by Ann Halam
I stood up, thinking, Whatever it takes, I’ll save you Miranda—
I mean, I tried to stand up. Instinct had carried me when I first climbed on board. Now my legs buckled, as if I was a newborn foal. I staggered. In front of me, below the deck, the door to the cabin opened. Bright lights came on all around me.
“Excellent!” said Dr. Franklin. “Well done, Semi!”
I tried to jump for the side. I fell over. He leaped up the steps, grabbed me by the arm, and half carried me, half hustled me into the cabin.
Skinner was there. He was sitting on a swivel chair, facing us. Behind him was a computer keyboard. The computer’s monitor showed blue sea, with a map of what must have been Dr. Franklin’s island. I could still see as clearly as Semi-the-fish. I could see all the details, the contour lines on the land and the charted waters of the ocean. I stared at Skinner. I was disgusted with myself for trusting him . . . but then I realized that while Dr. Franklin was holding my arm with one hand (I wasn’t trying to struggle), in his other hand he was holding a gun. He was pointing it at Skinner.
“You’re a madman, Charlie,” he said. “You may have had a romantic idea of rescue, but you should at least have been waiting for her by the pump outlet. What if she’d taken off for the open sea? She could have been very expensive shark meat by now.”
Dr. Skinner was staring at me in amazement. “I thought you’d be suspicious,” he whispered. “I was supposed to be on patrol. I had to take the risk. I thought—”
“You took a good many risks,” said Dr. Franklin. “It’s lucky I found out what you were doing. Oh Charlie, Charlie, did you think you could get away with it?” Then he laughed. “But never mind. I was in control. I am always prepared.” He beamed at me, his eyes glittering with delight. “This is, my, my, a most unexpected pleasure, Semirah. Wonderful, superb! Not quite what I had planned, but never mind! I can’t wait to get you back to the lab. Charlie, you are forgiven.”
But where’s Arnie? I thought. What happened to Arnie? Is he dead then? Was he dead all along? Delayed shock was hitting me. My legs were made of jelly, my head was full of cotton wool. I started to choke. Something hard was caught in my throat. I couldn’t think what it was. Manta rays don’t swallow objects, it must have been in there since I was last a girl. I doubled over, retching, and the thing shot out of my mouth, with a rush of seawater.
Dr. Skinner groaned and dropped his head into his hands.
It was clear that he wasn’t going to put up any kind of a fight. Dr. Franklin tucked his gun away. He said smugly, “I’ll take that. There’s a great deal of valuable information stored on that.” He stooped and swept up the tag I’d been carrying around with me, inside my body. As soon as he let go of my arm, I collapsed. I stared up into those cold, bright, self-satisfied eyes. I was human again, but I knew that what Dr. Franklin saw was still an animal, a thing to be used. That was the way he saw everyone but himself. Something icy and piercing struck my arm. In seconds I was unconscious.
When I woke up, the sun was hot on my face. I tried to get my arms free, but I couldn’t. I opened my eyes. I was back in the enclosure. I was in a wheelchair, on the gravel path beside the pool. They’d put me into pajamas and strapped me into a straitjacket again.
Dr. Franklin had warned us it would happen, if we didn’t behave.
He was there. So were Skinner and some orderlies. The tracking equipment I’d seen on the boat was there too, on a metal trolley. I stared at the beautifully clear and detailed monitor, thinking numbly: Arnie’s dead and Miranda’s gone. Were they going to lock me up again and leave me? I imagined myself living in there among the bushes. The orderly would bring food and dump it on the ground, and I’d eat it with my hands.
“Ah, you’re awake,” said Dr. Franklin. He had a big grin on his face. “You’ve done very, very well, Semi. Many congratulations! I’m delighted with your performance in Dr. Skinner’s little ‘escape attempt’ exercise, hahaha! I only wish I’d thought of it myself.”
He looked like a middle-aged little boy with a new Lego set.
“Soon I’m going to get you into the lab, young woman. Your response to the second-stage infusion is beyond my hopes. I’m absolutely thrilled. There is major investigation to be done: I want to biopsy the internal organs and the brain, take samples of your spinal fluid, oh, there are years of work!”
I wouldn’t let myself scream. I knew he wouldn’t care one way or the other, but it was for my own pride. I couldn’t bear to look at Skinner. I could see him out of the corner of my eye, polishing his glasses with trembling hands. What happened to you? I wanted to yell at him. But I could guess. Dr. Franklin had found out something about Skinner’s plans, and forced the miserable coward to tell him the rest.
Poor Charlie!
Maybe I shouldn’t have pitied him, but I did.
I was going to be tortured to death. But I still felt as if I’d rather be me than him.
I looked at Dr. Franklin. I knew it didn’t matter what I said. I was nothing more than a rat in his maze. I said it anyway. “I’m glad Miranda got away. You can’t hurt her now.”
I knew she hadn’t escaped from the island. Or from the horror that was our future. I meant her mind had escaped, forever. He could hurt the bird-monster, and that was bad. But better to be a monster than to be a prisoner on this island and have a human mind.
“I suppose you mean emotional pain,” said Dr. Franklin, cheerfully. “Which I’m afraid can’t be avoided in your case. I’m afraid you are both bound to suffer some discomfort in the next phase of my research, but I will cause as little physical pain as possible. I am never needlessly cruel! However . . . you may be interested to learn that Miranda is actually back with us. She had been seen circling over the compound. That’s why you’re here. I’ve decided, seeing the way you have responded to the second infusion, that I want her back under close observation, right now. I don’t want to use the stun ring. That would be harsh. . . . So we’re going to leave you here for a while. I’m afraid you have to be under restraint, after the way you’ve behaved, but that may be all to the good. If Miranda can recognize that her friend is in trouble, that may bring her in.” He gestured toward the orderlies. I saw the net, the long spiked poles. One of the men was carrying a rifle.
I choked back a cry of protest. I knew it would do no good.
“Oh, don’t worry, we’re not going to injure her. The rifle fires tranquilizer darts. Now we’d better get out of sight,” Dr. Franklin went on. “It would help if you would call her up on your radio link. She may no longer be able to understand or respond consciously, but I believe it will have an effect.”
I stared at him, and shook my head.
Our creator frowned. “Semi, Miranda’s loss is a blow to me too. Of course, I knew that I was making her psychological survival more difficult: by making her my favorite and then abandoning her, by giving her the ability to fly, and then giving her partial freedom. I had to test my transgenics to the limit. Naturally I made things harder for Miranda, because she seemed the stronger of the two of you. But that doesn’t mean I’m not sorry. Now please be sensible and cooperate, so that I don’t have to hurt her. Don’t you want to know if she still remembers you?”
I told him what he could do with the idea that I would betray my friend.
He shrugged, his eyes bright and cool. He wasn’t angry. “Resistant to the last. Well done! It doesn’t matter, we can fake your call sign.” He nodded to Dr. Skinner.
Skinner obediently put on a headset and did some tapping on the computer keyboard.
I started to struggle, hopelessly but furiously. I shouted at Skinner, “How can you do this? He’s mad, but you’re not mad! How can you let things like this happen! Help me!”
Skinner winced as if he could hear the jungle cat howling, but he wouldn’t look at me. He said to Dr. Franklin, “I’m picking up a response. She’s coming in again.”
Dr. Franklin spoke to the orderlies in Spanish. They moved off, under the tree
s. He stayed where he was, staring at the sky.
“Ha! There she is! How splendidly she flies!”
I could see the black T-shape of Miranda flying low. She zoomed in fast over the science buildings. Then I did call her up. There was nothing to be gained from keeping quiet now. I called her name, I yelled silently, Miranda! Get away from here! It’s a trap! There was no answer, no sense of her presence in my mind. It all felt blank, blanker than the white place. I screamed at her, aloud, “Get away from here! Get away from here!”
Dr. Franklin turned to me with an exasperated expression. “Semi, please!”
Then Miranda was gone. She’d vanished.
“Where’s she gone!” exclaimed Dr. Franklin. “She saw us! Is she flying away again?”
“No,” said Skinner. “No. . . . She’s close, don’t know where, too many buildings—”
I started shouting again, for what good it would do: “Miranda, fly! Go away, it’s a trap!”
Everyone, including the orderlies with their big net and their prodding poles, was looking this way and that: where had she gone? Then as suddenly as she’d disappeared, she was there again. She was overhead, she was diving into the enclosure. Her wings looked huge. She swooped into the mango tree and crouched on a branch: a monster out of a scary legend, winged and bird-headed, but human enough to horrify.
Her beak opened in a fierce, harsh cry—
“Aha!” exclaimed Dr. Franklin. “Excellent! Now what, I wonder . . . ?” He added something in Spanish. The orderlies moved in on the mango tree, slowly and cautiously.
I shouted, “Miranda! Get out of here!” I thought she didn’t know me. She wasn’t my friend Miranda. She was a weird wild animal, obeying vague memories that she no longer understood. . . . That’s what I thought. The bird-monster turned her head from side to side, fixing Dr. Franklin with a fierce, empty glare. Then she bent down and very deliberately tore at the black bracelet on her ankle with her razor-sharp beak.
She had it off in about two seconds, and glared at us again, defiantly.
I understood she always could have done that. But she had stayed with me.
“Oh Miranda,” I whispered. “You could have flown away. You could have brought back help. You could have saved us both. Why didn’t you?”
Then I thought, That’s not a monster, that’s Miranda again!
Even though I knew what horrors awaited us, my heart leaped for joy—
“Excellent!” cried Dr. Franklin, almost clapping his hands. “Oh, excellent, Miranda!”
The orderlies didn’t think this development was so excellent. They bunched closer together, nervously holding out their poles. They didn’t seem keen to get close enough to fling the net. She was a bird as big as a golden eagle, with a fierce beak, razor-sharp talons, and wings strong enough to break a man’s arm if she got a good swipe at him. And she wasn’t looking in a good temper.
While they hesitated, something was happening in Dr. Franklin’s zoo. The noise from that courtyard had been steadily growing. Now it was a confused roar of squealing and grunting. A horde of weird animals poured into view, racing out from between the nearby buildings: the capybaras, the wild pigs, the parrots and the bats flapping overhead; others I hadn’t seen before. It looked like some kind of weird hallucination: a hideous, freakish mob, all of them running crazy with panic and sudden freedom.
“What in hell—!” yelled Dr. Franklin.
“She’s let them out!” I shouted. “Miranda let them out!”
Miranda leaped from her perch, and flew at Dr. Franklin’s face, talons outspread—
The orderlies started yelling. Dr. Franklin struggled with Miranda on the edge of the pool. I saw his face slashed red, I saw him rolling on the ground, beaten around the head by blows from her wings. Transgenic animals were racing around the enclosure, squealing. It was pandemonium. I was screaming madly, “Leave him! They’ve got a gun! Fly away!” Dr. Franklin fell into the water. He was floundering and gasping—it seemed the mad scientist couldn’t swim. Some of the orderlies were trying to reach him, some were trying to throw the net over Miranda. She was stabbing at eyes and clawing at faces, shrieking, flying free of the net and the rods—
Something hit my chair. I wasn’t strapped in: I went flying. I couldn’t save myself, my arms were wrapped up and fastened at the back by the straps of the straitjacket. I hit the gravel with a thump, folded arms first, winded. Someone stooped over me, I felt a tug. A voice whispered in my ear: “Head for the jetty, the launch is still there” . . . and then Dr. Skinner was on his feet, running to join the others. He didn’t look back.
Miranda had taken flight, but the net was tangled around her, hampering her wings. Dr. Franklin was out of the pool. All the men were running after Miranda, Skinner with them, and Dr. Franklin, soaking wet. He was shouting, “Get a dart into her! Fire as soon as you have a clear shot!” The restraint on my arms had gone slack. Skinner had unfastened the straps at my back. I struggled free of the jacket. The enclosure was empty. I ran (I mean I staggered and stumbled, my legs were very wobbly) to the gate. Oh no. It was on a spring, it had shut and locked itself behind the men when they’d rushed through. No! I thought. I will not be beaten! I looked up at the fence and knew I couldn’t climb it.
Something flashed into my mind.
Those patterns that Miranda used to make and break up—
The one pattern that she had made sure I would see.
We had been stuck in here, me making my plans, and she making her own, with no way to share our secrets. But I caught on fast. Miranda had released the animals by opening their locked cages. She must have learned the code for this keypad as well. She could have opened our cage any time, the same as she could have pulled off that ring.
If there’d been any point. If I could have gotten away—
Five seedpods. Six red flower petals. Three manky pieces of melon rind, nine sticks, two dead butterflies. Five, six, three, nine, two. I slipped my hand through the mesh, reached for the keypad on the lock, and tapped in the code. It took me a couple of times. I was drenched in sweat. My fingers slipped off the keys, and they weren’t . . . they were out of the habit of being fingers. But I did it. The lock clicked, I was out. Leaving the noise of the chase somewhere behind me, I set off at a stumbling trot for the science blocks.
It was bad to be inside those buildings again. Even the coolness of the air-conditioning reminded me of terror. The operating room had to be somewhere near there: the place where we’d been given our infusions. The place where our evil creator would take Miranda, and me too, and torture us again, if we couldn’t save ourselves. I opened door after door. Empty, bright, clinical rooms. I found a walk-in cold cupboard with stacked shelves, but everything was general science supplies, genetic-engineering chemicals in packets and tubs; pieces of animals in plastic jars. I found a chest freezer, full of opaque white boxes holding who knows what horrors, but everything in there was heavily crusted with ice; it was obvious that nothing had been touched for a long time. At last I found an ordinary-looking kitchen fridge, standing on a counter in a long narrow room full of other, stranger machinery. The label on the door said Transgenic Project H.
H for human?
I looked inside, and found two stacks of small white boxes.
One of the stacks was labeled S, one was labeled M.
I started opening the boxes. I found little vials of blood, clear fluid, little gobbets of tissue. Everything was dated. These must be samples taken from me and from Miranda, at different stages of our treatment. In the last of the boxes labeled S, I found more of those tubes of powder. The label said Infusion Stage B. No date.
I scrabbled through Miranda’s boxes and found her Infusion Stage B.
No tubes of powder. A hypodermic, and glistening ampoules of pale fluid.
That explains why she couldn’t be dosed sneakily, like me, I thought. Someone has to give her injections. My heart sank. How would I know what to do? How much to give her at once? But there w
as no time to worry about it. There was a lab coat hanging on the back of a door. I grabbed it, spread it out and tumbled boxes into it, the two labeled Infusion Stage B and as many others as I could grab. I didn’t know what might be useful. I’d tied this bundle around my waist and I was about to leave, when I saw there was another stack of white boxes, behind our two. Each of them had a taped initial and a date, too.
The initial was A.
There was an Infusion Stage B box, with the initial A.
Arnie?
But Arnie’s dead, I thought.
The way Dr. Franklin and Skinner had behaved didn’t make sense, if they’d really had someone reporting on our conversations. Dr. Franklin hadn’t seemed to know if his radio telepathy was working properly or not. Dr. Skinner had talked about brain waves, but he’d been shocked when he saw me prove that I was still human inside. It all pointed to things being the way Arnie had told us. The doctors could detect brain activity in our speech centers, but they didn’t know what we were saying. They weren’t sure if we were saying anything human. But, wait, it was Arnie who had told us that.
Arnie?
I tugged the bundle from my waist, unfastened it, swept the A boxes in there and tied it up again. I didn’t clearly know why I was doing that, but it seemed I had to. I was wondering whether I should try to do some random vandalism or just get out of there. I was going to call Miranda, and I hoped and prayed she would answer me this time.
But someone called me first.
No, he didn’t call me. I had been calling his name, in my mind, strongly enough to make contact: and he was answering me. Semi? Semi? Hey, hey, SEMI?
It was Arnie. And he was somewhere close by.
chapter twelve
It’s a trap, I thought.
So near to escape. I couldn’t bear to stop now.
Don’t trust anyone on this island, I thought. They’re all working for Dr. Franklin.
Semi, Semi . . . , called the voice in my mind, getting desperate, and it sounded like Arnie. Not a fake. It sounded to me like that annoying, sarcastic, lonely boy—
