Tangled Up in Blue

by Joan D. Vinge

  “Cabrelle stood over me and stuck a plasma rifle in my face!” Tree shouted. “And the only goddamn reason he didn’t pull the trigger was because somebody lobbed a grenade into the tunnel, and it blew him and those other bastards to hell first!” He shoved Gundhalinu roughly aside and stumbled to the door. He went through it and out into the cool, clear air.

  He reached the washbowl and leaned over it, letting the water run, stunningly cold, down his hands and arms while he splashed his burning face. “Fuck you, Staun … fuck you! You promised, you promised me! You bastard, how the hell could you leave me behind, like this…?”

  He shut off the flow at last; watched his rage, his futility, his grief empty down the drain, like so much waste water. When he turned around again, Devony and Gundhalinu were standing across the room.

  Drying his eyes, he met their somber stares. “I remember·everything.… It was Blues that did it … other Blues. The only reason I’m alive is because my … my brother pushed me back. He took the hit … he pushed me.… But he promised—” His trembling hands balled into fists, closing over thin air. Devony came to him and put her arms around him; he clung to her until the reeling world began to stabilize.

  “Father of all my grandfathers.…” Gundhalinu sank onto the blue-green surface of the bath enclosure. “The grenade that killed Cabrelle has to be the one that was pitched at us. They were trying to kill us, too. But the Inspector kicked it back into the tunnel,” he gave a choked laugh, “and they were killed by their own grenade.” He looked up again wonderingly. “What else do you remember? Do you remember everything that happened?”

  “I—” Tree broke off, as anger closed his throat. “I remember you said you work for Aranne and Jashari, you spying bastard. Just like Cabrelle and that Special Ops team did.”

  “But that doesn’t make sense.…” Gundhalinu looked down at his hands, shaking his head. “Nothing makes sense, anymore. Damn it, I don’t even know why somebody wanted to drug me!”

  Devony moved away from Tree’s side to take first-aid supplies out of a cabinet on the wall. She carried them to the place where Gundhalinu sat.

  “If you’re not hiding anything, LaisTree, then why won’t you tell me what else you remember?” Gundhalinu leaned to one side, holding Tree’s gaze as Devony began to clean up his face.

  Tree dropped his bathsheet on the floor. “Look at me.” He gestured at his naked body—his side and arm, his leg, his face still covered with bandageskin and deadened by painkillers, still hurting with every breath he took, every move he made. “Don’t look away, look at me, you fucking prig! I was the only one left alive in that tunnel … and that was an accident. Somebody wanted me dead, too. Somebody from Blue Alley, maybe even the Judiciate. The only reason I ever came out of a coma is because they think I can lead them to something they want.”

  Gundhalinu gritted his teeth and didn’t answer; he made a choked noise as Devony forced a purple, unnaturally crooked finger straight, then splinted it.

  Tree looked at Devony, her face no longer flushed from the heat but ashen as she straightened a second swollen, purple finger, and sealed another splint. “Devony … let me finish it—”

  She shook her head, not meeting his eyes, or Gundhalinu’s as his breath caught on a barb of pain. “No,” she said, her voice barely audible. “I will.”

  Tree picked up his shirt and pulled it on, wincing as the motion hurt his side. “How long do you think I’ll stay alive, Gundhalinu, once you tell Aranne that I’ve got my memory back? If I’m lucky, maybe long enough for somebody to do to me what they did to you—”

  Gundhalinu looked up at him, away again. Devony applied more painkiller derms to his wrists and palms. “Thank you…” he whispered. She nodded.

  Tree finished dressing, and put on his jacket. “Forget about me. How long do you think you’ll live, Tech, once Aranne learns what I’ve told you?” He pushed his hand into his pocket, felt the mesh of the missing headset cling to his fingertips.

  “The top officials in the Hegemonic government and the Police are not part of some secret conspiracy,” Gundhalinu said thickly. “That’s impossible.”

  Tree took his hand out of his pocket, frowning. “Cabrelle put a gun to my head when I asked why he was there,” he said, keeping his voice level with an effort. “He said, ‘It’s better for all of us if you don’t know.’ And then he said … he said, ‘I’m sorry.’…” He took a deep breath. “You figure it out.”

  “That doesn’t mean the Chief Inspector ordered it! You were in the wrong place, at the wrong time … for the wrong reasons. You made a botch of their mission. He had no way of knowing why you were there—”

  “He spoke to me!” Tree said, his voice corroding with grief. “He knew who we were! They didn’t want any witnesses.… Are you going to tell me the Hedge’s retrieving some piece of stolen tech justifies killing his own men in cold blood? Is that what your fucking Technician code of honor is all about, Gundhalinu?”

  Gundhalinu stared at his hands. “It’s Carbuncle.…” he said at last. “It’s like entropy. Everything breaks down, here. Nothing stays in focus; the meanings don’t hold.…” He shook his head; when he looked up again, his eyes were filled with an old, deep pain. “I have two older brothers,” he murmured. “They made my life hell. I used to wish they were dead, all the time. But now my father’s dead … and they’re alive. And I don’t think they’ll ever let me go home again.” Tree stared at him, speechless. Gundhalinu looked away, his shoulders slumping.

  Devony wiped wetness from her face, and finished dressing in silence.

  “Devony?” Tree moved unsteadily back to her side. “Dev … you all right?”

  She shook her head. “It’s nothing … or it’s everything. I’ll be all right.” She smiled, barely; her hand rose to the blood-red tear of her necklace. Abruptly she reached up and took the necklace off, moving away from him to place it on a shelf. Gundhalinu watched her put it down as if he were hypnotized.

  “Why did you take your necklace off?” Tree followed her, brushing aside her hand to pick up the stone. “You always wear this.… Is it really an Old Empire artifact?”

  “It looks like an artifact to me,” Gundhalinu said. “The Snow Queen gave it to her.”

  Tree looked at him.

  Devony shook her head as Tree turned back to her. “I think it’s just a beach stone…” she said, glancing past him.

  Tree laid the necklace on the shelf, keeping his frown to himself.

  “What are you going to do now, LaisTree?” Gundhalinu asked.

  “Start taking my goddamn life back.” Tree raised his head. “Start acting like a Police officer, not a perp. Start thinking, like my brother would.” Like he always believed I could—The wounds of memory bled endlessly inside his eyes now, where he couldn’t look away. What had been unreachable had become inescapable, as if there was no middle ground. No going back. “I don’t care who’s involved, or what it takes. I’ll find the Bluekillers who murdered him, and I’ll make them pay. Or I’ll die trying.” He faced Gundhalinu. “What about you?”

  “I want the same thing,” Gundhalinu said.

  Tree frowned. “Even if it involves top officials in the Hegemonic government? Other Kharemoughis … Technicians?”

  “Yes.”

  “Even if you might die trying?”

  Gundhalinu hesitated. “Yes.”

  “Are you sure?” Tree pointed at Gundhalinu’s bloodstained clothes, lying in a heap on the floor. “You’ve been playing dress-up in that uniform until now, Blue boy. Do you have the stones to play for keeps? Because if you’re not absolutely sure—if you have any doubt at all—I don’t want you watching my back.”

  “I’m sure,” Gundhalinu said, grimly and without hesitation. “It isn’t an accident that we wear the same uniform, LaisTree. I chose to become a Police officer—just like you did.”

  Tree shrugged. “What about the missing tech?”

  “I still want to find it. But not as mu
ch as I want to get the killers. The stolen tech was never really the point, for me; it was just a point of access, a way I could keep working on this case. Because I had to be part of the investigation.” Gundhalinu’s gaze darkened. “I had to—”

  “Why?”

  “Because I nearly died at that warehouse, too, damn you!” Gundhalinu said furiously. “And because I … I saw.…” He shook his head. “I saw them.… Now, every time I close my eyes that’s all I can see: Blood and body parts.” He looked down. “Gods, I feel like I’m losing my mind! I want my life back, too.”

  Tree nodded, his face easing at last. “Okay.… Are there any other leads, any suspects Aranne told you about, but not the rest of the force?”

  Gundhalinu shook his head. “Three of the bodies in the warehouse weren’t ours. They were offworlders, recently arrived on Tiamat. No prior histories, no ties to anyone established here … though they had to be involved with the Source on some level; it was his warehouse they were meeting in.”

  “The Source is involved in everything, at some level,” Tree said. “He’s the tapeworm in the guts of this city.”

  “I know.” Gundhalinu nodded. “Do you remember anything else from the warehouse? Anything you saw, anyone, before—”

  “No. It happened too fast.” Tree shut his eyes. “Maybe Staun saw something; the rest of us never even made it through the door. We never hid any stolen tech, either. We never even saw it.”

  Devony glanced up at him from where she leaned against the wall, listening; he saw her expression, and looked away. “Everybody I talked to at the station house is ready to sell his soul for a lead,” he said. “Word on the street is nonexistent; it’s like everyone in Carbuncle has had their tongue cut out.”

  “Does that strike you as odd, considering the high profile of the crime involved?” Gundhalinu frowned.

  “Yeah,” Tree muttered. “I would say so.”

  “Only the Source has the kind of influence—”

  “Or the Snow Queen. The Winters want to get their hands on proscribed technology as much as he wants the water of life.” Tree glanced at Devony again, reluctantly.

  Gundhalinu grimaced. “What the hell is the matter with these people—don’t we do enough for them? Why can’t they be content with what they’ve got—?” He broke off. “I wonder how far Arienrhod would really go to keep us from preventing this trade.”

  “What do you think?” Tree said bitterly. “We’re only good for one thing, to the Motherlovers; we’re as expendable to them as the mers are.” He frowned. “Unless the coverup really is entirely on our end.”

  Gundhalinu’s jaw tightened. “That’s not—”

  “You were the one who wouldn’t go to Blue Alley. You said it wasn’t safe, or the Med Center either. Why not?”

  Gundhalinu rubbed his swollen eye, and swore under his breath. “Gods, I … when the Ondinean was questioning me, some of the things they said … there was no way they could have known those things without informants, or some kind of hidden surveillance.” He sagged forward. “For all I know, there’s hidden surveillance all over the city, and they’re laughing at us right now.”

  Tree kept his eyes off Devony’s face with an effort. “Yeah … well, you got us one new lead we can follow up.”

  Gundhalinu’s mouth formed a painful smile. “The Ondinean.”

  Tree nodded. “I know some places where we can start asking around. But first we ought to—”

  “First…” Gundhalinu said, in resignation, “will you help me get my clothes on?”

  15

  “Are you sure he’s in any shape to do this?” Devony put a hand on Tree’s arm, nodding at Gundhalinu, as they stopped in the doorway. “Nyx, are you—?” She put her arms around him, holding him, as though she would stop him physically from going out.

  “Does it really matter to you?” he asked, hating himself.

  She drew back, her face full of surprise and hurt.

  “I’m sorry.” He looked down, shaking his head. “I just … I’m sorry.”

  She kissed him. “Be careful,” she said, the way she had said it the last time he left her; like a charm against bad luck. She glanced at Gundhalinu. “Both of you.”

  Gundhalinu smiled uncertainly, as if her show of concern for him was as hard to fathom as what the Ondinean had done to him earlier. He lifted a bandaged hand in grateful acknowledgment as they went out. They went back along the alley to the Street, and headed downtown.

  At the entrance to the next alley, Tree pulled Gundhalinu to a stop.

  “Why are we stopping?” Gundhalinu shook him off, annoyed.

  “There’s something I need to find out.” Tree looked back toward Azure Alley.

  “What is it?” Gundhalinu slumped against the building wall, as if his body was just as happy for the wait.

  “I’ll tell you when it happens … if it happens.” Tree paced restlessly back and forth, unable to stay still. “What do you think of Devony, Gundhalinu?”

  “What do I think of her?” Gundhalinu looked up in surprise. “Do you mean her occupation?”

  “I mean, what’s your take on her?” Tree said impatiently. “What kind of impression did she make on you yesterday when you questioned her, and today?”

  Gundhalinu stared at his bandaged hands; his expression changed, and changed again. “Well … for one thing, there aren’t that many ’shifters in Carbuncle, because a sensenet is worth a small fortune. That means she must have impressed Berdaz, or someone, as being worthy of the investment. Personally, she struck me as very intelligent, and … unnervingly perceptive, when I spoke to her yesterday. And she must be a gifted actress—”

  Tree stopped moving abruptly.

  Gundhalinu looked down. “I only meant … that she convinced me she was Kharemoughi, when I met her. It wasn’t just her appearance. Her whole manner was perfect, if a little … forward. I never suspected, until she—” He broke off.

  Tree looked at his expression, and didn’t ask. “She even knows enough Klostan to tell me when I’m being a real … jerk, in my own language,” he muttered.

  Gundhalinu’s mouth twitched. “And she’s Tiamatan, which means she had to pick it all up without ever having been offworld.”

  “She’d never even been off the farm, until about five years ago,” Tree said.

  “How long have you actually known her?”

  “Only two days.…” Tree shook his head. “Three, if you count the night of the warehouse raid. We had one dance together, at the Closed Doors Club.”

  “I think she really cares about you.”

  Tree stared at him. “What made you say that?”

  “You asked me what I thought.”

  “I mean, how do you know?”

  “It’s obvious.…” Gundhalinu shrugged helplessly. “It would be obvious to any trained observer.”

  Against his will, Tree felt a smile pry at the corners of his mouth. He became preoccupied with his coat pockets until he was sure his face was expressionless again. Then, looking up, he said, “Have you got a first name, Gundhalinu?”

  “Of course I—” Gundhalinu broke off, looking embarrassed. “I mean … it’s BZ.”

  “I have something for you, BZ.” Tree pulled out the headset. “Is this the piece of tech you’ve been looking for?”

  Gundhalinu’s eyes widened. “Yes…” he breathed. “You had it, all along?”

  “Only since last night.” Tree frowned as he saw the sudden suspicion on Gundhalinu’s face. “It was with the contraband that got diverted to the rec room. Now you know exactly as much about it as I do.”

  “You didn’t see it before, at the warehouse? You didn’t see who had it?”

  “I told you the truth, damn it! The whole truth!” He looked away again, his throat working. “We weren’t even armed.…”

  Gundhalinu nodded, controlling his frustration with an obvious effort. “Why didn’t you give it to me last night, then?”

  Tree thought about it. �
��You didn’t say ‘please.’”

  Gundhalinu pushed away from the wall, his fists clenching. “You honorless idiot! This could have been over, and I wouldn’t have—I wouldn’t—” He looked down, his face crumpling; slowly, finger by finger, he opened his hands.

  “You wouldn’t be alive, probably,” Tree said sourly.

  Gundhalinu leaned against the wall, frowning but silent.

  “Besides, it’s not over until somebody pays, remember?” Tree pushed the headset back into his pocket. “Remember?”

  Gundhalinu nodded again, looking down.

  “How did you track me, anyway? Am I marked?”

  “Yes.” Gundhalinu said, with glum reluctance. “Underneath the bandage on your side. But you weren’t exactly secretive about your movements, anyway.”

  Tree pulled loose his shirt. He dug his fingers into the layers of protective film and peeled them back, fighting his body’s sickening sense of violation as he exposed the wound to the air. He found the fingernail-sized patch of the tracer, among the sutures and the mottled expanses of skingraft that held the raw meat of his damaged side together.

  Gundhalinu looked away. “They had every right to mark you,” he muttered. “You were a suspect.”

  Tree picked the tracer loose and pressed the bandage back into place. Swallowing bile, he crushed the silicon patch between his fingers. “Fuckers.…”

  “LaisTree—”

  “What?”

  “I’m sorry … about your brother.” Gundhalinu looked up again, into the face of Tree’s surprise. “I envy you your memories, Nyx.”

  “Thank you,” Tree murmured, forcing the words out. “Sorry I hit you.”

  “No you’re not.” It was a simple statement of fact.

  Tree burst out laughing, felt his surprise double as Gundhalinu unexpectedly joined him.

  “Maybe … maybe I should have spent longer in that steambath,” Gundhalinu mumbled, his freckles reddening.

  Tree’s mouth quirked. “I like you better this way.”

  Gundhalinu shook his head, and gave him a grudging smile in return. “There’s an access across the alley.” He gestured. “I’m going to check the starport immigration records. If the Ondinean’s a recent arrival, like the ones who were killed at the warehouse, maybe I can find a lead that way.” Tree nodded, looking up the Street toward Azure Alley again.