Rome

by Matthew Thayer

Don’t know what the hell I was thinking. Tore up my shoulder for a wolf? Damn lucky all three of us weren’t killed. Hell, I’m dumber than Mud Hen.

  Back’s out bad. Been walkin’ hunched over like an old man. Can barely lift my right arm. Mammoth Killers were quick to spot weakness. Been testing me, disrespecting rules, ignoring orders. Sal and girls are my protectors. Corporal had to push their buttons pretty hard a couple days ago to get them to knock off bullshit. Dished out a couple black eyes. Used his kicks and elbows to save his hands. Learning.

  Brothers are hot to get Flower alone. Also hot to steal atlatl. Little fuckers wouldn’t know what to do with either one.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  TRANSMISSION:

  Duarte: “These are the first gorillas I’ve encountered.”

  Hunter: “May well be the northern edge of their range. We’re bound to see loads more, as well as baboons, chimps and all the other noisy, sneaky, shit-throwing bastards.”

  Duarte: “Look how hard the silverback pounds his chest. He’s huge.”

  Hunter: “He knows we’re close.”

  Duarte: “You say the lions leave them alone?”

  Hunter: “Everything leaves them alone. Everything apart from elephants and Cro-Mags, that is. The pachyderms and gorillas have worked out a live-and-let-live relationship. There’s the occasional dust-up when one or the other thinks somebody’s wandered too close to their young, but man is the only predator with the balls to hunt a full troop of gorilla.”

  Duarte: “Hunt them? For food?”

  Hunter: “Trophies.”

  Duarte: “Trophies, why?”

  Hunter: “Because they’re bloody dangerous to kill. Such a feat looks dandy on a resume.”

  Duarte: “They don’t eat them?”

  Hunter: “Some do, though I haven’t the foggiest why. Gorilla meat tastes like muddy leather.”

  Duarte: “You’ve tried it?”

  Hunter: “Sure. One of my sons killed a massive silverback to impress me. Green-eyed bugger sure was proud of himself. Presented me with two of the hands and had his women prepare a feast. Didn’t want to piss on my boy’s parade now, did I? I choked down some liver and a steak, gave him a pat on the head.”

  Duarte: “Where was this?”

  Hunter: “In the grasslands between the Red Sea and Nile. Egypt. We’ll be going through there soon. This son does all right for himself and his clan.”

  Duarte: “Hunting gorillas?”

  Hunter: “Hunting a lot more than that. I half expected him to be the one who chased the Denisovans out of their territory. That sort of work is right up his alley.”

  Duarte: “Genocide?”

  Hunter: “You take all the fun out of things when you put it like that. Perhaps I’ll have the pleasure of introducing you two. You can ask him yourself.”

  Duarte: “I’m not sure I want to meet someone who kills gorillas for sport.”

  From the log of Maria Duarte

  Chief Botanist

  Hunter’s mood has evolved from surly to nearly tolerable as he approaches the close of his second day without the belt. We both sported black eyes after our fight. His was gone in less than a half hour. He tells me mine are now starting to turn from purple to greenish-yellow along the edges. I don’t care. My hands may still be swollen and my nose tender, but that brawl did me good. I started it and my only regret is I didn’t get to finish it.

  Next time, I’m going to make sure to have a rock or tree limb handy. He recovers so quickly you’ve really got to put him down. Hopefully that day will not come. He’s behaved himself since shedding his force field. This afternoon’s rather lengthy conversation featured only one blowup. Only twice did he shout I was a “bloody idiot.”

  Progress.

  I try to give him room to regain his footing on humanity as we putter around our campsite and watch the world from atop a lonely nob of a hill. We’ve claimed an abandoned human habitation site, a natural lookout post, complete with fire pits and flat, sandy spots for sleeping. As long as we keep a fire going the animals leave us alone, though I wonder if we might attract unwanted attention from humans. Hunter says to let them come, he’ll give them “what for.”

  He broods and brushes all direct queries away, saying he’ll tell me what I need to know “all in good time.” I have agreed to crawl back into my jumpsuit in 14 hours. Before that, I need answers to some rather basic questions. Where are we going? What are we doing? How long until I see Paul?

  For now, we’re taking baby steps. If he wants to moan about the weather and how it reminds him of a certain summer in Milan when he was just a bambino, I let him reminisce. One topic he strayed into was absolutely alarming. It started with a discussion comparing his sons Leonglauix and Salvatore, how each had their strengths and weaknesses.

  I built the men up and he generally tore them down, but in a grudgingly prideful way. Then came a surprisingly candid admission of how many children he has fathered in the Paleolithic. By his estimate the number could top 500!

  “There were stretches when I rogered a different gal every night of the week. It was a perfect storm of a horny lad having pick of the litter. And why wouldn’t I? I was the strongest bugger on earth. I see that grimace, Duarte. What can I say? I forgot to pack condoms.”

  I’ve learned to filter the crap Hunter says. You can usually believe about half the story–and if he’s wearing the belt you can cut expectations in half again. This was different. Something about the matter-of-fact way he explained things made me suspect they were true. There was no mist in his eyes or pictures on his computer to share. He just had a certain, unmistakable pride as he bragged about other offspring the same way he did Sal and Gray Beard. Parents have probably been doing it forever.

  Unabashedly, he admitted he often runs into his progeny and enjoys the encounters.

  “I don’t waste time on the dullards. Why bother? It’s the stars who intrigue me. When I see my kids have grown up to become clan leaders, fierce hunters and even storytellers, it brings back fond memories of home, of Italy and Salvatore’s many brothers, sisters and half-siblings.”

  It was all I could do to keep a blank face as I excused myself to make water behind a bush. Five hundred kids? Multiply that by a few generations and the impact becomes astronomical. My brain spins to think about it. Will such an influx of modern genetics cause long-term changes to evolution? Maybe, maybe not. As Hunter is quick to point out, Genghis Khan was said to have fathered thousands of children as he pillaged across Asia.

  “Mankind survived that,” Hunter rationalized. “I reckon it will survive me as well.”

  The problem is, what happens if this guy keeps chugging along forever? That’s what really worries me. By my math, judging from his awful dreams, he’s lived well past his supposed 300-year end date. What if he keeps uploading the exact same genetic markers into the populace over and over across a long period of time? I’m no geneticist, but my guess is, that can’t be good.

  What do I do about it?

  TRANSMISSION:

  Duarte: “Promise me you’ll consider what I say.”

  Hunter: “Quit stalling.”

  From the log of Maria Duarte

  Chief Botanist

  I must be crazy. Why else would I agree to follow Hunter to an unknown location for an unknown length of time?

  In one breath he claims he doesn’t know our destination. In the next he insists it is vital we go. “Somewhere near the Nile River, I think.” His confusion is quite consistent and seems oddly sincere. Maybe he really doesn’t know.

  I’m beginning to wonder if the location could be programmed into the belt. Or maybe in his nanos? They could have a glitch, or a hold over him. Whatever it is, his persistence has convinced me to take a chance. He keeps saying I will thank him in the end. I better.

  Filed under “poor timing,” Hunter has nearly returned to his calmer, more friendly self right as it is time to gear up. I snared a pair of rabbits this morning and we’re wait
ing for them to finish cooking over the coals. Once we’ve eaten and drunk as much water as we can hold, we’ll don our infernal armor and begin another run. Part of me hopes those rabbits never finish cooking. I have never had a tooth extracted, though I imagine this is what it’s like waiting for the procedure to commence.

  TRANSMISSION:

  Hunter: “Ready to go?”

  Duarte: “I suppose.”

  Hunter: “Cheer up, you can do some reports about the plants and people of Mesopotamia.”

  Duarte: “Maybe.”

  Hunter: “You could dictate to your computer along the way.”

  Duarte: “You fucking dictate along the way.”

  Hunter: “Just trying to be helpful.”

  Duarte: “Hunter, shut up and lead.”

  From the log of Hunter

  (aka–Giovanni Bolzano, Dr. Mitchell Simmons)

  Ethics Specialist

  Duarte said she wanted to run so we ran. Covering nearly 600 miles in a bit more than four days, she kept pace until I received an alert that her suit was about to overheat.

  Before she or her armor could blow a circuit, I seized control. Easing her to a stop in a shaded glen, I settled her into the needles at the base of a pine tree to rest. The data system prescribed a shutdown of 4.5 hours. I set her to wake up in six.

  I was contemplating running down a deer, but venison doesn’t appeal. Trout. I’ll get us some trout.

  TRANSMISSION:

  Duarte: “Paul is just over there.”

  Hunter: “More than 400 miles over there.”

  Duarte: “We could reach him in three days.”

  Hunter: “Stick to the plan, Maria.”

  Duarte: “I miss him.”

  Hunter: “You can’t welsh on our deal.”

  Duarte: “I want to, but I won’t.”

  Hunter: “In the end, you’ll–”

  Duarte: “Don’t say it!”

  From the log of Maria Duarte

  Chief Botanist

  A pile of dead and dying gnus blocks my view of the Cro-Magnon clan. Fires built by the women are close enough to smell the roasts and skewered meat as they cook. Shouts, screams and laughter cut through the bird cries and buzzing of flies. The barely-dressed party of 48 adults, 13 adolescents and six infants revels in the aftermath of a wildly successful hunt while Hunter lies between a pair of zebra carcass coughing up blood.

  With four broken ribs, internal bleeding and a serious spinal cord injury, his prognosis would be quite grim if he was a normal man. I wish there was something I could do to help, but even if he had thought to pack my medical kit, I’ve nothing to treat a severed spine or lacerated kidney. In any event, his force field won’t let me get close. Hunter’s fate is once again up to the nanos.

  Trouble erupted not long after we rounded the northern tip of the Red Sea and turned due south into the endless savannah and pockets of dryland forest that will someday become Egypt’s eastern desert. Trailing Hunter through chest-high grasses, weaving around animals of all size and species, including quite a few baboon troops and elephant herds, I was too preoccupied to pay attention to the signs as I should have.

  Gray Beard has taught us the precursors of a stampede, how to look for pricked ears and changes in a herd’s lowing–to always keep an eye out for smoke, as wildfire is a sure catalyst. We’d been running with giant herds for months. Safe and invisible in my jumpsuit, I had become complacent.

  Many times during the thousands of miles we traveled in the Fertile Crescent we were forced to cross through herds too huge to circumnavigate. There’s more space between the animals than you would think. Transiting a moving herd in modern armor is like swimming across a river, much easier if you go with the flow.

  This afternoon’s drama began innocently enough. Most animals had gone to ground or found shade against Africa’s late summer heat. Zigzagging through milling gnu, zebra, horse and giraffe as they cropped their lunches, we had clear sailing right up until we descended the banks of a wide, unremarkable gully.

  Gaining the sandy bottom of the dry wash, we were skirting around a cluster of much taller than average gnu. These gnu had the same oxlike heads, curved horns, coarse black manes and long, flowing tails as the wildebeest we had run beside in East Asia, but were easily double in size. I’d say the mature males measured nine feet to the top of their muscular shoulders.

  In a flash of tails and white eyes, the giants bolted, spooked by a flood of other animals rumbling down the valley.

  “Bloody hell, run,” Hunter growled over the com line as animals poured over banks. Arms and legs churning, leading the charge, we sprinted side by side as the valley narrowed and deepened. Each attempt to angle up and over the bank was met with a tidal wave of horns and hooves.

  Stealing a glance back, I found I was no more than three feet ahead of the leading giant gnu. Head ducked low, determined black eyes, ropes of white froth streaming from the corners of its mouth, it led thousands of other beasts running for their lives. To fall was to die.

  Leaping rocks and chasms, running without fatigue, we slowly pulled ahead. As the gully widened, it looked like we would soon be able to escape up and over the side. Those hopes were dashed as we turned a sharp corner and ran into an oncoming stampede that made our pursuit look like a lazy little cattle drive. Aurochs, elephants and rhino thundered over the banks to flood the valley. Crushing antelope and gazelle, the behemoths thundered headlong into us.

  “On me!” Hunter snapped. “Kneel!”

  With an audible pop, I was enveloped by Hunter’s force field as the two stampedes collided. Hunched together on our knees, safe for the moment inside the shield, we witnessed the southern wave of megafauna sweep the gnus, giraffes and zebras under. The sounds will be with me forever. Not only the pounding of the hooves and bodies being torn asunder, but the barrage of thumps and bangs against the field.

  Each collision took a toll on Hunter. After about 1,000 direct impacts, the protective field began to flicker. The impacts now jostled us. Drawing his pistols from their holsters, Hunter blazed both pulses and sonic blasts at the oncoming herd. I thought he was mad. There would be no stopping the charge that way. To his credit, he brought down a pair of giant aurochs to form a protective wall in front of us.

  We suffered no more direct hits until the stampede played itself out. Just as I thought we were in the clear, an aurochs leaped over a heap of dying gnu to land atop the field precisely above Hunter. With all of its great weight and inertia concentrated in its massive front hooves, the aurochs compressed the weakened field. Landing on Hunter’s shoulders, the monstrous bull bent him so his face slammed to the ground between his legs. With a bellow of surprise as the field cushioned the impact, the bull tumbled and rolled onto its side. Snorting, he righted himself and thundered away.

  Hunter’s belt must have been hit with a burst of adrenaline or something for he instantly stood and staggered about 50 feet. I was left kneeling on the bloody ground as he reached a pair of dead zebras and collapsed between them. With a sizzle, his field automatically set up a protective barrier. I have not been able to get close enough to even take his pulse.

  Though he’s invisible to the naked eye, through my visor I can see the blood streaming down his chest. When he opens his eyes, they dart about, looking at a body that no longer responds to his commands to move. How long would a quadriplegic last in this unforgiving world?

  On the positive side, Hunter has suffered worse injuries and recovered. Sal stabbed him in the heart with a poisoned knife and that didn’t kill him. That gives me hope. I wonder how long it will take him to mend this time. Probably long enough for me to get back to Paul. I’ve been thinking about it, and have elected not to abandon Hunter. At least not yet.

  The first Cro-Magnons showed up a half hour after the chaos ended, a group of young hunters carrying firebrands and following the lead of an older alpha male with a gorilla paw necklace hanging around his neck. Appraising the carnage as they meandered between
the carcasses, the men were quite pleased with themselves. As always when males are involved, there was the usual preening, goading and jockeying within the pecking order.

  The burns and strange holes in the two dead aurochs instantly piqued their interest. They inspected both animals intently before the elder with gray at his temples and wrinkles at the corners of his green eyes ordered his juniors to pry open the beasts’ mouths. With considerable effort and many starts and stops, he extracted the huge, gray tongues with a flint blade. Once the tongues–longer and bigger around than my waist–were harvested, he used a flat stone to serve as a butcher block. Covering the stone with a leather skin from his light pack, he began slicing inch-thick fillets, handing them out to his men to eat raw.

  Did Hunter somehow know they would gravitate to the hard-to-kill aurochs? Did he run to the zebras because they are the last things a Cro-Magnon with a valley full of fresh meat would choose? Did his belt? Who knows what sorts of safety systems that thing has.

  The rest of the Cro-Magnon clan trickled in from all points of the compass. I don’t understand the language, but judging by the tenor of their expressions of joy as they crested the dry riverbank, I imagine the men and women conveyed messages along the lines of: “Oh boy!” and “You’ve got to be kidding me! Wow!”