The Far Shores (The Central Series) (46 page)

Eerie kicked her heels
against the log they were sitting on, staring into the fire with her mad eyes.
Alex wondered what she was thinking, the way he always did. He wondered if he
would ever achieve any real understanding of her, of what went on in her head.
Probably not, he figured – particularly when he didn’t even understand himself.

For perhaps the first
time, Alex wondered how much responsibility he bore for the strangeness between
them.

“You don’t want me to
come here, then?”

“Not for me. Not unless
you want to.”

Eerie was silent for a
moment. Then she leaned her head against his shoulder.

“That,” she said
quietly, “was a good answer.”

Alex blushed and grinned
at the same time.

“I miss you, you know?”
Alex blurted out the words. “All the time.”

“I know.”

Eerie held his hand
tighter, and they remained that way, watching the fire, for what seemed to him
like a long time. Then she stood up partway and leaned in to whisper in his
ear.

“Alex, do you want to
take a walk on the beach with me?”

Alex took her hand and followed
her into the darkness, away from the twinkling lights of the Far Shores.

***

Dr. Graaf was seething, though there
was no way anyone could tell simply by looking. He had the same pleasant,
nonspecific expression that he always wore, but inside, he could hardly contain
the raging anger that consumed his thoughts. He let himself into the deserted
administrative building and headed directly to his own office, the lights
turning on automatically as he activated the motion sensors, then going dead a
few moments later as he passed.

It was hard to believe –
no, that wasn’t entirely true. He had fooled himself into believing that things
at Central had changed, that the years of selfless work he had performed at the
Far Shores would have created a certain amount of positive feeling toward him,
or failing that, at least mitigated the distrust with which he was viewed.
Clearly, however, that wasn’t the case – Rebecca Levy, Gerald Windsor, Alice
Gallow – they had all forbidden him from even asking the Changeling if she
would care to assist him in his research. And on what basis? Because of an
experiment that was a product of his youth!

There was no justice in
the world, he thought, gritting his teeth behind his placid expression. Gaul
and Vladimir bore equal responsibility for the implantation experiments, and one
was at the pinnacle of Central’s power structure, while the other ran the
science division at the Academy. Yet here he was, in unofficial exile at the
very fringe of Central, viewed with suspicion despite everything he had done
since. It wasn’t even as if the implant experiments had been a total failure –
Gaul had been the first patient, after all, and he was the Director. Even
Mitsuru Aoki was an Auditor, despite the crimes she had committed!

It was personal, he
decided. It must have been. He had taken pains to be certain that his
professional record had been spotless, since that early unfortunate misstep.
His accomplishments since had certainly rivaled those of Gaul and Vladimir –
hadn’t he solved the power quandary that had choked off Central’s growth since
the time of the Founder? His pioneering work in materials science and Etheric
application was the basis for the entire infrastructure of Central, but he was
looked upon with suspicion nonetheless.

Before he even reached
his office to discover the lights already on, Dr. Graaf had made up his mind.
There was only so much a man could take, after all, before he had to accept the
reality of his position, and act accordingly.

“What I am even doing in Kiev? I
don’t speak Russian.”

“Ukrainian,” Miss Aoki
chided him, clinging to Alex’s arm for balance on the icy ground, made even more
treacherous by the unlikely red stilettos she wore. “They speak Ukrainian in Kiev,
Alex. At least, they do since Euromaidan. As you should recall from the
briefing, at the moment you do speak Ukrainian. One of the telepaths implanted
it in your brain before he deployed. I should have had someone implant the ability
to walk in these shoes.”

“What? No way,” Alex
said doubtfully, tugging fitfully at the neck of his tie. “I can barely speak
English.”

“I know,” Miss Aoki responded
sourly. “You and Rebecca both sound as if you were raised on one of those
reality TV shows she loves. For the sake of argument – tell me, what does that
sign say?”

Alex looked at the
unintelligible mass of Cyrillic characters. Or, at least, he had expected them
to be unintelligible.

“Holy shit,” Alex said
quietly, amazed. “It says ‘Restaurant and Bar’!”

“Amazing,” Miss Aoki snapped.
“Now, shut up, please.”

Alex escorted her
another slushy, cold block. The architecture of central Kiev was a mess, with
crumbling Soviet tenements set beside modern office buildings, and the overall effect
was haphazard. There were few trees, and the closer they got to downtown and
the central square known as the Maidan, the greater the density of competing
anarchist and fascist graffiti. Though the disorders had quieted as the action had
moved to Crimea, the air still smelled of the tire fires that smoldered nearby and
filled the air with heavy black ash. On some of the roads they passed, the
debris from the recently moved barricades and the melted asphalt from the fires
was obvious, and in many places the roads were missing cobbles that had been
torn up to use as projectiles. A few buildings were completely burned out, and
more were damaged. Most of the stores and offices seemed to have resumed
business, but cautiously, with steel gates ready to close at a moment’s notice.

It was hard to judge the
mood of the place. There were police on the street, and armed men who looked
like soldiers, but no one seemed particularly concerned with them, nor did they
evidence any interest in the people around them. Parts of the Maidan were still
occupied by the pro-Western protestors who had recently toppled the Russian-backed
presidency, and the mixture of leftists and Nazi soccer hooligans was a tense
one. Alex didn’t see any fighting or arguing, but the atmosphere seemed charged
and tense to him, as if some malignant energy lingered in Kiev, searching for
an outlet.

No one had been shot in
the last few days, a fact that seemed to offer the locals a small measure of
optimism.

From the briefing, it
seemed as if things had been very much worse just a few weeks before, with
fighting and gunfire on the streets, but the state of the city was still
awfully grim. Alex wondered if the Ukraine had a past to be nostalgic for,
something beyond his faint understanding of a twentieth century spent lurching
from one atrocity to another. Far from imagining better times, Alex had trouble
picturing the city when the sun was out.

Wasn’t this where Katya
and Timor were from, or at least their family, their cartel? No wonder they
were happy to be shipped off to the Black Sun. Anastasia probably never made
them spend time in places like this.

Their outfits drew some
attention downtown, but as they moved toward one of the wealthier suburbs, the
attention began to peter out.

His clothes were
uncomfortable, but that was no surprise. They had, after all, been tailored for
someone else; someone slightly shorter and with a narrower neck and shoulders,
apparently. That was the downside, he supposed, with being a last-minute
addition to the scouting team. Apparently, the planning for this particular operation
had not extended as far as providing him with a wardrobe.

Miss Aoki’s dress, on
the other hand, had to have been made to her exact dimensions, because Alex
could see no other possible way that she could have fit into the shimmering,
silvery thing that accentuated every curve and contour. In fact, looking at it
made him more than a little bit uncomfortable, even with a fur coat over the
dress, despite the constant danger that she would stumble and drag both of them
to the ground. This was a teacher, he reminded himself, not an elegant,
desirable woman. Her black hair was not beautiful in contrast to the snow, nor
did he notice the fullness of her red-painted lips.

It was worth a try.

“Still seems weird,”
Alex muttered.

Miss Aoki sighed.

“What?”

“I don’t know,” Alex
stammered, suddenly wishing he had taken the hint the first time. “Seems weird
to be all dressed up in a city that just had a revolution. Something like that.”

She seemed to think it
over. Or she could have simply been watching for something, scanning their
surroundings. Alex always found her hard to read.

“That isn’t a bad point,
Alex. I’ll give you credit for noticing. Now, tell me – did it ever occur to
you that we wanted to attract attention?”

“Well, um, no...”

Miss Aoki shook her
head.

“You’ve become more
capable of late,” Miss Aoki admitted, to Alex’s surprise and secret pride. “You
are still walking around with your eyes closed, however, Alex. You need to
learn to notice trouble
before
it gets its teeth in your throat.”

Alex didn’t think she
was being fair, but he was grudgingly sympathetic to her point of view. He did
have a history of failing to notice what was directly in front of him.

“I have noted some
increased confidence on your part,” Miss Aoki continued. “This is a promising
development, in your case. I have harbored suspicions that you might content
yourself with moping and second-guessing yourself for the rest of your life. I
am pleased to find them unfounded.”

“I’m glad to hear you
say that,” Alex said gratefully. “You have no idea how much it means...”

“Your former obliviousness
was not endearing.” Her tone was firm, but not hostile. It occurred to Alex
that this was perhaps the most normal conversation he had ever had with Miss
Aoki. “You were not accepted as a candidate for Audits based solely on the
strength of your protocol, or your own willingness to volunteer. You were
selected because there are people who believe that you have worth, that you
could make a contribution of value as an Auditor. A lack of confidence is
unbecoming, in the face of such advocacy.”

Alex shook his head
again. The icy street and the dull buildings around him were little more than a
blur, his mind somewhere else entirely.

“I had no idea,” he
admitted. “I thought it was because of the catalyst effect, or whatever...”

“The value of a soldier
is not in their weapon, but in their willingness to employ it, and their
capability to do so with skill and discretion. If you listened to the lectures
in the Program, then you would have heard me say this any number of times.”

Actually, Alex had heard
it. The words were immediately familiar. But he hadn’t applied the rationale to
himself, because he never would have suspected that anyone else would have
applied it to him. Realization dawned belatedly on him.

“Miss Aoki, do you,” he
paused, licking his lips and considering his words, “that is – did you advocate
for me?”

“Of course,” Miss Aoki
said, sounding surprised, adjusting the shoulder strap of her dress beneath her
fur. “Goddamn this thing...”

“Um. Thanks. But...but I
have to ask. Why?”

“Do you remember my
battle with the silver Weir in San Francisco?”

“You mean Mr. Blue-Tie?”

Mitsuru blinked and
hesitated, uncertain.

“What?”

“Never mind. Yes, of
course I do.”

“Then is it safe to
assume,” Miss Aoki continued, tugging at the hem of her skirt with a frown, “that
you remember how that encounter ended?”

“Sure,” Alex responded,
puzzled. “You killed Mr. Blue – the Weir. You killed the Weir.”

“Yes.” Miss Aoki nodded,
with an expression that Alex couldn’t read. “With your assistance.”

“But that was no big
deal. I mean, if Anastasia hadn’t told me to...”

“But you did,” Miss Aoki
countered, surprisingly gently. “And when Central fell to the Anathema – surely
you remember your actions?”

“Well, yeah,” Alex
mumbled, looking away at the monotonously rectangular building beside them. “I
had Katya with me, though. And I only did what anyone would have done.”

“You fought your way to
the Academy, killing several rogue Operators and Weir in the process,” Miss
Aoki reminded him, taking a firmer hold on his arm as they crossed a patch of
half-melted ice on the irregular sidewalk. “You fought Alistair on your own and
didn’t die, which is no small feat. And you woke Rebecca, when no one else
could.”

“You make it sound
better than it was,” Alex protested. “Anastasia talked me into going back to
Central, and I mostly did it because I was worried about Eerie.”

“You know how to take
orders, and you have something you want to protect,” Miss Aoki countered. “These
are both positive qualities. You are aware that I was on a mission, under
official orders, on the night we met, correct?”

He had to concede the
point, if not the argument.

“Even so. I had help.
Without Katya, Mr. Windsor, Michael, and Rebecca, I probably wouldn’t have been
able to do anything...”

“Which is why Auditors
rarely work alone, and even when we do, it is with the remote assistance of a
large support team. The lone hero who saves the world is a comic-book myth,
Alexander, not an ideal to aspire toward.”

Mercifully, Miss Aoki
fell silent as they walked through the grim suburb. Alex felt that she was
wrong – he was certain of it – but at the same time, it bothered him that he
could not think of a retort that didn’t sound ridiculous.

“I get what you’re
saying, and appreciate you telling me.” Alex meant to say it to himself, but
his whisper carried on the empty street. “I owe you a lot, Miss Aoki, and...”

“Stop!” Miss Aoki barked
at him, and Alex’s mouth snapped shut of its own accord. “Be quiet.”

Alex bit his tongue and
waited for the lecture, but nothing was forthcoming. They crossed a moderately
busy street that seemed entirely lacking in traffic lights, which was a rather
thrilling process, then continued on to another block that was virtually
identical to the last, aside from a fringe of largely dead grass that
surrounded the unpainted concrete building.

“Um, I’m sorry about...”

“Will you please shut up?”
Miss Aoki shook her head. “Central picked up something nearby. I’m getting the
details.”

Alex wondered why he
wasn’t included in the briefing while he helped Miss Aoki navigate around a
sizable pool of muddy water and half-melted ice that had partially flooded the
uneven pavement. He understood that he wasn’t a full Auditor, and there were things
that Central couldn’t – or wouldn’t – tell him, but it still made him nervous.

“We are fortunate,” Miss
Aoki said finally, with a small smile. “There is activity in our area.”

“Great,” Alex said, in a
voice devoid of enthusiasm. “But if there’s going to be fighting, I still don’t
get why you brought me...”

“First off, we are a bit
short on male Auditors, and Xia or Michael would stand out in Kiev,” Mitsuru
explained wearily. “We suspect that the Anathema have a large number of Weir,
and possibly Witches, with them. They must allow them to feed from the general
populace, or they would starve. We are trying to trip up hunting Weir or
Witches by appearing to be attractive prey. We are supposed to look like a
couple, and we cannot simply rely on telepathic disguises. Besides that, you
are in the Program, which means doing the occasional field op for experience – and
this will be part of your evaluation for Audits, incidentally. Primarily,
though, you were selected because you constantly emit Etheric energy.”

“I what now?”

“See? That’s what I’m
talking about. Is that even English?” Mitsuru shook her lovely head. “The
catalyst effect, Alex. Remember all those tests Vladimir ran on you? You were
required to stand in the glass chamber for an hour or so?”

Alex remembered. It had
been like being in a human-sized test tube, and Vladimir’s constant muttering
to himself and occasional cackles of spontaneous laughter did nothing to
reassure him. He kept reminding Alex of the mad scientist in those old
Frankenstein movies, the black-and-white ones. The entire memory was panicky
and claustrophobic.

“He was determining the
amount of Etheric energy you radiate. All Operators give off a certain amount –
that’s what we call the Etheric Signature – something else that has been
repeatedly discussed in various classes. But, in this as in everything else,
you are both an exception and a giant pain in the ass. You siphon raw energy
from the Ether to create the catalyst effect. Assuming you don’t infuse another
operator with it, it doesn’t just disappear.” Mitsuru sounded bored with the
explanation, but Alex figured she was just concentrating on walking. “It
dissipates gradually into the atmosphere around you. Every Operator does it to
some extent, burning unused energy that would otherwise power their protocol,
but they are a slow burn while you are a forest fire. Makes you great bait.”