Marchey, who could only uneasily wait for him to get to the point.

  “Have you deduced,’’ Fist whispered, “what motivates me?”

  Marchey stared at the old man, knowing that his surprise showed on his face. So he made himself smile.

  “You’re a psychopath,” he answered blandly, knowing Fist would take exception to it. If they were going to play games, let him be the one on the defensive.

  Sure enough, he frowned and shook his head. “That is a glib… meaningless description… and rather… unflattering at that.” He held up his hand, waggling a bony finger. “Stop playing stupid. It ill… befits you.’’

  “Self-interest?” Marchey had to admit that he was curious as to what motivated Fist. He was criminally insane, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have some sort of logical framework—no matter how twisted—for all his actions.

  “Closer… but a vague category… not a specific motivation.”

  “Love?” He had to keep himself from being drawn in, from giving the responses Fist wanted to elicit.

  Those pus-colored eyes narrowed. Fist stared at him for several long seconds, then grinned. “Excellent. As I said… you are… an apt pupil. You learn. Use what you… have learned. You believe… that I am leading you… into some sort of trap… don’t you?” It was not a question.

  “Aren’t you?” Marchey parried.

  “You would know for certain… if only you understood… my motivations.” Haaaaaaaaaaa, Fist’s laugh made his skin crawl, but he knew he’d managed a draw.

  Now if he only knew what the hell the game was.

  Fist cocked his head to one side. “No doubt you have… called Ananke by now. How are… our dear friends there?”

  “Nobody said they missed you.”

  A look of mock disappointment. “After all I… did for them. Such ingratitude. How will… they ever get along… without us?”

  Marchey snorted. “They’ll get along just fine. They needed you like they needed a plague. The medical help they need is on the way, so they’ll be fine without me.”

  He glanced up at the clock, deciding that it was time to end his visit. He hadn’t gotten anything concrete out of the old psychopath, but neither had he found himself up to his neck in concrete and sinking into the mud under forty feet of water. Besides, it was time for a well-earned drink.

  Fist’s bubbling chuckle snatched his attention back like a slap in the face. “Not from… MedArm,” Fist said quietly.

  Marchey frowned. “How did you know that?”

  “The Helping Hands Foundation.” A skeletal grin. “The game grows… more intriguing,” he wheezed with ominous satisfaction. “I am pleased.”

  Marchey stared down at the old man, hands clamped tight on the unibed’s sides to keep him from shaking some answers out of the smirking bastard. “What are you talking about?” he demanded.

  Watch yourself! he warned himself. He’s sucking you in. But he had to ask. Anything that pleased Fist could only spell disaster for everyone else.

  Fist’s hooded eyes glinted with perverse pleasure. “Motivation,” he rasped. “Pleasure. Reward. Allegiance. Fulfillment. Accomplishment.” A pregnant pause. “Challenge.”

  He let out a long sigh, unmistakably savoring the moment and the situation. “Yes, even love. I do love life when… it puts the sweet raw stuff… of possibility… in my hands.” He closed his hands as if feeling what he spoke about in them and closed his eyes, an expression of something like serenity on his fleshless face.

  “It has put… that same sweet stuff… in your hands, too,” he added in a conspirational whisper, as if imparting some secret wisdom.

  Marchey leaned closer. “What do you mean?” he demanded again, knowing that he was taking the bait even as he did so.

  The only answer he received was an inscrutable half smile.

  —

  Marchey would have worried about himself if he hadn’t wanted a drink after his little dance in the dragon’s jaws.

  But he sipped rather than gulped, brows knit and his face pensive as he tried to get a fix on the situation.

  Fist was toying with him.

  But why? Was he being led into the initial passages of an elaborate labyrinth constructed for the simple reason that Fist was unable to resist turning people into rats in a maze, and he was the only rat within reach? Or could it be the beginning of a payback for spoiling his fun on Ananke?

  Although he couldn’t say why, he had a feeling that Fist’s agenda was more complex than mere revenge, that his objectives were clear and simple even if his methods of reaching them were not. But was it possible to see them through all the smoke and mirrors?

  What motivates me?

  The old bastard had known that this Helping Hands Foundation was bringing relief to Ananke, and thought it was funny—or wanted him to think he did. But which? And why?

  There was no way to te
ll. Fist’s every word was calculated, his every expression the manipulation of a mask. Any resemblance to humanity was artifice. The one time he had let his true self show had exposed something Marchey hoped to never see again. The conscienceless egopathy and remorseless brilliance and sheer malignant force of personality that burned inside him put him so far outside the human norm that he might as well be alien.

  Fist wasn’t giving anything away, that was for sure. Anything he offered was bound to be tainted—a free lunch where the sandwiches were buttered with arsenic. The smartest, safest course of action was to lock the clinic door, remotely reset the unibed to keep the old man under until they reached Botha Station, and do his best to put the matter out of his mind.

  Another sip. A reminder that forgetfulness came in a tasty and convenient liquid form.

  He just couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that Fist was holding himself in check. Manipulating him to be sure, but gently compared to the cruel and ruthless way he’d crushed Marchey’s resistance on Ananke. He wanted to start a game. There was something he wanted at stake. He’d as much as offered up everything he’d stolen from the Kindred as incentive to play.

  Another sip of his drink. Here was one sure answer. A few more of these and everything else would stop mattering.

  He made himself put the glass down, still half-full. Maybe this would be a good time to call Sal Bophanza back at the Bergmann Institute. He dealt with MedArm on a day-to-day basis, and might just know something about this Helping Hands Foundation.

  He had last spoken to the Institute’s director over two weeks before, only hours after he’d saved Fist from Scylla. Seeing the look on Sal’s face when he told him of the simple solution to the Nightmare Effect had been one of the high points of his life.

  Who would have guessed that a man raised in the Lunar African enclave Mandela would know a Rebel yell or an Irish jig? Sal had let out the first and given an energetic performance of the second.

  It had taken Sal a while to calm down. Once he had, Marchey had gone on to explain the situation on Ananke and request immediate relief. Then he had told Sal that he needed to stay on for a while. Sal had promised to do what he could.

  When orders to leave Ananke and proceed to Botha Station had come in a few days later, he had hated himself for the sense of relief he felt. Yet at the same time he’d been angered by not at least being allowed to stay on until help arrived. Anger and a sense of duty had won out. He’d called Sal to ask for permission to at least stay until then—although by then it was more out of a sense of duty than desire to stay.

  Much to his surprise, his call had been routed straight to MedArm. The unsmiling woman with the Chinese face and Phoban accent he found himself talking to had asked him to state his business. He’d begun to hem and haw out his request. She had interrupted him sharply, stating that the case had been reviewed, and the six days he was being given were more than generous.

  When he had tried to argue, she coldly informed him that those six days could be cut to four, or two, or even none, and broken the connection, not even giving him a chance to ask why he was talking to her instead of Sal.

  This time his call at least went to Sal’s office. He recognized the big real-wood desk and the meter-long crossed silver arms emblem on the wall behind it.

  But the man sitting at Sal’s desk and staring back at him was not his old friend. This man was white, and had the hard-mouthed, expressionless face and ramrod-straight posture of someone whose life was devoted to giving—and unquestioningly taking—orders. If the severe, tightly fitting black onepiece he wore wasn’t a uniform, it might as well have been.

  “Schnaubel here.” He glanced at Marchey’s silver arms, his posture subtly shifting from rigid attention to the impatience of someone forced to deal with a annoying underling. “State your business.”

  “I’d like to speak to Sal Bophanza if I could, please.”

  The answer was immediate and unequivocal. “You cannot. Dr. Bophanza is not presently available—” The pale blue eyes of the man on the screen flicked to one side. His hands were out of sight, but a slight movement of his shoulders told Marchey he was accessing. “—Dr. Marchey.” I know who and what you are, his face said with thinly veiled contempt.

  “Can you, um, tell me how I can reach him?” Sal was always available. The Bergmann Program was his life. His devotion to keeping the Institute going and to those who had become the first and only Bergmann Surgeons was total. He had never married, and lived in a suite just off his office. Those rare times he left the Institute he carried a full commlink with him so he could be instantly available to those who might be no more than a friendly voice away from suicide.

  This didn’t look good. Not good at all.

  “I am sorry,” the man behind the desk said, his tone belying his words. “I am in charge here. Please state your business. Dr. Marchey.”

  Marchey made himself smile, even though he felt a sinking feeling in his gut. “No business, really. I just called to, ah, shoot the shit with Sal. Can you at least tell me when he’ll be available?”

  “Oh, I’m certain well have Dr. Bophanza back soon,” Schnaubel replied, the superior, completely humorless smile that appeared on his face making Marchey suddenly very afraid for his old friend. “Is there anything else?” Are you done wasting my valuable time?

  “No,” Marchey said in the most offhand tone he could muster, “I don’t believe there is. Thanks.” He reached out and broke the connection.

  “Well,” he told the blank screen, sitting back and rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “That certainly put my mind at ease.”

  But it hadn’t. Nor did the rest of his drink.

  —

  Late that very same night he was dragged from a restless sleep by an insistent, earsplitting beeping.

  After a few sleep-fuddled moments to get his bearings, he realized that the sound was coming from the commboard. He crawled out of bed and shuffled over to it, yawning and rubbing his eyes.

  Squinting at the array of multicolored pads, he finally figured out that a comm mode he’d never used before had become active. He scratched his bald pate, unsure what he was supposed to do, then hit the ? pad because it seemed to sum up the situation perfectly.

  The beeping stopped. The main screen above the board lit and displayed the message:

  RECEIVING REQUEST FOR SECURE TIGHTBEAM MESSAGE LINK. ACCEPT?

  He peered at it a moment, then shrugged. Why not?

  So he hit the accept pad, muddily trying to puzzle out who would be calling, and why they weren’t using the usual comm channels. The secure beamlock com-msystem was a leftover from the ship’s earlier life as a UNSRA courier packet. He hadn’t even known the damn thing worked.

  PLEASE STAND BY FOR FULL RECIPROCAL ALIGNMENT

  he was advised. A few seconds passed. Beams locked,

  LOW-LEVEL ENCRYPTION MODE. BE ADVISED THAT THERE WILL BE A .5 SECOND ENCRYPTION/DECRYPTION LAG.

  The message scrolled up to the top of the screen, vanished.

  “Yeah, so?” he asked the blank screen, which blipped as if in response.

  Now a woman stared out of the screen at him. Her face was thin and pale, with high cheekbones and deeply etched lines at the corners of her clear hazel eyes. Her hair was moonlight gray and spilled over her shoulders. Her wide, generous mouth was quirked in an expectant half smile, and her arms were crossed before her ample bosom.

  “Gory,” she said. Her voice was low and whiskey-hoarse, with the slightest trace of a Russian accent. Marchey stared at her, remembering that face when it had been smooth and unlined, that voice when it had been a soaring alto which could wring tears from your eyes when she sang a love song.

  “ ’Milla,” he replied, voice husky with the rememberance of the thirty-two-year-old Ludmilla Prodaresk. Raven-haired heartbreaker. Songbird. Brilliant diagnostician and surgeon.

  Fellow Bergmann Surgeon. Her bare arms were silver, just like his own. How many years had it been since he’d se
en her last? Ten? Twelve?

  They looked each other over in silence. Marchey gazed at her careworn face, tracing the lines with his eyes and saddened that the years had used her so harshly. She was still beautiful, but it was the beauty of an Acropolis or a faded rose, of something that endures as a diminished shadow of its former glory.

  Did the years show as clearly on his own face? Not that he’d ever been beautiful. He reached up and ran his hand over the top of his head as if pushing his hair back into place so he’d look his best.

  When he realized what he was doing a rueful smile crept onto his face. There wasn’t any hair left to push back, was there? The little bit clinging for dear life to the back of his head hardly counted. He could have easily had it replaced, but why bother? Just as she could have had a rejuve, but had not.

  The mischievous grin Ludmilla gave him was so familiar that it resurrected the young woman he had known in her face and eyes. “You are looking like shit, Gory,” she said, then burst out laughing. Her laugh was still young, still as warm and fresh as a spring breeze. It melted away the snows of regret in an instant.

  “So are you,” he assured her, laughing himself, looking her in the eye and an unspoken message passing between them: We’re still here. We may be battered and bruised and old before our time. We might have screwed up our lives in ways we never could have imagined when we were young by giving ourselves over to a dream that turned sour, but you’re here and I’m here and dammit! but it’s good to see you again!

  “It has been some long time,” Ludmilla said.

  “That it has.” Marchey agreed. A lifetime.

  The smile faded from her face, letting the years creep back over it. “Must keep reunion short. There is covered pad marked ‘M-S-E-M’ on right side of your board. Please push it.”

  “Okay,” he said uncertainly, looking down to find it. He flipped the hinged cover up and tapped the pad underneath.

  It chirped and glowed blue. Ludmilla vanished in a squall of sleeting static. A message appeared in red:

  MAXIMUM SECURITY ENCODING MODE ENGAGED. PLEASE STAND BY.