Project Hannibal

by Kathryn Hoff

  “Must what?”

  “Musss-ttth,” Luis pronounced carefully. “Like a bull in rut. Adult males hang around near the herd but stay out of the way. But when the musth comes on, watch out. Very driven. Very aggressive.” He passed over the j.

  Kanut took the nub carefully. “So, if Bran’s a friendly puppy, what does that make you?”

  “Lone wolf,” Luis said. “Tomcat. Solitary. Not suited for family life.”

  “I’ve had tomcats that were pretty friendly,” Kanut said.

  “Neutered,” Luis sneered. “Pets.”

  “Everybody needs family.” The joint was down to nothing but paper and Kanut snuffed it out. “You must have parents.”

  “They split when I was three. My mother’s maternal instincts pretty much ended at weaning. She’s a cat, too. All the time I lived at home, she and I hissed and spit at each other.” He pawed the air like a snarling panther.

  Hell, he was talking too much. Pot did that to him.

  “Did your dad help out?”

  Luis shook his head. “He used to call me on my birthday.” Or the same month maybe. “He hasn’t even bothered to do that since I turned sixteen and came out as gay.”

  “That’s terrible.”

  Luis sniffed. “Mother’s taste in men was always exacra-, excarab- . . . it sucked. I asked her once what criteria she used when choosing a man to date. She said she liked to have a good time. Apparently, that didn’t require the man to have intelligence, culture, or simple kindness.”

  Kanut shook his head. “What a shame. Family’s the most important thing in life.”

  “You’re an Inupiaq, right?” Luis said. “I guess family’s important . . .”

  “Don’t do that,” Kanut snapped. “Don’t interpret whatever you don’t relate to as part of my native heritage. I don’t care what people you belong to—family is important.”

  Luis held up a hand. “Hey, I didn’t . . .”

  “Yes, you did. I may think you’re an entitled piece of shit, but do I say it’s because you’re gay or Latino?” He stabbed a finger for emphasis. “No, I do not. I do you the courtesy of assuming that you have chosen, as an individual, to be an entitled piece of shit.” He paused. “No offense.”

  No offense?

  After a moment of silence, Luis quirked a smile. “I know what you are!”

  Kanut narrowed his eyes.

  “A lion,” Luis said. “The only kind of cat that lives in a family. That’s what you are—plenty of roaring and ready to fight to protect the pride.”

  Kanut nodded, looking pleased.

  “Of course,” Luis added maliciously, “among lions, that’s all the males do: posture and fight. It’s the lionesses who rule the family.” He paused with a grin. “No offense.”

  Estelle had lost track of time. After another two calls, the satphone had run down, and Sera’s cellphone had long since died. The clouds kept the sky a uniform gray, hiding all clues as to what quadrant the sun was in.

  From now on, I’m wearing a watch, no matter how old-fashioned it makes me look.

  “It must be tomorrow by now,” Sera said. “They’ll come soon.”

  The women slept as much as they could, huddled together under the tarp. They ate bits of nutrition bars when their stomachs started growling, until the food was gone. When the water bottles were exhausted, Estelle refilled them from the meltwater running down the glacier, using a scrap of nylon scarf to filter out the ash. Any parasites they picked up, they’d have to deal with when they got home.

  “I’m going to write a book,” Sera said. “The Alaska Volcano Weight-Loss Plan. A guaranteed best seller.”

  Estelle laughed, but soon the lack of food would be no joke, especially for Annie. Food was fuel, and without fuel, the body’s engine wouldn’t be able to stay warm.

  They needed to conserve energy, but still Estelle made them get up and walk a bit from time to time. She insisted that Annie sit upright as much as she could, braced against a suitcase. Patients lost muscle and lung function quickly, lying down too much.

  The wolves sounded off from time to time. Were they getting closer? Estelle couldn’t tell. She tried to take comfort from their cries—surely, they’d be silent if they were on the hunt? But that thought put her nerves on edge when she didn’t hear the howls.

  Sera sidled close to Estelle. “Do you think the wolves would attack us?”

  “They won’t attack humans,” Estelle said, with more confidence than she felt. “Especially not three of us. You saw them in Denali, how they shied away from people.”

  “That’s different—we were in a tour bus.” Sera glanced toward the makeshift tent where Annie was resting. “Pick off the sick and elderly, isn’t that what predators do? Maybe we should go back to the plane. I know it would be colder, but the wolves . . .”

  Estelle shook her head. The crumpled plane might as well be on the moon—there was no way Annie could make it, no matter how much help Sera and Estelle provided. “We’ll just have to stay together so none of us looks like an easy target.”

  Sera hunched her shoulders, arms crossed. “I don’t want to die out here to be some wolf’s lunch.”

  Estelle took Sera’s hand. “Help will come soon.”

  CHAPTER 30

  Running

  Luis had to shake Kanut awake in the morning. “Come on, Officer. We have a long day ahead.”

  Kanut groaned and glanced at his watch. “Jesus, Cortez, it’s only four a.m.”

  “I’ve been up for ages.” In fact, Luis had already harnessed the mammoths and packed everything but the tent. “You can eat breakfast while we ride.”

  Luis put Kanut on a different mammoth, Emerald. He told Kanut that Topaz needed a rest from being ridden, but mostly he’d made the change because Emerald tended to lag at the rear of the herd, so Luis would be spared having to talk to Kanut.

  It was stupid to get stoned with a cop. How could he have talked so much? Telling Kanut about his dad, for God’s sake. He’d never even talked to Brandon about Dad. Lone wolf, my ass. This ridiculous situation had Luis acting like a damned trained seal.

  But it would be over soon. Two more ridges to cross, a small river to ford, another ridge, and they’d be at the crash site. He’d drop Kanut off to protect the women, then take the herd and head north. A few days should see him to the tundra in a place flat enough for the bush pilot to land, and by then, surely the ash would have cleared. Then back to Fairbanks and kill some time until Anjou was ready to begin operations again. That is, he thought gloomily, assuming Ginger was able to work her magic and get the grant extended. If not, it was time to think about a new career.

  For the next few hours, the mammoths kept a decent pace, trekking effortlessly over the tall grass, pausing to snatch a few bites, then moving on. The ash-dusted meadows changed to hills, more up than down, as the herd gradually gained altitude. The clumps of aspens grew fewer and farther apart.

  In midafternoon, Luis stopped and dismounted. “Time for a break.”

  “I could keep going for hours!” Kanut called.

  Luis chuckled. Liar. The trooper had to be hurting. “Maybe you can, but the mammoths need to rest.”

  He was getting worried about Opal. When she straggled up, fifteen minutes after the rest of the herd had stopped, she was almost asleep on her feet, too tired to eat.

  Elephants give birth without help all the time, Luis thought. But Opal was carrying one of Anjou’s newer engineered mammoths, bigger than a baby she might have had naturally.

  Kanut put away his satphone with a sigh.

  “Family all right?” Luis asked.

  “Fine, but Karen’s pretty mad at me for being AWOL all this time. It would be easier if I could tell her when I’ll be home.”

  “No air travel yet?”

  “The volcano’s still smoking. Alaska Eagle Med is hounding headquarters about their doctor, and they’re hounding me. What’s our ETA?”

  “Half a day. We’re about eight mil
es from the crash coordinates.”

  Kanut stretched. “Then let’s . . .” He froze, his eyes on the ridge they’d crossed an hour ago.

  A solitary wolf was silhouetted against the gray sky. It paused, head up, ears alert, facing their direction. Then, nose down, it ranged back and forth, mining the grass for all the information it could pick up from their scent.

  “Think he’s alone?” Luis asked.

  “No. But I don’t think even a whole wolfpack would take on a herd of mammoths.”

  “They might take on a young one like Jet if they could separate it. Mount up. Time to give the mammoths some practical training in avoiding danger.”

  As soon as he and Kanut were mounted, Luis touched his tablet. The device emitted a high cry, an elephant alert call.

  Instantly, the mammoth heads popped up. Ears flapped in agitation and trunks rose to catch the scent of danger. Ruby repeated the alert call, prompting the others to pick it up in a chorus of squeals.

  That’s right, girls. Find the danger. He’d sensitized them to dogs, trained them that fast-running canids were a thing to avoid, but this was their first exposure to wolves in the wild.

  Em was first to locate the wolf, her trunk lifted like a periscope homed in on the trail behind them. Her call changed to a short screech, a mammoth version of oh, shit.

  Ruby huffed. Immediately, the herd solidified. Jet was shoved to the center, the adults ranging on the outer edges with tusks facing outward.

  “Good, good,” Luis crooned. “Now, Ruby, move them out, but keep the herd close. Tcha.”

  Mammoths couldn’t trot. Technically, they couldn’t even run—there was never a time when all four feet would be off the ground. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t move fast.

  Ruby scrambled up the hill, lifting knees high, wedging her flat feet into toeholds and heaving her bulk up with surprising agility. Where no toeholds existed, a slash of her tusks created them.

  Luis checked the tablet. The herd was more strung out than he liked, but help was on the way—Diamond and Turq, the two males that had been loosely following the herd, had heard the distress calls and were coming up fast.

  The herd crested the hill and began to zigzag down the other side.

  A roar sounded from ahead—a small, nameless river cutting through the wilderness.

  At least, it had looked small from the satellite images. But with the spring thaw releasing water from mountain snows and the added burden of the storm’s rain, the river had broadened to thirty yards of torrent rushing over boulders.

  From where Luis sat atop Ruby, it looked like one serious barrier.

  In the rustic cabin, Anjou peered at the blips on his laptop. “What the devil is Luis doing? He’s supposed to be heading east.” Instead, the main herd had turned south, away from grid Hb27. “They seem to be going deeper into the area affected by ashfall. We should call him.”

  Ginger turned the laptop away and closed the feed of the mammoths’ positions. “Absolutely not. Satellite calls can be tracked. Luis knows what he’s doing. Our concern should be Silver and Gold.”

  He bridled. “Our concern should be all the mammoths.”

  “Of course, my dear.” Her simpering smile was unconvincing. Diamond, Ruby, Opal . . . his beautiful creations—and she’d already written them off.

  Anjou stared bleakly at the chinked cabin walls and the stuffed fish, wishing he had a way to escape. “Maybe we should call a press conference now,” he said. “Once the world knows about the mammoths, we can come out in the open and clear up all this misunderstanding.”

  “We’d be arrested immediately. Don’t you see? Now more than ever, we must stay out of sight. Better to lose Luis’s herd than lose our freedom.” She bent to straighten his collar. “Go comb your hair—it’s time for our video call.”

  Ginger drew her chair close so they could both peer into the screen. The grainy image of Nikodim Zhurov appeared, as sleek and self-satisfied as when Anjou had met him in Oslo. “Ginger! Henri! I am so glad you have contacted me. The Academy of Sciences is extremely interested in a collaboration. Our own progress has been substantial, very substantial. Unfortunately, the survival rates are not . . . well, to be honest, we are under pressure, great pressure, to make a better showing. To date, none of our specimens has survived more than a few hours.”

  Anjou sniffed. Of course they hadn’t. Producing a mammoth was about more than splicing DNA together and sticking it in an elephant. Zhurov didn’t have the overall understanding of the organism needed to bring a hybrid not simply to birth but to maturity.

  “We will need laboratory resources,” Ginger said. “And decent living accommodations.”

  Anjou tightened his lips. This was supposed to be a test-the-waters call, and she was talking terms already? This was all going a little too fast for him.

  “Whatever you need,” Zhurov said. “The finest facilities will be at your disposal for your research, and a dacha in the countryside to enjoy at your leisure. I can assure you that scientists are regarded much more favorably here than in your country. And we have none of the petty restrictions that seem to plague your institutions. Er . . . you did say two adult specimens? Females, and pregnant?”

  “Two thousand kilos each,” Ginger said, “and halfway through the period of gestation.”

  “So small! And yet mature. Remarkable.”

  As Ginger added details, Anjou became more and more uncomfortable. Zhurov was clearly more interested in Silver and Gold than in Anjou. For that matter, judging by the easy conversation between them, Zhurov was more interested in Ginger than in Anjou.

  “The logistics will be challenging,” Zhurov said. “Although I agree it is best to be circumspect.”

  Logistics? Were they already talking about how to transport the mammoths?

  Anjou broke in with, “Fine, we’ll get back to you.”

  Ginger sent him an annoyed glance but, after a few pleasantries in Russian, ended the call.

  “There was no reason to be rude,” she said.

  “There was no reason for you to go on and on, either. And since when do you speak Russian?”

  Ginger sighed. “I grew up in Korea. It was considered wise to learn both Russian and English. A little Mandarin, too, if you must know. Have you never wondered at the fact that only Americans seem incapable of learning more than a single language? And most don’t even speak that one properly.”

  Anjou stared out the window at the gulls swooping in the sky. Why did people love the long days of summer? Even daylight got boring when it never ended. And every hour of summer daylight would be paid for with an hour of dispiriting darkness when winter came.

  Ginger laid a hand on his arm. “I don’t want to quarrel. What’s really bothering you?”

  “I don’t trust Zhurov,” Anjou sniffed. “He’s too quick to make promises. He reminds me of a used car salesman.”

  “A used car salesman?” For a moment, Ginger just stared. Then she giggled, covering her mouth with her hand like a little girl. “Henri, you are jealous!”

  “Don’t be absurd. I don’t trust him, that’s all. He only wants the mammoths. Once he gets them, he’ll try to take over the research himself and crowd me—crowd us out. Take all the credit for our work.”

  “Impossible. You heard him—they haven’t succeeded with even one living specimen. You’ve created an entire herd.” She smiled sweetly. “If you don’t trust him, then trust me. This is the right thing to do—and we don’t have time to wait. Don’t forget, we are wanted persons. This is our chance, not merely to avoid arrest and prison, but to bring our dream to fruition. This is our chance to pursue our science, to go to the one place where our innovation is welcomed and not despised. Future generations will thank us.”

  Anjou stared, unseeing, out the window. Russia or prison? A hell of a choice.

  CHAPTER 31

  Out of sight

  The static-filled hospital call system blared into the residents’ lounge. “Dr. Dupris
to ER, stat.”

  Adrenaline pumping, Estelle sat up, ready to race into duty.

  Long grass tickled her face.

  “Dr. Dupris?” Annie’s quavery voice called. “Are you there?”

  Not the emergency room . . . Right. Alaska. The plane’s forced landing. Estelle took two deep breaths to get her heart under control.

  “I’m here, Annie.” She crept over to the tarp lean-to. “Do you need help?”

  “Well, yes. I need to pee, dear. But more important, I’m worried about Sera.”

  Estelle helped Annie sit up and, after a moment to rest, helped her to her feet. Annie was coughing more and already was noticeably weaker, her muscles losing tone from lying down too much.

  “Don’t worry about Sera. She’s going through a rough time right now, but she’s strong.”

  Annie clucked her tongue. “Of course she’s strong. The question is, where did she go?”

  “Go?”

  Estelle looked around. Surely Sera was curled up on the ground somewhere close. “She’s probably asleep. The grass is so tall . . .”

  “She walked away,” Annie said. “I heard her walk off up the hill, but that must have been an hour ago. I may have dozed off, but I’m sure I haven’t heard her come back.”

  “She’s asleep somewhere . . . she must be. Sera! Sera!”

  No answer. No teenaged girl in sight.

  To the west, steep, forbidding hills of jumbled rock rose in ranks. Not even a tree to entice an adventurous soul to go that way. To the south, unbroken grass meadow sloped down for half a mile, ending in a small ridge.

  To the east was the glacier. Estelle scanned it anxiously. No crumpled young body on its graveled surface. But if Sera had wandered onto the glacier and slipped . . . there was no telling how far a body might slide down the icy slope, cut and snagging on the sharp, frozen slivers.

  No! Estelle rejected the horrible image. Sera wouldn’t go near the glacier, not after the terrifying slide they’d all taken when they abandoned the plane.

  To the north, up the hill, more grass—and a faint trail of bent stems.