'23kpc' Chapter 31: A Discombobulated Recap

In real life, with real-life — and mischievous — partners, private eyes don't always keep their eye on the ball

[AI did a remarkably good job with the prompt for this image. If I were picking nits, I might complain about the woman’s mismatched shoes — but in truth, I didn’t even notice the missing heel until just now.]

Reminders:
All of ‘23kpc’ to date can be found here.
The ‘23kpc’ Reader’s Guide (briefly recapping names, places, etc.) is here.

From last week:

Guy and Al, along with other patrons of the museum’s “AlphaLiteralist” exhibit, were herded into a side room to be questioned about what they saw at the time when all the view-panel and holographic exhibits suddenly morphed into various representations of the word trú.

Guy and Al’s questioner was Daina Cheruiyot: one half of the “D&I” couple who are friends with Guy and Missy. She poked a little bit into the changes to the AlphaLiteralist artworks, and how Guy and Al had come to be in that gallery. Guy briefly described¹ the so-called “Muybridge” device which apparently caused Tyler’s death. But then Daina shifted the conversation: her other half, Idris, was the technology nerd (and hence could investigate the engineering angle more deeply); she herself, though, wanted primarily to quiz Al about Tyler’s background — especially as it might have had to do with religion.

She cautioned them: no fooling around. When she asked questions, she wanted straight answers. She looked pointedly at Guy: “I know you can be cute and charming and sometimes funny. But now is not time, yes?” Guy of course — being Guy — was stung by the “sometimes,” but assured her he’d behave.

And so Guy’s narration resumes this week:

Chapter 31: The Unnerving of Guy Landis

“‘Sometimes’?” Missy says to me. “She actually said ‘sometimes’? You’re not just embellishing for the sake of comedy, O love of my life?”

I’m still still licking my psychological wounds about it. “No, O love of mine — no comedy. Trust me. I am not and Daina certainly was not joking. She said can be, too — not I am charming and cute, but I can be.”

That uncontrollably musical laugh of Missy’s ripples up out of her throat, and patrons in nearby booths here in the Midship² turn their smiling faces in our direction. I glare at them. I might enjoy their envious attention — sometimes might — if I weren’t in such a self-pityingly sour mood. I push the food around on my plate.

Meatloaf, I’m thinking. Why the heck did I order meatloaf?

And then I answer myself: Because you never met a meatloaf you didn’t love, you oaf.

It’s not much, but even that little bit of something almost like wordplay lifts my spirits a bit. “So,” I say, “tell me about your own afternoon. Massage good? Feeling limber, maybe?”

“Limber enough, Darling.” She grins and lets that declaration hang there for a beat, turning in the air between us like Blue Eyes in the AlphaLiteralist gallery. But she’s not going to let me go further down that path, not now anyhow. “Daina was right, you know: you do have a way of nudging serious conversations in unproductive directions... case in point.”

She’s still grinning. I can see she’s agreeable to keeping things light. I’m not nuts, though; I recognize her real intention.

To wit: Back to business, husband of mine, and you were saying...?

“Well,” I continue, “I told her as much as we’ve been able to piece together about all the mysterious secrecy down on E deck. The way they change the subject, or they answer but don’t quite answer, when you ask them something they don’t feel like talking about. The customized v-coms, including the one that Orrie took into the dorm cylinder with him.”

“And what did Daina say to all this? Did she have any conclusions?”

I shake my head. “Maybe she did but just didn’t want to say in front of Al. And I have to say, I’m impressed that she never even took notes, or record—”

“Now, now. Distractions, dear Guy. We both already know Daina is an exception to most rules. I’m not asking you about Daina herself. What did she make of your Engineering Deck report? And what did Al himself have to offer? Any more background on Tyler?”