Human

by Hayley Camille

  His images seemed grotesque and otherworldly, like souls trapped and frozen in time. The crowd pushed forward to get a closer view. An old woman wailed and fell away shaking and a rabble of feverish chanting broke out across the group. A number of young men yelled to Charat. Neil recognised some of them as belonging to the hunting party who had captured him. Although he didn't understand their words, Neil guessed by their expressions they were seeking direction. Charat answered his men with a violent shout and nod. It did not escape Neil’s notice that the man enjoyed this power.

  Fear isn’t enough here. I need to be a god. I need awe.

  Neil felt in his pocket for his talisman. He spun it mechanically in his fingers and felt a rare shot of gratitude to his ex-wife for the gift. The polished silver lighter briefly reflected the firelight as he brought it up to his face. He turned to Charat, who was now coolly regarding the frantic crowd. They had an accord. Power for power.

  With a hard nod, Charat turned his back to Neil and roared at the gathered tribe. With disquiet they complied. Charat was now their connection to the soul-stealing stranger and that fear lent him a new authority. In his hands he held an unlit torch of bamboo. Its fibrous knob had been soaked in flammable oils, ready to ignite. Charat turned to Neil expectantly, a knowing glint in his eye.

  Between his palms, Neil flicked the lighter and a flame appeared. Gasps escaped the crowd. Neil held the flame high above his head. He knew what they would see. He was like a spectre in the dark night, with his white skin, strange hides and a superhuman ability to capture souls and freeze them in time. And now this. He created fire, from nowhere, and held it in his bare hands. The fear of such magic held no bounds. With a flourish, Neil set Charat’s torch alight. The crowd gasped. Inwardly, Neil was elated at his own performance. Surely, I am a God.

  But he had one more trick. This one he had kept to himself. Neil extinguished the lighter and pulled out his phone once more in flourished silence. The possibility of a stone-age conspiracy had grown like a dark humour within him.

  It is time to give these people something to really fear.

  A new photo.

  The redhead.

  With a flash he held up his device to Charat. There was a flash of recognition across the hunter’s face. Then Charat cried out with such rage that Neil was taken aback. He punched the air, yelling at the others and sounding… vindicated? The crowd pushed forward to see. They looked angry. But not surprised. They already know she's there.

  Neil had chosen this photo specifically. He anticipated what the humans would see in it. The redhead stood tall and pale above at least two dozen Ebu Gogo. Her hair was the colour of fire and her skin was pale like death. Bright green eyes looked down on the ape-men around her as she clutched a black hairy beast, misshapen and bent on her hip like a child. An animal that didn’t fit into their knowledge of the natural world. The scene was disorienting in its deviance. A tall spear, one of their own Neil now realised, was clasped in her fist and the creatures were rallied around her with primitive weapons.

  Neil knew his captors would understand that at least; the threat she held and the power she had, as she stood dominant amongst the Ebu Gogo.

  Neil caught Charat's eye with an unspoken agreement. The hunter raised his fist to the air, punching violently to the dark sky. The red beads shook and rattled as he shouted, filling the crowd with fear. He turned to Neil, and lowered his body to the ground in mock deference. Power for power.

  Neil raised his fist. He heard his voice break as he screamed above the confusion. Ebu Gogo must be killed! The authority in his voice was undeniable. A wave of fear rippled through his audience. They fell at his feet.

  Now I am a God.

  “Yeah it’s me Orrin, it’s Dimi.” The phone crackled, threatening to drop out. “Hello? Are you there?”

  “I’m here Dimi, and I’m desperate glad to hear you, man. Where are you?”

  “I’m in a sheep paddock on the side of a highway. I’ve been at the Parkes Observatory for weeks. Sorry for the midnight call; it’s been hard to get away. I had to drive a few clicks from the dish to use my mobile – the signal screws with our readings.” Dimitri’s voice was strained. “So what’s happening, O? What’s so urgent?”

  “Oh Christ,” Orrin laughed with relief that bordered on the maniacal. “Where the hell do I begin?”

  As he relayed the events of the past two weeks, Orrin found himself rushing through details, for the sheer release of confiding in an old friend. To his credit Dimitri did not interrupt, but rather grew quieter as Orrin spoke. When he finally finished, Orrin waited apprehensively for his reaction.

  “Well, you can’t say you lead a boring life, O.” The attempt at humour only barely concealed Dimi’s concern.

  “I wish I did.”

  “And you’re sure she’s gone, this woman? You’re absolutely sure this isn’t some kind of joke or misunderstanding.”

  “I’ve been to hell and back, Dimi. I did this to her. Believe it or not, the world is totally screwed on account of my mistake. I don’t need you to believe me,” exhausted, Orrin pushed his fingers into the ridges of his eyes, “but I do need you to help me. Please, man.”

  “How?”

  Orrin took a deep breath. He was crossing a line. “Information. Data. Astronomical survey results from the last, say, three weeks. Unpublished. Anything that looks anomalous or out of the ordinary and anything that impacted on the earth’s magnetic fields or might have caused my lab to go haywire. Lunar, deep space, solar flares… whatever you’ve got.”

  Silence. “You’re asking a lot, O. Some of the projects we’re running are classified.”

  “I know.”

  Dimi’s sigh crackled down the phone line.

  “I wouldn’t put this on you if I had a choice,” Orrin begged. “But I’m running out of options here. I’m desperate, man.”

  “Yeah, I know, Orrin. I know. Look, I think I have what you need.”

  “Serious? What have you found out there?”

  “I can’t go into it now. I’ll need time to get my data together and it’s not going to be easy. But if you’re at Melbourne Uni then this information makes more sense to me than you realise. We’ve been at the Dish for the past month tracking some seriously massive electro-magnetic radiation over you. The fields were declining with the waning moon but they’re picking up again now. I’ve also got hotspots of reversed polarity cropping up in weird co-ordinates across the earth. I’m still trying to find a common link, the places and environments seem entirely discordant to one other. But these hotspots are phasing in and out with the lunar interference as well. The strongest pulse seems to be heading your way from the Clavious Crater. The magnetosphere is already our priority, and now this. We think it might be linked somehow. It’s got the powers-that-be scrambling; if we get a magnetic energy surge from this thing – well you know what that could do.”

  “Jaysus, man. Why the hell are they keeping it quiet?”

  “My boss. The Director of Astronomy and Space is seeing dollar signs. She wants to understand its potential before she gets the media involved. Misunderstood, this flux is potentially devastating, but if we can manipulate and control it – well, she thinks there’s something in that for her. Only a handful of us know about it at all. She has friends in high places, particularly government officials. If she says jump, we jump, if she says figure it out and keep our mouths shut, then…” Dimi sighed.

  “She’s a damned header!” Orrin growled. “People need to know what’s going on! Who is this woman?”

  “Her name is Cassandra. Cassandra Chevalier. Or to us lowly engineers, ‘Director’,” said Dimi. “We were friends once. She started not long after me in Digital Systems, but she’s shot through the ranks like a rocket. She’s sharp as a knife edge and a downright bitch most of the time. But I have to give it to her; she knows what she’s doing. She’s shrewd and she reads people like a book. She filters the raw data by sight. That’s why I’ll need time to get
the information to you. She’s overseeing this project personally and nothing gets by her.”

  “Do you think you can do it? Transfer that level of data under her nose?”

  “I don’t know,” Dimi said. “She trusts me though; I’ve worked with her the longest. I’m not promising anything. But I’ll try.”

  “I understand. You know where to find me. And thanks man - for believing me,” Orrin said.

  “I’m not saying I do believe you O, at least, I need time to figure out what I believe. But I’ll help you.” Dimi hesitated. “There seems to be a lot at stake here for a lot of important people. I’m just sorry you’re involved in all this.” There was an edge to his voice Orrin couldn’t quite place. He shook it off as concern.

  “Yeah me too. Believe me Dimi, I am sorry.”

  “Yeah,” said Dimi. He was quiet for a moment. “No, no. You shouldn’t be sorry. Not really. Not if it’s true.”

  “What do you -?”

  “You found her, man. I mean, you went and screwed it up, but before that, you found her. The one you’ve been looking for. I’m happy for you, O.”

  “Thanks. I really did find her, didn’t I?”

  “Huh,” said Dimi. “I’m actually kind of jealous.”

  “Of this bloody mess?”

  “‘Course.”

  Orrin smiled sadly. He pictured his best friend pulling his shoulders back, staring at the empty paddocks.

  “Don’t give up,” Orrin said. “He’s out there, somewhere, waiting for you to come along and sweep him off his feet.”

  “Never been good at that part,” chuckled Dimi. “I’d better go; I’m bloody freezing out here. I’ll be in touch. Be careful, O. Seriously.”

  “You too, man.”

  As the disconnection tone beeped in his ear, Orrin sat back in his chair, flipping his mobile shut. Finally exhausted beyond the ability to dream, he walked slowly from his lab and made his way through the empty car park. It was nearly one in the morning and the night was ghostly. Dimi’s words drizzled through his mind. ‘There seems to be a lot at stake for a lot of important people. I’m just sorry you’re involved in all this.’ It was growing apparent that the situation was even more dire than Orrin had realised. And he wasn’t the only one who knew about it. Why had Dimi been sorry he was involved? What would the ‘powers-that-be’ do, if they knew Orrin had caused it? The relief he felt at knowing Dimi was on his side, was offset by the apprehension of what it might cost his best friend. With a heavy head, he drove home.

  It was past noon when Phil Chan appeared in the laboratory doorway, coffee in hand. He leant against the wooden frame, his eyes narrowing. Dale had stepped out for lunch and Orrin sat alone contemplating an oversized whiteboard of scribbled data.

  “I’m not saying I believe you Orrin.”

  “Of course you don’t.”

  “But I’m saying I’ll see this thing through,” Phil said. “Whatever’s going on here, I want to find out the truth. If it turns out you’ve screwed up my systems yourself– well, let’s just say you’ll be looking for a new lab assistant.”

  “Fair play. Should I ask why you changed your mind?”

  “Don’t push it.” And with that, Phil planted himself before the whiteboard and joined Orrin’s silent analysis.

  When Dale returned from lunch to find Phil back, his ever-present storm cloud seemed to lift somewhat, despite the fact that Phil’s return seemed more to prove their collective insanity than otherwise. Still unimpressed by Dale’s pandering, Phil regarded the younger student with cool indifference and Orrin with little more. True to his word though, he poured diligently over his code, recreating the statistical analyses that had been lost or changed. A growing list of environmental variables appeared on screens above them. The resultant mess of their last experiment was compared to their original parameters. Slowly a pattern emerged and the three men sat well past midnight comparing the old against new. The following morning found them again in front of the whiteboard, but this time contemplating their new data with less weary eyes.

  “The variables were incrementally rising from a week before it happened, we just didn’t realise.” Orrin couldn’t believe he’d missed the pattern. So distracted was he with his theories, he’d paid no attention to the changing conditions in his lab. “Something set off the crash though, there must have been a catalyst.”

  Phil scrutinised the whiteboard. “If the magnetospheric fluctuations were gradually increasing in your version of earth, as you insist, and ours have degraded exponentially in comparison, then something must have happened to throw the fields.”

  Dale leant forward. He’d been silent most of the day.

  “The same thing that threw us into this field collapse?” Dale said. “That degradation is the greatest environmental variable we've got. It seems too coincidental. There must be a link - something that connects the two events.”

  Phil looked from Orrin to Dale. Between them a bag of doughnuts sat uneaten. “Yeah well, until we know what caused this, we won’t be able to replicate it.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Orrin said. “But we’re a lot closer than we were. We know what went wrong now; we just need to know how to recreate it. If we can recreate those other variables, then maybe we can get her back.”

  Phil rolled his eyes but this time it was a little less convincing.

  “Any news from your friend at CSIRO?” asked Dale.

  “No, but don’t worry, he’ll come through,” Orrin replied. “Dimi’s one of my oldest friends.”

  “Are you sure you can trust him?” Phil asked, looking dubious.

  “Sure,” Orrin replied and shook off the chill it brought him. He had no choice.

  There was a sharp knock at the door and Jayne pushed through without waiting for a response. Dale and Phil straightened in their chairs, surprised. With an anxious scan of the men, Jayne’s eyes settled on Orrin.

  “I need you to see something. Come with me.”

  Orrin jumped to his feet. “What’s wrong?”

  Jayne twisted her hands together. She looked close to panic. “My ulterior motive. You wanted my help; this is why I’m giving it. Just come and see for yourself.”

  Orrin immediately followed the blonde woman from the room. Behind him, Dale and Phil fell into step as well, intrigued. After perfunctory introductions, Jayne ignored the other men and led Orrin silently through the streaming daylight, hugging pathways and shortcuts before finally arriving at the Biology Building. Orrin noticed Phil walk taller then usual, a purposeful stride keeping him to Jayne’s right, always in her clear view. Dale fell behind a step. They took a few short-cuts through the maze of laboratories and Orrin easily guessed where they were headed. As they arrived at the steel door of Behavioural Research Laboratory 6, the stink of formaldehyde and chemicals saturated his nostrils.

  The lab door was wide open and an unmarked van was parked metres away in the narrow laneway. Throwing Orrin a critical glance, Jayne stepped through the open door and led the way through dim light towards the rear enclosure. The inner mesh door was also unlocked and open, leaving only a row of steel bars separating the false habitat from the viewing area.

  Two men in beige overalls bent over equipment at the far end of the viewing area, a large rifle propped between them. A uniformed security officer straightened up from where he had been lounging against the wire wall. He cleared his throat pointedly.

  A man with a thin, sallow face looked up, scowling. “What the hell are you doing here again, Williams? I told you to keep out of this area. As of yesterday this room is restricted to authorised personnel only and I don’t care who you slept with to get a key.”

  Jayne stiffened with anger. “You can’t do this Professor Nerov! Liam Kent is the only person authorised to transfer these animals. Without his permission…”

  “No permission required,” Nerov growled. “Your boyfriend went and got himself locked up. I don't like his chances of getting his job back either.”

  �
�He's not my –”

  “It doesn't matter, he's not here!” Nerov shouted. He turned his back on them and took a deep breath, calming himself before he continued. “This authority comes from the Head of Department. As far as they’re concerned, these animals have become a liability. Perhaps Mr Kent's time would have been better spent looking after his resources, rather than setting fire to pharmaceutical buildings.”

  There was a crash of noise in the front laboratory and a man came running into the viewing area. He skidded as he slowed, pushing Phil and Dale aside. There was a flash of recognition in his eyes as he stepped in front of Orrin to face Nerov.

  “They’re not resources! They're here for behavioural studies and because I had no other alternative trying to keep them from the likes of you!” Liam yelled.

  Nerov gritted his jaw and shot a look to the security guard, who was now standing tall with one hand on his holstered gun. “How nice to see you again, Mr Kent.”

  “Wish I could say the same.” Liam was incensed. His mop of curls was dull and messy and his eyes were shadowed with dark rings. He was filthy and wearing the same clothes Orrin had seen him in at the rally a week ago. The telltale stains of blood and ash were on his jeans and sleeves and Orrin guessed he'd just made bail.

  “Thank God you made it,” Jayne muttered. Liam shot her a grateful look and turned back to Nerov.

  “So what's this? The minute I turn my back you slither in?” Liam said.

  Nerov met his cold anger head on. “You did this Kent! I warned you they were after your little tribe down here. You pushed it too far and now they're lab fodder.”

  “No! I fought against this for months! I protected them!” Liam’s face was red and his voice broke over the words.

  “You failed them!” Nerov spat back.

  The accusation hit Liam like a physical blow and he stumbled back. Behind him, Jayne let out a soft cry. Orrin's heart was pumping furiously and his mind raced. Dale and Phil edged around him. Dale's mouth had fallen open in horror.