Night of the Animals (31 page)

AS ASTRID REFLECTED ON THESE THINGS, THE
corners of her eyes began flashing purple—a regular, nonsecure audio Opticall. It was Omotoso again.

“Dear Astrid—I have some . . . strange news. But where are you?”

“Probably less than a hundred meters from you, sir.”

“Oh, yes—oh, Astrid, I can actually see you. We're south of you, dropped onto the bloody Broad Walk like clumsy squirrels. It's bunged up with autoreporters.”

Astrid spotted Omotoso, dressed in his civvies, waving at her. He wore a tight red and black leather jacket, which meant he'd ridden his cycle-glider, and incongruous navy and close-fitting elegant dress trousers. It felt funny to speak to her superior via optical and auditory neutral interface, standing so relatively close in the distance. But there was a certain intimacy about it.

“Astrid,” he said. “We are getting . . . intelligence . . .
reports
from some local psychiatrist—I don't know the fellow, a Dr. Bajwa, and that's confidential—that anyway, there's . . .
he
is concerned
the person inside the zoo may be a very old, rather helpless patient of his. The doctor's himself apparently quite distraught about it all. The patient's name, it's Cuthbert—
Cuthbert Handley
. He's a serious Flōter, we're told—and certainly not in any stage of recovery, like you. Totally nonviolent. But this Bajwa chap, he says Mr. Handley thinks he hears animals at the zoo, and he says this fellow might believe they're asking
him
—and I mean the animals—to release
them
. The doctor had heard from Mr. Handley tonight, via Opticall, and it was clear the NHS Twelve Code ‘danger to one's self or others' proviso was met, but the doctor, as I said, he's upset. Mr. Handley's very intelligent and evidently well meaning. But very dangerous in this circumstance, I might add. And, surely, he's got that very English—
you
know—sadness. He claims to have ‘special powers'—don't we all? But Mr. Handley, we think, is at the bottom of this whole mess. An old Flōt sot. Astrid?”

Omotoso, surrounded by swarms of people, was looking meditatively up into the sky as he spoke, as if stars were the only clear phrases he had to choose from.

Astrid thought of the grandfather she'd never met. He was, her mum said, ancient, caring, crazy, and Flōt-addicted. And there was the murky resemblance between her and Mr. Handley that Dawkins had alleged. She knew Cuthbert Handley couldn't be him—that was impossible, right? There were tens of thousands of crazy old Flōters, weren't there? Yet she didn't feel even remotely less spellbound by this man for knowing it.

“I . . . I don't quite know what to say. That fits with what the night watchman Dawkins said, sir. He said the man, this Mr. . . . Handley? Perhaps, he did indeed look as if he were spiring. Then he has some very serious mental health problems?”

Omotoso rubbed his cheek. “To say the least.”

Atwell had walked up to where she stood. Dawkins was there, too. There was also someone new, a very short woman in a most
improbable and campy sort of archaeologist's getup, including a khaki jacket with cap-strap epaulets, a rugged twill skirt, and, of all things, a pith helmet. She wore a kind of brace on her arm made of shiny brass gears. She had a round face with creamy skin and large, mildly protruding blue eyes, with two pieces of copper tubing arcing from her helmet down into her jacket. These features, with her short thick neck, gave Astrid the slight impression of a mechanical female bullfrog. To top things off, she held a small white snake curled in her plump hand. She was a kind of steampunk hobbit.

Astrid kept looking at the woman as Omotoso continued.

“Right. OK, here's the thing of it, Astrid. Do you have any advice? With your community work and all, you know, your recovery meetings and such, how . . . how would you deal with a Flōt sot on the rampage?”

“Kindly,” she said. “And I wouldn't say ‘rampage.' This is a man whose problems are much bigger than Flōt. If he's in second Flōt withdrawal, he'll be angry. If he's a sot, he'll be in first withdrawal, at best, and that means—well—people get fairly off their chump. If he's had BodyMods, and he's old, and he's still somehow alive and taking a drink, he could . . . yes . . . he could be talking to animals or any number of imaginary friends. But ‘rampage'—I wouldn't put it like that.”

“Right,” said Omotoso. “Point taken.”

“Thank you.”

“And, Astrid, I've had a think, and here's the hard bit: I, er, I
need
you to go home.” For a moment, she said nothing more. “Very sorry. You've had a long day. Just jack in the job, just for tonight, and go home and rest a bit, right? You are—
temporarily
—relieved of duty.
Tempor
—”

“Sir, why? What the fuck is that?” She felt blindsided—and utterly betrayed. “I don't understand. Why? What the fuck—”

“Watch it,” said Omotoso. “This is still the constabulary.”

Omotoso began shuffling one of his feet and avoiding Astrid's gaze. He looked restless.

“There's been . . . there's been a kind of occurrence, Astrid. I'm sorry. I'm not supposed to tell you anything even if I
do
know. But, er. It's a man. Found badly injured about an hour ago at a small group suicide in Poplar. One of the cults, at it again. This man, he was still alive when the Red Watch got to the house, apparently. He claimed to be from your FA meeting, apparently—Marcus is his name. I think he was—this is rather tragic—he thought the Watch might somehow contact you. I think he was . . . scared. But here's the thing. The same thing's happening all over Britain tonight. At least twenty FA members around the country participated in a self-murder attack. And there are more and more reports coming in.”

“Fucking hell. Marcus? I saw him earlier tonight. He was sober. He's kind of a prick, but he's all right, he's—”

“Not anymore. The Watch, Astrid. The bastards neuralpiked him. He was already full of drugs, and they killed him. May as well have done it for sport. They are cold bastards. But your name came up, and I've just been . . . asked . . .
told
, really . . . to take you off tonight's situation, as a precautionary measure. The Watch, they're absolutely terrified of Heaven's Gate infiltrating any of the police forces. If there's a perceived connection, an active suicider, they'll want to have a look. It's nothing to worry about, Astrid. You can understand that, I'm sure?”

“But I thought . . . you know . . . that the king and his lot approved of FA and all? That's not FA. It's not immune, after all, from the same kinds of temptations any other organization has in England. I thought Harry liked us?”

“I wouldn't go that far. Indeed, there are things that concern me—new policies—that are going to touch on FA and hundreds
of other orgs, I fear. Your name was in the mouth of a dying cult member. It'll need to be cleared up. It's bollocks.”

“Marcus . . . he wasn't a cult member. He was just a Dublin fecker. He was all right.”

“I hear you, Astrid. And there's something else. This is why I didn't use the blue-freq system, Astrid. I have . . . heard . . . from people I trust. I have heard that the king—and God knows whether it's even coming from the king himself—but I have heard that there's a Privy Council L7 directive coming. Astrid, FA—the king's people are saying there's a link, with the cults.”

“That's a disgusting lie. That's a lie. It's not true, guv.”

“I know that. You know me. I know this is all naff. But here's another thing: with the Army of Anonymous on the prowl, too, the whole ‘anonymous' thing isn't playing well . . . with the nobility, right?”

“That's crazy. We've nothing to do with AA-UK, with English republicanism, with politics of any sort. God damn it!”

She felt gutted about the directive. She had seen dozens of suicidal men and women saved by the fledging self-help organization. The L7 order would deeply damage if not destroy it. It would mean mass EquiPoise examinations. It would mean the inevitable hoodings, forced “serfing,” the reclassification of middle-class members.

“FA
helps
the king. This is a nightmare. And all that you said before, where you asked me for my advice? Were you just splurtin' brown sauce on my chip butty?”

“No! Come on, you. I . . . It's not the kind of thing anyone wants to bring up. Is there someone—one of your FA friends, perhaps?—someone, someone like that you can, you know, sort of have a chat with, too?”

“I'm off FA at the moment, sir. I'm not drinking—but I've sort of gone off it.”

“Gone off? That doesn't seem wise. You didn't sound like that a second ago.”

“Yes, sir. Off.”

“Yes, well,” said Omotoso. “I'm—you're not just saying that, because you're afraid of the Watch and the directive?”

Omotoso was now looking at her directly, with the same kind of tolerant expression he might have worn were they standing beside one another. “But that's . . . that's your business, naturally. OK. Go. Go home. Go. Is that clear? Inspector?”

Atwell was standing right beside her now, clearly trying to eavesdrop. She wore a somber expression and kept shaking her head whenever Astrid spoke, which Astrid found both consoling and grating.

“Yes.”

“I don't like how you sound. Something's off. You know, Constable, Astrid . . . you . . . I
see
this special thing inside you, like a guardian
ori,
^*
as my mum would call it—a ‘head within the head.' And all will be well—for you, anyway. But . . . I'm sorry. I really am. You must go home. Do not delay. Take care of your mum. And yourself. Ring your FA mates, right?”

“I don't want to ring them.”

“Astrid. Things look bad now, but you once told me that someone told you ‘The best is yet to come.'”

“On that score, guv, I think Mr. Handley . . . I believe he knows something we don't, Chief Inspector.”

“Good night, Astrid.”

She blinked off, her heart pounding again, her thoughts swirling like blown oak leaves. A crowd of people enveloped Omotoso and he was gone. Astrid felt as if she wanted to embrace Jasmine Atwell, out of fear and pain and confusion.

The round-faced woman with Dawkins and Atwell was staring at her.

Astrid said, to Atwell, “Constable.”

“This is, as you can probably surmise, Una,” said Atwell. “She just walked out. Dunno how. There must be an opening in the main gate somewhere.” Atwell leaned in toward Astrid. “She's dumb—I mean, she's a mute. And she's very worried.”

“I know the feeling,” said Astrid. She felt speechless.

As Astrid recounted the conversation with Omotoso, and explained that she'd been relieved, Atwell nodded slowly, with an open expression, surprisingly unperturbed. It made Astrid feel both warmer toward her and, in another way, suspicious. They remained several meters away from the giant media, police, and zookeeper scrum assembled on the Broad Walk along the eastern edge of the zoo. The air had grown considerably cooler. Astrid herself was beginning to feel queasy and chilled. She wondered if the enterovirus everyone seemed to be moaning about that week had finally infected her.

“Listen,” Atwell was saying. “I'll drive you home.” Her voice sounded a bit hoarse, and she was chewing something, a lozenge perhaps, in an irritated, rapid manner. “Ma'am, I'm ready to spit tacks, honestly. I'm not being assigned to any of the Bronze teams either, it turns out. It's a real slap in the face. I know what's happened with you is so unfair, but, honestly, this was also going to be my big chance. I've not once worked a major incident.” She sighed, said, “God
damn
it.”

“I'm sorry, Constable.” Astrid looked down. “You are as fine a PC as I've ever seen. I don't want to embarrass you now.”

“Aww, thanks, ma'am,” said Atwell. They were quiet for a few seconds. “What should we do? This is just
daft
.”

The commotion—solarcopters, spotlights, emergency gliders,
fotolivers, and the cacophony of the poor animals—had reached such a frenzy, Astrid could barely hear herself think. But when the conviction to do what she did next hit her, she didn't hesitate.

“I'm going in, Jasmine. This man, this Cuthbert, I need to see him.”

“In? That's insane. No. You are
not
going in, ma'am. It's not worth losing your career over, is it? Astrid? And there are wild animals about, aren't there?”

“I need to see him.” She gave a forced little chuckle, but she couldn't sustain a smile. She felt scared. “I think he may be . . . in a way . . . related to me.”

Atwell said, “Oh, dear. You're off the deep end, you are. Astrid. Do
not
go in there.”

Astrid looked away from her colleague. She said, in a strained, shuddering voice: “My whole
life
. As a . . . child . . . and a teenager . . . and then an adult, you understand? From the time I was a little kid. Until now, see? I've felt bloody
alone
in one thing or another, almost always alone. I've had it. I've had it! I don't care if what I'm looking for isn't there or not. He's come back for me—
some
one has.”

“Who?”

“That's what I'm saying. I don't know. It's Mr. Handley, perhaps? Or it's me? But I feel there's someone in me who's got to come see him—and to help him. It doesn't make sense. And the timing's bad, isn't it?”

She turned toward the zoo fence and began scaling it. “Don't stop me,” she said.

“No!” shouted Atwell. “Astrid! Don't!”

She was over the barrier in seconds. At that very moment, when her feet touched zoo-soil, Astrid felt herself beginning to awaken to a world half-created. It had been the most frenziedly un-Astrid thing she'd done in her life. For her to enter the zoo this way—it
was a step off a cliff. And she hadn't thought it through, at least not like a human being. She thought of her heavy
Encyclopedia of Mammals
tome back home on her bed, and its chapter called “The Wild Mind”—animals
did
think, it claimed, but it wasn't like Winnie-the-Pooh, and it wasn't like the shark in
Jaws,
and it wasn't what the white-haired Brian Cox said on
Wonders of Life
. It was deeper and stranger, and yet it was not amoral.