Windswept (20 page)

“Are we drinking more?” asked Madolyn as I shepherded the Breaches to a table on the lanai.

“No, just eating,” I said, “I think you’re all due for something more substantial than bar snacks.”

“I’d love some cake,” said Gricelda as she slumped into her sister.

“I think we can manage that,” I said as the waiters brought over trays of steaming purple kumara cakes, roasted squid, and plates of kimchi and other pickles. The Breaches tucked in without hesitating.

I picked at a bowl of chapchae as the Breaches revived. “So, have you guys given thought to signing up?”

“I’m in,” said Gricelda, her face stained purple.

“Me, too,” said Madolyn, flicking at a bleached spot on the front of her shirt.

Mimi just nodded.

I turned to One-Eye, who said, “You still haven’t convinced me, but if everyone else is going, I guess I will, too.”

“Close enough,” I said, making a note to transfer her ass to Steelcase as soon as possible. “How about you, Counselor?”

Banks’s mouth was full, but he nodded as he swigged down a cup of coconut water. “I just hope I can manage,” he said, wiping his mouth. “Things move faster than your legal code can keep up.”

“We usually like it that way,” I said. “Helps us fuck with the Big Three during Contract time. Especially when we upcharge them for hookers.”

Banks shook his head. “God, it really is a nonstop orgy of crime and degeneracy.”

“Is the Big Three still saying that about us?” I poured myself a cup of coconut water and took a sip to clear the cotton taste from my mouth. “We keep sending their PR departments requests for corrections, but they never listen.”

“Do you expect them to?”

“No, but I like frustrating the crap out of them,” I said. “The dumbest people I knew in B-school all got shuffled into PR, and they were the ones who always gave me the most grief during my all-too-brief career.”

“What, you mean you weren’t always a parasite on the Body Corporate?” said Banks.

“I’ll have you know, Counselor, that before I Breached I had worked my way to a Class Three pay scale with four letters of commendation, including one from the Board. On paper.”

“Signed in blood?”

“No, crushed baby seals,” I said. “Looks prettier.”

“So what happened?” he said. “It sounds like you could’ve written your own ticket. What made you give it up?”

For a brief moment, I wanted to tell Banks about the real reason I kept the bottle of Old Windswept, about the candle and the single finger at six o’clock. The fact that his eyes were so damn sincere would have made it easy: I could just open my mouth and it would all spill out, like all the bilge from a salvage.

But then there was a shrill whistle blast from outside, sharp and loud enough to cut through the street noise and the murmur inside Big Lily’s. “What’s that?” said Banks.

“Not our problem,” I said, turning back to my kumara cakes. Six o’clock couldn’t get here fast enough.

A bumblecar raced by, lights flashing and sirens screeching their horrible two-note song. A second bumblecar, then a third tore past. “Are you sure?” said Banks. “It sounds like–”

“It sounds like a Thursday night riot at the pitch,” I said, walking to the door. “St Seryn FC is playing a grudge match against the Freeborn All-Stars, and sometimes the crowds get started before the game, and–”

You need to get here right now
, came the text, loud and clear like someone had written it with thirty-meter-high letters of flame. I had to blink away the afterimages just to focus on the message header. It had come from Soni.

Where is here?
I replied, and got sent a picture. It was a shot of the Emerald Masjid against the late afternoon sky, though, as I followed the green spires to the ground, I saw that the actual subject was a pile of browned rags hanging over a set of rusting pipes. It took me a moment to realize that I was looking at the north end of the sewage plant, right off Courtland Lane, and that the pile of rags was actually a stack of bodies laid out on the tops of the testing lines, like someone had set out a bunch of gutted fish to dry in the sun.

I fought back the temptation to say I had nothing to do with it, until I remembered that I was still supposed to be looking out for this Ward, even the parts of it that tried to kill me.
Be right there
, I replied, then stood up. “I’ll be right back,” I said. “Local business.”

“Where are you going?” asked Banks.

“And is there more rum there?” asked Madolyn.

“You don’t need to worry about that, and no, there is no rum there,” I said, getting up.

Banks touched my elbow and said, “If it has to do with the police, I’d like to help.”

“And I’d like you to get your ass signed onto the Union books before you go wandering again,” I said. “Something bad is happening, and either here or the Hall are the safest places for you.”

“You said I’d be safe in Steelcase,” said Banks.

I held up my hands, trying to shush him, but One-Eye gave me a wary look, and Mimi’s face lit up with alarm. “Look,” I said, “you’ll be fine here, especially since I’ve got an open tab. As for you”–I pointed at Banks–“if you can keep your mouth shut, you can come along.”

He put a hand over his grinning mouth and got up.

It was a short downhill walk to the plant, and the smell of ancient farts and sewer slime got stronger as we got closer. It was never so overpowering that it kept people from living in the lower-rent homes nearby, but there was never any way to get away from it, either. It was a constant reminder, the smell, that there were some things people couldn’t get away from. We couldn’t get away from work, we couldn’t get away from hunger, and, despite all of the of the technological advances of the past twenty-five hundred years, we couldn’t get away from excrement.

A police had set three-meter-high screens around the crime scene, and a crowd hovered at the edge of the cordon, their faces washed yellow in the bumblecars’ flashing lights. I left Banks at the screens, and there were the bodies, beaten to a pulp and floppy as puppets. I’d seen plenty of people killed in industrial accidents or bar fights gone wrong, but this was different. The metal tang of the blood made my head spin. Soni stood nearby as some cops dabbed at blood drops on the ground. “Who are they?” I asked her.

Soni sighed and shook her head. “Jordan Blanton, Thor Becker, Remy Galletain… all locals.”

My guts turned to ice. I felt my bladder drop into my boots. Soni kept talking, but I didn’t hear anything as I pinged the corpses’ pais to confirm what she’d said. All those bodies, they had been people who had all been in the office last night, all of them had threatened me, and they had likely badmouthed me to anyone who would listen. I knew I should stay and explain to Soni, especially now that I had Banks with me, but I just turned and ran, knocking down the screens as I went. I might have heard people gasping and cops shouting, but I was gone before it could register.

I ran through the streets and alleys, knowing Soni could track me but not caring. I ran until the streets got dark and I’d run out of steam. I looked up, panting, and saw that I was back on Murdoch, outside the shitty bar with the cardboard sign. DRINK, it said, and I thought, yes, I should, because it was probably after six, and I might as well give in. Let the deal with Tonggow fall through, let Soni arrest me, let me just rot away where I wouldn’t have to deal with the Union or dead bodies or anything. That would be perfect.

And then the back of my right eye spiked with pain, enough to make me double over. I grabbed my head, looking around to see what was happening, when I saw Jilly and Banks ride up in the tuk-tuk, Bloombeck following behind on a cargo bike. Of course. Why not?

“Jilly thought you might be here,” said Banks. “You OK?”

“Peachy,” I said, wiping sweat from my brow. “Why is
he
here?”

“He found us,” said Banks. “Said he had something to tell you.”

“And you believed him?” I looked at Bloombeck. “What the hell do you want?”

“I am here to save the day, Padma!” cried Bloombeck, kicking the bike’s stand in place.

I massaged my temple and looked at Banks. “What time is it?”

“Ten after six.”

Dammit. “OK.” I straightened up. “Someone is buying me a drink. Now.”

The bar had gotten even worse. The mustard gas smell clung to the walls, and streaks of soot lined the barback. Jilly hugged herself and stuck close to Banks as we slid into a booth. I wanted to try and reassure her, but then Bloombeck shoveled his way next to me, his stench making my eyes water. “Fuck
me
, Bloomie. Did you go swimming in a cesspool?”

Bloombeck patted his stomach, and his sodden coverall made an unsettling splashing sound. “I been undercover, trying to figure out who framed you, just like you’d want me to,
partner
.”

The way he said that last word put a new layer of nausea on top of the current pile already roiling in my stomach. “The hell are you talking about? And get downwind of me, will you?”

“But, Padma, I got to tell you–”

“You can tell me from two meters away, where your stink won’t crowd me,” I said, shoving him away from me. His coverall felt like cold oatmeal. “God, where have you been? The sewer lines?”

“Best way to find out what’s going on,” said Bloombeck, and I looked at the gunk on my hand, then wiped it on my pants leg. I made a mental note to follow up later with a tetanus mojito.

Bloombeck said, “So, I heard about what happened with Saarien, and I put two and four together, and–”

“Stop there,” I said. “First of all, I had nothing to do with Saarien. Second of all, you and I are
not
partners in any way. Third, goodbye.” I stood up.

“But this will help me pay off my debt to you!”

“You turning your body into a fertilizer log would pay off your debt, because you’re worth more that way,” I said. “Go pester someone else.”

“No,” said Bloombeck.

I actually stopped. “Well, that’s a new one,” I said. “All these years, chasing your ample ass around Brushhead for back dues and owed favors, I’ve never known you to pass up passing the buck. What gives?”

Bloombeck wiped the top layer of muck off his cheek. “I want to make good on what I owe you, that’s all.”

“Bull’s balls. You’re working something, and I should have you arrested for impersonating a con man,” I said, wishing I had a bottle so I could take a pull on it.

“But I want to help you!”

“And I want to retire and have beautiful men feed me peeled grapes,” I said. “Guess which is going to happen first?”

“I know who killed Saarien!” he yelled. Enough people in the bar lifted their heads that I grabbed Bloombeck by the elbow and pulled his face to mine.

“Spill it,” I said. “All of it.”

Bloombeck grinned and licked his lips. I tried not to think about what he must have been tasting.

“OK,” he said. “So, I’m down at my local, having a nip, and I hear about Saarien’s passing. I get to thinking: why would you want to kill him? I mean, I know he’s gone and taken Breaches from you and given you all kinds of grief, but to kill him? That ain’t your style, Padma. You’d outdeal him, make him look stupid, do something with more finesse, you know?”

“That almost sounds logical,” I said.

“I know, I know, right?” said Bloombeck. “This whole thing stinks of a frame-up, and who would want to hurt you more than Saarien?”

“I imagine that list is pretty big,” said Banks. I shot him a look.

“WalWa,” said Bloombeck. “Your former employer. You cost them a lot of money, and, the other day, you waltz into their office, make ’em look stupid, then lift a bunch of people out from under their noses. How could they not want you dead?”

“Because that would cause a Union backlash and a work stoppage and crash their share price,” I said.

“But that’s if they actually
hurt
you,” said Bloombeck. “But if they hurt your reputation?” He put his hands in front of him, like he was serving me a sandwich. I thought about the rumors floating around the jail about Ghosts running around on Santee. If that were true, then we were all in new territory, the kind filled with flesh-eating landmines and laser-guided crocodiles. I heard nothing but rumors about how Ghosts operated while I was in B-school, and I had never moved high enough up the Corporate Ladder to learn what they really did. But I’d been able to piece together enough from news and water cooler scuttlebutt to know they were bad news. A single Ghost could upset an entire city, and a squad of them could wreck a planet. But were they
here
?

“This is all sounding frighteningly level-headed,” I said, pushing the thought of Ghosts out of my mind. “But still insane.”

“Insane enough to get into Thronehill?”

“What’s Thronehill?” asked Banks.

“WalWa’s Colonial HQ,” I said, then turned to Bloombeck. “How in hell could you do that?”

Bloombeck smiled and nodded behind him. “The plant.”

“Oh, you have got to be kidding,” I said. “You didn’t.”

Bloombeck huffed and waved his hands over his filthy clothes. “Where do you think all this is from?”

“I figured that was your standard grooming, Bloomie.”

“This is what I get for busting my hump?” Bloombeck said. “You think anyone else would be crawling around in the shit trying to find something out?”

My temples throbbed. “Jesus, is my
entire
day going to revolve around excrement? What in hell could you have possibly found in the sewers, Bloomie?”

“OK,” said Bloombeck, rubbing his hands together. “I was in the sewers because they lead into the main plant for the WalWa complex. Water, air, sewage, all go through there.”

“Bloomie, if you’re about to tell me that you have samples of some exec’s bowel movement as proof, I will beat the living hell out of you.”

Bloomie sucked in a breath and blurted, “It’s also where all their whole paper trail goes for disposal. All of it.”

All of my anger drained away, and I turned to Banks. “I hope you’re recording this, Banks, ’cause you’ve just witnessed something miraculous.”

“What’s that?”

“Vytai Bloombeck has had a good idea. No, a fucking
brilliant
one,” I said. “WalWa, of all the Big Three, still insists on doing everything on paper. Every purchase order, every policy change, every presentation has a paper version. There’s a palm pulp plant in Habana Vieja that does nothing but turn cane bagasse into reams and reams of paper, just to feed it all into the WalWa’s bureaucracy so it can be stamped, printed, filed, then chucked in the shredders and burned.”