by Chris Walley
As he watched, the swifts suddenly scattered in every direction with wild screaming noises. Merral glanced up to see, high above him, a large, stiff-winged bird gliding round in slow circles. A raptor of some sort, he thought, shading his eyes as he stared at it. He decided it was a buzzard and was puzzled by the reaction of the swifts; unlike some of the faster falcons, the slow buzzards posed no threat to swifts. He made a mental note to discuss it with Lesley Manalfi, the Planning Institute’s head ornithologist, then reality flowed back and he realized that he had more pressing biological problems than aberrant bird behavior.
“Now what?” he asked Vero on his return.
“Now, we sit and wait and think and pray,” came the solemn answer. “We have almost no water left, a little food. And no shade.”
Merral sat down beside him and pulled his jacket over his head to gain some protection from the sun. So as the hours passed and the rocks around grew warmer, Merral sat there hunched under the jacket with the sweat dripping down his face, conserving his energy and praying, in a way he had never remotely imagined he would ever have to, for deliverance.
14
By late afternoon Merral, feeling hot and increasingly thirsty, decided to try and distract himself. He turned to Vero, who still had his jacket over his head. “Let me ask you what you now think these creatures are.” “Ah. As you know, I have had a number of theories. I make the total five. One theory has been destroyed over these last two days. Namely, that the whole thing was a collective psychosis.”
Merral tapped his bandaged ankle gently. “I have evidence that renders that untenable.”
“Rather a shame. It was the easiest view to hold.” There was a thoughtful pause. “Theory two was that it was a direct incursion of the demonic. Obviously, we have little data on how that might occur. . . .” He paused. “But did you feel it was a demon you grappled with this morning?”
Merral thought about what he had seen and felt in those terrible few minutes. “No, I don’t believe you can kill demons with a bush knife. But, having said that . . .” He stopped, finding himself unable to continue for some moments. “Having said that, I felt in some way that that cockroach-beast was more than an organism. I felt there was anger in its actions, even hatred. Evil.” Merral caught a sympathetic nod of agreement from his companion and went on. “I cannot express it,” he added. “Not yet. Ask me again after the memory fades.”
And, for a few moments, Merral sat still, staring at his shadow on the baking black rock and trying to put out of his mind the weird jumping motion, the sound of the plates clicking together, the hateful organic smell, and those staring, bottomless, tarlike eyes.
Vero spoke suddenly, seeming to choose his words carefully. “I agree. It’s all too tangible. But I share your hesitation; there are some strange effects. Something has come into the worlds. I hope we can get it out. Or that, at least, it will not spread . . .” He tailed off midspeech, his face full of unspoken worries.
He slid over to the cliff edge, peered over carefully for a few moments, and then slid back. “Still under the tree.” Then he leaned back gently, putting his hands behind his head, and stared up at the sky. “So we scrub theories one and two. Now theory three is that these are aliens. We are, after all, on the edge of the Assembly. ‘Worlds’ End’ and all that. A thought which must have struck you?”
“Indeed, and been rejected,” Merral replied. “These creatures do not seem to me to be alien. Certainly not the ape-creatures. And all our experience is that the probability of intelligent alien life is very small. That Earth stayed stable long enough for such life to develop has always been assumed to be a direct work of God. And, of course, despite claims, we have never found anything more than simple algae or bacteria. And no alien artifacts or signals.” He paused. “At least such was the confident view I was taught. But my confidence is being eroded right now.”
Vero, still staring upward, nodded. “I agree. We may have become too confident. But I can’t see these things as alien. The DNA evidence seems against that too.”
“No. Not aliens. They are simply not alien enough. Which leaves you where?”
“With two related possibilities. Either theory four . . .” Vero shaded his eyes a moment. “Funny buzzards you have in your world. I’ve been watching this one for a bit.”
“Probably the same one I saw earlier. But go on.”
“Ah yes, theory four. Here we have a genetic mutation of humanity. More precisely, two mutations. Natural events occurring due to some accelerated biological process; a supercharged evolution.”
Merral’s answer came slowly. “No, again. All we have here is microevolution, the same as you have. Some of it pretty dramatic, but it is limited. Yes, we have new species, but they are recognizably related to what was imported here. Variation on places like Farholme is about what you would expect for a world with new niches. That buzzard you are watching is probably a living example. That strange flight pattern is probably because it’s moving slowly into a new niche. Another hundred generations and it will probably be more like a condor. And, as you know, human genetic change here, while it occurs, is slight. But these things . . .” He hesitated, wondering how to express his feelings. “These monstrosities would be a major jump—or a series of major jumps—beyond anything we can imagine. Anyway, the whole Assembly would hear and mourn if any parent here produced an ape-creature or a cockroach-beast as offspring. A truly horrible thought. Try me with your last one.”
Vero was shading his eyes again and squinting as he looked upward at the buzzard. “Hmm. Strange how he keeps the sun close enough behind him. Yes, theory five is similar, but says that these things are deliberately gene-engineered.”
“What?!” Merral could hardly contain himself. “That we have produced these things?”
“Well, that someone has.” Vero had shifted his gaze sideways so he could look directly at Merral. “This is my preferred option. Reluctantly.”
Indignation and unbelief seemed to flood into Merral’s mind at once. “But that,” he protested loudly, “is totally against everything the Technology Protocols allow. Gene-engineering up to plants—if needed—is allowed. But no further. That’s enough. That’s about the most fundamental breach possible. I mean, we were upset enough about modifying a long-dead human voice, but that is nothing. Nothing at all in comparison.”
“Ah. . . .” Vero’s voice had a sharp edge to it. “You too made the link. How interesting. This is one reason why I was trying not to feed you with my ideas.”
“The link?”
“Between altering a re-created voice and genetic manipulation of human cells.”
“Oh, there is no link!” Merral felt himself getting irritated. “Your overactive sentinel imagination!”
“Sorry. I’m not saying your uncle did this, too. But—what shall we say?—a spiritual climate in which one can happen is a climate in which the other can happen. Both are rebellion.”
Merral could merely shake his head. “The idea that anyone could create that fiendish creature that attacked us is beyond me. Why?”
“It may have advantages that we do not have.” Vero rolled over so he could face upward again. “For instan—wait a minute!” His voice sharpened and he froze. “Oh, the idiots we are!”
Something’s up, Merral realized. But what?
“I wish I hadn’t left my pack,” Vero announced suddenly in a voice that was oddly louder than normal. He turned sideways to face Merral and began whispering with exaggerated lip movements. “I think the bird is not right. A mechanical observer of some sort. Pretend to have a conversation with me and take a look.”
It took Merral a second or two for the bizarre concept to be understood.
“It’s not your fault, Vero,” he said loudly as he looked upward, narrowing his eyes against the brightness of the sky. “We needed to make a quick getaway, so it was quite reasonable.”
He looked at the bird out of the corner of his eye. Yes, Vero was right. There was some
thing wrong about it. It wasn’t that it was a buzzard practicing to be something else. It was something else pretending to be a buzzard.
Vero was speaking. “Yes, but I shouldn’t have left the water.”
Merral made his mind up; all the evidence fit. He rolled over and looked at Vero. “You are quite right,” he whispered. “I should have spotted it.”
“It’s called surveillance, and we don’t want it,” Vero muttered between clenched teeth. “Any ideas how we remove it?”
Over the next few minutes, in quiet asides interjected into a loud conversation about why, and why not, they should have left the pack, they plotted how they should get rid of the circling watcher above them.
“Right,” announced Vero. “I’m going to see if I can get any more decent images of the ape-creatures below.”
“Fine, a good idea. I shall sit here and save my energy.”
As Vero walked over, peered over the margin of the cliff, and toyed with his diary, Merral leaned back next to the tiny pile of weapons and looked upward at the sky.
The bird drifted over Vero.
Still staring upward, Merral reached out slowly until his fingers wrapped around a flare tube. The bird seemed preoccupied with Vero and slowly descended to within four or five meters of him. Without looking at what he held in his hand, Merral rotated the two setting rings to give the shortest range and the maximum intensity. The flare wouldn’t last for a long time, but it might be enough. If he was accurate.
One-handed, he pulled off the tab that protected the firing button.
“Hey, Merral!” Vero shouted, walking toward him, “wait until you see this.”
Vero came over with his diary and put it down next to Merral, who rolled over as if to look at what his friend had in his hand.
“Ready?” whispered Vero.
“Yes.”
Still staring in apparent fascination at the screen, Merral held onto the flare, carefully avoiding the recessed button. He listened until he was sure that he could hear the gentle sound of slow wing beats and see, faintly reflected on the polished screen, an image of the circling bird.
Suddenly, Merral rolled over, swung up the flare tube, aimed it, and pressed the firing button.
There was a brief, ear-piercing screech as the flare shot up, a brilliant flash of silver light, and a simultaneous bang.
As Merral leapt to his feet, he heard a falling, fluttering sound that ended in a gentle thud as the bird struck the rock nearby.
Vero bounded over and put a foot on its neck. The bird writhed and flapped; he twisted his foot sharply and the creature became still.
Vero bent down, picked up the buzzard by its wingtip, and dropped it on the rock at Merral’s feet. It lay there as a curiously stiff, broken mass of brown feathers with no hint of motion.
“Pooh! It smells!” Vero said, wrinkling his nose. He bent over the bird and began poking it tentatively with a tiny pocketknife. As he did, Merral caught sight of a fine silver tracery that glinted in the sun.
“You see,” Vero stated in flat, almost numbed tones, “it is a machine imitating something. A simulacrum.” He looked sharply at Merral. “I presume this the first thing of its kind you have seen?”
“Of course! I have never dreamed of such a thing. The Technology Protocols forbid it. All our machines proclaim that they are machines.”
“As throughout the Assembly. Since that far-off year of 2110 when the Rebellion ended.” There was a strange, grim satisfaction in his voice.
Merral swallowed, squatted down, and looked in wonder and puzzlement at the creature. True, there were feathers and claws. But the beak was fixed half open, the eyes were empty holes, and beneath the vacant sockets was a pair of tiny, glinting lenses that ran back into wires.
Vero, who had been prodding gently with his knife, abruptly paused and muttered. Then he poked again. “An odd technology. Very odd. Look!”
Merral peered closer, seeing where Vero had stripped off a part of the skin and feathers and exposed a filigree of delicate silver wires wrapped over a gray substance in which thin white tubes were embedded. An unpleasant, rotting smell came from somewhere.
Vero glanced up at Merral with a worried expression. “It’s not at all what I expected. There are bits of dead bird here.”
“Dead?” Merral asked, suddenly aware where the foul odor was coming from.
He stared at the bird, catching sight of a tiny wisp of smoke. “Look out!”
There was a tiny crackling sound and a burst of yellow flame began to play around the body. Vero and Merral hurriedly stepped back as a black-edged golden flame flickered rapidly over the body, giving a cloud of acrid stinking smoke that twisted upward.
Flapping away the smoke with disgust, Merral stared at Vero. “What happened? Did you short-circuit it?”
“No. I don’t think so.” He looked thoughtfully at the fire, which was already sputtering out. “I think it was a mechanism to prevent us from taking it away and analyzing it.”
“So they have clever machines, too. Do we have the power to do this?”
Vero was staring at where the abating flames were revealing a blackened skeleton over which melted wires drooped. “Extraordinary, quite extraordinary,” he muttered, a great disgust evident in his tones. “The power? Maybe. The desire? Thank God, no. Disguise has never been our way. And to do it by using a dead bird? That is something very strange. No, far worse than strange. . . .” He tailed off.
“Well spotted,” commented Merral, “I thought it was odd. It has been watching us for some time?”
“Yes. Probably listening, too. But good shooting on your part. You got the wing.”
“I stunned it. I suppose it was that odd owl we saw.”
“Yes.” Vero nodded, still staring at the pile of wire and bone. “We should have realized it wasn’t flesh and blood when we couldn’t pick it up on the infrared.”
“Of course.”
Vero scratched his chin. “And what was the power source? I saw no fuel or energy cells. Odd.”
Then he stood up and turned to Merral. “This bird thing is, it seems to me, every bit as significant as the other creatures. But a discussion about what it portends must wait. We must get a message out. Our own safety—even our survival—is quite immaterial.”
Merral looked at him and realized that he was perfectly serious. Then, as he thought about what they had encountered that day, he realized that Vero’s judgment was right. “I agree, reluctantly. The message must get out. That is all that matters.”
Vero reached out and patted his arm. “Thank you for your support. Now we have only limited time. In under three hours or so the light will begin to go. Let us think through our options. We might be able to make a run for it now, down the other side and through the woods. How well can you walk?”
“I suspect short distances. But I am unenthusiastic. We might have to walk a long way for a diary to work. Possibly Herrandown, in fact. Not an easy task with enemies at our heels.”
Vero frowned. “Well, it was one idea. Perhaps we must just hope that Anya realizes there is a problem when she calls us.”
Then he sat down and fell silent.
At five o’clock they divided the last of the water, had some food, and for the fiftieth time tried—and failed—to send a signal out. Then they returned to watching, Vero taking the west side of the plateau and Merral the east.
Merral, wishing, among many things, that they had more water, sat dry-mouthed near the edge of the cliff, moving forward every few minutes and peering down to the trees. There the three dark figures continued their seated vigil, and only the occasional slight movement revealed that they were not statues. The lower angle of the late-afternoon sun had enlarged their shadows and somehow seemed to increase their menace. As he stared at them, an alarming thought struck.
He rolled back away and walked slowly over the hot rock to the other side of the summit where Vero was squatting down, peering over the edge. Vero glanced back at him and gestu
red him down with an unmistakable urgency.
Merral’s heart sank. He dropped to his knees and crawled alongside his friend.
Vero grimaced. “Well, we don’t have to worry about making a run for it down here. Look.”
Merral carefully looked down. Here, too, the sheer cliff face ended in a long, bare rock scree which, amid more large tumbled boulders, ran down under dense trees. Now, in the shadows of the trees and the boulders, five large figures were standing still, like distorted and blackened imitations of humanity. At their feet, equally immovable, half a dozen smaller, brown figures were clustered. Although they were too far away for him to be certain, and he was squinting against the light, the indelible impression Merral had was that all of them were staring up at the cliff.
For a moment, Merral could say little, so great was the internal turmoil this scene caused him. A part of him, detached from the cold waves and billows of emotion that buffeted him, was able to recognize that he was again deeply afraid. What I am feeling today is true fear. What I have only read about before, I now experience. This time, though, he knew it was different; with the cockroach-beast he had been scared, but he had had no time to think about his emotions; he had to act. Now, I have fear and cannot act, and I can feel the fear seeping into my mind and corroding my thinking. But, even as he thought this, another part of his mind intruded and said that he must think, and that now was not the time for analysis of his feelings.
He swallowed. “Yes. Interesting. Eight ape-creatures and six cockroach-beasts. I don’t suppose sentinel training gives you any idea what to do next?”
“No,” Vero muttered. “Not at all. The vision Jorgio had seems the best guide here: watch, stand firm, and hope. And, at the last, to die well and take as many with you as you can.”
“I hate to add trouble to trouble, but before long, perhaps ten minutes or so, my side of the hill will be in total shadow.”
