Why You Were Taken

by JT Lawrence

  A cab rolls to a stop in front of them, and the leaning man motions for them to get in. They hesitate, but then the driver flashes a card at them: a green rabbit. It happens so quickly Kirsten wonders if she imagined it.

  They climb inside, and Seth gives the driver the address of TommyKnockers. Kirsten feels every bump of the drive; every pothole sends more blue sparks flying up her arm. She needs to talk to distract herself from the pain.

  ‘Why the green bunny?’ she asks. ‘Seems a bit, I don’t know, too fun and quirky for what you guys do.’

  ‘No science journals lurking in your house, I can tell.’

  ‘You don’t have to be snarky. I prefer pictures. It doesn’t make me dumb. It’s how I see the world, in thousands and thousands of photos. Pictures fly at my brain all the time as if I’m some kind of five-dimensional dual projector. From reality, hyper-memory, from my senses... books are just too much of an assault... you wouldn’t want to be in my head.’

  ‘Mine neither,’ says Seth. ‘I see formulae and patterns and equations in everything. Sounds like a similar affliction.’

  We’re similar, in some ways, he thinks.

  ‘We’re similar,’ she says, ‘of course we are. We’re twins.’ It sounds strange to say it out loud. He finds it strange to hear it.

  ‘Ever heard of the Fibonacci sequence? The Golden Ratio?’ he asks.

  ‘Of course. It’s that pattern that keeps appearing in nature. And in beautiful things. Didn’t know the Fibonacci part.’

  ‘He was a mathematician. He discovered it by theoretically breeding rabbits.’

  ‘Theoretically breeding? That doesn’t sound like much fun.’

  ‘I don’t want to bore you.’

  The nerves in Kirsten’s broken arm hum.

  ‘Tell me. I’m interested.’

  ‘So in theory you’d start with one pair of baby rabbits. When they mature at two months, they have their own pair of baby rabbits. So it’s just one pair for the first and second month, then an additional pair in the third month. How many pairs? Zero, one, one, two Then the parents have another pair. 3. By then, the first babies are mature enough to breed, and they have a pair, along with the parents. 5. Then 8, 13, 21, 34, 55... etc. In a year you’ll have 144 rabbits.’

  ‘So you just add the number to the number before it to get the next number.’

  ‘If you wanted to suck all the beauty out of the equation then yes, I guess you could say that. So the sequence is fn equals fn minus 1 plus fn minus 2 where n is greater than 3 or n is equal to 3’

  ‘Okay, you just lost me.’

  ‘It’s not important. I get carried away. The cool thing is that the ratio plays itself out in nature. Pinecones, pineapples, sunflowers, petals, the human body, DNA molecules. Like, a double helix is twenty-one angstroms wide and thirty-four long in each cycle. It’s also in lots of different algorithms. So, handy in... software and stuff.’

  ‘Hacking?’

  ‘In theory.’

  ‘You smartypantses like your theories.’

  ‘Goes with the territory. Science, and all.’

  ‘Ooh, “science”,’ she mocks, smiling. ‘Using a strange and beautiful ratio to bring down the baddies. A green bunny.’

  ‘It’s the symbolism, more than anything.’

  ‘I like it.’

  ‘Any reason you chose bright green? The green number is three, so that kind of makes sense.’

  ‘It’s a nod at bioartist Eduardo Kac. He created artwork based on a transgenic albino green fluorescent rabbit called Alba. They bonded. Once he had finished his research, the corporation he was grinding for went back on their word and didn’t let him take her home, and she died in the lab. It was sad. They were attached, after all that time. The corp became, like, the epitome of bio-bullies, and she’s kind of our mascot.’

  ‘Poor Alba,’ says Kirsten. ‘What did they splice her with, you know, to make her glow?’

  ‘GFP of a jellyfish gene.’

  Kirsten thinks of the beautiful jellyfish she saw at the aquarium, when she

  learned of Betty/Barbara’s death.

  ‘I don’t know, it seems wrong to me.’

  ‘That’s the whole point. He used transgenic art to spark debate on important social issues surrounding genetics, and how they are affecting and will affect generations to come. It was ground breaking, for its time.’

  ‘And poor Alba lives and dies in a lab.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Not cool.’

  ‘Not cool.’

  ‘And so... Fibbonacci, Kac... you pretty much have an obsession with bunnies?’

  ‘Science does. Theoretical bunnies, anyway.’

  The car stops, the driver cuts the engine. Seth looks past Kirsten, out of the car window, and says, ‘We’re here.’

  She moves, but he puts his hand on her shoulder. Still, a kind of vibration.

  ‘Stay here, this will just take a minute.’

  Kirsten watches him disappear down an alley, then lies down on the back seat, cradles her arm, and closes her eyes. Keke, we are on our way. Keep breathing, keep breathing.

  Rolo sees Seth coming and begins to lift the red rope to allow him access into the club. Seth gestures to show he’s not going in, and Rolo clicks it back into place.

  ‘Mister Denicker,’ he says in a low rumble, ‘what can I do for you?’

  ‘Good to see you, my man,’ says Seth, and they click their fingers together, leaving two five hundred rand notes in the giant Yoruba man’s palm. ‘I need to see your—associates—again. The ones you introduced me to a few years ago.’

  ‘You wish to make another purchase?’ he enquires.

  ‘I do.’

  ‘The people themselves change. They have various addresses, and various contact numbers. Are you looking for heat, or spike?’

  ‘Heat.’

  ‘In that case, I suggest you contact Abejide.’ He takes out his handset, which looks like a toy in his huge hands, and pushes a button. Seth’s Tile pulsates. ‘Tell him I sent you.’

  Seth turns to go, when Rolo says, ‘I gather you know, Mister Denicker, that you are being followed?’

  Chapter 28

  Little Lagos

  Johannesburg, 2021

  Seth spins around, hand in pocket, but he can’t see anyone in the alleyway. Rolo motions with his eyebrows that the interloper is ahead of them, around the corner to the right, effectively blocking his way out. He motions for a bouncer stationed inside to watch the door, and jerks his head for Seth to follow.

  They enter the club and walk through the velvet curtains and over the plush carpet towards the restrooms. It feels like midnight inside. A woman in a snakeskin bikini dances lazily around a pole. Guests, swirling the ice in their drinks, nod at Rolo as he passes. The restroom is large and spacious, tastefully decorated in comparison to the club’s gaudy interior. A man is swaying at one of the urinals.

  They walk to the last stall on the left, which is always closed. Rolo takes a bunch of keys out of his pocket, squints at them, locates the correct key and unlocks the door, revealing another door in the wall where the toilet should be. He hefts his bulk through the narrow stall door and unlocks the next door, which swings out into the darkness of the back street of the club.

  ‘Good evening to you sir,’ he says, as if nothing was out of the ordinary.

  ‘Good evening, Rolo.’

  Seth glides in the shadows along the buildings until he reaches the car. He sneaks up to it and is about to jump in when he sees that the car is empty. He stays down, crouching next to it, pulls out his gun. As he moves forward, he looks into the car and sees that it is not in fact empty, but that the driver’s body has listed to the side, a bullet hole in his temple. He glances around, but the evening is silent around him.

  ‘Kirsten?’ he says, knowing if the killer is near he will be giving his position away, but in the moment not caring. ‘Kirsten?’

  A hand shoots out from under the car, grabbing his ankle, a
nd he yells with fright, pointing his gun at it. He realises a split-second before he pulls the trigger that he recognises the hand—it’s the female version of his own.

  ‘Kirsten!’ he whispers. She starts crawling out; he tries to help her. She’s ivory-skinned and beaded with sweat. He sweeps her into his arms for a moment then opens the driver’s door and pushes the dead man out onto the street. He looks for a wallet but the driver’s pockets are empty. Kirsten clambers into the passenger side, feels the warm blood seep into the seat of her jeans. Seth jumps in, locks the doors, and presses the ignition button. It’s been a while since he has driven.

  ‘Put your safety belt on,’ he says, but Kirsten’s numb fingers can’t follow the instruction. He doesn’t flick on the headlights until they reach a main road, and keeps checking for a tail in his rear view mirror.

  ‘What happened?’ he asks, keeping his eyes on the road.

  ‘What happened? A boy with a nice face falls out of a window and then a man’s brain is blown out of his skull.’

  ‘Did you see who did it?’

  ‘No. He saw something—’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The driver. Saw something or heard something. He told me to hide. There wasn’t any time. He would have seen me run. I rolled under the car. Then I just heard the shot and there were yellow stars everywhere. I saw his feet. The killer. Big. Black boots, like... workman boots. He circled the car, so slowly. I was trying not to breathe. Then he walked in the direction you disappeared.’

  ‘One guy?’

  ‘Yes. I think so.’

  ‘He must have followed us from the flower shop.’

  Kirsten keeps quiet, looks ahead.

  ‘He was waiting for me, in the alley. Hopefully we’re a little ahead of him now.’ He fiddles with the air conditioning dial. It’s not cold in the car but Kirsten is shaking. They travel in silence for a while.

  Kirsten scrolls through Keke’s drop-down list of contacts, looking for Marko. He isn’t listed by name, so she looks for FWB, but doesn’t find it. Most of the contacts seem to be in codes and nicknames. LoungeLizard; Open SAUCE; hotelbarsuperstar. Then she sees HBG and clicks on it. Hackerboy Genius.

  KK> HBG, Kirsten here. You there?

  HBG>> Whre is Keke, wth u?

  KK> Missing. We need your help.

  He takes a while to reply.

  HBG>> Anything. For her.

  KK> Is there any new info you have, that you hadn’t shared with her yet? I have her FD.

  HBG>> Not / lot. Ths fckers knw hw 2 cover thr trax.

  KK> Chips were made by GeniX. Capsule was superglass.

  HBG>> Ahead / thr time.

  KK> Can you find out who had access to that kind of tech / early 90s?

  HBG>> Short answer = no1, but let me look.

  Kirsten looks across at Seth, who is concentrating on navigating the narrow roads crowded with pedestrians.

  ‘Anything?’ asks Seth.

  ‘He’s looking. He’ll let us know as soon as he finds something.’

  The roads are crammed with communal taxis of all different colours and states of disrepair. Reading the bumper stickers, Kirsten thinks she should photograph them some time and have an exhibition of taxi décor in Jozi. She considers all the mini-disco-balls, the hula girls, the fuzzy dice hanging on rear view mirrors she has snapped over the years. A cut-out picture of a car radio face Prestik-ed to the dash; a makeshift beverage holder made from an old plastic Castle lager beaker, held in place with an artfully manipulated coat-hanger wire; a handheld fan taped to the windscreen and wired into the cigarette lighter power source; a dog-eared picture, stuck in the sun-shield flap, of a young bride, perspiring in a synthetic fibre dress. They all tell their own stories.

  People swarm around their car. Drivers steer one-handed, leaning on their hooters, heads out of their windows. A scuffle takes place a few metres away from them.

  ‘Welcome to Gadawan Kura territory: Little Lagos,’ he says.

  ‘You aren’t supposed to call it Little Lagos,’ says Kirsten. ‘It’s un-PC.’

  ‘Fuck PC,’ says Seth. ‘It has the highest concentration of Nigerians—and hyenas—outside of Nigeria.’

  ‘And Malawians. And Zimbos.’

  ‘Those guys don’t count,’ he says, ‘too quiet.’

  ‘African Slum of Nations.’

  ‘That’s more PC. More representative. Good one.’

  They haven’t moved for a while, so Seth parks with the intention that they walk the rest of the way.

  ‘It’s nothing short of insane to walk around here, but if we sit in this gridlock your friend’s had it.’

  Kirsten grabs the insulin kit, slings the handle over her arm and keeps it pinned to her chest as they manoeuvre their way through the throngs of people. Seth presses the button to lock the car and set the alarm, but has little hope for it to be there when they return. There are a few other white creeps around who look like locals—poor whites, thinks Kirsten—who don’t stand out as much as she does with her new apocalyptic hairstyle, and Seth’s smudged eyes and piercings. Having grown up in a virtually colour-blind society, it’s a novel feeling to be so aware of the tint of her skin; she feels the glances from everywhere. They pass an informal marketplace, a few stalls on the side of the road that seem to be doing a great deal of business. Airtime; doorstops of white bread; amaskopas; paraffin sold in re-purposed, scuffed plastic soda bottles; yellow boxes of Lion matches; half-jacks of cheap brandy-flavoured spirits; spotted bananas. Leathery R50 notes travel from palm to palm and change is slipped deftly into warm pockets, never counted. They weave in and out of the streams of people, Kirsten shielding her broken arm, till Seth turns into a road without a name.

  They make a few more turns, passing a house in mourning with a SuperBug warning on the door. The occupants’ wailing sends streamers of powder blue out of the house and Kirsten tries to dodge them. Seth almost trips over a blind beggar with grey milk for eyes, and the stench of open sewers makes Kirsten retch in the direction of a greasy, defaced wall.

  ‘Almost there,’ he says, checking his Tile and grabbing her hand when she straightens. She lets him lead her further into the jutting maze.

  When they arrive at the destination, it’s not at all what Seth expected. A 1950s style brick-and-mortar house stands defiantly among its corrugated-iron shack neighbours. Chipped steps lead up to a small burgundy veranda: sun-brittle plastic chairs and a blue front door. Cracked black windows like broken teeth in the grimy façade.

  ‘I expected... more of a... security system in place,’ says Kirsten, ‘taking their particular business into account.’

  ‘They move around a lot. I guess there’s not always time to put up an electric fence.’

  They walk up the steps and are startled when something with matted brindle fur bolts straight for them, screeching, yellow fangs bared (Rotten Egg Yolk). They both jump. The animal gets to within a metre of them but is yanked back by its chain. A monkey.

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ says Kirsten, hand to hammering heart.

  Despite the limitation of being chained to a pillar, it still tries to get at them, chattering and screaming in frustration. There is a raw patch of skin around his neck where the collar chafes; it seems there are frequent visitors to this house.

  ‘There’s your security system,’ says Seth.

  They knock on the door. Kirsten has the urge to wash her hands and wonders if the house has running water. And if they have running water, would it be acceptable for her to ask if she could use it? She isn’t sure what kind of etiquette is expected in this kind of situation. She will smile and ask nicely, and hope to not offend protocol. Footsteps sound behind the door and a masculine voice says, ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m looking for Abejide,’ says Seth. ‘Abejide.’ The door opens, but there is no light on inside, and no one says a word. They take it as a sign to enter, and as soon as they step across the threshold, the door is slammed shut behind them and they are pressed against the wall, smo
ke-fragrant hands over their mouths, gunmetal clicks to their heads.

  Chapter 29

  Yip, Yip, Yip.

  Johannesburg, 2021

  Someone flips the light switch and the image of the room jumps out at Kirsten. Cadmium blazes around five glistening, tight-muscled men; dark, oily, like sealskin. They wear layers of light, dusty clothes, wildlife-fur armbands, leather trinkets, and carry the biggest automatic weapons Kirsten has ever seen. Only two aim their guns at them; Kirsten guesses two AK47s are enough.

  The youngest of the five pats them down, takes Seth’s gun off him. Looks embarrassed when he finds blood on Kirsten’s jeans. She has the unreasonable urge to tell him it’s not hers, but has a hand over her mouth. He snatches the insulin kit from her hand, sniffs it, and drops it on the floor. She protests and the muzzle of the gun gets pushed right into her ribs. Seth strains a little against the man holding him down. Not too much to warrant being shot, not too little to show he’s not a pushover.

  ‘What do we have here?’ the man says.

  ‘A couple of white maggots,’ another says. He pronounces it mag-GOTS.

  ‘You a cop?’ he asks Seth, taking his hand away in order to let him speak. The animal teeth on his leather necklace click together, sending little circles towards Kirsten. Seth laughs.

  ‘I think that everyone knows that cops don’t come into Little Lagos.’

  The man lets out three bars of a laugh, looks around at his colleagues. They flash their teeth. The moment is short lived; as soon as he stops smiling the others do too.

  ‘Then who the fuckayou?’ he asks.

  ‘A punk,’ says one of the other men. ‘A fuckin’ punk come to make trouble for us.’ Seth can see he is the dangerous one: hopped up on something—tik? Nyaope? White Lobster?—and unable to contain his jerky movements. Not a quality you want in a man pointing a large gun at your face. Kirsten senses that he has killed a lot of people. Bloodthirsty, she thinks. She can almost smell the warm red metal on him.