The Windup Girl (57 page)

The
gaijin
Carlyle's voice calls in. "You're really going to protect that windup?" He peers around the corner, cautious.

Anderson-sama shrugs. "Without her, we wouldn't even have had an excuse for the coup." He gives her a crooked smile. "That must be worth something."

He looks again at Hock Seng. "Well? What do you think?"

"You swear this?" the old man asks.

"If we break faith, you can always report her later. She's not going anywhere soon. Not with everyone on the lookout for a windup assassin. We all benefit, every one of us, if we come to agreement. Come on, Hock Seng. This is an easy call. Everyone wins, for once."

Hock Seng hesitates, then gives a sharp nod and lowers his gun. Emiko feels a sudden flood of relief. Anderson smiles. He turns his attention to her and his expression softens. "Many things will be changing now. But we can't let anyone see you. There are too many people who will never forgive. You understand?"

"Yes. I will not be seen."

"Good. Once things calm down, we'll see about getting you out of here. For the moment, you'll stay here. We'll splint up that arm. I'll get someone to bring in a case of ice. Would you like that?"

The relief is almost overwhelming. "Yes. Thank you. You are kind."

Anderson-sama smiles. "Where's that whiskey, Carlyle? We need a toast." He gets up, wincing, and comes back with an array of glasses and a bottle.

As he sets the glassware down on a small end-table, he coughs.

"Goddamn Akkarat," he mutters, and then he coughs again, a deep hoarse sound.

Suddenly he doubles over. Another cough wracks him and then more follow in a wet rattling series. Anderson-sama puts out a hand to steady himself but instead jostles the table. Tips it.

Emiko watches as the glasses and whiskey bottle slide toward the edge of the table, spill off. They fall very slowly, glinting in the light of the rising sun. They're very pretty, she thinks. So clean and bright.

They shatter across the floor. Anderson-sama's coughing spasm continues. He collapses to his knees amongst the shards. He tries to get up, but another spasm seizes him. He curls over on his side.

When the coughing finally releases him, he looks toward Emiko, blue eyes staring out from sunken hollows.

"Akkarat really cracked me up," he rasps.

Hock Seng and Mai are backing away. Carlyle has an arm over his mouth, frightened eyes peering over the crook of an elbow.

"It's like the factory," Mai murmurs.

Emiko crouches down beside the
gaijin
.

He suddenly seems small and frail. He reaches for her, clumsy, and she takes his hand. Blood spackles his lips.

47

The formal surrender occurs on the open parade grounds before the Grand Palace. Akkarat is there to greet Kanya and accept her
khrab
of submission. Already AgriGen ships are in the docks, unloading U-Tex rice and SoyPRO onto the docks. The sterile seeds of the grain monopolies—some to feed people now, some to go to Thai farmers in the next planting cycle. From where she stands in the parade grounds, Kanya can see the corporate sails with their red wheat crest logos billowing above the levee rim.

There was a rumor that the young Queen would oversee the ceremony and cement the new government under Akkarat, and so the throngs are larger than would be expected. But at the last moment, word came that she would not, after all, attend, and so they all stand in the heat of the dry season that has gone on too long already, sweating and sweltering as Akkarat steps up on a dais while monks chant. He swears oaths as the new Somdet Chaopraya to protect the Kingdom in this unsettled state of military law, then he turns and faces the army and civilians and remaining white shirts under Kanya, all arrayed before him.

Sweat trickles down Kanya's temples but she refuses to move. Even though she surrendered the Environment Ministry into Akkarat's hands, still she wishes to present it in the best, most disciplined light, and so she remains at attention, sweating, with Pai in the front rank beside her, his face schooled into careful immobility.

She catches sight of Narong standing a little behind Akkarat, watching the proceedings. He inclines his head to her and it is all she can do not to scream at him, to shriek that all of this destruction is his fault. Wanton and pointless and avoidable. Kanya grits her teeth and sweats and drills her hatred into Narong's forehead. It's stupid. The one she hates is herself. She will formally surrender the last of her good men and women to Akkarat and see the white shirts disbanded.

Jaidee stands beside her, watching thoughtfully.

"You have something you want to say?" Kanya mutters.

Jaidee shrugs. "They took the rest of my family. In the fighting."

Kanya sucks in her breath. "I am sorry." She wishes she could reach out. Touch him.

Jaidee smiles sadly. "It is war. I always tried to explain that to you."

She wants to answer but Akkarat beckons for her. Now is the time for her abasement. She hates the man so. How is it that her youthful rage can be so undone? She swore as a child she would destroy the white shirts, and yet now her victory has the reek of the Ministry's burning grounds. Kanya climbs the steps and performs her
khrab
. Akkarat allows her to remain prostrate for a long time. Above her, she can hear him speaking.

"It is natural to grieve a man such as General Pracha," he says to the multitudes. "Though he was not loyal, he was passionate, and for that, if nothing else, we owe him a measure of respect. His last days were not his only days. He labored on behalf of the Kingdom for many years. He worked to preserve our people in times of great uncertainty. I will never speak against his good work, even if, at the end, he went astray."

He pauses, then says, "We, as a Kingdom, must heal." He looks down at them all. "In the spirit of good will, I am very happy to announce that the Queen has accepted my request that all the combatants who fought on behalf of General Pracha and his coup attempt are granted amnesty. Unconditionally. For those of you who still wish to work at the Environment Ministry, I hope that you will continue to work there with pride. We face all manner of hardships, and we cannot know what our future holds."

He motions to Kanya to stand and walks across to her.

"Captain Kanya, though you fought against the Kingdom and the palace, I grant you both a pardon and something more." He pauses. "We must reconcile. We, as a kingdom and nation, must reconcile. Must reach across to one another."

Kanya's stomach tightens, she feels sick with disgust at the whole proceeding. Akkarat says, "As you are the highest ranking member of the Environment Ministry, I now appoint you to its head. Your duty is as it was. Protect the Kingdom and Her Royal Majesty the Queen."

Kanya stares at Akkarat. Behind him, Narong is smiling slightly. He inclines his head, showing respect. Kanya is speechless. She
wais,
deeply
shocked. Akkarat smiles.

"You may dismiss your men, General. Tomorrow we must once again rebuild."

Still speechless, she
wais
again, then turns. Her first attempt at an order comes out as a croak. She swallows and give the order again, her voice cracking. Faces, as surprised and uncertain as her own feels, stare at up at her. For a moment, she fears that they know her for a fraud, that they will not obey. Then ranks of white shirts turn as one. They march away, uniforms flashing in the sunlight. Jaidee marches with them. But before he does, he
wais
to her as if she truly is a general, and this hurts more than anything that has come before.

48

"They're leaving. It's done."

Anderson lets his head fall back on the pillow. "We've won then."

Emiko doesn't respond; she's still looking out toward the distant parade grounds.

Morning light burns through the window. He is shivering. Freezing and grateful for the onslaught of sun. Sweat pours off of him. Emiko lays a hand on his forehead and he's surprised to feel that it is cool.

He looks up at her through his haze of fever and sickness. "Is Hock Seng here yet?"

She shakes her head sadly. "Your people are not loyal."

Anderson almost laughs at that. He pushes ineffectually at his blankets. Emiko helps him strip them away. "No. They're not." He turns his face to the sun again, soaking it up, allowing it to bathe him. "But I knew that." He would laugh more, if he weren't so tired. If his body didn't feel as if it was breaking apart.

"Do you want more water?" she asks.

The thought doesn't appeal. He's not thirsty. Last night, he was thirsty. When the doctor came at Akkarat's order he could have drunk the ocean, but now, he is not.

After examining him, the doctor went way, fear in his eyes, saying that he would send people. That the Environment Ministry would have to be notified. That white shirts would come to work some black containment magic upon him. All that time Emiko hid, and after the doctor went away, she waited with Anderson through the days and nights.

At least, he remembers her in fractured moments. He dreamed. Hallucinated. Yates sat with him for a time on his bed. Laughed at him. Pointed out the futility of his life. Peered into his eyes and asked him if he understood. And Anderson tried to answer but his throat was parched. No words could force their way out. And Yates laughed at that as well, and asked him what he thought of the newly arrived AgriGen Trade Representative coming to take his niche. If Anderson liked being replaced any better than he had. And then Emiko was there with a cool cloth and he was grateful, desperately grateful for any sort of attention, for her human connection. . . and he had laughed weakly at the irony.

Now he looks at Emiko through bleary vision and thinks about debts he owes, and wonders if he will live long enough to pay them.

"We're going to get you out," he whispers.

A new wave of shivering takes him. All through the night, he was hot, and now, abruptly he is cold, shaking with the freezing feel, as if he has returned to the Upper Midwest and freezes in those still cold winters, as if he looks out at snow. Now he is cold, and not thirsty at all, and even a windup girl's fingers feel icy against his face.

He pushes weakly at her hand. "Is Hock Seng here yet?"

"You're burning up." Emiko's face is full of concern.

"Has he come?" Anderson asks. It is intensely important that the man come. That Hock Seng be here, in the room with him. Though he can barely remember why. It is important.

"I think he will not come." she says. "He has all the letters he needed from you. The introductions. He is already busy with your people. With the new representative. The Boudry woman."

A cheshire appears on the balcony. It yowls low and slips inside. Emiko doesn't seem to notice or care, but then, she and it are siblings. Sympathetic creatures, manufactured by the same flawed gods.

Anderson watches dully as the cat makes its way across his bedroom and molts through the door. If he weren't so weak, he would throw something at it. He sighs. He's past that, now. Too tired to complain about a cat. He lets his gaze roll up to the ceiling and the slow whirl of the crank fan.

He wants to still be angry. But even that has gone. At first, when he discovered that he was sick, when Hock Seng and the girl had pulled back, alarmed, he had thought they were crazy. That he hadn't been exposed to any vectors, but then, looking at them, at their fear and certainty, he had understood.

"The factory?" he'd whispered, repeating the girl Mai's words, and Hock Seng had nodded, keeping his hand over his face.

"The fining rooms, or the algae baths," he murmured.

Anderson had wanted to be angry then, but the sickness was already sapping his strength. All he could summon was a dull rage that quickly burned away. "Has anyone survived?"

"One," the girl had whispered.

And he had nodded, and they had slunk away. Hock Seng. Always with his secrets. Always with his angles and his planning. Always waiting. . .

"Is he coming?" He has a hard time forcing the words out.

"He will not come," Emiko murmurs.

"You're here."

She shrugs. "I am New People. Your sicknesses do not frighten me. That one will not come. Not the Carlyle man either."

"At least they're leaving you alone. Kept their word, there."

"Maybe," she says, but she lacks conviction.

Anderson wonders if she's right. Wonders if he is wrong about Hock Seng as he was wrong about so many things. Wonders if his every understanding of the place was wrong. He forces away the fear. "He'll keep faith. He's a businessman."

Emiko doesn't answer. The cheshire jumps onto the bed. She shoos it away, but it jumps up again, seemingly sensing the carrion opportunity he represents.

Anderson tries to raise a hand. "No," he croaks. "Let it stay."

49

AgriGen people march off the docks. Kanya and her men stand at attention, an honor guard for demons. The
farang
all stand and squint at the tropic sun, taking in the land they have never before seen. They point rudely at young girls walking down the street, talk and laugh loudly. They are an uncouth race. So confident.

"They're very self-satisfied," Pai mutters.

Kanya startles at hearing her own thoughts voiced aloud, but doesn't respond. Simply waits while Akkarat meets these new creatures. A blond, scowling woman called Elizabeth Boudry is at their head, an AgriGen creature through and through.

She has a long sweeping black cloak as do others of the AgriGen people, all of them with their red wheat crest logos shining in the sun. The only satisfying thing about seeing these people in their hated uniforms is that the tropic heat must be awful for them. Their faces shine with sweat.

Akkarat says to Kanya. "These are the ones who will be going to the seedbank."

"Are you sure about this?" she asks.

He shrugs. "They only want samples. Genetic diversity for their generipping. The Kingdom will benefit as well."