The Skill of Our Hands--A Novel

by Steven Brust

  Daniel walked across the rug like he was counting the steps between Ren and the door, and Jimmy tried to imagine what he was seeing. Ren, at that moment, looked older than she was, certainly older than he was, but pretty still, in that clean-living, fresh-faced honest way of hers that Jimmy and Phil both adored.

  Ren started to offer Daniel her hand to shake, but dropped it under the force of his obviously rehearsed, “Hi, I’m Daniel Whitman. Kate recruited me for Phil’s stub, but she changed her mind. I know I’m young, and I know I’m willful, but I want to do this for you. For Phil.” He cleared his throat and pressed on. “Kate told me about you and how much Phil loved you. Loves you. She showed me your memory of finding him again after you grazed too far back in time. I want to—” He faltered, his script failing him. “I’ve never—”

  “Daniel!” interrupted Irina, now using her gracious hostess voice. “You must have traveled all day. I’m sure you’re tired.” She shot Ramon a wicked glance but he wasn’t paying attention. “Come into the kitchen with me and I’ll fix you something nice.” Irina stood, and it looked to Jimmy like it was an effort for her to do so. “Are you hungry? I’m sure you need a drink!”

  “I’m good, thanks,” Daniel said.

  “Have a seat.” Ren offered him her chair. “Let Irina bring you a beer.” Ren smiled at Irina.

  Irina looked like she wanted to spit. “He’s not thirsty. He just said so.”

  “Actually, Tucson is pretty hot—” Daniel started.

  “Kate changed her mind about you,” said Irina. “She doesn’t think you’re a good recruit.”

  “I’ll check.” Jimmy started to graze, but Ramon had his phone out of his pocket, so Jimmy waited.

  “Oh, Christ’s boiled bottom!” Irina exclaimed, and held out her hand for the phone. Ramon ignored her and turned toward the kitchen. “Kate, please give a call when you get this message. There’s a young man here who says he’s Daniel Whitman.”

  “Tell her I’m sorry,” Daniel called after Ramon, who didn’t look back.

  “You said you wanted a beer,” Irina reminded him.

  “I—”

  “Irina.” Jimmy opened his eyes, looking a warning at her.

  “Jimmy.” Irina turned to him as if expecting him to move. He waited, watching her, thinking she looked old again.

  Ramon came back in with two opened beer bottles and a glass. “I left a message for Kate,” Ramon said. “I’d like to hear back from her before we proceed. She recruited him, she may want to titan.”

  “I can do it,” Ren said.

  Jimmy watched Irina watching Ren, whose eyes hadn’t left Daniel since he introduced himself. “You want to take him to bed and try him out first, Ren?” Irina got up from the coffee table and flopped onto the sofa.

  Daniel looked up from pouring his beer into the glass. “Fuck off, Irina.”

  Ren laughed, and when Daniel finished his pour, she reached out a hand to him. He stood and took it and came around the coffee table to sit next to her. Ren turned to Jimmy. “I don’t think I can do the ritual though.”

  “Want me to?” Irina said, but Ren just ignored her.

  “I’d be delighted,” Jimmy said.

  Daniel and Ren sat on the sofa holding hands like kids on prom night.

  “Shouldn’t we even discuss this?” Irina asked.

  “Jimmy.” Oskar’s voice rasped raw. They all turned to look at him, but he stayed limp, the back of his head fallen onto the chair, his face slack.

  “What is it?” Jimmy was on his feet instantly, one hand on each arm of Oskar’s chair, bending down to him. “Oskar?”

  “Phil’s gone.”

  “Not again!” Ren took her hand out of Daniel’s. “No,” she said from behind both her palms.

  “Oskar!” Jimmy cupped Oskar’s face in his hands, pushing Oskar’s blond hair back from his forehead, rubbing his perfect, pale cheekbones with the dark pads of his thumbs. But he felt it too, sapping him, an abrupt unwinding, like a popped torsion spring.

  “Matsu is dead.” Oskar’s eyes washed almost black with fear. Jimmy’s feet suddenly went cold.

  “Matsu?” Ren stood, jumped the coffee table, and was down the hall before any of the rest of them had absorbed the information. Jimmy turned and followed.

  “Matsu,” Irina whispered.

  They’d left him alone. For hours now, Matsu had been in Ren and Phil’s bedroom holding on to Phil’s stub. If he’d stroked out like Frio, he’d done it alone with no one to help him.

  “Shit!” Ramon said behind Irina as they ran down the hall after Ren.

  Ren threw open the bedroom door, flipped on the light and pulled up short. Matsu’s body lay motionless in the dead center of their bed.

  They all stopped still. Jimmy saw Ren take a shuddering breath. She crept toward Matsu’s body. He opened his eyes.

  Daniel made the noise anyone would at seeing a corpse sit up in bed, but Ren stood as still as Matsu should be. Irina started to say something snotty to Oskar, but Ren flew over the foot of the bed and onto Matsu. His arms went around her. “Phil!” Ren said, in a single sob.

  Matsu raised his head from Ren’s neck and looked up at the cluster of gaping faces in his bedroom door. “Oskar, Jimmy, Irina, Ray, New Guy,” he said with a grin and a wild, cocked eyebrow. “Isn’t anyone going to ask ‘how’s the head?’”

  TWENTY-THREE

  Turned and Headed Back

  Phil felt himself grin. Everyone except Ren started speaking at once, questions full of “How—?” But he was more interested in “who,” and with trying to understand why, of all the fifty-some times he’d been through the process, this was the first time he’d ever found himself instantly and fully present, with no trace of whoever had last held his new consciousness.

  So he kissed Ren, hard, to kiss away her grief and fear and frustration at everyone around her, and she kissed him back, full of relief and promises and questions, and their lips said, “You went away,” and their mouths said, “I came back,” and there were things that would need saying, in words and in touches, but they promised they’d say them.

  Everyone ignored them, their voices like the buzzing of flies outside the window. Phil was interested in what they were saying, but he was much more interested in holding Ren, so when the kiss ended with a mutual sigh, they squeezed each other, and held each other while the rest of them yammered. Phil rested his cheek on top of Ren’s head and watched the faces around them: Irina looked torn between confused and furious; Jimmy just stared, shaking his head back and forth; Ray was wearing his Intense Look—like Phil was a problem he was going to solve whatever it took; Oskar’s mouth opened and closed, providing a sort of visual counterpoint to Jimmy; and the new guy, like Phil, looked from one to the other uncomfortably, as if waiting for someone to tell him he wasn’t supposed to be here.

  “Phil,” said Ren against his neck. Not a question, a ratification.

  “Yeah,” he said, and held her, soaked in the spicy scent of her hair. After a while he asked, “How long was I away?” But Ren didn’t hear him over the barrage of questions landing like German 88s all around them.

  Eventually people stopped talking, and Phil opened his eyes, about to repeat his question, but Ray said, “Phil, we need to figure out how this happened.”

  “How what happened?” Phil said.

  “Matsu.”

  “Matt? Where is he?”

  “Phil, he spiked you into himself.”

  “Huh? That’s impossible.”

  They all shook their heads.

  Phil tried to get up to look in the mirror, but Ren wasn’t letting go. “It’s true,” she said.

  He stared at the ceiling. “That’s … how? Jimmy, could you—”

  Jimmy’s eyes were already closed. Irina started to say something, but Oskar said, “Wait.”

  Jimmy’s eyes opened. “Yes, it’s happened before; maybe half a dozen times in the last forty thousand years. We’ve had Incrementalists spike themselve
s into another; the whole ritual takes place in the Garden, and—how is your head, Phil?”

  Phil blinked. “Actually, it’s fine. No pain at all.”

  “Yeah,” said Jimmy, nodding at Ray, whose eyes were wide and gleaming. Whatever else was or wasn’t going to happen, Phil knew Ray, at least, was delighted.

  Ren kissed Phil’s neck. “I can’t believe you’re back,” she whispered, and Phil just squeezed her.

  “It’s kind of unreal to me, too,” he said. “Matt. Jesus.”

  “Now we’ll need to find a recruit for Matsu,” said Oskar.

  “There’s no rush,” said Irina. “Not like with Phil’s stub going all wonky and us ready to take just anyone.”

  “I’m right here,” said the new guy.

  Irina laughed. “No, Kate ruled you out, and Ren won’t overrule her now she’s got Phil in blond beefcake.”

  “Irina,” said Ren. “Don’t drink any tea.”

  For once, Irina didn’t have a reply.

  Phil looked at her—at Irina—and tried to imagine what she’d gone through to leave her looking so haggard. His stub-and-Seconds had never been that hard on her before. He could have grazed for it, if she’d seeded anything, but holding Ren seemed like a better idea. “Who are you?” he asked the new guy,

  “Daniel,” he said. “I’m a friend of—I know Kate.”

  “Kate? How did Kate get involved in this? No, don’t tell me. I’ll need it all in order, and I don’t want it now. For now, what are we doing about Frio?”

  “He shot you,” said Oskar.

  “Yeah.”

  “The cops blamed unnamed vigilantes and closed the case.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Phil said.

  “Are you hungry?” Ren asked him.

  “No,” Phil said. “If being hungry means either of us has to move, I’m not hungry.”

  Oskar’s eyes had never left Phil. “What do you mean, you’re not surprised?”

  “Frio wasn’t acting under police orders when he shot me.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I was spiked into him, Oskar, you don’t think I was able to pick up anything? Oh, and, speaking of, who had the bright idea to—oh.” Phil looked at Irina. She met his eyes. “Irina,” he said. “What’s your game this time?”

  “Making the world better,” she said. “You should try it.”

  Phil felt rather than saw Oskar suddenly go on full alert. He started to say something, but Jimmy cut him off. “Not now,” he said. “I think the first thing to deal with is Matsu. I’ll titan.” He looked at Daniel, who looked back at him; Phil tried to read the expression on Daniel’s face. It reminded him of how Colonel Walcutt looked right before they went into a fight: determined, a little rigid, like he wasn’t going to acknowledge, even to himself, whatever fear or nervousness he felt.

  “Dan’s a good recruit,” Phil said.

  “Seriously?” said Irina. “What’s the rush?”

  “Irina, you just spit in my face,” Phil said.

  She didn’t apologize, but she stood up and backed off. “Kate had reservations about him, and we still have a truly excellent choice in Sam.”

  “Irina,” said Jimmy quietly.

  “I just want to make sure the recruit we pick is vetted. Is that unreasonable?”

  “Like Frio was,” Phil asked. “The way you spiked me into the guy who shot me?”

  “I didn’t know that!” Irina suddenly reminded Phil of an attack dog just waiting for the word to go for someone’s throat. She played at being all about sex and sensuality; even to herself, and it let even those who knew her well forget how strong she was, how determined she could be, and how she really, honestly, was an Incrementalist in every way that counted. They might forget what mattered to her, because sometimes she did. They remembered that she could be ruthless, but forgot what she was ruthless for.

  Phil said, “I don’t know what you’re doing this time, Irina, but if you need my help—”

  Daniel said, “Can someone explain—?”

  “No,” said two or three people all at once; Phil thought he was one of them.

  Irina said, “Look—”

  “Oh, we’re looking,” said Oskar.

  “Not now though,” Phil said. “Now I’m hungry.”

  He stood up and reached for Ren’s hand.

  * * *

  “There’s deli meat and bread for sandwiches,” Irina told the new Phil-in-Matsu. “And I picked up a couple pounds of chopped beef BBQ.”

  Honestly, if she weren’t around they’d all starve at the first sign of crisis. No one else thought to go shopping.

  “Is there still some of my pasta sauce in the freezer?” Phil moved less gracefully than Matsu in the same body, or his foot was asleep. Irina thought the overall effect was a little weird, but Ren couldn’t stop looking at him.

  “Yeah,” Ren said, and climbed after Phil. They walked, holding hands, through the clot of Incrementalists at the foot of their bed. They all crowded in, resurrection band style, a ragged parade down the hallway behind them. Irina thought it would be weird for Ren—liking Matsu, loving Phil, to have the two combined all of a sudden. Phil stopped and offered his hand to the dog, who sniffed it and lost interest. Phil gave a twisted Phil-smirk—odd in Matsu’s face—and continued to the kitchen.

  The situation would be even weirder for Oskar, loving Phil as he did and loathing Matsu. Irina fought the urge to turn around and look at him. He’d done such a good job officiating Chuck’s memorial—compassionate, articulate, a charismatic speaker who knew he was good at what he was doing and enjoyed it, but only because it served the people who needed it. He was a good man, and a tolerable Incrementalist. Just not as smart as Phil who, with his, “if you need my help,” had disarmed her more than all Oskar’s glower and demands. But Irina didn’t need his help. It was all solved, at least for the night: Phil was back, Ren was happy, Menzie was at work on his article, and the SWAT team was staying home.

  Irina needed to sit down. With nothing left to do, she had nothing left. She leaned against the hallway wall while Phil surveyed his kitchen like a traveler returned to his harem. He opened the freezer, extracted a frozen concubine of Tupperware, and stuck it in the microwave. This house didn’t have the handy bar and barstools that his Vegas kitchen had, and the table was too separate from the workspace for easy conversation, so while Ren moved around Phil in the kitchen, the rest of them stayed clumped between the counter and the table.

  Ramon hovered as close to Phil as he could without getting in the way or being pressed into service. He held his slim body motionless on its funeral high heels, but Irina could almost hear him vibrating. “What’s the first thing you remember after dying?” he asked Phil. “Oskar reported you gave him a dagger as an index of those seeds you’d been making but not pointing to on the forum. They all pertained to your work on the immigration legislation. Do you remember that?”

  “What was up with that, anyway?” Irina asked. “Why so violent? Why so secretive?”

  “Irina,” Oskar’s bass rumble spoke right into Irina’s ear. “You have exactly no space to question violence or secret-keeping right now.”

  Irina hadn’t meant it as an accusation. She was only pointing out patterns, but Oskar was right. The anger in his voice unnerved her, but his absolute and uncharacteristic control of it was interesting. An innervating cascade of anxiety, exhaustion, and loneliness made her want to just lean back into him, to rest against his chest and righteous rage. Irina needed arms around her, and Oskar’s were lovely.

  But he kept on talking. Oskar always kept talking, rattling on to Jimmy and everyone else about Matsu. Irina wobbled into a kitchen chair and watched Oskar’s lithe shoulders under the soft black of his shirt until she felt Jimmy watching her watching them. Irina met his eyes, but he didn’t smile.

  “Christ’s tiny testicles, Oskar, what’s the fucking hurry?” she finally snapped. “Trying to set a new stub-to-Second record for Matsu? Why? It’s no
t like you’re his biggest fan.”

  “The way Matsu transitioned into stub without his body’s death might conceivably transfer the instability of Phil’s stub to his,” Ramon theorized.

  And Ren suggested, “Gratitude, maybe?” She turned to Irina, drying her hands on a kitchen towel. “Some people feel that. It was a pretty extraordinary sacrifice he made for Phil.”

  “We don’t know it was a sacrifice at all,” Irina countered. “Phil could have gone all Celeste on Matsu, for what we know. Hell, for all Phil knows. She shared a consciousness with me, if you remember, and I wasn’t in the Garden holding on to her stub. Shit, it’s possible Matsu’s still in there with Phil. Remember Ethan and Qing?” Irina grinned. “How do you feel about threesomes, Ren?”

  “I’ve shot you before, Irina.” Phil didn’t look up from his work.

  “Oh, that’s very nice,” Irina said, too tired to resist the bait. “Threaten my life. We’re not supposed to be the killers, Phil, or the assholes who use violence and threats of violence to win. We’re the ones who nudge things a little, feed the good wolf. You remember—incrementally?”

  “I’m sorry,” said Oskar, unattractively nasal with scorn. “How is having someone arrested not using the threat of violence, if not the actual fact of it, Irina?”

  “It worked,” was all the comeback she could muster. She was exhausted. “Menzie’s helping me make things better in ways and on a scale that may eventually surprise you all.” Irina turned from Phil, with Matsu’s surfer-boy hair falling into his ancient eyes, to Jimmy, whose moral depth had drowned even his utter sensuality. She scrubbed at her eyes to hide the tears, and came away with mascara on her fingers, goddamn it.

  “Irina,” Phil said, and the doorbell rang.

  “Would someone turn off the fucking bat signal, please?” Irina snapped. “This is getting ridiculous.”

  “Hello?” a woman’s voice called over the sound of the front door opening. “Ren? Anyone home?”

  “We’re in the kitchen,” Ren answered. “Come on in, Jane.”

  Oskar turned, a little eagerly it seemed to Irina, and stepped aside to make room for Jane in the archway between the living room and kitchen, but Jane had stopped halfway across the living room floor. Oskar opened his mouth and shut it again upon seeing her face.