The Cull

by Jon Jacks

  ‘Looks promising,’ I say. ‘Click on it.’

  Pat opens up the link.

  As soon as I see the second paragraph, I know we’re onto something.

  ‘Oh, that’s interesting,’ I say, pointing out the passage.

  Pat leans forward to read it.

  ‘What? That most of our DNA is junk?’ He sounds confused. ‘That’s not what we’re after, is it?’

  ‘No, sorry; I mean it’s a bit of a coincidence. After I’d given up researching frequencies, I’d got side-tracked finding things out about DNA.’

  I point to a particular line in the passage.

  ‘See this bit about the so called junk actually following the same rules as language? That’s right, I reckon; it doesn’t say it here, but if you make a graph of how frequently certain words crop up – you know, words like “the” as opposed to words like “zebra” – every language comes out looking the same, following what’s called Zipf's Law. And so do the alkalines of our DNA.’

  Pat chuckles grimly.

  ‘You’re joking? You’re saying there’s a message in there?

  ‘Not a message. You could write anything you wanted in there. It would make the Encyclopaedia Britannica look like a shopping list.’

  ‘Wow!’ Pat eyes me suspiciously. ‘And you found all this out – and you weren’t tempted to leave your own little message?’

  I blush.

  ‘Well, I, er – look, no one will ever believe it anyway Pat, okay?’

  ‘You’re going to get yourself in real trouble one day Jaz!’

  ‘I wasn’t stupid enough to put it under my own name, Pat! Let’s just say that if anyone’s upset, Harvard University has got an awful lot to answer for!’

  ‘Getting back to our wormholes,’ Jolie says, pointing out a passage lower down the screen, ‘it looks like our DNA can also produce “tunnel connections between entirely different areas in the universe…outside of space and time”: which I think is exactly what we’re looking for, isn’t it?’

  ‘Maybe; maybe not,’ I say doubtfully.

  I expect Jolie to look either hurt or crestfallen. Instead, she frowns thoughtfully, saying, ‘You’re wondering why Gariel would bother coming here, right?’

  ‘Sure. I mean, all this DNA forming magnetised wormholes might give us an idea how Gariel gets here from this parallel world – which, let’s remember, we’ve simply conjured up to try and make sense of what’s going on. But if he’s really from a parallel world, how would anything I come up with affect him? I’d be affecting this world, not his.’

  ‘Can I smell burning?’ Pat sniffs the air.

  ‘Hey yeah, I think I can too!’ Jolie says, looking about the room anxiously.

  There’s a fizzing, a sputtering noise.

  ‘I think it’s the computer–’

  Suddenly, the whole room shudders violently.

  The chairs jump.

  The table rattles.

  The computer leaps, slides across the table, goes blank.

  We’re bounced into the air, sent stumbling ungainly.

  We’re all shocked, clinging on to whatever we can grab nearest to us.

  ‘Did something just hit the house?’ Pat wonders.

  Then the ceiling starts tumbling down around us.

  *

  The whole room is shaking once again.

  ‘It’s an earthquake!’ Pat screams, even though he doesn’t sound like he believes it himself.

  We all rush for the door. It isn’t easy; the floorboards beneath our feet are shuddering, warping, breaking free. We’re sent rolling from side to side.

  It’s like the Fun House from Hell.

  The table, chairs, computer and even the bed are leaping around like there’s a whole army of poltergeists having fun in here.

  As if we’ve suddenly been transported back to some Victorian ball, Pat stands aside at the doorway to allow us girls to dash out first.

  The stairs are bucking, like they’ve come alive. And they’re wanting to throw off anyone foolish enough to think they can tame them.

  Even so, it’s the only way out.

  We rush down them, missing steps, half tumbling against the leaning, pulsating walls, the snaking, cracking bannister.

  Sometimes, somehow, we find that we’ve managed to put a foot back on the step we thought we’d just left behind.

  The crack of exploding wood. The harsh snap of shattering brick. The crash of tumbling walls and timbers.

  Abruptly, it’s all drowned out by a thunderous roar.

  We all turn, look behind us, look up.

  The entire roof is collapsing in on itself.

  On us.

  Then, suddenly, even the violently rocking steps beneath our feet drop away. Like they’re being sucked into a vast vacuum cleaner hidden underground.

  ‘Arrrrgggghhhhhhh!’

  We all shriek in terror as we plummet downwards. And the whole house shatters and falls around us.

  *

  Chapter 21

  How can we be falling so far?

  Where’s the earth gone?

  Where’s Gariel?

  Isn’t he going to save us this time?’

  *

  It’s true; time slows down as you rush to meet your death.

  Something to do with your mind working at superfast speed.

  I can hear that relaxing, melodious note; MI, the miracle tone.

  Then I realise it’s Jolie. Jolie’s hit the note perfectly.

  And suddenly Gariel’s there. His glow suffusing everything.

  Slowing everything.

  Slowing everything physically, not just mentally.

  Our fall is languid now. As is the falling of the remains of the house raining down around us.

  It’s probably my imagination, but Pat seems to be falling a little faster than Jolie and me. He hits the ground – at last, the ground! – sooner than we do. It’s hard enough to knock the breath out of him too.

  I float down to a soft landing, closely followed by Jolie.

  The remains of the house land around us just as unhurriedly. Whether huge chunks or small, shattered sections, they touch the rock of the ground with a dull crump.

  They slowly topple, slowly settle, like everything is taking place at the bottom of a deep lake.

  I glance over at Pat.

  He seems okay, shaking his head like he’s just a little bit groggy, a bit dazed, but otherwise fine.

  Beyond Gariel’s iridescent light, walls of jagged rock loom everywhere about us.

  The sky is high above, a small patch of blue, as if I’m looking through a dark, roughly-hewn tunnel.

  Odd clumps of grassy earth continue to fall away from the edges, dropping towards us at normal speed.

  Something else is rushing towards us.

  Hurtling down the cavernous hole like a deadly, dark missile.

  It’s a massive roof timber.

  And it’s heading directly towards a dazed, unknowing Pat.

  *

  Chapter 22

  ‘No!’

  Leaping to my feet, I throw myself at Pat, barging him out of the way.

  I glance up.

  I’ve saved him. I’ve knocked him out of the way.

  Now I’m the one lying directly in the dark missile’s path.

  *

  I shut my eyes tight.

  Like that’s gonna help, right?

  The crushing impact never comes.

  Slowly, I open my eyes.

  The huge wooden beam is hovering over me, upright, towering. Like I’m looking up at a mysterious monolith.

  It’s stopped just a hand’s breadth from striking me.

  It glows with Gariel’s glittering light.

  With a sweep of an arm, Gariel directs the beam to gracefully topple off to one side.

  ‘You shouldn’t have done that Jasmine!’ I can tell from his stern tone that Gariel is angry. ‘It was his time.’

  ‘His time?’ I glance Pat’s way a
nxiously. I realise what he’s saying. ‘You were going to let him die?’

  ‘It is written. It was his time.’

  ‘Why would you rescue us but not him?’ Jolie demands.

  ‘I rescued you because you called me. You should not have called me.’

  ‘We were about to die?’

  It’s a strange question to ask. A moment ago, I was sure I was about to die. But I suppose there’s a part of me that’s got used to Gariel being around to rescue me.

  ‘You were not about to die. It is written that you and Jolie would have survived.’

  He indicates Pat with a slight nod.

  ‘It was his time only. To save him now is to change what was destined to be. It might jeopardise the mission.’

  ‘The mission?’ Pats asks irately. ‘Is all this some sort of military mission?’

  ‘No; we don’t believe in such things. We are of The Perfection. It is a mission to ensure the spreading of the Truth.’

  ‘You’re like a missionary, you mean?’

  Jolie says it like she’s impressed, enthralled.

  Gariel nods demurely, like some obedient monk.

  ‘We must bring the Truth to everyone so that they might be saved.’

  ‘Saved? But not Pat?’

  I know he didn’t mean saved in this way. But I’m furious that he was about to let Pat die.

  ‘His role in your development is over. His presence from now on would only deflect you from your task. It is not only the difference between the success or failure of the mission, but the difference between billions saved and billions lost.’

  ‘How can you fail?’ Jolie asks worriedly. ‘You wouldn’t be who you are, a Prefect, if you failed.’

  ‘She’s got a point,’ I agree. ‘Obviously, I must complete whatever it is that’s expected of me. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here.’

  ‘There will be failures in some worlds, successes in others. Some are necessarily harder to bring to a successful conclusion. Each Prefect accepts that. Yet he or she must nevertheless strive to achieve the best possible outcome, for the saving of so many people is dependent upon it.’

  ‘Ah, so you are from a parallel world!’ Pat declares triumphantly.

  Gariel nods.

  ‘A world where the other me helped create…what?’ I say ‘This religion of the Perfect?’

  He nods again, even as he corrects me.

  ‘The Perfection. You provided us with the Book, the Book that granted us contact with God.’

  ‘There’s no such book in this world!’ I declare adamantly. ‘And even if there were, I wouldn’t know where to even start looking for it! Obviously, this is a world that’s completely different from the world you come from.’

  ‘No, there are many similarities.’ He doesn’t shake his head. He simply looks my way, his eyes shining elatedly. ‘And as for the similarities that didn’t exist here, I have attempted to reconstruct them to ensure you are directed on the correct path.’

  ‘Similarities? Reconstruct them? You mean you alter things?’

  He nods once more.

  ‘If it is essential to your development, it must be recreated in this world.’

  ‘Such as my death you mean?’ Pat says. ‘That timber, that last part of the roof; why was it still falling long after everything else had hit the ground? Why was it coming so fast when you had slowed everything else?’

  ‘The fall should have killed you. In which case there would have been no need for my intervention.’

  ‘Intervention? Is that another word for murder?’

  ‘I have saved you previously. In other worlds, you died on the bus, in the school fire.’

  ‘But you saved him, right, because he was essential for my development?’

  Gariel nonchalantly nods in answer to my irate question.

  ‘If you were prepared to cause Pat’s death, how many others have you killed?’

  ‘To save the many, it is necessary that some will be lost to us. In many worlds, the sacrifice of the school bus was enough to instil the dawning of understanding within you.’

  ‘The school bus! You…you made that woman block our path?’

  ‘The convert has been amply rewarded for aiding the revelation of the truth,’ he blithely replies, apparently assuming my emphasis on made is an accusation of coercion. ‘She and her family are now in our world, where her child can be cured.’

  ‘She agreed to help you kill all those children to save her own?’ Pat spits in disgust.

  ‘She would have thought she was talking to an angel, remember?’ Jolie points out.

  ‘And Brian, the cop who killed Jane?’ I say. ‘I take it his family’s there too now? And his kid’s being treated too?’

  ‘I explained the importance of our mission. They were eager to aid its completion.’

  ‘Why Jane? How was that supposed to put me on the right path, or whatever all these deaths were supposed to do?’

  ‘I am not responsible for all the deaths surrounding you that were necessary for your development. In this world, Mary’s death was a natural accident. In the case of her friends, their bullying would have been a distraction. As for the police woman, in some worlds she persecutes you relentlessly for their deaths; in others, she believes she is helping you, but is actually drawing you away from the righteous path.’

  ‘Oh my God; it’s all been some sort of culling,’ gasps Pat shakily. ‘Treating everyone like they had some infectious disease!’

  ‘What could be a more infectious disease than erroneous thought, than poor morals? And what inspires a person to seek the solace and embrace of their God more than suffering or witnessing a great loss? For some, obviously, the loss has to be so much greater than others.’

  He glares at me accusingly as he says this.

  ‘Sometimes, the loss also has to involve someone close to you.’

  His gaze fleeting wavers towards Pat.

  His light flickers, shimmers.

  ‘Wait! Don’t go–’

  He isn’t listening to me.

  He vanishes.

  *

  Chapter 23

  It was a sinkhole.

  Caused, we were told as we were finally lifted out, by an old coal mine running deep beneath the house.

  I was worried that the newspapers would cover the accident under banners along the lines of ‘The unluckiest girl in the world’.

  Fortunately, of course, my name hadn’t been revealed in relation to most of the other events. This time, too, my name is withheld, ‘for essential reasons of privacy and to allow the victims space to recover from their individual traumas.’

  I was offered even more time off school.

  I took the offer up.

  I can’t face going in and being deliberately avoided by everyone.

  And, let’s face it, they have every reason to avoid me, don’t they?

  *

  ‘Do you think he’s planning on causing a massive loss of life next?’

  Jolie’s eyes are wide, like the horror of some great calamity is already opening up before her.

  ‘I mean, the way he said some people only turn to God when they suffer some massive tragedy?’

  ‘Yeah, adding that it helps if it involves someone close to you,’ Pat says miserably. ‘Great, eh?’

  ‘I think it’s a possibility,’ I say. ‘But what could it be exactly? We’ve already had a school bus wiped out, a fire. What next?’

  ‘An explosion maybe?’ Pat looks like he’s pondering the feasibility of this. ‘The boiler’s down in the cellar; he could cause it to explode easily enough.’

  ‘How can we stop him, whatever it is he’s going to do?’ Jolie wrings her hands. ‘We can hardly go to the police, can we? Who’s going to believe us?

  ‘We could say evacuate the school, something like that?’ Pat shrugs.

  ‘Oh sure; they’re bound to do that just on the whim of three school kids!’

  ‘Even if we stop him, couldn’t he just ke
ep going back in time until he gets the result he wants?’ Jolie’s beautiful, doe-like eyes are now wide with worry.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ I say. ‘He spoke of possible failures; he wouldn’t say that if they could just keep whipping back in time.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be here if he could, would I?’ Pat says. ‘He could have just travelled back a few minutes to make sure I died in the sinkhole.’

  We all nod in agreement.

  ‘There must be some constraints on their time traveling, like the time travel paradox, or something similar,’ Pat says. ‘Or perhaps they’re allowed just one journey and that’s it. The frequency of their DNA or however they do it might limit–’

  ‘The frequencies!’ Jolie almost jumps up into the air in her excitement. Those eyes are wider, more sparkling than ever. ‘Every time, we come back to the importance of the frequencies!’

  ‘Sure, but what about them?’ Pat doesn’t look convinced that Jolie’s brought up anything of relevance. ‘Unless you think we should call him to try and get him to change his mind.’

  Jolie shakes her head.

  ‘No, no; course not! But if that MI tone is good for DNA’s health, and if we’re guessing right that Gariel’s relying so much on how DNA can produce these wormholes; well, couldn’t we just disrupt everything with a dissonant tone? Something that sets everything on edge?’

  Pat leans forwards towards Jolie, hugs her tightly, fondly.

  ‘Hey, that’s not a bad idea at all, you know!’

  They both chuckle, like this is the happiest time of the year rather than the lead up to what could be the wiping out of the entire school.

  ‘Sorry to put a damper on all this hilarity,’ I say solemnly, ‘but even if this dissonant tone thing really does have a chance of working, don’t we have a problem in making sure he can hear it?’

  ‘Well, he certainly seems to be able to hear the MI tone whenever we play it.’

  ‘Sure, just as I’ll smell and walk to a cookie counter if I see it. But you aren’t going to get me anywhere near a pan of cooked sprouts.’

  Jolie frowns thoughtfully.

  ‘Hmn, we need some way of making sure he can’t get away from it; or at least, make sure he can’t avoid it if he’s anywhere near the school.’

  Speakers,’ says Pat, ‘we need lots and lots of speakers!’