"Soon it will be your turn," Wyte said. "Will you be ready?"
"Ready for what?" Finch said.
"Never lost." Now it wasn't Wyte sitting beside his father, but Finch as James Crossley. Youthful. Neatly trimmed beard. Eyes bright with confidence. The James Crossley who'd worked as a courier for Wyte.
Finch smiled. "It's been a long time since I've seen you. Could've used you earlier, James."
His father had disappeared. Duncan Shriek was sitting next to James now. Flickering in and out like a faulty bulb.
Finch stared at them both. While the Spit burned down around them.
Shriek said, "You can't survive much more of this. You've got to find a way out."
Finch grinned painfully. With each new bolt of green light another part of him was disintegrating. Falling away.
"Easy for a dead man to say. I'm still in the world," he said.
Something was calling. Some noise was exploding in his head.
"You'll be back," Shriek promised, fading into darkness.
Woke, finally, to the sounds of combat. Rockets. Gunfire. The recoil of a tank blast?
Through the window, through the blood in his eyes, Finch saw intense flashes of light. Nothing like the gray caps' spore clouds. Or their fungal displays. That light was more like a mist. This was harsh and sudden. Unforgiving.
Blood tickled his throat. The Partial had taken teeth. Each a raging agony in his mouth.
The Partial sat on the couch, tapping his foot. He'd turned the chair so it faced him.
Finch laughed. An unhinged laugh that ended on too high a note. Thought, "Could the interrogation be getting to the f**ker?" But had said it aloud. The Partial crept behind him. Felt a soft sawing around his numb hand. A sudden flowing release.
Still the rockets went off. So they must be real. Not hallucinations.
No one's coming for me. No one.
The Partial placed Finch's bloody pinkie finger on the table. It looked like a white worm.
"Don't disrespect me again," the Partial said. Breathing hard. Something almost sexual in the way he swallowed. Let the tip of his tongue show through his teeth. "Or there's more where that came from."
A chuckle or the low sound of a moan? "Only eight, or nine. But I won't. I won't. I won't. Just untie me. I can't feel my hands. I can't feel my legs."
The Partial ignored him. Which meant slapping him a few times.
Nothing he'd told the Partial had stopped him. Nothing. Not once. Not any more than Stark had stopped Finch. Saw Bliss at the table in the Photographer's apartment, carefully creating the vial of liquid. Saw Sintra's face against the wall as they made love. Rathven's hesitant smile at their detective joke. None of it mattered anymore.
Began to cry. To weep. Slumped over. Head leaning toward his lap.
"Oh, there's nothing to cry about, Finch. Nothing at all," the Partial said. "We're just having a conversation. A kind of meeting of the minds. If it makes you feel any better, those sounds you hear-they're your rebels, Finch. They've abandoned you. They're attacking the tower. It won't work, but I almost wish it would. Except there's no place for me in their new world, either."
"I'm sorry the gray caps. Betrayed you." Mangled the words. Parched. As if he could drink forever and not be satisfied. But the Partial had only given him boiling water.
"Are you?" the Partial asked. "Really? Because all I ever got from you before was contempt. An aura of deep contempt."
"Not contempt. Ignorance."
"Ignorance?" Incredulous.
"Of what. You had to go through. To become a Partial."
At some point during the interrogation, if that's what it still was, Finch remembered consoling the Partial. Couldn't keep it straight in his head. His brain felt like it was outside of his body. Exposed and raw.
"It's nice of you to pretend," the Partial said.
If I ever get free, I am going to put out your eye with my hands.
Another flash. A recoil. But the attack seemed blunted. The explosions of light less frequent. Saw the Partial's serious, pale face in the half-light.
"I've told you all I know," Finch said. "Anything you needed to know." But not Sintra. Not Rathven. Not the Lady in Blue. Hadn't given them up. Still, couldn't be sure anymore.
She said she'd have watchers on me. She lied.
The Partial ignored him. "Don't worry, Finch. We're almost to the end. Almost to dawn. Just another couple of hours. You might even make it."
Couldn't help himself. "Fuck you. Fuck you. You psychotic little prick. You cock-sucking psychotic bastard. You f**king coward!"
Thrashing in his chair until it fell over onto its side.
Silence then. Waiting.
The Partial lowered himself against the floor next to Finch. Looked him in the eyes. Said, "We'll keep going until I see all of you. All of you."
Finch tried to spit in his face. All that came out was a trickle of blood.
Am I dying? Is this what death is like?
The rest dissolved into a kind of distant burning.
A kind of despairing, raging ache.
Back on the Spit. On the roof of the houseboat. Dusk now, the sun almost gone, but lingering.
The Spit smoldered. Thick with flame and smoke. The towers were silent. From that angle, he couldn't see what lay between them. But strange birds flew out between them. Like parrots, but different. Flashes of green-blue-orange. Beyond that, the city, in an agony of bronzing light.
Opposite him on the bench sat Duncan Shriek. This time he had a long gray beard, white hair down to his shoulders. His beard writhed, alive. His overcoat wasn't made of cloth at all. Concealed a mountain of a body, reminding Finch of Wyte. No shoes. Shriek's feet seemed to blend into the wood of the floorboards as if rooted there. His image flickered in and out. Could not seem to settle into flesh and blood.
"Hello again, Finch," Shriek said.
Finch, bitter: "They burned your body. Spread your ashes over the towers. You're dead," Finch said. "You failed us. Thousands and thousands of people are going to die because of you." Angry at himself.
Shriek said, "Your body is shutting down, Finch. You cannot take more torture. You have to do something. All I can do for now is numb the pain."
Finch's legs were on fire. He couldn't put out the flames.
"There's nothing I can do."
Shriek pulled him close. Until his face was inches from Finch's. Drawn into the power of those eyes that were both more and less than eyes. Into the magisterial force of the experience and pain there. "Find a way. And when you've done it, drink the vial you brought with you. Even if you do kill the Partial you'll die there on the floor, otherwise."