Catspaw

by Joan D. Vinge

“He does psions.”

  Her mouth opened again, but nothing came out of it this time.

  “You remember that girl you told me about—the one Daric brought here, who’d been beaten so bad she couldn’t talk? The psion—?”

  The knuckles of her hand stood out as it tightened on the back of her chair. “Daric?” she murmured. “Daric made that happen?” Her eyes were begging me to tell her I was lying.

  “She wasn’t the only one,” I said. “Sometimes he even watches.”

  “Oh, God.” She broke away, pushing up out of her seat, her hands balled into fists at her sides. “Why?” she said, turning back. “If he’s a psion too, why would he do that?” Challenging me to make it make sense.

  I shook my head. I’d asked myself the same question, trying to make it make sense, all through the endless afternoon. “I don’t know. Why don’t you ask him?” I got up off my chair.

  She jerked a piece of clothing free from a hook, thought about throwing it in my face; threw it on the floor instead. “Why did you have to tell me that? Goddamn you—what do you want me to do about it?”

  I shrugged. “Like I said. I just wanted you to know the truth. What you do about it is your business.” I started for the door.

  “You’re a lousy human being, you know that?”

  I looked back at her. Her face was all congested-looking; she was going to be crying in another minute. “I try,” I said. I went on out.

  I sat down at a table out in the club and had a drink, watching the room fill up, waiting for Mikah to show. They’d hired a new bouncer. I half expected him to come over and tell me to get out, after what I’d just done; but he didn’t. The club was as dark as a cave tonight, and smoky. Fingers of colored laser light gibbered across the darkness in frantic parabolas, shattered into clouds high above my head to the wailing of recorded synth music. I settled back, losing myself in the dark/bright spaces overhead.

  Finally I sensed Mikah making his way across the dance floor. He sat down at the table with me, wearing black body-armor. He fit right in. I had on my old jeans and torn shirt; I’d brought them to work with me in a shoulder bag, knowing I’d be going out. “Hey, freak,” he said.

  “Don’t call me that.”

  He looked surprised. “What’s eating you?”

  I looked away, down at my empty glass. “Nothing. What’s your problem?”

  “I’m a deeve.” One side of his mouth pulled up. “Somebody been rubbing your nose in it? Wipe the shit off your face, kid, and forget about it. You ought to be used to that by now.”

  I shook my head. “It’s not that. I wish it was only that.” I unclenched my good hand, laid it flat on the table.

  He ordered himself a drink, settling back into the pile of cushions. When I didn’t say anything else, he shrugged and asked, “What happened to your shirt? You have a hot date last night?”

  I looked down at the long rip across the front and almost laughed, remembering how it had really happened. But then I remembered last night, the fire and the star-covered table.… I reached up, touched the emerald earring, still in my ear. I hadn’t meant to keep it; hadn’t meant for anything to happen the way it had, last night.… Finally I admitted the truth to myself, that Lazuli had only been using my body to help her forget how much she hated being with her husband; maybe even to pay him back. And I’d let her. It had been so easy to use me, like the only brain I had was between my legs. I felt stupid and helpless—felt myself start to get an erection again, just remembering red velvet and golden skin.…

  “You must be somebody’s type,” Mikah said. “I hear it’s fun to be famous.”

  I glanced away. “You find out why I’m so popular that total strangers want to kill me?”

  He shook his head. “It’s not street talk. That means it’s vip level, and their secrets keep real well.”

  I looked up, surprised. “You think it has something to do with Elnear?”

  He shrugged. “Dunno. But you guessed good about DeAth—he did the wetwork for what happened at that party the other night. But after that I hit a wall. I can’t find out who hired him to drop the Lady. Nobody down under seems to want her gone—she’s on their side, they don’t want that drug deregged any more than she does.”

  I wondered what Elnear would think if she heard that. “Damn,” I said. “I thought I knew … I thought it was Stryger. But it’s not.”

  “Stryger?” Mikah grunted. “You mean the Plastic Saint? You really thought he’d try to take out his opposition with a human bomb?”

  “Yeah,” I said, feeling my eyes ice over. “That’s exactly what I thought.”

  “Hm.” He shrugged again. “I’ve heard talk about him. Thought it was only talk.” He sounded relieved; I’d just restored his faith in human nature. Even he could have told me the way to one of Stryger’s good works.

  “Whatever you heard, it’s not bad enough. But it doesn’t do me any good—” I rubbed my face. “DeAth would know who hired him, right?”

  “Maybe not.” Mikah shook his head. “He’s too paranoid. He likes to keep his clients protected—and his own ass covered. He’ll fill any order that comes in on a credit float. No questions … no ID.” No responsibility, and no risk.

  “Jeezu—” I felt frustration strangle the disgust inside me. That meant that even if I could get into DeAth’s brain and pick it, it probably wouldn’t get me anywhere. “There’s got to be some kind of record, someplace. What about numbers on the credit transfers?”

  He thought about it. “Yeah, maybe.… But if you think his lab was a deathtrap, his personal accounts are gonna make that look like a park. Nobody sane would try a data raid on him.”

  I hit the table with the wrong hand; winced and swore. “Damn it,” I said, “there’s got to be somebody on the Market good enough. I want to access those fucking files. Who’s the best?”

  Mikah tugged on the silver ring in the side of his nose. “Unh. I did say nobody sane.…” He half smiled. “Maybe you’re talking about Deadeye. He does things nobody else can. Nobody knows how. But only when he feels like it. A real hostile son of a bitch.”

  “‘Deadeye’? He like to pick off his visitors with a stungun, or what?”

  Mikah laughed. “I heard he’s dropped a couple … but maybe that’s just hype. I dunno, could be his rep as a cracksman.… Could be the fact that he’s got a dead eye.” He shrugged, still laughing behind his own eyes.

  “A dead eye,” I said.

  “Yeah. Looks like shit, all festering.” He wasn’t joking.

  “How come he doesn’t get it fixed?”

  “I told you, he’s half crazy. But he’s a wire wizard, if he’ll deal.”

  I started to get up. “Let’s go find out.”

  “Hey—” he said, his disappointment showing. “Don’t you want to stay for the show?”

  I glanced at the stage, still empty and waiting in the darkness above the crowded floor. “I’ve done it.”

  He sighed, and stood up. “Right.”

  We made it through the crowd to the door without any more distractions, and took the Tube under the bay.

  Deadeye’s part of town was a lot less choice than DeAth’s, although down in the Deep End that probably didn’t make a whole lot of difference. We waded through drifts of trash to a barricaded iron door large enough to swallow a tram. It was the entrance to what looked like an abandoned warehouse. There was no flicker of any security; no sign that anybody even lived there, or ever had. “How do you know he’s here?” I asked.

  “He never goes out.” Mikah raised his fist to beat on the door—jumped back with a curse as it hit the metal. “Shit! It’s electrified.” He shook out his hand, looking at me, half exasperated and half embarrassed. “You got any ideas? You’re the one who wanted to meet him.”

  I looked at the door, up the silent, windowless building front. “Yeah. I’ll give him a call.”

  “He doesn’t have a phone.”

  I smiled. “I don’t need one.”
/>
  He tapped his head. “What makes you think that’ll make him glad to see you?”

  “I got nothing to lose.” I shrugged.

  He grunted. “Excuse me while I cross the street,” he said. Just in case Deadeye decided to fry me. He stepped back, but only about a meter.

  I folded my arms, hugging my chest, centering myself. I let my mind out into the block of formless darkness that was the warehouse, that held one fragile star, the energy of a living human mind. Somewhere.…

  There. Contact. I went in through the shell of spidery radiance, weaving my way into the pattern of a stranger’s thoughts; surprised, when I didn’t find the dead black walls of illegal augmentation I’d expected. I moved on, a thief entering a sleeping house, not bothering to cover the sound of my footsteps as I got ready to give Deadeye one hell of a big surprise—

  A fist of raw energy smashed into me, searing the filaments like a beam of coherent light. I let go and bolted, breaking all contact, shutting down, walling up my own mind behind a jumble of razor wire.

  “Ah—!” My own shout of surprise, still loud in my ears. I was back on the street again, staring at a blank wall, with eyes that were ready to jump out of my head. “Jeezu! You didn’t tell me he was a telepath!”

  Mikah had hacked up a few more steps, away from contamination. He was staring, but his expression changed as the words registered on him. “A freak?” he said, loud with disbelief. “I didn’t know he was a freak—”

  I held up my hands, waving him quiet; braced for another attack … for something that didn’t come. Slowly, carefully this time, I let out a tracer, hunting Deadeye through the darkness again.… Found him. balled up tight as a clenched fist behind his own barbed wire; fear so strong it made me feel sick oozed out of him like sweat. He had a lot of raw psi talent, but he didn’t know how to use it the way I did. I could see the chinks in his defenses; taking him would be easy. But I could see, too, that if I broke through now he’d go right over the edge. I touched him, barely; let him prick the finger of my thought just to get his attention. And then I backed off, letting him feel me go, letting him know that I wasn’t going to come back … leaving him alone, there in the dark.

  I shook my head, seeing Mikah’s face again, the question in his eyes. “No good. You were right. He is half crazy.” I glanced at the sealed door, the blank, unyielding walls. “Now I know why, anyhow. Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

  Mikah nodded and shrugged. He hunched his shoulders as we began to walk away, keeping his distance.

  There was a clank and a grating scrape behind us, as the iron door swung open. Somebody stepped outside, shapeless, anonymous, inside a heavy load of mismatched clothes. But I didn’t have any trouble making out his face—the raw, weeping sore where his right eye should have been. I looked away again, fast.

  “Who is it?” he asked, his voice hoarse, like he hadn’t used it in weeks. “Which one of you?”

  For just a second I thought he was completely blind, that he couldn’t see us. But then I realized what he was really asking. “Me,” I said. I took a step forward. (Me.) I laid the picture in the barely open fist of his thoughts as carefully and nervously as I’d pass over a piece of crystal. I hadn’t done this in a long time.

  His mind spasmed shut over it; crushing it. Opened again, millimeter by millimeter, until a finger tendrilled out, beckoning me. (Come here.) His real hand twitched, hidden inside a frayed glove; trying to gesture in case I hadn’t understood.

  I moved toward him, not really wanting to get any closer, but not seeing how I had any choice. I kept trying to look at his face, but my eyes slid away again every time that oozing socket came into focus. I wondered how the hell he could leave it like that, untreated. I wondered how long he’d been wearing those same clothes. I could smell him before I got nearly as close as he wanted me to.

  He stood staring at me, his good eye squinting, as if even this gloom was too bright for him. Glance by glance I filled in a face covered by a bristle of half-shaved beard. He was nearly bald, and he’d half shaved what hair he had left, too. His whole head was pale and lumpy, like something made of dough. His teeth looked rotten. I couldn’t tell how old he was; he looked middle-aged, but maybe not. His one good eye was as green as a perfect emerald.

  His gloved hand rose up to my face. I managed not to jerk away as it groped me like a curious spider, and dropped to his side again. He was just proving to himself that I was real. (Telepath—?) he asked. I nodded. (What … what do you want?) The uncertain mutter of his thoughts inside my head said he hadn’t used that voice in a long time, either.

  (I need some help. I want to access a system.)

  His mind clenched up, eased open again. (Whose?)

  (He calls himself Doctor Death.)

  His fist shot out, catching me by the front of my shirt, catching me off-guard. “Who sent you here?” he rasped, losing control, snapping the thread of real contact.

  I forced his hand away; took a breath as he backed off. I felt Mikah shifting from foot to foot behind me, weapon-systems armed. (Nobody sent me.) I dropped my guard just enough, and let him pry until he believed me. (I need some information that only DeAth’s got. I can pay—)

  (Go away.) He turned his back on me, began to shuffle toward his door.

  My hands tightened. (Wait! How long’s it been? Since you felt this? Since you had somebody who could really talk to you—)

  He stopped, and faced me again. My eyes cringed; I made myself see through him with that other set of eyes, until his surface disappeared. I felt him remember something, a touch, words that weren’t spoken but only were—but it was so long, so unbearably long ago; could have been just a dream.… The one eye that he still had got red-rimmed and watery-looking; his Adam’s apple jerked up and down in his throat. Finally he nodded, silent with his mind, lifting his hand to wave me after him as he started back toward his door.

  I followed, with Mikah treading on my heels, his face expressionless, his mind locked on ready.

  “Who’s that?” Deadeye stopped short suddenly, blocking the doorway, looking at Mikah.

  “My brother,” I said, and Mikah’s mouth twitched.

  “He don’t look much like you,” Deadeye mumbled. But that was all he said. He started on again, letting us follow him inside.

  We went on through the dark, echoing space of the warehouse, Mikah hanging onto my sleeve because he couldn’t see without his night lenses. I could feel him wondering why it seemed like we could when he couldn’t.

  Finally there was real light ahead again. Deep inside the warehouse Deadeye had built his room, his refuge. It wasn’t what I’d expected. His world was lit by a single stick-on glowplate, but it was neat, ascetic, clean; it had dull but decent furniture, a portable kitchen unit, and a simple console, the kind everybody who had a place to put one had to have, so that daily life could go on. Mikah was right—there was no vidphone plugged into it. Deadeye didn’t even have a threedy. But it was plain he wasn’t hurting for money. He wanted it this way.

  He sat down in an ancient rocking chair, and picked up something from the box lying beside it. I saw a pair of long, thick needles, tangled in what looked like a ruined sweater. He untangled the mess with hands that knew just what they were doing. I felt Mikah tense up beside me as he tried to guess whether it was a weapon. I shook my head, glancing at him, and he eased off.

  Deadeye set the chair rocking with his foot and began to work the needles through the yarn, feeding more bright-colored thread into the sweater, until I realized he was actually making it out of nothing. The chair creaked, the needles clicked; he never looked up at us standing there waiting. He’d never had anybody all the way in here before; not even once.

  I moved on into the room, sat down cross-legged on the floor in front of him. (What is that stuff?) I thought, focusing on the motion of his hands.

  (Knitting.) The wordsign flickered on in my mind: images of needles performing an ancient dance with yarn, turning it into a
hundred different patterns and shapes.

  (What do you do it for?)

  (It feels good.) He looked up at me, for half a second; looked down again when I flinched at the sudden sight of his face. (Eye make you sick, does it?)

  I nodded.

  (Supposed to. Keeps ’em off me.) Everybody else.

  (That could kill you.)

  His face rearranged itself until I realized he was smiling—the way somebody would smile who’d just glued your feet into your shoes. (Not unless I look in a mirror.) That was no rotting sore on his face; it was only a cosmo piece, a joke, a trick.

  “No shit,” I said, feeling my own mouth start to smile in relief, even while my eyes were still refusing to believe it. Mikah jerked upright on the couch across the room, startled by the broken silence.

  (Who are you?) Deadeye asked me, finally.

  (Cat.)

  (Where’d you come from?)

  (Ardattee. Quarro.)

  I felt his irritation sting me; I wasn’t giving him anything that meant anything, that words alone couldn’t say. (You a ’breed?)

  I nodded.

  (Thought so.) The warped smile squeezed out of him again. (Why aren’t you crazy?) The one eye looked into me, too knowing.

  I glanced down. (Dumb luck,) thinking of Siebeling. I felt him groping, nagging, pushing.… I let down more defenses, loosened more knots; let him creep into my mind and take a look around, answering his own questions. Picking through my past like a dog nosing over trash. My body went rigid muscle by muscle, while I struggled to keep my mind loose and open.

  He grunted, and blinked, and broke contact. One hand let go of his knitting … reached out, pulled back again, and picked up the thread. After that there was no sound but clicking needles; no other motion, no other sign. Nothing but a wall of tangled wire and despair.

  I sat waiting, taking deep breaths. (Goddamn it,) I thought finally, slamming it through his guard, (you got what you wanted from me! What do I get from you?)

  He jumped like he’d been shocked. He looked up at me, his one eye red and wet. He put out his hand again, reaching for me. I braced, ready to pull back. But he only patted my shoulder twice, gently, and took his hand away again. I stayed where I was, too surprised to do anything at all.