Cronix (22 page)

Oriente nodded, squinting at the arterial eddies in the churning water. Swaincroft finally found what he was looking for and paused: a huge crowd of people on a grey day at the Washington Mall, thronging around a funeral cortege. A black hearse inched through the masses, which were held back by metal railings and cops in rain macs.

“This is the funeral of your friend Douglas Fitch. January 17, 2025.”

Oriente stared at the screen. A light drizzle was falling on the crowds, and people clutched umbrellas and sodden bouquets. The news cameras followed the funeral procession as it pulled up in front of the Lincoln Memorial, where President Landis gave a moving oration, comparing Fitch to Moses, “a visionary who led his people out of slavery to the Promised Land, only to die himself before that final, hallowed destination could be reached.”

“Of course,” interjected Swaincroft, “he tactfully doesn’t mention that the analogy would have worked better had Moses tried to dash across the River Jordan and drowned before reaching the Promised Land.”

Oriente frowned. “What do you mean?”

Swaincroft tried to muster a concerned look, but Oriente could tell he was bursting to tell the story. “Well, Fitch died just a month before the first successful recorded upload. But there were unconfirmed rumors that emerged years later, that Fitch didn’t want to die any more than the rest of us. You’ve heard of the Haitian Voodoo Head, of course?”

Oriente nodded. Even someone who had tried to cut himself off from the world as much as he had couldn’t fail to have heard some version of the legend of the first mass foray into the virtual afterlife. It was a favorite horror story told by mortal mothers to terrify their children on dark winters nights, a gruesome warning of the folly of trying to cheat death
.

“Horrible,” muttered Swaincroft. “The authorities always denied it, but according to the reports at the time, a hundred and twenty five terminally ill Haitians were persuaded by their
houngons
, or priests, who were actually in the pay of a private consortium that would later become the MEvolution Corporation, to have themselves chipped. Unfortunately, the afterlife environment had not been perfected at that point. They were unable to sleep, and started going insane. While the programmers tried to fix the problem, the Haitians all somehow fused into one amorphous mass and started popping up like ghosts on computers around the world. Kids would be surfing the Internet and suddenly this screaming, tortured soul would appear on the screen. They had to shut down the program completely. The full story didn’t emerge fully until years afterwards, and MEvolution sued anyone who propagated the story. Might have slowed down the Exodus a bit if people had known what could really go wrong with the system at that point.”

Oriente grimaced. “And Fitch?”

Swaincroft looked at the floor, almost apologetic now.

“He had been diagnosed with cancer of the lung and esophagus. They say he tried to insert himself into the doomed Port au Prince experiment before the risks were fully appreciated.”

There was a long silence, before Oriente shook his head and rubbed his face. “The ghost in the machine,” he said, as though remembering something. Still staring at the screen, he asked, “You have any of that in your archive?”

“Unfortunately that was never captured on film,” said Swaincroft. “Or if it was, the government and MEvolution stashed it away somewhere well beyond the reach of lowly academics like myself. Officially, it never happened. Old wives tale. No one I know of has ever seen it.”

“Maybe not so unfortunate,” said Oriente. Swaincroft stared sheepishly at the floor, realizing his academic enthusiasm had outstripped his human sympathy.

“Do you have footage of the actual funeral service?” said Oriente.

“Sure. Let me see.” Swaincroft leafed his notes, the scrolled the slides forwards. A picture of an open casket flashed up, and Oriente found himself staring at the familiar face, gaunter even in death than it had been in life, cushioned in the coffin's silk lining. The hunter leant close and took a deep breath.

“Yes, that’s him alright.”

Swaincroft nodded. “That is indeed him. So…I don’t know who or what your wolf was, but I very much doubt it was Douglas Fitch.”

***

Fitch was summoned in the small hours from his trailer by the head nurse, Mrs Falkingham: one of the guinea pigs was having a seizure. Fitch, who had only been sleeping fitfully, pulled on his clothes and rushed to the dormitory.

It was a long fiberglass pre-fab, shipped out in flat packs to this isolated African facility and erected by government contractors. By the time the guinea pigs had arrived, the place was deserted save for the security detail and a handful of high-security clearance medical overseers. The guinea pigs were all young, hand-picked volunteers from various US government services, keen to help but unaware exactly why they were out in the center of this vast continent. Most of them did not even know what country they were in, having been flown in from Jo'burg in small light aircraft helmed by South African bush pilots.

To Fitch’s annoyance, the young man had been mildly sedated by the time he arrived. He was murmuring in his bed, a film of sweat on his brow. The other volunteers peered down the fluorescent lit corridor, puzzled and fearful. Mrs Falkingham, a blonde woman in her fifties whose husband had served in the military, ushered them back to their quarters. When she'd made sure all the doors were closed, she returned to the afflicted young man's room.

“He just woke up screaming,” she said. “The duty nurse found him on the floor, absolutely hysterical, tangled up in his sheets. It woke the whole building.”

The man’s breathing was shallow, the hysteria abated but far from gone. “Did he say anything? Any description of what he was experiencing?” Mrs Falkingham shook her head, and turned towards the door as Stiney stumbled in, plastic sandals sliding over plastic floor and belt still unbuckled.

“What was it?” he panted, a look of expectation on face. “Did he speak?”

Fitch shook his head. “He’s sedated. But maybe we can wake him up.” He ignored Mrs Falkingham’s disapproving frown. They weren’t out here for the health of these kids. They had been exposing them to Subject GK-154b’s memory banks for a week now, and getting only mixed results. He glanced at the chart on the young man’s bed, addressed him in a gentle voice.

“Andrew? Andrew, can you hear me?” There was a murmur from the young man’s numbed lips. Fitch softly patted his cheek. “Andrew, I need you to wake up now. It’s all alright, come on now.”

“Shit, what did you give him, a horse tranq?” hissed Stiney, glaring at the head nurse. She started to defend her decision, but Fitch motioned them both to be quiet. The young man’s eyes flickered open.

“There were men with torches, flashlights. Out there, in the jungle. Hundreds of men. I was in there, I was….I was one of them. Something in my hand, like a stick…a club, I don’t know.” His eyes were more open now, though still lacking focus. “Everyone was armed, but crude stuff, knives and machetes and shit. Couple of men had guns. And they…we…were silent. Totally silent, just walking along this mud road. I could hear the insects so loud. And there was a church where we all stopped. Dark inside, but you could hear kids crying. Someone shouted for the people to come out, but they didn’t.”

There was a quaver in the man’s voice. Fitch noticed with satisfaction that even though Stiney had forgotten to buckle his belt, he had brought a digital recorder, which he was holding close enough to catch the volunteer’s stuttered recollections.

“What happened then?” Fitch pressed the pale man, drawing a nervous look from the nurse. Stiney leaned in closer, edging her slightly to one side.

“I don’t know. Suddenly the church was on fire. There was a smell of gasoline, and the fire was spreading fast. Everyone moved back from the blaze, surrounding the door. Then it opened, and all these people poured out with the smoke. And we…we started hitting them. Cutting them. All of them. Old men, little kids, women…we sort of picked one each as they came out, though sometimes there were two men hitting one…I saw this girl, not even a teenager really. She ran towards me, trying to break away from the crowd. And she looked at me and I raised my club and hit her. I mean, really hit her. I broke her jaw. And it felt good. It felt really good. Almost…sexual. And I kept on hitting her and hitting her until she was just this pool of blood and pulp at my feet. And then I started screaming, and screaming until I thought I was going crazy, and Nurse Falkingham was there…”

There were tears in the young man’s eyes, but still a lingering sense of wonder, the aftertaste of some forbidden, tantalizing horror. Fitch sneaked a glance at Stiney, transfixed by the account. He straightened up and nodded to the nurse. “Mrs Falkingham, I think we can help Andrew sleep now…”

She moved towards a trolley in the corner of the room. As Fitch stood up, the young man feebly grasped him by the sleeve.

“Mr Fitch. There was something…I don’t know exactly what. But I...I don’t think it was a dream. It was something far worse, more…more like a memory.”

“That’s okay, son,” muttered Fitch, patting the young man’s hand and placing it back on the sheet that covered his chest, which was again starting to heaving with agitation. “It was just a dream. Just a bad jungle fever dream.”

***

The voice again. Inside his head.

Little man, it said.

They are coming

Oriente dropped his knife and fork on the breakfast plate and ran to the door. No one there. He went to the window but could see no sign of the strange voice.

Sweet Jesus, he thought. This is it. Losing it at last. Unraveling.

He was sweating profusely, and feared he might throw up his bacon and eggs.

Just as he leaned over the sink, however, a huge noise ripped through the building, like a giant metal sheet clanging to the ground. The window jumped in its frame, but the glass did not break.

The sound took Oriente by surprise: it was such a long time since he had heard an explosion that at first he thought it must have been a door slamming. He stepped into the corridor and saw nurses rushing towards the front of the building.

“What was that?” he asked Nurse Shareen as she stomped down the hallway.

“How the fuck should I know?” she shot back with her customary warmth. He followed her to reception, where people, both Eternals and Sapiens, were drifting into the street. It was a clear day, and the small crowd of onlookers were pointing at a cloud of black smoke rising in the sky, like a greasy jellyfish propelling itself slowly upwards.

An ambulance tore out of the garage, siren wailing. A bearded local in overalls, some kid of delivery man, clambered in his truck to follow. Oriente stepped after him.

“Mind if I tag along?”

“Feel free,” the man said. As they drove over Lambeth Bridge, the man craned his neck to keep the pillar of grey smoke in sight.

“It’s not too far away,” the driver said. “Looks like it must be over Knightsbridge way.”

Oriente was relieved to be out. The breeze from the car window cooled his feverish sweat and for the first time weeks, he realized that no one knew actually where he was right now. Even he didn’t know where he was headed, as they left the river behind and bumped through cow pastures and clusters of horse chestnuts. They drove past Buckingham Palace, now the headquarters of both the London Council and the constabulary. Oriente saw officers setting up a cordon to keep vehicles away, while others checked the cars parked outside.

There was little sign of any houses between the palace and Kensington. The Serpentine lake had burst its banks over the course of hundreds of wet seasons and was now home to a variety of migratory birds, some wading in its muddy waters, other still spiraling the treetops, still spooked by the explosion.

The car emerged from a growth of oaks into an open commons grazed flat by sheep and cattle. The livestock had clustered near the tree line, as far as possible from the wreckage of a twisted chassis that was still belching black smoke.

The driver whistled. “Will you look at that? They hit Kensington Palace.”

“What's in the palace?” said Oriente. The driver looked at him like he was a simpleton.

“DPP headquarters, of course.”

One whole wall of the building had been sheared off, leaving a gaping hole that resembled a wound in a skull. Dazed officials stumbled across the graveled forecourt, led by rescuers into the open fields where most collapsed in shock.

A police woman stopped the car before it could get too close, and asked the men what they were doing there.

“Came to see if we could help,” said the driver. She said they could go no further in the vehicle, so the driver turned and parked. Walking back, Oriente spotted a half dozen bodies lined up on the driveway, covered by blankets. Some had lost their shoes in the blast, and stockinged feet poked out from under the covers.

Medics were treating the wounded. A man in a dust-covered business suit, his face caked in blood, was led out of the wrecked building by a rescue worker, stumbling over bricks and glass. Oriente mingled with the crowd of emergency workers, police and curious locals who were peering into the devastated interior.