Fearful Symmetry: A Thriller

by McBride, Michael

  The tree dropped suddenly.

  He looked up to see Adrianne leaping toward him with her arms extended. The trunk fell away from her feet. The branches grabbed for her legs.

  Brooks caught her hand and threw himself backward, pulling her along with him. She landed squarely on his chest, knocking the wind out of him. He rolled out from beneath her and crawled toward the ledge, his vision throbbing, his body convulsing in a desperate attempt to refill his lungs.

  White bodies became entangled in the branches of the falling pine as it dropped out of sight, while others still advanced along the lone remaining tree.

  He collapsed to the ground and rolled onto his side. Drew the ax and swung it for the tree, but there was no force behind the blow.

  Adrianne leapt over him and sat on the ground, braced her feet against the trunk, and screamed as she pushed. The tree slid a good foot along the ledge. She scooted closer and tried again.

  Brooks saw white hair clearly now as arms shoved branches out of the way for bodies moving low to the trunk, humanoid feet gripping almost like hands.

  Adrianne shoved again with her legs and the trunk slid. The uppermost branches bent and the treetop dropped over the edge.

  Brooks saw a flash of terror in a pair of blue eyes through the needles, and then they were gone. The tree canted downward and dove into the river with a splash of water that passed through the mist.

  His breath returned with a high-pitched wheeze and he crawled over to where Adrianne stared down at the river. Far across on the other side, a silhouette stood apart from the forest, its long fur blowing on the wind like flames. It raised its face to the sky and drew several deep inhalations. Its head snapped back down and it turned in their general direction. Again it rose to its full height and sniffed. It abruptly dropped to a crouch and bared its teeth at them. And then it was gone, leaving only a trail of shaking branches in its wake.

  Thirty-nine

  Excerpt from the journal of

  Hermann G. Wolff

  Courtesy of Johann Brandt, Private Collection

  Chicago, Illinois

  (Translated from original handwritten German text)

  March 1939

  On the twenty-fourth day I followed them. Three monks arrived with the dawn. Two led oxen by the reins while the third carried what I at first believed to be a lantern from a distance. As they neared I saw the smoke issuing from the openings in the golden housing and smelled the distinct aroma of sandalwood. The monk swung it gently from side to side like a priest with his thurible.

  I waited at the top of the cliff beside the path, hidden behind the same rhododendron for the third straight day since concocting my suicidal plan. I watched them chain the first yak to the cairn at the edge of the farmer’s land. My gracious host—a man I knew by the name of Wang-chuck [sic]—remained inside his home behind the battened shutters until they were gone before he finally came out to inspect the offering. He fed it fresh vegetables of a quality better than he reserved for his own table and served it fresh water from the stream. He was still singing its blessings when I passed him on his knees and followed the scent of sandalwood into the forest.

  They moved at a slow, steady pace thanks to the yak, which allowed me to sneak from behind one tree to the next at a comfortable speed that minimized my exposure. The grunting of the beast allowed me to keep track of them even when they were outside of my range of sight.

  Only a fool would not recognize what they intended to do with the yaks. I had already listened to several being slaughtered from where I awakened to their screams in the relative safety of the barn. They were sacrifices to the creatures, flesh and blood in exchange for their safe passage. After all, could not even the mighty lion be tamed in such a manner?

  There were several times when I feared they sensed my presence. I hid as best I could and waited with baited breath until they contented themselves once more that they were alone and again resumed their trek, all the while burning that infernal incense, which after a time came to blend with the smell of the forest itself.

  I do not remember how long we walked, only that by the time we reached the bridge where what seemed a lifetime ago I filmed König examining the footprint of the monster that killed him, it felt like days had passed. The mere act of returning to that awful place caused me such anxiety that my heart pounded and my legs trembled. My mouth became so dry that no amount of fluid would slake my thirst. My head hurt and my palms sweat and I worried my breathing would give me away.

  Never had I imagined I possessed the kind of courage I required to cross that bridge, while every fiber of my being resisted with such vehemence that I was in tears before I set foot on the weathered planks.

  Every tree, it seemed, was alive with movement and beneath the sound of the river was the roar of something else. I knew this was not the case, for if death came for me, I knew I would not see it coming. I lacked the skills of a hunter, at least when it came to animals of a lower order. I was able to track the monks without much difficulty and followed them for the better part of the day, until the sun was beginning its descent and lengthening the shadows. They were halfway across the clearing by the time I reached the end of the path, and still oblivious to my presence. I could tell where they were going by the course they plotted through the tall grasses. As I expected, they intended to chain the beast to the chorten where we had left the remains of the man from the broken coffin. Once they did, I had every cause to believe they would expedite their departure before the feeding commenced, which meant I had precious little time to enact my plan.

  I knew this part of the valley better than any other and made my way to the cave where we had left all of our supplies. They remained precisely as we had left them, only then was not the time to gather those for which I had come. This trip was to collect one solitary item I found in its own case with the rest of König’s belongings. With it in my possession, I followed the path around the circumference of the field until I heard the lowing of the yak, at which point I slowed my progress and approached the monks with an element of stealth.

  By the time they heard me coming, I was already in their midst with the Erfurt Luger our master hunter inherited from his father in my fist. My plan had been to disrobe them, relieve them of the incense-burning censer, and disguise myself as one of them long enough to gather everything of importance and facilitate my departure. As they were holy men, I expected immediate compliance with my demands, not the chaos that ensued.

  Everything happened so fast that even now I am uncertain of the sequence of events or how they came to pass. I know only that one of the monks made a move to disarm me of the pistol and another was shot in the ensuing fracas. The first monk disengaged when his brother fell and before I realized what I intended to do, I had shot him in the back, leaving me alone in the clearing with the last monk, who turned and ran before I got a look at his face.

  I called after him that I meant him no harm and that events had simply spiraled out of my control. Even if he heard me, I am certain the sight of his brothers on the ground and me wearing their blood spoke louder.

  It was only when he disappeared into the jungle that I realized the monastery from which he hailed was somewhere along the path I would need to travel to pass through the Himalayas. If he were allowed to reach it, his entire order would be waiting to intercept me on my return to the Fatherland.

  He put up a furious chase, but in the end his red robe betrayed him through the trees and I shot him from thirty meters. When I finally reached the point where he had fallen, all that was left of him was a pattern of blood on the ground. I did not have the time to further track him, not with the rate at which the sun was sinking toward the mountains. I was confident, however, that with as badly as he was wounded, he would not be able to outpace me indefinitely.

  I returned to the clearing where the dead men lay on the ground before the yak, stripped out of my clothes, and left them with the dead monks, one of whose robes fit me well enough. I was surp
rised the beasts had not yet been summoned by the smell of the carnage. It was only then that I understood what König had recognized from the start: These creatures preferred to hunt under the cover of darkness or in the deep shadows of the darkest sections of the forest.

  I remember gauging the distance from the sun to the peaks before running back to the cave. There were so many things I wanted to take, and yet only so much I could carry. A single trunk filled with film canisters and samples of the flora was my physical limit, at least across a distance of any length, which meant I would be forced to leave behind the crates of specimens König collected and entire trunks overflowing with the research of our scientists. I did not comprehend their work well enough to quickly sort out the most important pieces, either. If I returned with only a fraction of my own work, none of which detailed the Aryan race we had been sent here to find or corroborated my fantastic stories of the hairy beasts that killed the rest of my team, I would undoubtedly incur the wrath of Herr Himmler. I was running out of time and there was no way I could salvage this plan without carrying well more than I could move, even with the aid of a mule.

  It was from this thought that inspiration struck.

  I realized I had something better than a mule, something that would allow me to carry everything I needed.

  I conservatively estimated the sun to be three hours from setting, which meant I was already running behind schedule. I was going to need every minute of that three hours and even then I would be reliant upon a significant amount of luck.

  The yak was still in one piece when I arrived and came with me willingly enough once I unchained him, although at a maddeningly slow pace. By the time we returned to the cave, I was on the verge of panic. The animal grazed while I burdened it with everything of importance: a case of König’s rarest pelts; Metzger’s magnetic readings and gemstones; Eberhardt’s maps and sketchbooks; a case of what I hoped were my best films; and Brandt’s prized trunk with his cherished journals and irreplaceable supplies. I tied it all down as I had seen the Sherpas do so many times and swung the censer in front of me as I drove the yak toward the setting sun, which I watched darken from gold to orange, and orange to red through the canopy above me, all the while knowing I would never reach the bridge in time.

  The shadows grew bolder and from their depths I heard the crackle of movement, sounds that became less subtle with each passing minute until they were all I could hear. The branches visibly shook and I recognized that I had run out of time.

  The sun was still a blood-red stain on the mountaintops when the yak brayed and dug in its heels. It was only then that I deciphered the sounds of footsteps from the ruckus, footsteps that blossomed into riotous crashing as the forest came to life. The animal shrieked. I heard the sudden rush of blood spattering the forest floor, then the heavy slop of viscera following suit.

  I turned to see it collapse to its knees, then topple to its side. The rope snapped and spilled its cargo into the bushes.

  And then all was quiet, save for the rumble of the river.

  Warm blood crept over the tops of my sandals and onto my bare feet. I held the censer in front of me like a shield, the smoke drifting from the vessel into tentacles that searched the night air for the creatures I could not see, and yet knew were somewhere nearby.

  I stood perfectly still as one by one they emerged from the shadows of the forest, man-apes that approached their meal with caution before attacking it with a savagery the likes of which I’d never seen before.

  I watched them in abject horror, flaying the animal with their claws and thrusting their teeth into its flesh. I was certain when they were done with it, they would turn their hunger upon me, but I didn’t dare move. I was paralyzed by fear to such an extent that I lost control over my own body. I could not run, even if I tried.

  And then they looked up at me from their meal, their hairy faces and beards clotted with blood, and I realized just how horrible of a mistake I had made.

  Forty

  Yarlung Tsangpo River Basin

  Motuo County

  Tibet Autonomous Region

  People’s Republic of China

  October 17th

  Today

  Brooks and Adrianne ran to the northwest. If they could survive the swollen river, then so could whatever those things had been.

  Brooks thought of the way he’d seen those muddy feet gripping the thin trunks and realized just how easy it would be for them to climb back up the cliffs. They needed to put as much distance between themselves and the river as they could, and they needed to maintain an element of unpredictability. The creature he had seen on the other side had taken off to the west. At the rate it was moving, it would easily beat them to the bridge.

  They burst from a thicket of larches and sprinted across a meadow spotted with locus flowers and puddles dappled with rain. The rugged foothills rose ahead of them, maybe a mile through the dense forest of sandalwoods and lychees. Somewhere up there was the escarpment with the hanging graves. If they could just find it, he would be able to pinpoint their location well enough that they could work down through the hills and approach the bridge from the north along the rocky bank where the cover was thicker. And even then there were no guarantees, but unspoken between them was the understanding that if they couldn’t cross the bridge, then they’d rather go out with their lungs filled with water than in the same manner as Julian and Warren.

  Adrianne’s hand slipped from his and she collapsed onto her chest.

  Brooks turned around, took her by the hand again, and helped her up to her knees. There was blood on her lips and chin and her eyes didn’t quite focus on his.

  He pulled his sleeve over his hand and used it to wipe away the blood.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Just tired.”

  She offered him a weak smile and he saw the blood on her teeth and along her gums. He tried not to let the surprise show on his face.

  “I can’t possibly look that bad,” she said.

  He placed his palm on her forehead and looked directly into her eyes. Her skin was waxy and she was burning up.

  “How long have you known?” he asked.

  She shrugged.

  “It’s coming on faster now. I can feel it. The pain in my mouth is getting worse by the minute.”

  “We need to get you to a hospital.”

  She rested her palm against his cheek. He felt her long nails against his ear.

  “I was so desperate to impress you when we first met. Do you remember that day?”

  “Don’t talk like that.”

  “At first I wanted you to see how brilliant I was, how perfect I was for the institute. I wanted you to need me. And then…and then I just wanted you.”

  “I’ll carry you out of here myself if I have to.”

  “The problem is we’ve been looking at this species all wrong. The Lotka-Volterra equation doesn’t apply because we’re not dealing with the traditional predator-prey relationship. We’re looking at them from our perspective, not theirs. What we’re dealing with is a complex dynamic more closely resembling that of a host-parasite relationship, which is governed by the Nicholson-Bailey model. The parasite—or virus in this case—searched for and chooses its hosts at random, but only those that are genetically susceptible to it become infected, which is why the model is inherently unstable. It’s that instability that allows for coevolution in the first place. We need to stop thinking about them as a discrete species and start thinking of them as human beings. We have to ask ourselves what we would do if we were them.”

  “We would leave here.”

  “So why haven’t they? All of these years and they’re still here.”

  Brooks thought of the house with the shutters and doors that looked like they’d been attacked by animals.

  “I think they do leave.”

  “So why do they come back? Why do they stay here?”

  Brooks had no answer.

  He pulled her to her feet and plucked
a lotus flower. Its petals cradled a small amount of rainwater. He offered it to Adrianne, who thanked him with a nod and swished the water around in her mouth before swallowing it. She licked her teeth and smiled again. The blood was gone, but her gums were red and swollen.

  He had ibuprofen in his pack, but there was no way they could go back for it now. Maybe they could sneak into the cave where Warren died and raid his supplies. They needed to find a way to lower her fever and reduce the inflammation…

  He furrowed his brow and turned in a circle. It took a moment, but he eventually saw what he was looking for. He guided her toward a cluster of plants, one of which had a stalk covered with tiny pink bulbs and leaves reminiscent of those of a dandelion. He gripped it near the base and pulled it out of the ground.

  “Thank you, Julian,” he said, brushing the dirt from the roots and handing it to Adrianne. “Alpine bistort. Eating the roots produces an anti-inflammatory response every bit as potent as ibuprofen.”

  She stared down at it for several seconds before bringing it first to her nose, then to her lips. Her eyes met his when she took the first bite. She winced and took another. Then another still.

  He took her hand and pulled her again toward the northwest and the waiting cliffs.

  Something she’d said continued to bother him as they entered the forest. If these creatures—these new men—retained even a small amount of their humanity, they would want to go home. It was the most powerful instinct and one common to every species. They would have been terrified by the physical transformation and crippled by the pain. In their position, his lone thought would be of crossing the Himalayas by any means and finding his way back home. The only way he would have stayed here in this horrible place was if he no longer knew where home was. And the only way that could happen while he maintained even the smallest semblance of cognitive function was if he no longer remembered where home was.