They sat quietly for a few moments. To Norton, letting Jeff have the last word felt like a kind of defeat.
‘Well, what about this Istanbul clue then? I mean, seriously, it doesn’t come close to any of our current investigations, it’s right out of left-field. Some other thirteen the Europeans have got interned in Turkey, who might have a connection to some Peruvian gangster who might have ties to the people who maybe had our renegade thirteen shipped back from Mars. I mean, am I supposed to trust that? It’s pretty thin.’
Jeff stared out of the window.
‘Maybe it is,’ he said absently. ‘Thirteens don’t think the same way as us, they have a whole different set of synaptic wiring. Some of that, the more extreme end, we just go ahead and label paranoia or sociopathic tendency. But often it just comes out as a different way of looking at things. That’s why UNGLA employs guys like this Marsalis in the first place. In some ways, that’s why I suggested you dig him out of Florida and hire him. Give you access to those other angles.’ A sudden, hard look. ‘You didn’t tell anyone that was my suggestion, did you?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Yeah? Not even this ex-cop you’ve got under the skin so badly?’
‘I made you a promise, Jeff. I keep my promises.’
‘Yeah, okay.’ His brother pressed thumb and forefinger into tight closed eyes for a moment. ‘Sorry. I shouldn’t get so harsh with you, just I’m stressed out of my fucking box right now. This job’s a political tightrope act at the best of times, and now isn’t the best of times. Someone gets to hear that the director of the Human Cost Foundation is giving informal advice to a COLIN officer on matters relating to the genetically enhanced, I’m going to be looking for another job. We’ll get the whole Rim-China-Mars super-conspiracy bullshit blowing up in our faces all over again, probably lose the bulk of our funding overnight. Bad enough that we’re taking in black-lab refugees and giving them Rim citizenship. Arranging for dangerous genetic variants to be released from jail, that’d be the final straw.’
‘Yeah, well like I said. Relax. No one knows.’ Norton felt an unaccustomed tightness in his throat as he looked at his brother. ‘I appreciate all this, Jeff. Maybe it doesn’t come across that way sometimes, but I do.’
‘I know.’ Jeff grinned at him. ‘Been looking out for you since you were knee-high anyway. That’s what big brothers are for, right? Whole stack of genetic predisposition right there.’
Norton shook his head. ‘You’ve been working this field too long, Jeff. Why not just say you care?’
‘I thought I just did. Base reasons for caring about your siblings are genetic. I didn’t have to join Human Cost to know that.’
An image of Megan bloomed brightly in his mind. Long tanned limbs and freckled smile, sun and hair in her eyes. The recollection forced its way aboard, seemed to dim his vision. It felt as if the v-format and his brother had suddenly been tuned down into a muted distance. His voice sounded vague in his own ears.
‘Yeah, so what about sibling rivalry? Where does that come in?’
His brother shrugged. ‘Genetic too. At base, all this stuff is. Xtrasomes aside, everything we are is built on some bedrock genetic tendency or other.’
‘And that’s how you justify Nuying.’
Jeff’s expression tightened. ‘I think we’ve had this conversation, and I didn’t enjoy it much last time. I don’t justify what I did with Nu. But I do understand where it comes from. Those are two very different things.’
Norton let the memory of Megan fade. ‘Yeah, okay. Forget it. Sorry I started on you again. I’m feeling pretty stressed myself right now. Got my own genetic tendencies to handle, you know?’
‘We all do,’ his brother said quietly. ‘Thirteen, or bonobo, or just base fucking human. Sooner or later, we all have to face what’s inside.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Morning came in laced with the sounds of traffic along Moda caddesi and children shouting. Bright, angled sunlight along the side wall of the room he’d chosen to sleep in and the reluctant conclusion that out here at the back of the apartment there was a school playground directly under the window. He levered himself out of the bed, shambled about looking for the bathroom, stumbled in on a lightly snoring Ertekin in the process; she slept sprawled on her back with her mouth half open, long-limbed and gloriously inelegant in the faded NYPD T-shirt and tangle of sheets, one crooked arm thrown back over her head. He drank in the sight, then slid quietly out again, found the bathroom and took a long much-needed piss. A faint hangover nagged rustily at his temples, not nearly as bad as he’d been expecting. He stuck his head under a tap.
He left Ertekin to sleep, padded to the kitchen and found a semi-smart grocery manager recessed in next to the heating system panel. He ordered fresh bread and cimits both, not knowing Ertekin’s preferences, milk and a few other bits and pieces. Found an unopened packet of coffee – Earth-grown, untwisted – in a cupboard and a Mediterranean-style espresso pot on the worktop. He fired up the hob, set up the pot and by the time it started burbling to itself, the breakfast delivery was buzzing for entry down at the main door. He let them in, found a screen phone and carried it through to the kitchen table. He unwrapped the cimits – gnarly rings of baked and twisted dough, dusted with sesame seeds, still warm – broke one up into segments, poured himself a coffee, and went looking for Stéphane Névant.
It took a while.
The duty officer at the Internment Tract HQ in Ankara wasn’t anyone he knew, and he couldn’t pull UNGLA rank, because his operating codes were six months out of date. Naming friends didn’t help much. He had to settle for a referral to one of the site offices, where, apparently, Battal Yavuz was putting in some overtime. When he tried the site, Battal was out in a prowler and not answering his radio. The best the woman on site could do was take a message. What should–
‘Just tell him he’s a reprobate motherfucker, and a big bad thirteen’s going to fly right out there and steal his woman if he doesn’t call me back.’
The face on screen coloured slightly. ‘I don’t think—’
‘No, really. That’s the message. Thanks.’
Noises from the corridor. He cut the call and broke another cimit. Found an unexpected grin in the corner of his mouth, frowned it away. Ertekin used the bathroom, went back to the bedroom by the sound of it, and for a moment he thought she was going to go back to sleep. Then he heard footfalls in the corridor again, approaching. He leaned back in his chair to watch her come into the kitchen. Wondering if she’d still be in the T-shirt. His hangover, he noticed vaguely, was receding.
She was dressed. Hair thickly untidy, face a freshly scrubbed scowl.
‘Morning. Sleep well?’
She grunted. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Working.’ He gestured at the phone. ‘Waiting for a call back on Névant. Why, what did you think? I’d skip out on you as soon as you passed out? Perfidious, self-regarding thirteen motherfucker that I am.’
‘I didn’t pass out.’
‘Well, you dropped your glass while you were resting your eyes then. I figured you’d finished drinking anyway, so I went to bed. How’s your head?’
The look she gave him was answer enough.
‘Coffee still in the pot, but it must be nearly cold. I can—’