Page 49 of The Half Life of Valery K

The Coroner’s Report

City 40, 1963

It wasn’t being lifted that woke Valery up, but being set back down again. Some part of his mind must have been certain he was about to be dropped on the floor, but when he jerked awake, he was a few centimetres off a cushion. Shenkov eased him down the rest of the way and set one hand against the side of his head to steady him.

‘I’m on the early shift,’ Shenkov whispered. ‘It’s only five o’clock, you can go back to sleep. Are you okay here? This thing is brutal.’

Valery didn’t understand at first and had to sit up before he saw he was still on Shenkov’s living-room couch, under a fur blanket. The air was cold now, but the heating must have just come on, because the radiators were plinking. ‘I’m okay,’ he said, wondering why anyone wouldn’t be, on a couch full of cushions and blankets.

Shenkov nodded and disappeared.

Five o’clock; it was a gloriously late start. Valery drifted up and made some coffee, admiring how bright but how inoffensive the electric lamps were, and basking in the happy fact that he could have them on for however long he wanted. He coiled up in a kitchen chair to read yesterday’s paper, and only when Shenkov reappeared and looked alarmed did he realise he must have been in the way.

‘There’s some coffee. I’ll get out the way—’

‘You’re not in the way.’ Shenkov paused, as if he were about to say something else, but then seemed to decide against it. ‘I looked at the guide. Skating’s on at eight tonight.’

Valery felt desperately glad, realised it was wildly inappropriate in the face of someone he barely knew, and coughed. ‘Oh, right, brilliant,’ he said. ‘See you later, then.’

And that was that. Valery came round every evening, for the skating or whatever was on – sometimes just the news. Not wanting to push his luck, he made sure he was always back in his own apartment upstairs again by ten o’clock. Or he did for a week, until Shenkov asked if the couch was really that terrible. After that he stayed for most of the time, and slept much better knowing there was someone in the next room. Either Shenkov was an outstandingly polite liar, or he liked strays, because he never seemed to regret the invitation, and if Valery was late, he came to fetch him from the lab.

The KGB had no luck with Pyotr, and nor did anyone else. Quietly, Shenkov said that he had told the search teams to look for a body now, but after two weeks, there was no body, and then they stopped looking. Even so, whenever he went out to do fieldwork, Valery caught himself staring through the trees, hunting for any flicker that might have been a child running. He never saw anything; only the slow reddening of the berries, which announced the coming winter. It was the beginning of November now, and although it didn’t feel cold to him after Siberia, the huge marshland sky was greying, the rain poured in the evenings, and in the mornings, a luminous fog hung among the scrubbed tower blocks of City 40.

Dr Resovskaya came round every week with a file full of lists – every lab supply that was available to them – and when Valery flicked through, it quickly turned out they could get anything. There was even a long list of marine creatures you could order.

Including a live octopus. He ordered it just to see what would happen, and then nearly exploded with delight when, only a week later, a tank arrived with a small octopus in it, with a leaflet sticky-taped on top detailing tank requirements, recommended water salinity for the species, acceptable food lists, and a special filtration unit. Valery read it carefully before he opened the locked tank (it is recommended that you give an octopus something to play with, or it will sulk and refuse to participate in experiments) to see if the octopus would like to look at a marble. The second the tank was open, though, the octopus flooped straight out and hugged his hand. It sat there on his wrist for ages, pulsing brilliant yellow. It was soft to touch, but not slimy. Charmed, he showed it the marble, which it took, but it kept his hand as well. When he finally persuaded it back into the tank with some tiny crabs from the supply that came in the box (live food is best. NB: no canned tuna if you don’t want it flung at your head), his hand was covered in miniature kiss marks from the suckers.

‘Why?’ Resovskaya asked mildly. ‘You want to do a saltwater study?’

‘No! I want an octopus. No irradiating the octopus.’

‘I would say you aren’t supposed to use our budget just to buy pets—’ she began, and yelled when the octopus squirted a jet of water at her.

‘The leaflet says they can be territorial,’ Valery said, doing his best at apologetic, but once she’d gone, he gave the octopus all the remaining crabs. It skimmed along the bottom of the tank, hoovering.

It was because the students had come across to play too that Shenkov didn’t see the octopus when he leaned in.

‘Valery. Come with me a minute.’

Valery stepped out, fighting the sense that he must be in trouble, but Shenkov only steered him out by his shoulder and leaned down so they wouldn’t be heard.

‘The coroner’s given in her report on the man you found in the woods. She says he died of a heart attack, and when I queried radiation, she shut me down. Said I was mistaken.’

‘You’re not,’ said Valery.

‘You only glanced at the body.’

‘I stared at it for twenty minutes while I waited for the KGB, I have two research doctorates in radiation-focused fields, and I have radiation sickness; how much more qualified do you want me to be?’ Valery asked, starting to smile.

Shenkov ducked his head a little. ‘Sorry. I was hoping you were going to say you might have made a mistake.’

‘I didn’t. If he was walking around while his organs were shutting down from the radiation then yes, his heart could have given out, but that isn’t a primary cause. Why?’

‘Because if you’re sure, then the coroner is lying, and now I don’t know how many other cases she lied about. I’ve been looking over the county files, for local deaths. A lot of people seem to die of heart attacks.’ He hesitated. ‘How many is normal, do you know?’

‘One in five of all natural deaths.’

‘It’s more like one in three here.’