The Genome

  “If it is the real murderer, and if the confession is truthful. If the evidence of guilt is convincing to me.”

  “The life of one person is nothing in comparison to the lives of two civilizations.”

  “I will not execute an innocent person,” Sey-Zo repeated. “I expect convincing evidence of the actual murderer’s guilt, Mister Detective-Spesh.”

  “Deadlock,” said Janet quietly. Grinned a crooked grin. “How strange … no one wants a war, but it is unavoidable.”

  Holmes looked around the recreation lounge.

  “Among you, my fellow citizens,” he said softly, “is the person who killed Zey-So. There is absolutely no doubt that he or she represents some very powerful organization that is interested in instigating a war. The murderer hadn’t been motivated by primitive phobias or grudges. His or her actions were calculated, cold-blooded, and selfless. Because whatever happens, this case will be solved, and the murderer will be punished.”

  Silence …

  “So you’re ready to face death?” asked Holmes. “You still think that this unknown goal is worth the destruction of two civilizations?”

  “If Eben is set free, the Empire will not perish,” Janet murmured.

  “Do you wish to confess something?” Holmes inquired.

  Janet smirked.

  “All the evidence points to you.”

  “Circumstantial evidence. Well, do what you wish. No one is required to testify against herself.”

  “But I can testify in Janet’s defense!” suddenly shouted Kim. Holmes braced himself.

  “Really? How curious. And what can you tell us, young lady?”

  “Janet and I were in her cabin. For a long time. She has an alibi.”

  “Both she and you?” Holmes pointed out. “Tell us the exact time.”

  “Twelve p.m. to three a.m. ship time.” Kim looked at Alex and gave an embarrassed smile. “Sorry, Alex …”

  Janet sighed.

  “You shouldn’t have said anything …”

  “Why didn’t you report this earlier?” Holmes demanded. “Some personal problems, perhaps? You had a sexual encounter you didn’t wish to make known?”

  “Yeah, right!” Kim snorted. “Sorry, Jannie …”

  “Then why were you silent on the matter?”

  “We had a private talk, okay? It has nothing to do with the Zzygou! We were … we were gossiping, you know. Girl to girl!”

  She looked at Alex again. He nodded, catching on.

  No, it wasn’t sex, after all. If there was anything erotic about it, it was in some minimal, trivial form—crying on each other’s shoulder, patting each other, maybe a little kissing.

  They had been discussing him. Him! Discussing and dividing him up! The smart Janet who understood everything, and the poor Kim, suffering from unrequited love. The younger asking the experienced woman’s advice. The woman sharing the secrets of sex and flirtation, the secrets that are impossible to graft by any kind of pre-programming …

  Alex looked away.

  He already seemed to understand what it was not to love.

  But it seemed not to have given him the main thing. Love itself.

  Or was it simply too late?

  Both Kim and Janet had already become his comrades in arms, his sexual partners … but not at all his beloved. Love is a force of nature. From steadily smoldering coals you can rouse a spark of passion, but not the flame of love.

  And wouldn’t it be great to fall in love with Kim—she was beautiful, young, smart, and loyal!

  What a stupid mechanism of reproduction Nature invented! Why can’t it be controlled?

  He looked at Holmes, who began talking again.

  “Thank you very much for the information, Ms. Kim O’Hara. Even if the information is somewhat belated. Do you have any documentation to affirm that you were with Janet Ruello from twelve to three o’clock last night?”

  “No, I don’t.” Kim shook her head. “But is my word worthless?”

  Holmes sighed.

  “In this particular situation, it is worthless. You could be covering up for the perpetrator. You could be an accomplice. I have taken your words into consideration, but I cannot rely on them.”

  Kim lifted her hand and slapped it forcefully on the table. Plates and silverware jumped up, and a deep dent was left in the polished wood.

  “Easy,” said Holmes soothingly. “A fighter-spesh should control herself.”

  “Are you deadlocked, Holmes?” Alex asked. He didn’t recognize his own voice. It seemed to him tense and hoarse.

  And he probably wasn’t the only one. All eyes were now on him.

  “I am deeply convinced that I know the murderer’s identity,” Holmes reported courteously. “But I still have no proof. And Lady Sey-Zo yearns for solid proof.”

  Alex silently rolled up the sleeve of his jersey. Then asked:

  “Does everybody know what this is?”

  “The Demon,” said Kim. “Your little devil …”

  “It’s an emotion scanner,” said Dr. Watson, entering the conversation. She was looking at Alex with genuine curiosity. “How strange … Why did you have one implanted?”

  “I must be the spesh who seeks out the unusual,” replied Alex with a crooked grin. “I’ve always wanted to see what exactly I am feeling. And maybe … maybe I wanted to see something on the Demon’s face that I couldn’t ever experience myself.”

  “It is smiling.” Dr. Watson walked up to him and unceremoniously grabbed his arm. “Captain … what does this mean?”

  “It means that everything is going to be all right,” said Alex. “I, too, know who the killer is. And I’m sure his guilt will be proven.”

  Dr. Watson’s eyes looked full of doubt. As though what was happening now was an unheard-of violation of natural laws.

  “If you can help the investigation …” the detective began.

  “I can’t—just yet. But tomorrow morning, everything will change. Believe me, Mr. Holmes.”

  “Captain!”

  Sey-Zo moved towards him, spreading out her arms, as if to underscore that she wasn’t doing so in aggression. Alex got up, stepped forward to meet her.

  “Who killed Zey-So?”

  “I will tell you tomorrow.”

  The Zzygou’s eyes were peering intently at his face. What was she trying to read on the face of a creature that resembled her race only in appearance?

  “Give me the murderer. Give him to me, and I will stop the war. In the name of every one of our race, I swear! I will stop the war!”

  “The murderer will be in your power.” Alex looked at the other crewmembers, sitting still as statues. “What will you do with him?”

  “I don’t know …” The Zzygou faltered. “I have to decide. What is considered worst punishment in your race?”

  It seemed the question was asked sincerely. Unlike Janet Ruello, Lady Sey-Zo had no training as an executioner-spesh.

  “Throw us into a briar patch—that’s the worst,” grumbled Morrison. And burst into a fit of almost hysterical laughter, which no one else dared to share.

  “Traditionally, it is primitive physical torture, which relies upon various violations of bodily integrity and stimulation of pain receptors,” reported Janet. “If I’m not mistaken, it is the exact type of thing you were using against human settlers on Valdae-8?”

  “Stop it!” said Dr. Watson quickly. But the crew’s restraint had already snapped.

  “Unnatural sexual contacts!” uttered Generalov.

  “Separation from the work you love,” declared Lourier.

  “Separation from the person you love,” said Kim softly.

  Alex shook his head. Looked at Holmes, who faked a slight, understanding smile.

  No one believed him! No crewmember believed that Alex really knew the killer’s name! Not even the killer himself. Everyone thought his words a bluff, a scene performed for the Zzygou in order to save humanity. Everyone—or almost everyone, except the murderer—
was willing to sacrifice himself for the cause.

  “The most terrifying thing,” said Alex, looking straight into the Zzygou’s eyes, “is to lose your own individuality. Your ‘self.’ The worst thing is to lose your consciousness and become a puppet, yanked by invisible strings.”

  Sey-Zo’s eyes, that had just been so human, suddenly changed. The pupil trembled, split apart, broke into hundreds of tiny dots. Alex felt a short, agonizing spasm of dizziness.

  Then it was all over.

  And Sey-Zo’s gaze turned human again, the way it couldn’t and shouldn’t have been.

  “You probably telling the truth,” the Zzygou said. “I will think.”

  At the opposite side of the table, Kim chuckled softly. Then she quietly recited:

  “We fear death not, nor its posthumous sting.

  We dread, while we live, that the fate it might bring—

  Black void—is more likely and worse than the Pit;

  We don’t know just whom we would beg, ‘Please, please, quit!’”

  The Zzygou did not deign to pay any attention to either Kim O’Hara or to the great poet’s words.

  “Who is the murderer?” she asked.

  “Will you take my word for it?” asked Alex in reply.

  “No.”

  “Then wait till tomorrow. In the morning, I will tell you everything.”

  “I wait, human.”

  The Zzygou turned and walked out of the recreation lounge. Someone—it must have been Morrison—heaved a deep sigh.

  “Bravo, Captain,” said Holmes. “You were magnificent.”

  “I was ready to believe,” said Generalov, reaching for his wine glass, “that you really do know who the killer is, Captain.”

  “I do.”

  “Give it up!” Puck shook his head. “You want to set yourself up as bait for the murderer. Am I right? You are hoping that he will decide to get rid of you during the night and get trapped as a result.”

  Dr. Watson cheerfully nodded.

  “Exactly! Just like in Moto Conan’s The Case of the Boy with a Rubber Eye!”

  “That’s useless, Captain,” said Morrison. “If the murderer is cunning enough to hide among us, he won’t fall for such a cheap trick.”

  And only Sherlock Holmes, the clone of the great detective Peter Valke, didn’t smile, looking at Alex.

  “Are we really going to wait till tomorrow?” asked C-the-Third. “Mr. Holmes … if you know the villain’s name, why not use torture?”

  “This question has already been raised. I think that the murderer will endure any amount of pain. And under too much duress, anyone will admit to anything. Torture won’t give us proof.” Holmes began filling his pipe. “So yes. I agree with the captain. Let’s postpone everything till tomorrow.”

  “Will you join us for supper, Mr. Holmes?” asked Janet, all of a sudden. The detective looked at her with obvious surprise. And Janet herself seemed a bit startled by her own courtesy.

  “Thank you, Ms. Janet Ruello,” said Holmes with exquisite politeness. “Unfortunately, I prefer not to partake of food during an investigation. Especially if its chemical composition is unknown to me. But I appreciate … your offer.”

  “Okay, go gnaw on your vitamins under your pillow!” said Janet through clenched teeth, as if coming back to her senses. Puck Generalov giggled.

  “She’s got you there, Holmes, old boy!”

  He leaned toward Janet and slapped her on the shoulder. The black lady looked at him in surprise. She half-rose and moved closer to him. They sat together, demonstratively hugging and looking at Holmes.

  Kim laughed. Poured herself some wine, leaned over to Morrison, and whispered something in his ear. Then both of them roared with laughter.

  Alex forced himself to look away. And saw that Holmes, puffing his pipe, was watching what was going on with curiosity.

  “More wine, anybody?” asked Paul Lourier.

  “Sure,” Generalov eagerly agreed. “But not this red watery stuff—I think there was some decent port in there!”

  Lourier got up, walked over to the bar.

  “Alex,” said Holmes softly. “Do you smoke a pipe?”

  “Yes, but I don’t have one on me.”

  “Join me.” Holmes pointed to the chair nearest to him and got a disposable pipe, already filled with tobacco, out of his pocket. It wasn’t the good old briar from Earth, of course, but a worthy imitation of it. Besides, this pipe did not need to be seasoned. And the tobacco was quite good.

  Alex lit it up. He managed to hold back a sarcastic remark about the tobacco, whose chemical composition was unknown.

  “You’re very interesting to work with,” Holmes said. “I’m really enjoying this investigation, despite the tragic circumstances. The situation itself—the ship, flying through the hyper-channel, the small number of suspects, the exotic nature of the victim … Please don’t think me a cynic!”

  “I don’t. You just love your job, that’s all.”

  Dr. Jenny Watson perched on the arm of Holmes’s chair.

  “Yes, this is a classic murder … like the one in The Case of the Yellow Starship.”

  “I believe the captain was the murderer in that one?” inquired Alex.

  Holmes nodded with a smile.

  “Yes. But I wouldn’t insist on that analogy. You play along with me wonderfully well.”

  “And you, with me.”

  They looked at each other.

  “What is it you want, Alex?” inquired Holmes. “To help me, to help some friend of yours, or to prove that a pilot-spesh can be a detective as well?”

  “To help myself.”

  “That’s a serious reason,” Holmes agreed.

  From then on, they smoked in silence. The hysterical merriment that seemed to have overtaken the crew after the Zzygou’s departure also evaporated. Kim went off to her quarters after a failed attempt to take Alex with her—he just shook his head. Immediately after she left, Morrison, having fetched up a bottle of wine and two glasses, also disappeared from the recreation lounge. Generalov, growing gloomy, emptied a few glasses of whiskey and soda in quick succession and made himself scarce. Lourier excused himself and departed. He loitered briefly in the hallway, as if irresistibly drawn to the sealed door of the reactor module, and then went off to his cabin. Janet, engrossed in her own thoughts, took a long time to notice that she had been left alone with Holmes, Watson, and Alex. She kept swirling her glass, with the remnants of wine splashing at the bottom. For some reason, Alex remembered that Eben had a Red Sea, where the water was actually red because of a myriad of edible plankton. A reserve food source for the entire planet … an artificially created reservoir full of krill. Perhaps, looking at the thick red wine, Janet was thinking of her homeland?

  Then the black woman lifted her head.

  “Captain, permission to leave?”

  “Permission granted.” Alex was slightly surprised by such a formal request, but decided to keep with her tone.

  Only the three of them remained.

  “Dr. Watson and I will take the vacant passenger cabin,” said Holmes, “if it’s all right with you, Captain.”

  “I can let you have mine.” Alex shrugged.

  “That won’t be necessary.”

  Holmes carefully cleaned out his pipe. He shook his head with disapproval upon seeing the small cleaner-beetle crawling out of a corner. What’s cleanliness to a detective, except more obliterated evidence?

  “Do both of you really know who the killer is?” Dr. Watson asked suddenly.

  “I do,” said Holmes.

  “So do I,” declared Alex.

  “In Moto Conan’s book The Case of Three Men Who Lost the Fourth, Holmes and the murderer exchanged just these kinds of phrases!” said Dr. Watson excitedly.

  Holmes shook his head.

  “No, my dear Watson. Forgive me, but I’m not quite ready to press charges.”

  Dr. Watson smiled, acknowledging another failed try. Then she said:


  “What amazes me is the killer’s composure. It is well known that a detective-spesh solves ninety-nine point three percent of all cases. How can he remain calm in such a situation?”

  “If we were dealing with a classic murderer—an ordinary immoral natural—your surprise would be appropriate,” Holmes admitted. “But this was a well-planned act. And the one who is hiding behind someone else’s identity”—he threw an eloquent glance at Alex—“is totally devoid of fear. An assassin-spesh never loses his cool, the same way that a pilot-spesh keeps control of his ship till the end … even seeing that death is unavoidable.”

  “I thought so, too.” Alex permitted himself to smile at Holmes. “See you tomorrow, Holmes. May a new day bring us luck.”

  He got up, nodded to Dr. Watson, and quickly went down the hallway.

  He didn’t feel like sleeping.

  Alex lay, covered up to his waist, looking through a little tome of World Literature Classics by the glow of his night light. The book, in search mode, was displaying works under the keyword “love.”

  There were lots of works.

  You could even say—all of them.

  Alex moved to the “poems” directory. Chose a poet—Dmitry Bykov—and entered the same keyword.

  THE CINEMA WHERE THE TWO OF YOU MUNCHED PINE NUTS, DUMPING THE SHELLS INTO YOUR COAT-POCKET—

  A DETAIL EVEN CHEKHOV HIMSELF WOULD LOVE,

  THAT PINCE-NEZED EX-PROVINCIAL GARDENER AND DOCTOR.

  YOU’D’VE EMPTIED YOUR POCKETS—NOT MUCH OF A LOAD, AND THE TROLLEY-STOP HAD A HANDY DUMPSTER.

  BUT YOU FORGOT, BECAUSE LOVE HAD YOU QUITE OVERWROUGHT,

  AND BLIND, AND BEMUSED, IN LITERARY PARLANCE.

  SOME TIME WILL PASS, AND ONE DAY YOU’LL SEARCH FOR A NICKEL OR DIME FOR A RIDE BACK FROM NOWHERE, IN YOUR OLD COAT-POCKET, NOW THIN WITH AGE, YOU’LL DISCOVER THE REMNANTS OF THOSE PIGNOLIS.

  AND THERE YOU’LL STAND, INEXPLICABLY MUTE AND STRAINED, HIDING YOUR FACE FROM THE OTHERS, CHOKING BACK TEARS … WHAT WILL YOU SAY THEN ABOUT THOSE ‘SMALL’ DETAILS—

  OF LIFE AND LITERATURE—THAT YOU MOCKED ALL THOSE YEARS?

  He put the book aside. In the corner of the page blinked a cheery little face of the “reference person,” ready to define any archaic words, or give a biographical sketch of the poet, or provide a critical analysis of the text.