She smiled and held out her right hand. He searched the implant, then reached out his right hand and clasped hers with the appropriate amount of pressure. This first test of his social skills was critical.
“Gen. With a G. Pleased to meet you. You’re an aborigine, aren’t you? Your accent sounds like it’s from the Northern Territory, maybe near Uluru?” Too much data. Stop being an Observer!
Her eyebrows went up, but she still smiled. Good. Surprised, but not upset. “Onya. I didn’t peg you for a native.”
Gen went on alert. “Why not?”
“Well, most of them don’t ride tour buses. That, and your pale skin and fine blond hair. You look like a Viking, not an Aussie.”
He mentally reached out to the implant to find the meaning of “Viking.” A few seconds of concentration left him with an uncomfortable feeling in his midsection and a rapid breathing rate. What happened to the implant? He could access none of its Terran cultural and historical data.
Silently he cursed the failing fabrication systems on the aging drop ship as well as his hurried Observer indoctrination. He hadn’t planned on being an Observer. The ship was running dangerously short on personnel, and the recruiter’s description of Observer work intrigued his biologist sensibilities. Of course Gen wanted to help reclaim his world from the ultimate killer his kind had created. Of course he would help. It had all sounded so organized, so analytical—so safe.
Well, maybe the human neural pathways weren’t as compatible with the implant as they were with the Ki link. It had happened with other species. At least the implant’s language features were still working. He’d have to improvise the rest based on what he remembered from his pre-drop briefing.
He took a deep breath to slow his heart rate. “Right you are. I’m from . . . Vancouver. Canada.” He’d heard that name on an intercepted broadcast just before landing. The briefing said something about it being a well-known city in a noncontroversial country.
“No worries. I don’t bite.” She rotated her torso and reached into a small red bag beside her on the seat. In it he could identify different types of foods—fruits, breads, dried meats, other items new to him. Then she turned back and again extended her right hand, which now held a small shiny square. “Chocolate? It always helps me relax.”
Gen eyed the square warily. “What’s that?”
Her mouth opened and her voice made rapid tonal variations. Gen liked the sound. “This is Endangered Species chocolate. Organic, fair trade, voted ‘Best Vegan Chocolate’ in Australia again this year. It even has a picture of an endangered animal on the package.” She pulled a box out of her bag. “See? This one’s a Tasmanian Devil. The limited population is threatened by devil facial tumor disease.”
Tumors could be useful. At least, no Ki had experienced them yet. Say something. Keep her talking. “You seem to be knowledgeable about the environment and local species.”
“I’m an environmental engineer by training but a conservationist at heart. My grandfather taught me the old ways. I’m the last of my line.” Her smile faded to a straight line.
“Why are you on a tour bus?” Gen raised his hand and gestured at the scenery. “You’ve seen all this.”
“I’m an experiment. The tour company hired me to provide commentary in hopes of attracting more business. I’m between grants, so I took the job to educate more people about taking care of our land.”
Gen leaned forward to indicate his interest. “I’m fascinated with the Outback. I’d love to know more about the food sources there.”
“Why? Thinking of living off the land?”
Oops. Better watch his wording. “I mean, it’s an unusual combination of plants and animals in what looks like an inhospitable, desert environment. But your ancestors survived there, in harmony with their surroundings. How did they do it?”
She laughed. “Do you have a few years to talk about it?”
“Not really.” Maybe a week, on the outside.
The bus slowed and pulled off the road, stopping next to a copse of gum trees and a low-slung building in the middle of nowhere. He vaguely remembered something about a rest stop. What was that midday meal protocol?
He was getting in deep. Might as well keep going. “But I have the hours until we reach Uluru. Would you like to join me for lunch?”
She cocked her head, as if assessing his sincerity. He did his best to look trustworthy.
“Sure,” she said, and flashed her teeth at him. Their whiteness contrasted nicely with her dark skin. “The roadhouse has some great meat pies.”
As they walked through the heavy door into the cool diner, Gen searched for an open-ended question to continue the conversation. He was pleased to discover he could still use the input mode of his implant. He wanted to capture everything she said for later analysis. Anything might prove useful. “So what’s it like to grow up in the Outback?”
“Quiet. Our tribe was small. Grandfather took the children for long walks, told us how our world was formed during the Dreaming, and taught us about our sacred places like Uluru. I learned how to find food and water and use our traditional tools. Sometimes the ancestors spoke to me at night.”
“If you felt so close to your tribe, why did you leave?”
“When Grandfather—the last elder—died, the tribe fragmented. Adults couldn’t find work, the kids wanted to see what the rest of the world lived like. I won a full scholarship and went off to college and grad school. By the time I came home . . . well, there was no ‘home’ left. So I did my best to continue in Grandfather’s footsteps by becoming a field biologist.”
Gen imagined he knew how she felt. He couldn’t go home either—well, he could go back to the ship, but it wasn’t home. Home was deadly, unless a lucky Observer finally found something that could kill Ki.
She started to move away with a slight smile. “Would you excuse me? Nature calls.”
Great timing—he needed to check on Ki. “Me too. I may need a few minutes.” Gen followed her to the restrooms in the back of the roadhouse, remembered to enter the door labeled “Men,” and claimed an open stall. He sat on the toilet and switched on the link.
273 minutes after drop: Ki stands gloating over the body of the big male red kangaroo that clawed it. Looks like Ki hunted down and slaughtered the whole troop. Calorie intake adequate, but nutrients not satisfied. Something’s out of balance. Running fluids analysis—hmmm, too much iron. The red dirt is full of it. Could this be a tool? No, metabolism is already adapting to clear it. Still need fluids. It’s back in search mode, digging near plant roots. Reproductive budding is starting. Estimate first litter will separate in thirty-five hours.
Gen tried to swear as he switched off the link, but his human tongue couldn’t form the right sounds. Thirty-five hours! His original analysis had said he’d have at least four Terran days before Ki generated its first clones. The iron overload must have triggered an epigenetic change that accelerated Ki’s reproductive cycle. He’d been too optimistic.
But he still hoped Terra would provide the Ki solution. He was so tired of the Observers’ failures. Tired beyond words. At the very back of his now-human brain, something else was nagging at him as well, though he couldn’t quite say what. Something about Observers . . .
He rose to leave the toilet stall, then realized he needed to use it. Human bodies didn’t process their waste efficiently. By the time he got back to the table, Barina had acquired a meat pie and a glass of brown bubbly liquid that emitted a bitter odor. He smiled at her as he walked over to stand in the queue at the counter.
He understood queues. They gave him a chance to watch other people and learn how to do whatever he had to do next. He ordered “meat pie and a beer,” same as the male in front of him, and dutifully held out the plastic card labeled “VISA” he’d found in his landing kit. Amazing how no one asked him any questions about it. They just wanted him to make marks on the paper they handed him. Evidently finances were quite orderly on this world. He liked that. He
wondered if other Observers were so lucky.
When he joined Barina at her table, her pie was gone. She sat sipping her beer. A few shiny squares bereft of chocolate lay on the table.
“I’m sorry I took so long. I’m not used to trips of this distance.” He couldn’t help smiling—she’d never believe how long his last trip had been.
“No worries. I know what it’s like.” She watched him sit and take a bite of his lunch. “How do you like the pie?”
It tasted surprisingly similar to the roo tail, though not so bloody. He suspected he shouldn’t say that. Instead, he lied. “Good. What’s in it?”
“No bush tucker, if that’s what you’re thinking. Just steak, bacon, onion, and seasonings, I’d guess. And no peanuts. I asked.” She glanced out the window as a road train rumbled by on the highway. The semi with its four trailers seemed kilometers long.
“You don’t like peanuts?” Gen couldn’t imagine anything tasting worse than bloody roo.
“I’m deathly allergic to them. If I get even a small bit of one, my airways swell shut and my blood pressure bottoms out. I’ll be dead in a few minutes if I don’t get help.”
He took a cautious sip of the brown bubbly liquid. It was cold and tickled his nose. A giggle escaped. How did he make that sound? He raised the glass and poured more into his wide-open mouth. As he dropped the glass on to the table, he noticed Barina watching him. Her skin between her eyebrows crinkled in a bunch.
He needed to learn more about edibles here. “Is bush tucker typical roadhouse food?”
“Nah. It’s getting popular in some of the posher joints in Sydney and Melbourne. But most people think of witchety grubs and get grossed out.”
“Does the bush have lots of toxic plants and animals? Like the cane toad?”
She answered, but he didn’t hear. He was internally jolted as the link switched itself on, as it was programmed to do when Ki made its first kill of the dominant species. The image of the disemboweled human female, half-buried under her shredded equine, combined with the grinding of Ki’s teeth against her fractured skull, threatened to bring his meat pie back up his gullet.
This wasn’t what the recruiter had described. This wasn’t clean, analytical, organized scientific observation. This was ugly, gut-wrenching, chaotic killing: a superior predator introduced to an unsuspecting population.
Ki was genocide. And the Observers were helping it happen.
He was helping it happen.
“You ’right?” said a voice in the distance.
He couldn’t watch. He closed his eyes, but the link’s images imposed themselves on his awareness. He forced his chair away from the table and jumped to his feet. Ki fell away from its victim. It was enough of a break. Gen severed the link.
Then he realized he’d forgotten to place his verbal time stamp on the recording—a cardinal Observer offense. He wasn’t thinking clearly. His training hadn’t prepared him for these—what were they?—oh yes, feelings.
“Oy, Gen, what happened? You look green.”
He looked around. People were looking at him. As if I could stop Ki. No, wait. They were noticing his behavior was out of place. He sat back down slowly, took a deep breath (which had an oddly calming effect), and raised a hand to wave away concern.
“I guess that meat pie is giving me problems.” He cast about in the implant’s thesaurus for a suitable medical term. “Acid reflux. Sorry. I’m okay, really.”
Barina’s eyebrows were further above her eyes than they’d been a moment ago. Did she believe him?
He discovered he desperately wanted her to.
He looked at the dry, flat land outside the roadhouse window. This Outback looked a lot like the homeworld he’d seen in the ship’s archives. His people lost their world so long ago that Gen’s drop-ship generation had never even seen it. Why should Barina’s people lose theirs to Ki?
He considered his circumstances and made a choice. He drained his beer, scooted his chair up to the table, and leaned forward in what he hoped would seem utter earnestness.
“Barina, you care about the environment. You care about the people. I need your help.”
She cocked her head slightly, but said nothing.
“I’m a biologist, like you. I’ve been hired to help fix . . .”—what word to use?—“. . . an experiment that’s gone horribly wrong. But I can’t do it alone.”
He looked directly into her eyes, trying with every ounce of his being to convey the importance and urgency of his mission.
From somewhere within her he sensed a spirit, an other-worldliness different from his, yet kindred. Perhaps her ancient race was also alien to this world. At least, they might be more open to the extraordinary, given its stories of the Dreamtime. Somehow, he was sure, she could understand his message.
She leaned back in her chair. “Tell me about it. I’ll help if I can.”
“The other tourists are getting on the bus. Let’s go sit in the back where we can talk.”
They boarded the half-empty coach and moved to the back row. Most everyone else sat toward the front. In hushed tones he told her his story. How geneticists had created a biological weapon, a super-adaptable creature called Ki, to replace soldiers. How it was too adaptable and reproduced too fast. How activists had captured one from the lab and freed it. How it and its offspring decimated food and residents. How he and a handful of others had been searching for something that would kill it. He left out the part about how the Observers had decimated countless other worlds while searching for that something. He didn’t consider himself one of them anymore.
She tapped her fingers on the plastic arm rest slowly. “So that’s why you asked about toxic plants and animals?”
“Yes.”
“Where is Ki now?”
“In the Northern Territor y, somewhere southwest of Alice Springs.”
“How do you know?”
He considered his answer. How much would she believe? He decided to stick to a subset of the truth. “I’m tracking it. Electronically.” That was technically, if not entirely, true. “I know where it is, and . . . some . . . of what it’s doing.”
“That’s why you jumped out of your chair in the roadhouse.”
He swallowed the pie back down again. “It killed a woman.”
“Oh, gods.” Barina’s eyes widened and she leaned away from Gen. “Did you know that would happen?”
“No,” Gen answered truthfully.
“Why didn’t you stop it?”
“I don’t have any weapons that would kill it. That’s my mission. To find something that can kill it.”
Her eyes grew wet at the corners. An expansive cattle station alongside disappeared into oblivion, along with several pieces of chocolate, before she spoke again. “What if . . . what if Ki gets to a population center?”
“It hasn’t yet.” Again he considered how much to reveal. “At least, it’s not in the news.”
Her eyes narrowed. “How do you know? There’s no cell coverage out here. Not enough people to make it profitable.”
“I have satellite coverage.” No need to say which satellite. He brought out his handheld, made to look like an iPhone, and checked its screen. “The woman’s been found. But not Ki. It’s long gone by now.”
“Can you tell me what it’s doing?”
“Just a minute.” Gen pretended to scan his handheld while reluctantly activating the link. He was instantly wet and cool and clean.
345 minutes after drop: Ki is in a pond of H2O at the base of Uluru. A nearby sign labels it the sacred watering hole Mutitjulu. The water soothes its skin and removes the red dust. It splashes with the delight of a child and sucks down mouthfuls of coolness. Now it moves onto the warm rock to dry. Wait—something moves nearby. It’s a serpent of some sort . . .
“Ow! Something bit me!”
“Where?” Barina looked all over and around him, searching for a culprit. A few rows up, heads turned to look back down the aisle. He realized he had shouted.
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“False alarm,” he said loudly, and smiled toward the other tourists. Then he leaned back and spoke more quietly. “Not me. It’s Ki. A snake bite, I think, on its backside.”
“How did you know that? You’ve got one helluva iPhone.” She angled her head to see the handheld’s screen.
Gen touched the screen to hide its Observercoded displays. Time for a bit more exposure. “I’m linked to it. In my head.”
“Hmmm,” she said with an odd tone in her voice. “That’s some technology your employer has. The link lets you feel things too?”
“Evidently. I don’t think they explained all its capabilities when they recruited me.” Gen hoped his human voice box didn’t project the growing resentment he felt.
“Who did you say you work for?” She stared at him intently.
He cleared his face of guile and looked back at her. “I didn’t. I can’t. Will you still help me?”
She looked down and sat quietly for a full five minutes. He wondered if this is what “holding one’s breath” felt like. Finally, she spoke.
“It’s my heritage that Ki threatens. Can you tell me what the snake looked like?”
“It is about two meters long with a dark brown back. Belly is cream-colored or pale orange with darker orange spots.”
“You have good observation skills,” Barina said with a slight smile on one side. “Sounds like an eastern brown snake—its very potent venom has neurotoxins that cause paralysis and muscle weakness. Also interferes with blood clotting. It’s responsible for most snakebite deaths in Australia. This is good news. Can you tell if Ki is affected?”
Gen was surprised to realize the link was still open. He must be getting better at controlling the bandwidth of the interface. He broadened it a bit and tried to find words for what he sensed.
“Its backside hurts. It’s limping, dragging a foot. Now it’s dropped in the dirt.” No more itching—apparently that adaptation was complete. “Looks like that snake slowed it down a bit. What other toxic substances can we throw at it, if this doesn’t work?”
They spent the next hours discussing Ki’s nutritional needs and possible biochemical pathways they could attack with bush flora and fauna. Gen left the link open slightly, just in case.
Analog Science Fiction and Fact 01/01/11 Page 30
