by Rajan Khanna
Then, my feet hit the floor. It’s a long space. Open. Lined with shelves. I move closer to one and shine the flashlight over it to see that it’s covered in garbage. Boxes torn into tatters. Plastic wrenched and ripped apart. Food containers. As I shine the light over the next shelf, then the one opposite, then the far side, it’s pretty much all like that. It makes sense. If the Ferals got in, they would have taken it all.
Just a few hours ago, I would have wilted at the sight of this. If it had been intact, it would have been a treasure trove. Some of it seems to be things like oil and salt and spices, all valuable. This plus the computers and other equipment on the upper floor would have been Dad’s score. It would have set us up for years. Gotten us a second ship, even. Not that Dad would have wanted that. Me?
Maybe.
Something bothers me. There were Ferals here. There’s dried shit strewn across the place. The smell is terrifying. Definitely more than one Feral. Where are they now? Did they just eat and leave? It seems like this would have been good shelter. It feels like it would have been comfortable. I think? But what the fuck do I know?
I move down the long room, shining the light in front of me. Over shredded bags and scraps of plastic, supplies made confetti by nails and teeth. More desiccated droppings. And there, at the end of the room, is the answer to the mystery. Maybe the ground shifted here, or there was an actual earthquake. Or maybe it was built upon shaky foundations. The wall, which seems to be solid and mostly intact, has fallen away from the building, leaving a big crack, almost a crevasse beneath it, which extends down into the hill. Some enterprising Feral must have discovered this entrance and gotten in.
That’s one of the things I never understood, and Miranda never was able to enlighten me—what remains in a Feral’s mind? Is there any scrap of humanity left, any knowledge or buried subconscious treasure still lodged in the mire of that Bug-addled brain? Is there memory? Or is it just curiosity? Because that’s something Miranda talked about. That, in addition to the driving hunger and the violence, Ferals were, like our monkey ancestors, curious. Those things all together are why they run toward gunshots and engines and crashes rather than running away. That’s why they’re so dangerous.
I’m halfway down into the crevasse before I’m conscious of the fact that I’m doing it. The rock here is broken off in almost flat sheets, so it’s not too hard to lower myself in, finding footholds as I descend. It wouldn’t be hard to get up this way, either.
Further down this crack, I see why there are no more Ferals here. The rock gives way to dirt and, while there was probably a viable tunnel here for a while, it’s now collapsed and filled in. I sit there, for a while, in the dark. Surrounded by cold stone and earth, like one of them.
I wonder what it must be like for Ferals. I was raised to believe that everything human in them was gone. That those things weren’t people. But, if I’m honest, truly honest with myself, here alone in the dark, I can admit that I’ve had doubts. What if occasionally there are memories, fleeting in the chaos, but there after all. The memory of a smile of a loved one. Or the taste of something delicious in a world of rough eating. It doesn’t change the fact that they’re Ferals, or that they’ll rip your face off, or that they should be put down as quickly and as efficiently as possible. Thing is, I don’t know if it’s better if those memories exist or not. What’s more tragic—that they are haunted by their former life or that it’s gone completely?
Ben Gold, philosopher in the dark.
I realize what I’m doing, squatting in the darkness, not just on the ground but under it. A piece of shit, stuck in the bowels of the world.
I climb back up into the storeroom, then up to the basement, and then to the ground floor. I don’t know what I expected to find here—answers? Peace? None are offered. Ganesha’s hands are actually empty.
I walk outside, and the sun blinds me. I should feel warmed, but instead I just feel exposed. The small, shriveled thing that is me is now laid bare to the world, and I find that prospect truly terrifying.
I wander around to the other side of the hill. Where I judge the tunnel would have led, and there, as I suspected, is a gash in the earth, the way into the temple that was probably until recently open and available to any Feral that might have come along.
Then, as I crouch atop the hill, eyes squinted against the sun, the heat beating down on me, I see my father.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
FROM THE JOURNAL OF MIRANDA MEHRA
Dear Ben,
Have you ever felt like you’re a passenger in your own body? Like a feeling of not fully being present, of being detached and untethered from what your hands and legs and even mouth might be doing?
Working in the lab is like that, rote but disconnected. You just focus on the work, on the data in front of you. Anything else gets too . . . defeating. I wake up in my cell, they walk me to the lab. There are brief interruptions—meal time (either next to the lab or in my cell), bathing time twice a week—but otherwise my life oscillates between two poles.
So when I was taken from the lab today and escorted to Blaze, it was notable. But also terrifying. What did they want from me this time? Was it some kind of new punishment?
My escorts walked me, without talking, to the second floor of the building, to a large office with windows overlooking the city. The guards left. Maya, too. Just me and Blaze. I’m sure there were others nearby, but for the moment we were alone, her standing behind the desk and me sitting in front of it.
I sat there and fantasized about escaping, about attacking Blaze, maybe even killing her. I started thinking about how long that would take. I thought that I could kill her before the guards got to me. I wouldn’t last long after that, but surely taking down the head of the Helix would be worth it?
The thought was persistent. Mostly because I was scared. People don’t see Blaze very often. I’d heard stories, of experiments she did on some of the people who didn’t work out. Human test subjects.
Blaze is taller and more athletic than me. She might get the upper hand in a fistfight, and I didn’t like those odds. I looked around for a weapon, somewhere, anywhere, but the closest I could find was the pen on her desk. That could work, plunged into the carotid. But I would have to be precise.
The moment passed. Of course I wasn’t going to attack her. Not there. But if she tried something . . .
“You know why I don’t fear for my safety?” she asked, as if reading my mind.
“No,” I said. “Why?”
“Because I created this environment, I control the variables, and I’ve accounted for any possibility, including a threat to my person. Most people learn this quickly, either by the easy way or the hard one. Most of the time, I need not even bother to make a pretense.”
“All of the variables?” I asked.
She stared back at me without saying anything.
“There’s still chance,” I said. “Entropy. You have the advantage in reach and weight and strength, but there’s still a probability that I could overcome you, no matter how small that number may be. It’s non-zero.”
“True,” she said, nodding. “But you’re only seeing what’s obvious.”
I narrowed my eyes but said nothing. She held up one gloved hand, smiled, then formed a fist. Almost too quickly for me to see, a knife extended from her wrist, a good ten or more centimeters beyond her fist. “A special design,” she said. “A bit dramatic, I’ll admit, but certainly effective.”
I nodded. With something like that, she could have killed me before I got close enough to do any real damage. She probably would have enjoyed it.
She grabbed the blade with her other gloved hand and retracted it back into its hidden sheath. “Just a reminder. You see only a fraction. You see the shape of the organism, but you don’t see the brain, the nervous system, the limbic system. The complex systems below the surface that govern response and action. You see the guards, our visible security, but not the countless measures we built into our society h
ere.”
A threat. And an attempt to intimidate me. I wish I could say it didn’t work, but there, with me sitting in that room, her standing up behind her desk, and all the space between us, I felt like she was in complete control. And me? I was powerless. “Noted,” I said.
She smiled and it almost seemed warm and genuine. Almost.
“You’ve been here for weeks now, and you’ve been working, yes, but I know that you can do better than you are. Maya reported on all the work you did back on your island, the strides you made, even against our special cocktail, what you called ‘Enigma.’ Love those names, by the way. We tend to number our viruses here. It’s more efficient, but I think I’ve shown that I have an appreciation for the dramatic from time to time.”
She didn’t seem to need a reply from me, so I didn’t give her one.
“Threats can be useful. They keep people in line, but they don’t engender enthusiasm. They don’t stoke the fire, they stifle it. Instead, I’m going to make you an offer.”
I stared at her.
“Miranda, I believe that we could accomplish great things together. I even think that you could come to see that, too.”
The thought made me want to vomit, and I felt my morning meal come up in my throat. I swallowed it down, trying to keep my face blank. “What’s the offer?”
Blaze placed her hands down on her desk, palms flat against the surface. “First, let me say that we’re not monsters here. We’re not the Valhallans, who threaten and bully pointlessly, even among their own people. I believe that minds work better with a little freedom.”
I leaned forward in my chair. “You’ll let me out? Into the city?”
Blaze nodded. “You’ll have to be supervised, but yes. You’ll come to learn that there’s nothing you can do that would damage our operations; there’s no way for you to escape here.”
I wish I could say that I spit in her face, unimpressed by her offer, but the idea of weeks and months of my life alternating between my cell and the lab . . . it was wearing me down, little by little. On the commune, at Apple Pi, on Tamoanchan, we had labs, yes, but we worked outdoors a lot of the time. We walked outside to clear our heads and debate our work and feel alive. They had cut me off from all of that.
So when she held out freedom in her open hand, limited though it was, I wanted to grab for it. But I forced myself to remember the other hand.
“What do you want in return?” I asked. My voice sounded small and weak.
“Don’t look so worried,” she said. “What I’m offering you is a chance to do something you already want to do. I’m offering you a chance to work on a vaccine.”
I sat back, stunned. I was sure she was going to put me to work on a new viral weapon. Or work on their weaponized Ferals. “A vaccine?” I asked, when I found the words. “For Maenad?”
She smiled. “Yes.”
Once again I had to force myself to remember where I was, whom I was talking to. “Why?”
Blaze crossed her arms and gave me a deep stare. “I think you’ll realize why,” she said. “This is something we both want.”
It was obvious. While we all worked with Maenad, we were still vulnerable to it. A vaccine would give the Helix free reign to work with Maenad without worrying about infection. I flashed back to being on Gastown, running scared like everyone else, as Valhallan ships, rigged with hooks, dropped bleeding Ferals onto the city.
“I want a vaccine for everyone,” I said. “You would keep it for your people alone.”
“Perhaps,” she said. “Certainly at first. But . . .” She leaned forward and joined her hands together. “Once a vaccine exists, it exists. Once we crack that problem, it can be re-created.” She shrugged. “Who’s to say that you, or someone like you, couldn’t take that and run with it. Make more. Spread it around. I don’t think much of your chances, but they are . . . non-zero.”
I sat back, still silent. Thinking.
“You know your best chance is with us. With our equipment, with our knowledge, as well as your own. You had an impressive operation, in your laboratory on that island, but ours is better. Our people are better.”
“Bullshit,” I said. I hadn’t meant to, it just spilled out of me.
Something flinty came into her eyes. “You came from a commune, right? Some cobbled-together group of doddering old scientists trying to make the world a better place?” I could see something hot bubbling up behind her calm demeanor. “The people who started the Helix, they set their priorities early on. While the rest of the survivors were off raiding weapons depots for guns and ammunition, we were raiding hospitals and research centers. Our predecessors even raided the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.” Her eyes sparkled, as if there was something more she wasn’t revealing. A story there. “While people were fighting over scraps and finding holes to hide in, while your people were sitting in your fields or your schoolhouses, we were building laboratories, within which we were growing our own food, and planning, of course. Planning the future.” Her gloved hand squeezed into a fist. “This is our birthright.”
Somewhere in her pompous tirade I found a little heat of my own. “Yet you still don’t have it. Your vaccine.”
She inclined her head. “It has, so far, eluded us. But your detection test, that was groundbreaking. Using what you discovered, I think that we can bridge that gap. You can help us.”
It was tempting. I’m ashamed to say it, but a vaccine. I’ve wanted one for so long. But the Helix killed my friend. They kidnapped me. They attacked Tamoanchan. They took Gastown. They have you, Ben. I wanted to scream in her face; I wanted to tell her to go fuck herself; I wanted to say that I would sooner die than help her and the Helix get what they want.
Instead I just said, “I can’t.”
Blaze sighed. She closed her eyes and shook her head. Then she shrugged. “Very well. I’m disappointed, but I can’t force you. I expect you want to get back to your room?”
I exhaled and nodded. I had been expecting anger, a tirade, bullying . . . something. But she just came out from behind the desk and said, “Let me walk you out.”
I stood up and she escorted me out of the room, surprising me by taking me into one of the adjacent corridors. “I’d like to show you something,” she said. She opened a door off of the corridor and beckoned to me. It was clear this wasn’t a request, it was a command. I told myself that if she wanted to hurt me, she would do it in front of the others. To make an example. I forced myself to walk forward and through the door. Blaze followed behind me.
I immediately smelled antiseptic, but something else. Something undeniably human. I stopped short when I saw the figure standing there.
A male Feral, naked and heavily muscled, held in a glass or plastic enclosure. It stood straight, barely moving. It didn’t react to my presence, or Blaze’s. I turned, scared, to look at Blaze. Her smile took up most of her face. “Isn’t it impressive?” she asked.
“How?” was all I managed to ask.
“Careful training and conditioning. It took a while to get it to learn, but it’s just another animal, after all. A social animal. That makes it easier.”
“It’s . . . larger than I’ve seen.”
“Growth hormones and anabolic-androgenic steroids,” Blaze said. “Administered regularly over a course of months. Plus more specialized training. We built an exercise course down on the ground.”
I turned to face her, without turning my back on the Feral. “For what purpose?”
She smiled. “Control.”
She walked up to the cage door, and, to my horror, opened it. “It’s quite safe.”
I stayed where I was. Then she came to me, put a hand on my arm, and walked me to the open door. “See?”
“Yes, I see,” I said, trying to move away.
“See a little closer,” she said. And pushed me through the door. It happened so fast. Next thing I knew, I was in the cage and the door was closed.
“Let me out,” I said. I kept my voice ev
en, scared that I would rile up the Feral if I was too loud. I stood sideways, trying to plead with Blaze but unable to turn my back to the Feral.
“Soon.” Blaze crossed her arms. “I want you to see the level of our control.”
“I get it,” I said.
“Not yet.” Her smile showed her perfect teeth. Then she held up a hand in a closed fist, palm facing outward, and whistled shrilly.
In an instant, the Feral changed. The stillness turned into a low crouch, muscles bunching, but even worse were its lips, which curled back from its teeth. A low sound came out of it, part groan, part growl, and it poised for attack.
I froze. I’ve worked with Ferals so many times. But this was something different. It went from completely neutral and still to ready to kill in just an instant. My whole body tensed up, waiting for it to start tearing me apart, and then—
Blaze whistled again. The Feral returned to its silent, still state.
I was shaking, no longer in control of my body. “Behavioral conditioning,” I said, when I was able to form words again.
“Just so,” Blaze said. “Strong conditioning. We can take it around anyone and it won’t attack, unless we want it to. Only, we’ve never really tested the duration of the control. Whether it will hold indefinitely.” She shrugged. “Until now.”
Before the meaning of her words could sink in, she wheeled around and walked toward the exit.
“No!” I yelled, but then I immediately silenced myself, too aware, too afraid of the Feral so close to me.
“I’ll leave the light on,” Blaze called over her shoulder. “So you can at least see your companion.”
Then she walked out the door.
Something that sounded like a whimper came out of my mouth, but I stifled it. I couldn’t move. I could barely breathe. I was afraid that any movement I might make would attract its attention, would trigger its attack. Or that I might inhale some of its saliva.
I was too close to it. One lunge away. I froze in a standing crouch, unsure, unable to move, painfully aware of the Feral where it stood.