by John Darnton
Homo sapiens.
Matt circled the spotlight of the beam, engrossed in the craftsmanship, the artistic flair behind the lines and the colors, trying to tease out the narrative: a saga of some sort of battle. Yes, that was it; the two subspecies were at war, a primal conflict of some sort. But why did it seem so oddly familiar?
Suddenly it hit him. “Susan, do you know what this is?”
“Yes,” she said, coming to the same realization at almost the same instant. She sounded strangled with surprise. “The Khodzant Enigma!”
“And look, it’s complete. It’s not missing a fragment. It’s probably the original.”
“What the hell’s it doing here?”
They had not noticed that Van had slipped away, passing through another passage off to one side. While they were marveling at the tableau and trying to decipher the conclusion of its message, his shout interrupted them. “Hey, come here. Quick!”
They tore around the corner. Matt was relieved to see that Van was not in trouble. It had been wonder, not fright, that had prompted his call. He was staring around in amazement at the edge of a vast cavern, the innermost lair of the creatures that were hunting them.
It appeared to be empty, but the signs of habitation were everywhere. Smoke from three small fires curved upward and disappeared into the hazy darkness above. The walls were scorched all around, black marks that reached high up on the rock like chimney smudges. They were hearths, Matt realized, used for cooking and probably curing hides. Instinctively his eyes kept searching for movement. There was none, but he had the eerie sense that the cavern had been teeming with creatures only a short while ago and that they could return at any moment.
With a force of will, Matt calmed himself and then conscientiously began to look for details. Every nook and cranny was filled with animal hides. They lay on mounds and ledges, on the rocky floor, piled up in corners—the brown fur of bear, longhaired buffalo, deer and elk, giant hares, marmots, mountain antelope, and others he could not recognize. They were placed in groupings, he realized.
“Looks like they have divided up into family units maybe,” Susan said. Bones were scattered around her feet. “Look at this,” she said, pointing to a pile off to one side. It contained hunks of meat and gristle, unrecognizable pieces of animal, half putrid and still dripping blood. “Now we definitely know they’re meat-eaters.”
Off to another side was a pile of weapons, and Susan bent down to examine them. There were awls, axes, spears, and several chopping and grinding tools. Chips of stone lay around a flattened boulder that had been used as an anvil. Fascinating, she thought, a small tool factory. It was quite advanced for primitive hominids to prepare the core of the stone that way before flaking it, the Levallois technique, she recalled. There were other implements, some one or two feet long, that she had never seen before.
She found a small pen, a natural indentation in the rock that had been closed off with a semicircle of boulders and lined with animal hides. She considered it for a long time before she was able to ascertain its function.
“There are definitely families living here. Look at this.”
Admiring how Susan’s curiosity overcame her fear, Matt walked over and peered down, noticing instantly the strong, unpleasant stench from the worn-down skins and the tang of urine.
“It’s a crib,” she said. “More of a pit, really, but it serves the same function. Put the kids in there and you’re free to kick off your shoes and cook up some hairy mammoth.”
They investigated some more. Some weapons were lined up on a ledge, their tips covered in blood. Matt lifted one and sniffed it. The odor was faint and indistinct. He put it back in the same spot. “If this is their home,” he said, “where did they all go? It looks like they were all here a minute ago.”
“Maybe we scared them away. Some kind of general alarm to evacuate, protect the women and children.”
“Could be they know we’re here. They could be watching us. Or setting a trap of some sort.”
Van was nervous. He had moved over to the center of the cavern and stood stock-still, motioning for them to join him with one hand and staring up, his eyes wide.
They joined him on either side and looked up. Against the rock face, reaching high into the dome of the cavern, stood a huge icon, built out of the jagged outcropping, a statue of some sort, dripping with tufts of black and white fur. It appeared to be some kind of beast, half-hominid perhaps, half-bear. It had the narrow muzzle of a cave bear with shining fangs; above the muzzle, a pair of tiny eyes stared maliciously at them from recessed sockets. In the dim light above they thought they could detect a protruding forehead and, on top, strands of black hair that hung down and merged into a twenty-foot carpet of bearskins on either side. The apparition looked like a giant voodoo doll, with enough artistry in it and a malevolence of spirit to evoke a mixture of splendor and horror.
“That must be their deity,” said Susan. “A zoomorphic godhead. Look how it shimmers with ... with hatred. Whoever—or whatever—created that is evil, purely and simply evil. It’s a pagan god of malice and death.”
“This is a shrine, all right,” said Matt. He noticed flecks of red embedded in rocks around an upended log directly below the figure. “I wouldn’t be surprised if they engaged in sacrifices right here.”
It did not take long for them to discover the skulls. They were fixed upon the wall to one side of the icon, in a dark recessed corner. Matt moved the flashlight beam around slowly, illuminating them one by one, like hideous masks on a gallery wall. They were clearly human skulls, with their broad shining white domes and thrusting jawbones. One was turned slightly sideways, so they could spot a telltale hole at the base of the back, just above the spinal cord. The brains had been extracted.
“Matt!” exclaimed Susan. “They are brain eaters.”
Matt’s light moved on and they saw something else that made them gasp. On one side, the freshest trophy, was a new head. It had been crudely severed, and bits of darkened artery and bone hung down from the cheek. It was almost unrecognizable because so much of the flesh had been torn away, but there was no doubt that it was Sharafidin.
Matt felt sick. Susan retched. Van was silent. “Well, now we know,” he said after a minute.
“We can’t just leave it there,” said Susan. “We have to do something.”
“Are you crazy?” Van retorted. “This is hardly the time for a funeral—or the place. We better beat it or we’ll end up like that.” It was not hard to read the depth of his fear because he was shivering.
A noise came from the opposite end of the cavern that sounded like a rock scuttling across the floor. Matt felt Susan squeeze his arm and doused the light, but it was too late.
Suddenly a high-pitched scream filled the cavern, a cry unlike anything any of them had ever heard before, piercing and plaintive. It sounded as if a set of human vocal cords had been stretched taut and opened wide, like an instrument. It echoed throughout the cavern and up and down side passageways.
Across the cavern, high on a ledge they had not noticed before, a dim figure, small in stature, peered down at them. A child, Susan thought. Then it screamed again.
They fled down the closest passageway, hurtling across the rocky slope as if propelled, not pausing to choose an escape route. They heard the beat of their own footsteps rebounding off the walls. But then came other footsteps, not their own. They thought the sounds came from behind but they could not be certain. They ran faster, feeling winded in the high altitude and dizzy in the stale atmosphere of the caves.
“Can’t go on much more,” wheezed Van. He had begun to stumble occasionally, and his arms were flailing at his sides like useless flaps.
“Don’t stop now, for God’s sake!” shouted Matt. But Van’s face was sallow, drained of life. He can’t last much longer, Matt thought, and he’s the one with the gun.
Abruptly the passage ended and they were in a dark canyon. Matt moved the beam ahead. There wa
s a bridge, entirely of rock, across a ravine. It was impossible to tell how sturdy it was. “It’s our only hope,” he said. “We have to go one at a time.”
Van, still badly winded, nodded. “If we get across, they can’t rush us. If they try to cross the bridge, we’ll set up an ambush.” He raised the gun and held it sideways.
Susan crossed first. She did not look down and took her time to find secure footing. Poised halfway across, above the darkened pit, she could hear the footsteps getting louder. She hurried and made it safely. Then Van crossed and finally Matt.
They ducked into the mouth of a passageway on the other side and waited. Soon, with a clamor, the creatures bounded into the canyon. Across the divide they stared at the three humans, and instantly they froze and all sound died away.
This close, they looked truly hideous. Mangy hair fell on sweaty muscles encrusted with dirt. Their look had a leer to it, and they showed their teeth, which had no canines. Most carried clubs. Some had long, thin, stiletto-like weapons. They began bobbing up and down and grunting with excitement.
One stepped forward and moved toward the bridge. Without hesitation, he stepped onto it, moving warily but steadily. Another lined up behind him. Halfway across, the first stopped for a moment, puzzled. He looked directly at them. Why were they not running away? What was that object one of them was holding?
Van raised the gun and pointed it at the creature’s chest. His hand was shaking. “Now!” shouted Matt. “Go ahead, do it!” His voice rebounded around the canyon. The creatures whipped their heads around and stared at him, and the one on the bridge stopped again and stood, a perfect target. Still Van did not fire.
“What the hell are you waiting for?” Matt yelled. Was Van too paralyzed to shoot? “Give it to me if you can’t do it!”
At that moment, he heard the explosion near his ear and saw the kick of Van’s wrist as it flew upward. The creature, standing upright in the middle of the bridge, looked surprised at the hole in the middle of its chest. Blood poured out of it. Matt looked across at the others; they shrank back at the sound, so incredibly loud, and appeared astounded and even frightened. The creature touched his chest, still confused, but just at that moment the sound of the explosion came thundering back at them through the canyon and then thundering in from another direction. Now it seemed to be louder, until there was a crack, a rending, another deeper sound, and rocks began to fall. The sound continued until it set up a shaking like an earthquake, and as more rocks fell the canyon filled with dust, obscuring their view.
“Cave-in!” shouted Susan as they fell back.
At that moment the earth above seemed to crumble, and with an earsplitting sound it came crashing down on them, a relentless weight, so fast there was no time to register pain. Matt spun downward in a spiral toward darkness and nothingness.
He awoke, unaware that he had been unconscious. The first thing he felt was a weight on his legs and a kind of deadening sensation. He lay in darkness. He could barely breathe for the dust. He could not remember where he was or what had happened.
Gradually, it all came back: the paintings on the cave wall, the sighting of the creatures in the snow, Rudy’s death, the chase, the cavern, the gunshot He tried to move his legs and found he could not. Had they been crushed in the cave-in? Was this what it would feel like to have no legs? He patted the outside of his pockets. There was the outline of a knife and a pack of matches. The matches, he remembered, had belonged to Rudy who had handed it to him just before he left the cave. When he pulled it out and struck a match, a blinding flash erupted. It dwindled to a halo and he looked around. He saw his legs, disappearing under a wall of rock and dirt that slanted up toward the ceiling. Then blood along his left arm. Through the dust he could make out a form lying next to him. It was Susan, lying crumpled and immobile. He could not tell if she was breathing.
Matt began the long job of extricating himself. It was hard to do on his back in the dark. He pawed at the dirt, leaning forward so hard that his abdominal muscles seized up in a spasm. He pushed the dirt behind him and shaped it into a backrest, using his hands as shovels. His fingers began to bleed. He pulled large rocks down and tossed them to the side. The going was slow because as soon as he dug out a cavity, more dirt and rocks came rolling down the incline to fill it. He felt a metal object. His heart soared; it was the flashlight. He held his breath in prayer while he switched it on. It didn’t work. He threw it aside and continued digging. After half an hour he had uncovered all but the tips of his feet. Lying straight back and pushing at the ground with his fists, he was able at last to propel himself free of the rockslide. He found he could move one leg; the other was twisted to one side.
Susan moved and began talking to herself in a low, dull monotone. Matt struck another match, pulled himself to her, and brushed her cheek. She opened her eyes, then closed them and reached down to scratch her arm. He felt a dampness behind her head, rivulets of something sticky mixing with her hair, and knew it was blood. He tried standing and found he could just manage it by putting his weight on his good leg and reaching out to steady himself against the cave wall. He pulled Susan up. She was able to stand, though her eyes were still closed.
Matt struck another match and looked back. The cave-in had blocked the passageway with fresh dark earth, without destroying the walls, as if a bulldozer had pushed tons of rock and debris through the narrow channel. There was no sign of Van or the gun. Not a bad way to go, thought Matt, sudden and final, death and burial at the same time. He moved his arm to touch his knapsack, which he was still wearing, and felt a pain in his shoulder that he had not been aware of before.
They staggered down the passageway, inhaling the dust that was beginning to settle. Susan seemed to be in a coma. She was talking, but he could only catch a word here and there. He tried speaking to her. When he did she fell silent, but he couldn’t tell if she heard him or not. She gave no sign.
He felt his way around a bend and struck the last match. Ahead was a straight stretch. Squinting, he saw a shaft of light cutting across the tunnel like a sword blade. Gently he lowered Susan to the ground, hobbled ahead, knelt down—there was that pain in the shoulder again—and put his face to the hole. The cold air struck his face, sank into his lungs, and seemed to spread through his limbs like a shot of whiskey. He drank deeply of it.
He widened the hole, tearing at the dirt, pulling it inside, and pushing it away. It went surprisingly quickly, and soon he could stick his head and then his upper torso through the opening. Outside, where the snow was piled in drifts, it was cold and quiet. The sun was shining, its light so blinding he could barely see.
Returning for Susan, he had to push her through the hole from behind. Her legs fell limply into the snow and she did not awaken. The snow was deep but it had hardened, so that they sank in only partway. He wanted to get as far away from the cave as possible, so he tried to stand and pull her from behind, but he could not manage it, and after a few steps fatigue and pain overcame him. He sank down and his mind began to drift. He felt the wind now, and let it carry him. He wrapped his arms around Susan and placed her head beneath his chin. It was a perfect fit. We are one at last, he thought dimly as the wind gently rocked him.
Sitting there immobile, he felt the cold creep in. It began around the edges, then moved toward the center. He could feel his limbs turning heavy, his senses thickening. He thought of lights going out in the distant rooms of a mansion. He hugged Susan tighter and leaned back into the snow; it felt strangely warm. His eyelids faced the sun. It made the screen before him dazzle with shooting stars and meteors. He found himself being drawn toward the hot vortex, the dawn of creation.
They stayed there, unmoving as statues, until the snow piled up around them. Then, as clouds came to clutch at the sun, lumpy figures approached and long pairs of hairy arms reached down and picked them up, out of the snow.
II EDEN
13
Kane tilted the urn and held it at the top with a flattened pal
m to pour the dregs of rotgut coffee into a mug emblazoned with a yellow happy face.
He had arrived the night before on a helicopter that had picked him up from the airport’s VIP lounge at Dushanbe, where he had been rushed through formalities by a group of excited Tajik officers who didn’t speak a word of English. He had dressed in civilian clothes to keep his arrival low-key.
Then he spent two hours in the helicopter that blazed its way over the barren ground and scrub trees like a flying lighthouse. Finally, they put down in a scruffy clearing outside Murgab, a drab Tajik town at the foot of the Pamirs. The dust raised by the blades coated Kane’s forehead and cheeks and circled his eyes, giving him the ringed look of a raccoon.
He was met by the night duty officer, a guy in rumpled fatigues called Grady, who shook his hand perfunctorily and yawned. Kane was not asked to show an ID, which was strange for an operation so highly classified. When they reached the dormitory Grady pointed vaguely to rows of double bunks and said, “Choose any one. They’re all the same—uncomfortable.” Then he disappeared through a door. Kane set his duffel bag down. From the darkened end of the room came several snores. A TV and a VCR rested on a table in the center, along with a ragged stack of tapes, Penthouse and Hustler magazines, and empty Coke bottles, some with soggy cigarette butts in them. Two almost empty aspirin bottles stood nearby. The peeling walls exuded boredom.
No doubt about it, the place was a dump. Kane remembered the old photographs he had seen of Los Alamos, the wooden barracks on top of a mesa in the desert where the greatest scientific minds of the century had gathered to create their satanic engine of destruction: the broken-down water tower, the mud-filled streets, the smelly-looking gymnasium, and the tiny ranch house where the bomb itself was assembled. Strange how the most epochal events occurred in the most dilapidated of settings.
