Memory Seed (14 page)

CHAPTER 12

Zinina woke with a headache. For a few minutes she lay in bed listening to the creaking of the house and the rustling of Kray, until she heard Graaff-lin speaking to a pyuter and decided to get up. She showered in medicated water, spread depilating cream over her head, wiped it off with a towel, then dressed.

Breakfast consisted of the remains of last night’s Food Station meal – some grey stuff, some white stuff, and some carrots that tasted only of salt water. She dropped vitamin supplements into the mess as it bubbled over the gas burner.

Food in hand, she went to see Graaff-lin, who was in her workroom. ‘Still no Arrahaquen,’ she remarked.

‘That is not my fault,’ replied Graaff-lin.

Zinina said nothing. She watched Graaff-lin instructing her pyuters by squeezing the contours of a soft metal ball. ‘Perhaps,’ she said, ‘she’s gone back to the Citadel, to her real friends. Maybe she was spying on us.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Graaff-lin, not looking up from her work.

Irritated, Zinina said, ‘Don’t you care then?’

‘I simply do not know what has happened and I realise we cannot find out. If she is dead, she is dead.’

‘Well I’m going to do something. I’m not sitting round here. It’s like jumping in a green pool.’

‘You go out and look some more,’ said Graaff-lin, ‘but as sure as seeds is seeds I am not. I have work to do concerning our discoveries.’

Zinina dressed for the city, pulling her protectives from their antiseptic bin and her boots from the tray of disinfectant. As she opened the front door Graaff-lin called, ‘If you do not find her, do not come back and vent your frustrations on me.’

Zinina departed without a word.

The nearest wall-pyuter was dead. She walked down to Pine Street, stopping at another wall-pyuter, this time one that worked. The rain beat against her ears as she keyed in a link to the Citadel’s public network, a constant patter, like an eternal drumroll signifying the demise of humanity.

The crimson query mark appeared. Zinina requested knowledge of the independent Haquyn, then, when that returned a negative, of the priestess Haquyn. Nothing.

Depressed, she walked up Hog Street then took back alleys leading to the Infirmary. Here, she noticed that a number of passages were blocked by barbed wire, and on some of these barriers were hung fragments of wood painted with green triangles, the sign for a green alley – in other words, the sign for ‘keep out’. She hurried on, the stench of atmospheric ozone on the wind making her choke.

The Infirmary were not treating Arrahaquen, nor had she been in as a casualty. So Zinina walked the short lane that led to the Dispensary.

Eight defenders armed with needle rifles and a laser bazooka greeted her. Because of its reveller problem, the Dispensary required continuous defence. Zinina noticed a charred corpse nearby, left untouched to deter others.

Arrahaquen had not been seen at the Harbour, nor at the Temple of Balloon Love. The priestess outside Rien Zir’s temple had not seen her. And nor was she at the Spired Inn.

Zinina trudged back along Morte Street. She did not know what to do. Worry was beginning to consume her, and, over and over, she tried to think where outside the Citadel Arrahaquen could be. She glanced into the Cemetery, and saw a figure.

It was a most unusual person. In fact, it looked like a man.

A man! Most likely he was a reveller of course, but still, how often did anybody see a man outside of the Fish Chambers?

Zinina climbed over the wall and, crouched low, ran to a line of hedge, along which she hurried until she could see him more clearly. It was indeed a man; sitting in a canvas chair, an umbrella over him to ward off the rain, and reading a book. He was dressed in dark knee boots with blue elastics, brown corduroy trousers, and the biggest, blackest greatcoat Zinina had ever seen. His scalp was hairless, but his cheeks grew stubble. He seemed to be eating something, and as she watched Zinina saw him extract a cube from a silver packet and pop it into his mouth.

Zinina was intrigued. The man’s eyes were deep and brown, though rather rheumy, while his mouth was wide and thin-lipped, and his nose narrow and almost malformed with its high ridge.

Standing, she took out a short knife from her kit, then approached.

He heard her, and looked around.

‘Fear not, good woman,’ he said, glancing at the knife. ‘I am harmless. Replace your dirk in its receptacle.’

Zinina stood before him. His voice was deep, resonant, and every word was enunciated with clarity. ‘Sure,’ she said, ‘once I know who you are and what you’re doing in this tombgarden.’

He looked around him. ‘The Cemetery? I come here for the nepenthic quality inculcated within me. Surely you too would wish to forget your every care awhile?’

‘Sometimes, yes. I do it with drink.’

The man smiled, placed a plastic bookmark between the pages of his book, then snapped it shut. ‘Drink, yes. How merry.’

‘Are you a reveller?’

‘No.’

‘What’s that you’re reading?

‘Oh, only an old diary. As a matter of fact it was written by a reveller, one from the Archaic Quarter.’

‘Who are you?’ Zinina demanded.

He did not answer but instead gazed at her, looking her up and down. A thoughtful expression came to his face.

‘You’re a man,’ Zinina said bluntly. But there was something else he could be. She fumbled in her kit for a sterile needle and, quick as a cobra, lunged at his arm. He shrank back, taken by surprise.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked. ‘That was dangerous.’

Zinina threw an alcohol swab in his direction, but she did not apologise. ‘There’s blood on your wrist. I reckoned you might be a pyuton.’

Frowning, the man said, ‘Well I
am
human. Are there further diagnostic checks to be undertaken?’

‘No. I’m satisfied. But I still want to know what you’re doing here.’

‘Perusing a diary, as I said,’ he replied, opening the book again.

‘Aren’t you scared of revellers?’

‘Yes. But they will hardly bother me so close to the Cemetery wall. Their prime encampments lie southwards.’

Zinina laughed. ‘You don’t know much about revellers, then. They can be anywhere hereabouts.’

The man smiled as though he was humouring a small child. He rummaged inside his coat and pulled out two battered packets and an old tin. From these he took a piece of paper, a match and some chopped-up weed, items from which he proceeded to roll a cigarette. Zinina, used to seeing some of her friends smoking, watched, fascinated. She had never seen a man smoke in her life. And now she noticed the odour of the weed...

‘I know you,’ she said, with thumping heart. ‘You rescued me from the pit off Blank Street.’

He nodded. ‘Indeed I did. And now we meet again.’

‘You took me to Graaff-lin’s house?’

‘I did.’

‘Who are you?’

‘My name is deKray. Might I know the jannitta whom I have the privilege of looking up to?’

‘Zinina. Why did you take me there?’

‘The aamlon is an acquaintance of mine.’

Zinina frowned. ‘She’s never mentioned you.’

‘Why should she?’

‘But you rescued me. And my kit.’

‘At the time you were a Krayan in distress, Zinina. I noticed you were wearing the garments of a member of the Citadel Guard, though you had tried to alter your clothes by ripping off the lapels and flashes. I deduced that you were a deserter. When the woman attacked you, I beat her off, then pulled you out. Realising that your position was somewhat precarious, I carried you down to Graaff-lin’s house, hoping that she would offer you sanctuary. I thought it wise not to reveal my identity... you had a better chance simply appearing out of the green. Had Graaff-lin known it was I who foisted you upon her, she might have acted differently.’

Zinina nodded. ‘And what is that stuff you smell of?’

‘Menthol,’ he replied, relighting the cigarette when it went out. ‘Do you imbibe at all, Zinina?’

‘Nope.’

‘It can be ghastly stuff,’ he said, puffing at the crooked cigarette, ‘but it has the same effect as your alcohol. You know, I once read that if I tried to imagine what sort of person my cigarette would be, I should learn much about myself. The same applies to your glass of dooch, I imagine.’

‘Really? And who would your cigarette be?’

‘I imagined my cigarette as an Infirmary doctor. Now is that not curious?’

Zinina laughed. She found herself tantalised by the mind that might lie behind this polished exterior. DeKray possessed the air of an aesthete. He radiated calmness. When he spoke it was as if tomes had come alive. ‘What did you make of that thought?’ she asked.

‘I do not know. Only rarely do I ponder the matter. Mayhap it means that I wish to operate upon myself.’

‘Hoy,’ Zinina said, ‘why not come back with me to Graaff-lin’s? She should meet more people.’

He paused, clearly not sure, took a puff and then gazed speculatively at her. ‘Very well. I must confess, I have not seen her for a while.’

DeKray packed up his things, then followed Zinina out of the Cemetery. In Sphagnum Street he remarked, ‘I used to reside two alleys away, you know, at a domicile in Cochineal Mews.’ Sporadic talk about the rain and the sound of gunfire enlivened the walk home, but, crossing the Peppermint Bridge into Eastcity, Zinina began to feel nervous. What would Graaff-lin say?

She decided it would be better if deKray remained outside the house while she fetched Graaff-lin. Nervously, she told Graaff-lin that a friend awaited her at the front door. When Graaff-lin saw who it was she halted, face set into a grimace. But her eyes conveyed her feelings. ‘Not a friend, rather an acquaintance,’ she said.

‘That is how I described myself,’ said deKray.

Zinina reassured Graaff-lin, saying, ‘Don’t worry, I’ve checked him. He’s the one that rescued me.’ DeKray took out a menthol sweet and dropped it on to his tongue. ‘He reads a lot,’ she added.

‘I know.’

Suddenly inspired, Zinina asked him, ‘Hoy, you don’t happen to know what a noophyte is?’

Graaff-lin scowled at her. ‘Don’t be ridicu–’

‘Assuredly yes,’ deKray interrupted. ‘A noophyte is what Graaff-lin here would term a conscoositie.’

‘A conscoositie,’ Graaff-lin said, recognising the aamlon word. ‘A conscoositie?’

‘Why, yes.’

Graaff-lin’s face seemed lit up. ‘A conscoositie! Of course. That would explain the strange partial inhabitation of the networks...’

Graaff-lin walked back into the house. Shrugging, Zinina gestured for deKray to follow. Divested of his boots and greatcoat Zinina offered him a seat.

‘We know of some noophytes,’ she said. ‘We wondered what they were.’

‘Don’t tell him anything,’ Graaff-lin said, sharply.

Zinina studied deKray’s face. ‘Can you prove you’re an indep?’ she asked.

‘Utilise my kit number,’ he replied. ‘The Citadel pyuters will confirm my status.’

Graaff-lin checked deKray’s identity. He was genuine.

‘We can trust an independent,’ Zinina said. ‘He’d be a defender, wouldn’t he, if he was a spy or something?’

Graaff-lin seemed hesitant, but Zinina, impatient, had no time for procrastination. DeKray was happy to illuminate her darkness. ‘A conscoositie is a partial or fractured model of reality – an abstract model. Thus, we human beings are noophytes, except that most philosophers would judge human beings to be almost complete models of reality, and so would class them apart.’

Zinina glanced across at Graaff-lin. It was clear that she was uncomfortable, being so close to a loose man – and maybe this loose man in particular. ‘Where do you live?’ Zinina asked him.

‘At a maisonette in the south of the Citadel Quarter.’

Zinina opened an internal shutter and peered out into the evening gloom. ‘Better walk you home,’ she said. ‘It’s dangerous out there.’

‘That is most gracious,’ deKray replied.

Suited up, Zinina led him out and along to Pine Street, but before they entered it she took him by the arm and stopped him. ‘Look,’ she said, ‘it’s getting fraught out here.’ She handed him a rusty needle pistol.

He smiled. ‘But men are not permitted to bear arms.’

‘If you hide it nobody’ll know.’

'I shall risk the enormous risk.’

Zinina smiled back. As he hid the pistol within some recess of the huge greatcoat, she noticed on one lapel a large copper hat-pin with a bulbous head. She watched his face. It was not that his features showed no emotions, rather that his emotions flickered through his expression, like sunny patches in a cloudy sky. DeKray was a cultured man. He had the driest, yet most delicate, sense of humour, even though he was acutely aware of his position in Kray. Zinina liked him for that.

‘How did you get to know Graaff-lin?’ she asked him.

‘We both studied pyuter metaphysics at the Waterlily Institute, near the Cemetery.’

‘I’m sorry I spoke rough at you up the tombgardens,’ she said, as they walked along Pine Street.

‘In truth I expected you to,’ he replied.

‘Well, sorry. You must admit it’s better to be safe than sorry.’

‘I suppose that is true.’

Silence fell between them. But the city was not silent. As they walked south they heard automatic gunfire, and once a large explosion. People ran by, as if being chased.

Then deKray halted. ‘I hear carousing revellers,’ he said. ‘We had better secrete ourselves.’

Zinina heard the singing, but around them stood only locked doors and alleys filled with poison vines, death-roses and stinking puddles. ‘We better hide in a doorway,’ she said.

This they did, taking muslin masks from their kits and tying them across their faces. Three revellers emerged from an alley. Pledgets were pressed by elastic bands to their noses, and all were filthy and bloodied. Zinina shivered when she saw the blood. Each carried a toad in one hand, and as they staggered by Zinina saw one reveller lick the eye secretions of the noxious beast.

‘I have witnessed such things before,’ deKray said as they hurried on. ‘Such toads expectorate a dense humour from their eye ducts, which in humans produces a psychedelic response. No doubt those revellers were deep in some other, druggy reality.’