Extinction Game

by Gary Gibson

  ‘I’ve got an idea,’ I said, picking the notebook back up and tucking it under one arm. ‘You up for a drive?’

  She gave me a strange look. ‘Where, exactly?’

  ‘North,’ I said, and patted the book under my arm. ‘I’d like to take a look at the statues he drew.’

  ‘Please don’t tell me it’s because you want to go on a fucking picnic,’ she said, a warning in her voice.

  I couldn’t help laughing at that. ‘Kind of, yeah.’ She stared angrily at me and I put my hands up in surrender. ‘Or at least,’ I continued, ‘that’s what we can tell people we’re doing if anyone asks where we’re going.’

  ‘But why?’ she demanded. ‘What the hell do you expect to find there?’

  ‘It’s just a hunch I have, okay? A feeling.’

  She didn’t look convinced. ‘Look,’ I explained, ‘your Jerry made up two stories, and I think they’re connected in some way. The first is about all the fights you supposedly had, and the other is about a bunch of picnics that never happened. Not to mention that, prior to all this, he hadn’t written anything in his diary for years. Now, since we can’t exactly go back in time and ask him what he was up to, that means all we have left are those statues he was obsessed with drawing.’

  ‘You think there’s some reason for all that?’

  ‘All I can think of,’ I said, ‘is to at least take a look at them. You never know, it might spark something.’

  ‘I’ll admit it sounds like a plan,’ she said. ‘But I’m too tired, Jerry. I haven’t slept in at least a couple of days.’

  ‘Chloe . . .’

  She stepped towards the kitchen door, and when she turned to look back at me I could see she was fighting back tears. Her voice trembled when she spoke. ‘Tomorrow, okay? I’m borderline hallucinating, for God’s sake. And then we can go on our pretend picnic.’

  I watched her depart, thinking of how badly I wanted to go and see those statues at the first opportunity. I could have gone on my own, but something held me back. I needed Chloe to be there.

  Those diary entries, after all, had been intended for her, and not me.

  SIXTEEN

  After she had gone, I sat in my kitchen, feeling frustrated and upset for quite some time. I didn’t want to wait until tomorrow: I wanted to go right now. But I knew equally that I would never do so unless Chloe was also there. She had known my predecessor better than anyone else, after all. She might well have insights or ideas based on that knowledge that might help me make sense of the faked diary entries.

  I decided I needed some kind of distraction until the next morning. Eventually I tossed the notebook down and headed back to the Hotel du Mauna Loa. But when I got there, the only other person present was Wallace Deans, squeezed into a chair in the corner. He was clearly deep into a binge, if the half-empty bottle of hooch by his arm was anything to judge by. He regarded me with me watery eyes, and I wondered just how long he had before his liver finally gave out.

  ‘Maybe you should take it easy,’ I said, nodding at the bottle.

  ‘Go to hell,’ he slurred at me, his head dipping down to regard the table.

  I knew it wasn’t really any of my business, but I pulled a chair up across from him anyway. ‘I heard about what the Patriots did to you.’

  Wallace let out a drunken snort. ‘And you think that’s what this is about?’ he said, holding up his glass.

  I leaned back and grimaced as a cloud of foul breath enveloped me. Now I was sitting across from him, I realized he smelled as if he hadn’t washed or showered in weeks.

  ‘Okay,’ I said, doing my best to maintain an air of equanimity. ‘So why all the drinking?’

  He stared off past me for so long that I really began to think he’d forgotten I was even there. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Well, if you—’

  ‘Fucking Vishnevsky,’ he roared, slamming his glass down hard enough on the table to make me jump. ‘Fuckin’ no good sonofabitch.’

  ‘What happened, Deans?’ I heard a voice say from behind me. ‘You and your boyfriend fall out?’

  I twisted around to see Rozalia standing by the door. By the time I turned back, Wallace had already half-struggled out of his seat, a look of fury on his face. He stumbled and tried to grab hold of the table, and succeeded only in pulling it down with him as he collapsed on the floor.

  I jumped up, pushing my chair back. The last thing I needed was Wallace throwing up all over my shoes.

  ‘Jesus,’ Rozalia muttered, gazing down at Wallace, who groaned as he tried, unsuccessfully, to sit back up. ‘He stinks even worse than usual.’

  I looked down at him uncertainly. I wanted to say something to Rozalia. I knew I had been too harsh on our last encounter, especially now I knew the truth about the diary entries, but she was acting as if nothing had happened.

  ‘Maybe we should try and get him back home,’ I suggested.

  She gave me a look of horror. ‘I don’t even want to touch him while he’s in that state.’

  I looked down again at Wallace and, judging by the smell, suspected he had soiled himself. ‘We can’t just leave him like this.’

  Rozalia gave a heavy sigh, and I could see from her expression that she was mentally resigning herself to Doing Something About Wallace. ‘You know, I only came here to get something to eat,’ she said. ‘This isn’t what I had in mind for how I was going to spend my evening.’

  We managed to wrestle him more or less upright, but it proved harder than I thought it would be, particularly given his not inconsiderable girth. ‘I thought they made all of us work out,’ I gasped, standing up after we had got him in another chair. ‘How the hell did he end up like this?’

  ‘He’s a genius at logistics and networking,’ said Rozalia, her nose wrinkled in disgust. ‘That kind of work doesn’t require too much running around.’

  ‘C’mon,’ I said to Rozalia. ‘Let’s get this over with.’

  Just as we reached down for Wallace, the door banged open and Casey walked in. ‘What the hell’s going on?’ he demanded, seeing Wallace slumped between us.

  ‘Your buddy’s in a mess,’ said Rozalia, standing upright again. ‘He’s going to wind up killing himself if he keeps drinking like this, you know that?’

  Wallace made a snorting sound and his eyes flickered open. He waved one pudgy arm as if dismissing all of us.

  ‘Yeah, well, it’s none of your business anyway, is it?’ said Casey. He gestured towards the door with his head. ‘You leave him to me and I’ll get him home.’

  I bit back my words as Casey reached down and tried to get Wallace to stand up. ‘C’mon, you sorry piece of crap,’ he said. ‘Get the hell up.’

  ‘No,’ Wallace mumbled, twisting away from Casey. ‘All your fault.’

  ‘We tried that already,’ I said. ‘There’s no way he’s going to be able to walk—’

  ‘I already said, it’s none of your goddam business,’ Casey snapped, glaring at me. He bent down, wrapping one of Wallace’s arms around his shoulder before trying to hoist him up and off the floor.

  ‘Hey,’ I said angrily. ‘Don’t talk to me like—’

  Casey’s face suddenly turned white, and he let go of Wallace, who slumped back down. It didn’t take much to guess he’d put his back out again.

  ‘Fuck,’ Casey shouted, walking in circles and grimacing from the pain. ‘Lousy stinking bastard.’

  ‘Did you just mess your back up again?’ said Rozalia, without a trace of sympathy.

  Casey backed away towards the bar, grabbing hold of it with his other hand, and glared at us.

  ‘You know,’ I said to Casey, ‘I was trying to help just now. You didn’t need to be an asshole about it.’

  ‘Don’t bother trying to explain anything to him,’ said Rozalia, her expression sour. ‘Casey’s all about looking out for number one. Isn’t that right, Casey?’

  ‘You want to help?’ said Casey. ‘Then just leave me the hell alone. I’ll ge
t Wallace home.’

  ‘You’re kidding,’ I said, looking at him. ‘Look at you. You can barely stand upright. How long has your back been like this?’

  ‘Fuck you,’ Casey snapped. ‘I can do my job better than the rest of you put together, this day or any other.’

  I spread my hands and nodded at Wallace. ‘Go right ahead.’

  Casey just glared at me.

  ‘Yeah, that’s what I thought,’ I said. I looked at Rozalia. ‘We’ll get him home.’

  ‘Thanks for volunteering me for the job, asshole,’ Rozalia muttered under her breath.

  ‘And you should take it easy,’ I said to Casey. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what his problem was, but when I stepped forward, taking hold of Wallace on one side while Rozalia took the other, he at least had the good grace not to say anything more.

  But damn, Wallace was heavy.

  ‘Maybe if we leave him in the street overnight the rain’ll wash the smell away,’ said Rozalia, once we finally had Wallace on his feet between us. I couldn’t tell if she was kidding or not. Probably not.

  Wallace swayed a little, but I felt confident he would stay upright so long as we remained on either side of him. We led him out through the front entrance and down the steps, Casey following after us the whole way and wincing with each step he took. Regardless, he appeared determined to accompany us the whole way.

  Wallace belched mightily, and I struggled not to gag at the awful vapours emerging from the depths of his gullet.

  ‘Leave me alone,’ he slurred.

  ‘C’mon, big boy,’ said Rozalia, her voice strained from her exertion. ‘We’re going for a walk.’

  In all, it took us nearly half an hour to guide Wallace back to his own place. Casey seemed to decide it was his job to take the lead, as if we actually needed him to guide us there. Soon he was barking orders, telling us which way to turn, and I started to realize why Nadia had had such a low opinion of him.

  The interior of Wallace Deans’ home resembled nothing so much as a dumping ground for domestic waste. The mess was, frankly, unbelievable.

  ‘How the hell does anyone live like this?’ I muttered through clenched teeth, once we had manoeuvred Wallace in through his front door. Even the air inside his home made the roof of my mouth itch. The furniture was nearly invisible beneath mounds of discarded clothing and pieces of dirt-stained machinery that sat on random oases of blackened carpet. I glanced through a doorway and saw that every kitchen surface was almost entirely hidden beneath half-gutted computers and other, less familiar pieces of junked technology.

  I looked up, seeing a bundle of cables duct-taped to the ceiling. I followed it with my eyes, seeing that it terminated at a cramped table in one corner that supported at least four flat-screen monitors, arranged in haphazard fashion.

  There was a constant faint but nonetheless discernible hum of electronics. I noticed that more cables ran across the floor, appearing to originate from several portable battery generators.

  I looked at Rozalia, but she just shook her head, her mouth puckered up as if she’d eaten something bad.

  By now, Wallace had recovered enough that he could just about put one foot in front of the other without immediately tipping over. We kept a tight grip on him anyway, and under Casey’s droning guidance we guided him up a set of narrow steps and into his bedroom, where we found a mattress covered over with crumpled, greasy-looking sheets.

  Wallace managed to get one knee up onto the mattress before tipping face-first onto it. After a moment he started to make a noise that sounded like an aeroplane’s engine cutting out in the moments before it ploughs into the ground. The noise soon steadied, becoming more obviously the sound of a man snoring more loudly than I might otherwise have believed possible.

  I looked over at Rozalia on the other side of the bed, and at Casey, who stood near the door. ‘That’s it,’ I said, moving past Casey and towards the door. I had a sudden, desperate need for a shower. ‘I’ve had more than enough for one night.’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Rozalia. ‘Help me get him on his side. Last thing we need is him drowning in his own vomit.’

  I suppressed a groan, and went back over, helping tip Wallace onto one side while Casey watched with an anxious expression whose meaning I couldn’t begin to fathom. I noticed that Wallace had taped large sheets of black paper over the windows, and remembered it was much the same downstairs.

  ‘What the hell is it with this place?’ I gasped, stepping back from Wallace once more. ‘How the hell can anyone live like this?’

  ‘Thanks for all your help,’ said Casey, with clear insincerity. ‘I’ll keep an eye on him now.’

  ‘What is your fucking problem, exactly?’ Rozalia snapped at him. From the look on her face, she’d clearly had enough.

  Wallace stopped snoring. ‘Imphhrrrerr,’ he said.

  ‘What did he say?’ I asked.

  ‘If we’re lucky,’ said Rozalia, ‘that was a death rattle.’

  Wallace’s hand beat at the surface of the bed. ‘Imphrurur,’ he said, with greater urgency.

  ‘He wants his inhaler,’ said Casey, somewhat testily.

  ‘Oh.’ Rozalia nodded in comprehension. ‘Of course.’

  Living in a shithole like this, I thought, it was hardly surprising he had trouble breathing. I looked over at Casey. ‘Any idea where it is?’

  He stared back at me in apparent outrage. ‘How the fuck would I know?’

  I gave up on asking him anything more, and looked around until I saw a set of drawers by the side of the bed, half-buried beneath a mound of unwashed clothing. I opened them one by one until I found a shrink-wrapped inhaler. I reached in to get it, then noticed something gleaming dully at the back of the drawer. One half, I saw, of an I Ching coin.

  I stared at it, frozen, one knee on the floor, my hand still on the drawer’s handle.

  It wasn’t possible.

  ‘Jerry?’

  I glanced back at Rozalia and Casey, and felt a terrible tremor run through my muscles.

  I looked again. The coin was still there. I wasn’t imagining it.

  I reached in and took hold of it. The scuffed and tarnished metal felt cool and hard against the palm of my hand. My head swam as I pushed the drawer shut. I had the inhaler in one hand, the coin in the other. I studied the latter in the sparse moonlight that somehow found its way past the sheets of card covering the windows.

  It was identical in every respect to the half-coin I had worn around my neck for years in memory of my dead wife, and which I had lost in the river when Nadia died. How, then, could it possibly be here, in a drawer in Wallace Deans’ home?

  Assuming, I realized, that it was mine, and not the other Jerry’s.

  I pushed myself back upright, my legs feeling as if they were about to fold under me. I turned to look at Rozalia, and from her expression guessed my shock must be evident.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked, her voice full of worry.

  I stood there, the half-coin in my open palm. I saw her eyes dip down to see it nestled there.

  ‘I found his inhaler,’ I said numbly.

  I looked back down at Wallace and saw he had woken up again. I watched as his eyes moved from the set of drawers to my hand, working it out. He looked suddenly a great deal more sober than just a moment before.

  I lowered my hand until he could clearly see the half-coin. ‘Wallace,’ I asked, forcing myself to remain calm, ‘can you tell me where you got this?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and leaned to one side before noisily throwing up on the floor close to my feet. I stepped back quickly, just avoiding the flow of liquid as it hit.

  ‘Fuck,’ shouted Rozalia, her face twisted up in disgust.

  Casey’s eyes were on the broken I Ching coin in my hand. His gaze moved up to meet mine, and he gave me a look I couldn’t decipher.

  ‘I’ll get some tissues,’ he said, his tone flat and emotionless, and stepped out of the room.

  ‘Jerry,�
� said Rozalia, once Casey was gone, ‘will you please tell me what’s going on?’

  Wallace made a moaning sound. I was just about to tell her when Casey returned, clutching an enormous wad of paper towels and carrying a bucket. He pushed past me, kneeling down carefully before making an attempt at cleaning the mess up.

  I stared again at the half-coin grasped in my hand and tried to think how it could possibly have come into Wallace’s possession. There had to be some rational explanation: something that would make perfect sense and chase away all the paranoid fantasies yelling for attention in the back of my head.

  Maybe. But somehow I doubted it.

  Casey stood back up. ‘Maybe you should go now,’ he said, his tone wooden. ‘Thanks for your help and everything, but I think I’d better stick around and keep an eye on him.’

  I glanced down at Wallace, who had drifted off into a more peaceful sleep, snoring more quietly this time.

  ‘Does he still need his inhaler?’ I asked, handing the shrink-wrapped device over to Casey.

  ‘Mostly he just needs to dry out,’ the other man replied. He nodded curtly to me. ‘Thanks.’

  There were so very many questions I wanted to ask Wallace, but I knew they would have to wait. Some instinct told me not to say anything while Casey was around.

  Rozalia gave me one last, long questioning look before she followed me back outside.

  We walked for maybe half a block before Rozalia stepped in front of me, a determined look on her face. ‘Spill,’ she said. ‘What the hell just happened back there?’

  I held the coin up so she could see it more clearly. Its Chinese characters glistened softly under the moonlight.

  ‘Do you know what that is?’ I asked. ‘Did the other Jerry ever tell you the story about it?’

  She opened her mouth and closed it. ‘He always wore it around his neck.’ She paused. ‘I’ve seen you wearing it too, but I don’t recall seeing it recently.’

  I nodded. ‘I lost this when I was in the river with Nadia. It was gone, Rozalia.’

  ‘So how the hell did it get into Wallace Deans’ . . . ?’ Her eyes grew round and wide, and she stared at the coin as if seeing it for the first time. ‘Oh.’