Day of the Predator

by Alex Scarrow

  Forby nished cranking the shut er down. The archway was dim once more, lit by the sterile zzing glow of the ceiling tube light.

  ‘They plateaued,’ said Cartwright. ‘Perhaps their species evolved to the best it could possibly be. And then just stopped.’

  Sal made a face. ‘I thought evolution never stopped. I thought it always changed, always, like, adapting.’

  ‘Oh, but it does and can stop,’ he replied. ‘There are species alive today that are virtual y identical to their distant prehistoric ancestors – sharks, for example. Nature had evolved them to be perfect for their environment, perfect kil ing machines … why bother adapting any further?’ He shrugged. ‘Perhaps in this world, those reptilian hominids out there are the dominant predator, with nothing to compete against … and have been that way for mil ions of years?

  ‘Evolution is nature’s way of problem solving. If something changes that chal enges a species’ ability to survive, then that stimulates an adaptive response. If there’s nothing to chal enge a species’ existence, then why would it ever need to change?’ Cartwright shrugged. ‘A dead-end of evolution.’

  ‘A dead-end world,’ echoed Forby.

  They made their way across the dim archway. ‘On the They made their way across the dim archway. ‘On the other hand, maybe there’s some practical limit to how much smarter that species outside can get? Maybe those long heads are already too heavy to develop any greater cranial capacity?’

  ‘So their brains wil never get any bigger?’

  ‘That’s right. And they’l never do any bet er than spears, mud huts and dugout canoes.’

  ‘Wel ,’ said Maddy, approaching the desk, ‘whatever. We’l never know, because those creepy-looking things weren’t meant to happen.’ She sat down at the computer desk. ‘Bob, how’re you doing with those candidate signals?

  ’ > Analysis completed. The last 1,507 density soundings before you ordered me to cease the sweep indicated the immediate location was occupied by a permanent physical obstruction. This could be a natural intrusion, for example a fal en tree or a geological event.

  ‘So, before that?’ Maddy asked impatiently.

  The others joined her at the desk.

  > A total of 227 transient density warnings. Cartwright squat ed down beside her and studied the dialogue box. ‘That means what? So now you’re down to two hundred and twenty-seven possible locations for your friend?’

  Maddy nodded. ‘Can we lter that any further?’

  > A rmative. 219 were single-incursion events. Of the remaining eight density signatures that demonstrated a repeated incursion, only one demonstrated a regularly repeated incursion, only one demonstrated a regularly timed signature.

  Sal bit her lip with excitement. ‘That’s it! Surely? That’s got to be it!’

  > A rmative, Sal. There is a high probability that this is the correct time-stamp.

  ‘YES!’ said Maddy, spinning round in her chair, her hand raised for a high-ve. Sal obliged with a hearty slap and a shriek of excitement.

  Cartwright smiled. ‘I presume that means you’ve found your friend?’

  ‘Yes … see?’ Maddy grinned proudly. ‘I told you we could do it!’

  ‘So then … what happens now?’

  She spun back to face the monitors in front of her.

  ‘Bob? We’re good to begin charging up to open a portal?’

  > Information: we have a 24-hour time period identi ed in which to open a window.

  ‘Hmm.’ Maddy pul ed absently on her top lip. ‘Twentyfour hours. But when exactly do we open it?’

  Cartwright looked vexed and impatient.

  ‘We have to be sure they’re there, right?’ said Sal on Maddy’s behalf. ‘You know? Before we commit to opening a portal. If we spend the stored charge and they’re not there, we’ve gone and wasted it.’

  Maddy nodded. ‘We’l only have enough stored energy to open one, maybe two windows. How do we make sure they’re actual y right there and ready and waiting to come through, though?’

  through, though?’

  ‘Hang on!’ cut in Cartwright. ‘You just said “they”. Are you tel ing me there’s more than just your friend stuck back there?’

  Sal nodded. ‘Yes, Liam … and some others … children that were caught up in an accident.’

  ‘Good God,’ the old man whispered. ‘Accident? This was an accident? What the heck have you people been up to?’‘It was a training incident,’ cut in Sal, ‘that’s al . It went wrong. These things happen from time to time.’

  > Information: it wil be possible to open a series of pinhole windows and obtain a smal -resolution image of the target location.

  ‘Right.’ Maddy nodded. ‘Right … then we could see exactly when – during the day – there’s somebody standing around. Yes … yes, good idea, Bob. Let’s proceed with that.’

  > A rmative.

  Cartwright sighed. ‘So what’s happening now?’ Clearly impatient to see the displacement machine actual y nal y running.

  Maddy turned to look over her shoulder. ‘We’re taking some images of the portal location to make sure that when we open the window they’re ready and waiting to come through.’

  ‘Why don’t you just open your portal and see for yourself?’

  ‘Sal just explained that. We could be wasting a ful

  ‘Sal just explained that. We could be wasting a ful power-up, and we can’t risk doing that.’ Maddy shrugged.

  ‘Anyway, wouldn’t you want to check rst? This is the Cretaceous era, right? That means dinosaurs. I’d want to know the coast is clear of T-rexes rst. Don’t you?’

  The old man glanced at Forby and the man shook his head quickly. ‘Taking a few photos rst sounds like a pret y good move to me, sir.’

  Cartwright laughed nervously. ‘Uh, I guess you’re right. OK … we’l do it your way. Just get a move on before those hunters down the beach nd a railway arch in the middle of their jungle.’

  CHAPTER 68

  65 mil ion years BC, jungle

  The three girls had revived the smouldering re; the dried brit le moss that seemed to carpet every boulder and rock made perfect kindling and already a thick column of smoke was drifting up into the evening sky.

  Liam felt a lit le happier now. Fire had seemed to keep those creatures at bay during the last few nights that they’d been out on their errand. They seemed to have a healthy respect for it – actual y, to be more precise, a morbid fear of it.

  He looked up across the twilit clearing. It had got dark very quickly. He wondered how the others were doing with Keisha. Surely they must have found her by now? If those pack hunters real y had fel ed that tree and made their way across, then he was surprised they’d al owed her to live.

  He was considering that point when he heard two sounds at the same time: one a far-o scream, shril and terrifying that rat led around the clearing like a gunshot, and the other the sound of approaching trainers slapping the hard ground. He exchanged a hurried glance with the girls, and with Becks as she stopped ddling with their damaged windmil and snapped erect like a spooked damaged windmil and snapped erect like a spooked meerkat.

  ‘Help!’ He heard Edward’s voice through the gathering gloom, and then a moment later picked out of that gloom the dancing outline of his pale T-shirt.

  ‘Edward! What’s up?’

  The boy joined him, gasping and looking anxiously back over his shoulder. ‘They’re h-here! THEY’RE HERE!’

  Liam fol owed his gaze and saw nothing across the clearing, just the dark outline of the apron of jungle.

  ‘Where are the others?’

  The boy ignored his question, his eyes wide with terror.

  ‘Th-they’re h-here, they’re h-here!’

  Liam grasped his arm rmly. ‘EDWARD! What about the others?’

  The boy looked at him. ‘Dead,’ he replied. ‘Al dead.’

  ‘Oh God, look!’ gasped Laura.

  She was pointing across the clearing. Where a mere second ago
he’d seen only jungle, now he saw a line of the creatures approaching them cautiously, spreading out like beaters for a hunting party. He quickly estimated thirty, maybe forty, of them; al sizes.

  The whole pack … Jay-zus!

  In the middle of the line, he thought he recognized one of them in particular. The one he’d seen in the jungle, barking orders to the others, their leader.

  ‘Liam,’ said Becks, stepping back from the windmil to join him and the others near the smoking re, now beginning to take hold and crackle and spark. ‘Do you see beginning to take hold and crackle and spark. ‘Do you see the middle one?’

  He knew what she was referring to. The one in the middle, the pack leader, was holding one of their spears in its claws. He nodded.

  ‘Like my adaptive AI,’ she continued, ‘the species has observed our behaviour and learned from it.’

  He swal owed nervously. ‘Back to the palisade … we need to go now!’

  ‘Negative, I must stay.’

  ‘What?’ He looked at her.

  ‘This location has been probed in the last twenty-four hours.’ She nodded towards their broken windmil . ‘There are decaying particles in the vicinity of the interference device. They may scan again at any moment.’

  She was right, of course. Ut erly barking mad, but quite right.

  ‘Al right, al right,’ he ut ered, watching the approaching hominids closing the gap slowly. ‘You four,’

  he said to the others, ‘get inside the wal and wait there!’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ asked Edward.

  He real y had no idea just then … some notion of holding out beside the camp re, back to back with Becks until … until … what?

  Until they’ve nal y worn her down, and jump her. Then turn on me.

  But, there was a slight chance, wasn’t there? A slight chance Maddy and Sal were going to sweep this place again at any moment. And, if they did, this might be their again at any moment. And, if they did, this might be their last chance to ag the signal, to tel them they were right here. The alternative, hiding inside their imsy palisade until these creatures nal y managed to gnaw their way through the twine, pul aside a couple of the logs from the wal and get in … He shuddered.

  ‘There’s a return window coming,’ he said. ‘It’s coming soon! Becks and me need to be out here waiting for it. You four wil be safer inside. I’l cal for you when it opens. Now just go!’

  ‘I want to stay,’ said Edward, picking up one of their hatchets from a pile of cut wood beside the re. The other three nodded. ‘We’l f-ght them t-together,’ whispered Laura, her teeth chat ering noisily.

  Jasmine looked across at the palisade, twenty yards away beyond the ickering pool of light from the re.

  ‘They’l nd a way in anyway.’

  Liam looked at the creatures, now almost entirely encircling them, maintaining their cautious distance. ‘Al right. Perhaps you’re right,’ he ut ered. ‘Becks, how’re we gonna do this?’

  ‘Recommendation: I need to be in the vicinity of the interference device in order to detect any precursor particles arriving.’

  Liam nodded. ‘Yes … yes. R-right. We should hold the ground over there.’ He reached down towards the re and pul ed out a branch. The end of it ickered with ames.

  ‘Everyone grab a torch. They don’t like re!’

  The others fol owed suit. Then moved together in a The others fol owed suit. Then moved together in a tight huddle, away from the reassuring glow of the camp re towards their contraption, a dozen yards beyond the growing pal of amber relight.

  The creatures fol owed them, silently padding across the soft ground, watching them, and ever so subtly closing the distance around them.

  ‘YOU BACK OFF!’ screamed Laura at them, waving her aming stick.

  The creatures hissed, warbled and mewed at that, one of the smal er ones at empting a copy of her shaking voice.

  ‘… Yoo …. bak … o f …’

  Becks turned to Liam. ‘This location has just been scanned again. There are several hundred new particles.’

  Liam felt a surge of hope. ‘Oh, c’mon! Why don’t they just get on with it and open a bleedin’ window?’

  Becks cocked her head. She had no answer.

  Al of a sudden, the creature holding the spear barked in a croaky voice and, as one, the creatures surged forward towards them.

  ‘Oh my God! Oh my God! screamed Laura.

  ‘Recommendation: use your spears to –’

  CHAPTER 69

  2001, New York

  The best part of an hour passed in silence with Maddy, Sal and Cartwright gathered around the monitors watching a progress bar slowly inch across one of the screens, and an empty directory slowly l with low-resolution JPG les. Forby meanwhile stood beside the doorway, cranked up a couple of feet, gazing at the jungle world outside.

  ‘They’re stil hunting those beach pigs or whatever those things are,’ he cal ed out softly.

  ‘Good,’ replied Cartwright absently. ‘How much longer?’

  Maddy shrugged. ‘You can see the progress bar yourself, can’t you? It’s nearly there.’

  The old man made a face. ‘If it’s anything like the Windows I got at home, nearly there can mean another ve minutes or another ve hours.’

  ‘This is an operating system from sometime in the 2050s,’ said Maddy. ‘It sure ain’t gonna be Windows.’

  The progress bar suddenly lurched forward to a hundred per cent and Bob’s dialogue box appeared.

  > Process complete.

  ‘Bob, can you do some sort of slideshow?’

  > A rmative. Images are taken one every ve minutes. A monitor to the left of them ickered to life, revealing A monitor to the left of them ickered to life, revealing a smal pixelated image of green and blue.

  Maddy squinted at the image. ‘What is that?’

  ‘Jungle,’ said Sal. ‘That’s what it is. Jungle and some sky.’Forby joined them around the desk. ‘Yeah … that’s a jungle, I think.’

  A second image appeared, almost identical to the rst, a couple of pixel blocks had changed tone slightly. ‘Is this as clear as the images get?’ asked Cartwright.

  > A rmative. The pinhole and image data size has been kept to a minimum to conserve on energy consumption.

  ‘Al we need is to see enough pixels change to indicate something moving around the area, right?’ said Sal.

  > Correct, Sal.

  ‘Can you play through these slides a lit le faster, please, Bob?’

  > A rmative, Maddy. Increasing display rate times ten. The next slide came up, just the same as the last, and another, an undecipherable icker show of green and blue pixels. They watched in silence until approximately midway through the complexion of the image suddenly changed with a mass of dark pixels.

  ‘Whoa! Stop!’ said Maddy. She studied the shape onscreen. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘That looks like a person,’ said Forby. ‘See? That’s a shoulder and an arm.’

  Sal cocked her head and frowned. ‘It doesn’t look right.’

  Sal cocked her head and frowned. ‘It doesn’t look right.’

  ‘What time in their day is this image, Bob?’

  > 14:35.

  ‘Half past two in the afternoon,’ said Sal.

  ‘Give us the next image, Bob.’

  Another dark image appeared on-screen, the blue pixels of sky and green of jungle almost entirely gone.

  ‘Somebody standing right in the middle of the portal location … for about ve minutes,’ mumbled Maddy to herself. She looked at Sal. ‘That’s got to be the support unit? She’s sensed a tachyon particle and she’s hanging around for another?’

  Sal shook her head. ‘Maybe … but the shape of the body looks al kind of funny to me.’

  ‘Oh, come on, it’s a one hundred by one hundred pixel image – everything’s going to look al funny.’

  She shook her head again. ‘I’m not sure. It could be anything … it could be some animal.’

>   ‘Bob, next image.’

  Another image ickered up and this time the dark mass of pixels was gone, leaving the image the same even mix of blue and green squares.

  Maddy grabbed a pen from the desk and scribbled the time of 14:35 on a scrap of paper. ‘Wel , OK, we know someone was hanging around then. We’ve got one possible window. Let’s get on with the slideshow and see what else we get.’

  Once more the images began to icker on-screen one after another, a second apart, the blue pixels of the sky after another, a second apart, the blue pixels of the sky slowly changing hue from bright blue to a rose colour.

  ‘It’s evening,’ said Cartwright helpful y.

  The sequence continued, with the sky pixels slowly reddening in colour, and the jungle’s light green becoming a deeper darker green, until al of a sudden, in the middle of the image, they saw a single dot of bright orange.

  ‘Stop!’

  Al four of them craned forward to get a bet er look.

  ‘That’s re, isn’t it?’ said Forby. ‘A ame?’

  Sal nodded. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Someone starting a camp re maybe?’

  ‘Fire … right,’ ut ered Cartwright, ‘and the only thing that can make a re back then is going to be human.’

  Maddy tapped her chin thoughtful y. ‘Yup … so maybe this is a more reliable candidate than the other. What time is this image, Bob?’

  > 18:15.

  ‘Give me the next image.’

  The orange pixel became a dozen pixels, and half the screen was l ed by a vertical block of black pixels. In the top left corner, they could just make out the sky, the pink evening becoming a deep purple with the onset of dusk.

  ‘Someone’s standing right there again!’

  ‘And that thing doesn’t look as weird as the earlier one,’

  said Sal.

  Maddy looked at her. ‘How can you tel ?’

  ‘Screw up your eyes a bit, Maddy … it sort of blurs the pixels slightly. You can make out shapes more easily.’

  pixels slightly. You can make out shapes more easily.’

  ‘A camp re and someone standing right there,’ said Cartwright. ‘Looks like the best time so far.’