The bullets. Wyte kept taking them like gifts. They tore through his limbs, lodged in his torso. Leaving holes. Leaving daylight. That closed up. And running in the shadow of that magnificence, as Wyte's scream became a roar again and they were assailing the ramparts of the Partials, he felt as if he were following some sort of god, his own gun like a toy as, from the shelter that was Wyte, he shot back at the chapel to keep the rebels pinned down.
Wyte's voice came out incomprehensible and strange now. Guttural and animal-like. No part of him in those moments that was human. Once he looked back at Finch to make sure he was still there. The whites of his eyes colonized. His pupils looking like something trapped. Trapped forever inside its own flesh.
For awhile it was as if Wyte had lent Finch that kind of vision, because he could see the bullets coming. As if Finch were floating overhead, watching. And it was ecstasy or some kind of odd heaven. The surprise that eclipsed the Partials' pale faces as Wyte overran their positions. Wyte trying to outrun something he couldn't outrun. Tendrils from his chest racing out to impale them. The weeping muzzle of his gun taking them in the legs, the heads. Faces trampled under his charge. Fungal eyes still clicking and clicking as the bodies lay dead. While even the rebels' fire had become scattershot from the shock of the new. From seeing the glory that Wyte had become. The monster.
Then it all came crashing down and Finch was in his skin again. In that one last look back he saw it all as a crazed tableau of men fallen, falling, firing, or running at an impossible speed. Almost distant enough as they made it to the warren of streets beyond to think of them as the silhouettes of broken, spasming dolls.
Realized he was roaring, too, like Wyte. As the tears ran down his face. As he kept firing behind him long after the enemy had faded into time and distance.
4
reathless. Aching. Side hurting. Wyte trailing bits of things into the rubble behind them. Waiting for a bullet in the back of the head that never came. The acrid smell of spent ammo. A shambling halt under the shadow of the arch. The boat still tethered in the canal. The sky dark gray.
Wyte was still coming down from whatever had possessed him. Voice slick with some hidden discharge. Muttering: "Like wheat. Like paper. Just shredding them. Just running through them."
Finch babbling back. Exhilarated. Heart still beating so hard in his chest.
Wyte's face had regained a semblance of the normal, skin sealed over the bullets. Already now looking drawn, diminished. Finch kept seeing Wyte killing the Partials.
Wyte had rebuttoned his trench coat. The lining torn. Hung down below the hem. Mud-spattered. Blood-spattered. About a dozen bullet holes in it. Small orange mushroom caps peeked out from the holes. Others had burst through the fabric. Around the buttons, purple fungus rasped out, probing.
"Wyte, Dapple's dead," Finch said.
"I know, Finch. I saw. Get in the boat."
Finch climbed in and sat down. Held himself rigid as Wyte made the difficult negotiation of casting off and jumping in without capsizing them. Wyte sat down opposite. The boat glided across the water, back the way it had come. Like magic.
"You saved my life, Wyte," Finch said. And it was true. Monstrously true. Kept staring at Wyte with a kind of awe. Wyte's strength had manifested in a way Finch still couldn't quite believe.
"But not Dapple," Wyte said. "Dapple's dead. And I feel beaten and bruised all over."
Had Wyte passed a point of no return? More things that had colonized him peered out from the collar of the coat. Spilled out from his pants legs. Erupted in red-and-green patterns from his boots. A stench of overwhelming sweetness. Of corruption.
"Don't go back to the station," Finch said. "Not today."
"We were sent there to die, weren't we?" Matter-of-fact.
For my sins.
"Maybe we weren't," Finch said, thinking about the Partial standing over Shriek's body. Lecturing him about how Partials saw more than gray caps. "Maybe it's all falling apart. In front of our eyes. Everything."
Wyte made a wet clucking sound. He was trying to laugh. "Didn't it fall apart a long time ago?"
Knew Wyte was thinking about his wife, his kids, the little house they'd shared together so long ago.
Finch didn't want that in his head, shot a glance up toward the ridge. Anyone could pick them off. Anyone. "Stay at home. I'll figure it out. Call you."
Wyte nodded again, almost slumped over in his seat. A kind of glow had begun to suffuse his features. Green-golden.
Or you'll call me. Suppressed a shudder.
Finch's vision blurred. Too many things to keep inside. Every time he thought he'd tamped down one thing, another came rushing up.
A long silence. A complex smile played across Wyte's blurring lips. Finally said, "You know, Finch, I think we're a lot closer to solving this case."
A double take from Finch. A stifled smile. "Yeah, Wyte. Sure you do. Rest now. Sleep. I'll keep watch."
Wyte nodded. Closed his eyes.
A flake of something floated onto Finch's shoulder. Then another and another. He looked up to see that it was snowing. It was snowing in Ambergris.
As the white flakes drifted down, Finch on a hunch looked back. The white dome of the farthest camp had disappeared, replaced by an impression of billowing whiteness. An outline of what had once been. Realized that bits of fungus were raining down on them.
Raindrops followed, thick but sparse. Finch blinking them away. He laughed then. A wide laugh. Showing his teeth.
The "snow" still coming down. Falling onto Wyte's slack face. Melting away. Into him.
5
y the time Finch made it back to the hotel, he was almost asleep on his feet. Keeping him awake: left shoulder on fire. A bullet hole through the right arm of his jacket. Would've nicked him if he'd been a fatter man. A sharp pain in his ankle when he climbed the steps to the lobby. Stomach empty and complaining. Even after he bought some sad-looking plums. On credit. With a threat. From a woman who'd set them out on her stoop like a row of Bosun's carvings. Ate them on the way back to the hotel. Slowly.
Passed the Photographer inside. Grunted a hello. The Photographer just stared at him.
Lots of love to you, too.
He turned left in the courtyard, descended. Stopped at Rathven's door. Knocked.
A slow, reluctant opening. Long wedge of light. When Rathven looked up at Finch he thought he saw the secret knowledge they shared shining through her eyes.
A frown hardened her face. "What do you want?" She had one arm behind her back, hiding something. Wore severe pants and a shirt that almost made her look like an Irregular.