BEYOND EXTINCTION - Even the concept of truth is a lie Page 3

  They fall silent. The evening is still. The air is cooler. Their footsteps fall softly, rhythmically on the ground. Jack is surprised, even moved by her trust in him. He smiles, and they walk on with Max by their side.

  We are so good together. I wonder if she will stay the night.

  *

  The tension in Mark and Chrissy's living room can be cut with a video-editing scalpel. Going home is always a gamble. With Chrissy's unpredictable moods, anything can happen. Today, he needs her support but fears her fury.

  "I know the situation is bad but at least we have a home! It's not much of a home but it's ours," Mark tells Chrissy, but she is red-faced and trembling. "It's a lot more than most humans can afford now. Someday, a rich numan will come along and buy it. We can emigrate and start a new life in FedOz. This could be the making of us."

  They are both painfully aware that she had thrown in his face a dozen times that numanization of the BBC could cost him his job. Neither of them had foreseen his banishment from media work altogether.

  "Chrissy, it could be worse! The spookpolice were a lot kinder than I expected – especially after I told them that the NBC guards used their pacifier on me. The spookpolice could've banned me from any work. As it is, they've only banned me from media work."

  He studies her face apprehensively. She doesn't care what I have been through, what I am suffering. It's all about how it affects her.

  They have been lucky so far with jobs, lucky to have been able to hang on to their one-bedroom terraced house in a rundown part of Thaxted, once a pretty village but now an ugly sprawl of drone zone workers' homes. At least no one can throw us out. He shivers with uncertainty. Until today, I thought no one could throw me out of my job. Life is so uncertain now.

  "I told you, a year ago, that the numies would kick you out and give your job to one of their own," says Chrissy, on the edge of one of her onslaughts that have become part of Mark's life since they married six years ago.

  "We need to think of the future, what we're—"

  "Don't give me that crap!" she shouts. "That's your problem. You're always ready to think the best, expect the best, and trust anyone or anything that stops you having to fight for your rights."

  "I just mean—"

  "You just mean you'll arse-lick any little numie that can give you a job! Maybe you can clean numie lavatories or walk their dogs. You'll never get any work in media and that's the only skill you have."

  "Chrissy, please! Let's stop and—"

  "You stop, Mark! That's what you're good at. But I'm not going to stop. I'm not going to stop here. I'm not going to stop with you. I can get a good job in FedEurope somewhere. The numies aren't as strong there and the human men are real men, unlike you."

  Mark wants to argue, but after the humiliation handed out by the NBC and spookpolice, he cannot find the words.

  "Chrissy, please don't go!" he manages.

  But he is talking to her back as she stomps up the stairs to their bedroom. The wardrobe doors bang open, the drawers slam, something is dragged across the floor, and finally she struggles down the stairs with two bags.

  "I'm not coming back," she says. "I've taken three-quarters of the money we've been saving. I need it for fares and a new life."

  "Okay, but—"

  "And you are too much of a weak little numie lover to stop me."

  "Chrissy, can we just—"

  She ignores him as she drags her bags out of the front door, scraping one against the peeling paint, and disappears into the street.

  Panic hits him. I've lost my job and her. Both in one day! I should have taken the easy way out and gone to FedOz years ago.

  He stares into space, too paralyzed to move. All his friends have gone to FedOz or disappeared. His old lifestyle has gone with the numanization of the area. Even his brother Eric gave up and took his wife and kids to FedOz. He still talks to Eric on the public video link, but somehow it is unsatisfactory. It's not only what Eric says; it's how he says it. Eric was always a depressingly dour bloke. Now, when they speak, it sounds like he is on a constant high. There is too much "It's fantastic" rather than the usual defeatist "Well, what can you do?" And his constant invitations for Chrissy and Mark to join them. It's more like talking to an artificial intelligence sales machine than to Eric.

  He sits for a long time, listening to the ticking clock. Finally, he gathers his strength, starts planning his campaign of action. A job. He must find work. He will have to pay to use the bus to Cambridge city – the numan-human detector lets numans ride free but insists on "cash only" from humans. While he is there, he might as well look at the latest FedOz emigration cruise offers. The deals seem to get better week by week. I can take the value of the house by depositing the sale cash in the FedOz NewLife Bank.

  *

  Chapter 2

  Alice looks around Jack's kitchen. Mock old, not very new, dark oak and deep blue fabric, lived in with everyday scuffs and marks but clean and mostly tidy. She likes it. She likes the way that Jack is male-careless about mixing colors and styles and never getting anything perfectly straight. And the way Max's toys are left where he drops them. Maybe some flowers would make it more human.

  Outside, yesterday's sun is a memory. A storm is blowing in, the black clouds invading from the south again and robbing the morning of light. Maybe Jack will let me borrow his car to get to my meeting with Galen. She really does not want one of the Center's vans picking her up here.

  Jack is everything I need – and he is so handsome and strong. She laughs as a thought strikes her. He is everything that Galen would love to be: tall, muscly and good-looking. Jack's skin is perfect, like hers when she was young and creating her life.

  She cannot say what attracts her the most: his deep brown eyes, clear of the iris rims of numans; his slow smile that devours her; or the thick black hair covering his head, body and arms – what Galen, jealous after failing to make himself taller, calls "animal fur." Whenever Jack is near, she feels that forbidden sexual tremor denied her since her youth. She loves Max, too. And they both love me!

  She stops her thoughts abruptly. There is no time for this! Everything is running away with her time. Jack is showering. She has showered, found Max's food and fed him, and started breakfast for them. Garden chairs! They must get the garden chairs in before the storm.

  A Google delivery van drops off bread "baked" minutes ago. Anyone could print their own but Google owns the patent, every bread, every country worldwide. At least the village has fought off the drone deliveries that wreck the peace almost everywhere else in Dorset.

  "I've guessed at what you like for breakfast," she says as Jack emerges, ten years younger than the stressed version she found when she arrived yesterday.

  "Anything. Whatever you're having," he replies as he sits at the table with her.

  *

  Galen's Director's Desk overlooks one of the gardens at the FedUK Genetics Research Center, a few miles from Jack's cottage and even closer to Abbotsford village center. He has a good view of wild orchids in the trees and flocks of bird-of-paradise blooms around the storm water run-offs. His dome is the biggest of five linked and set in a large complex with a water purification plant, electricity generator, a drone zone that is rarely used, a sewerage processing system and homes for employees. The whole area is enclosed by security fencing and guarded by a permanent detachment of troopers.

  There is nothing on his Director's Desk, nothing to catch the light from the tall casement windows styled into a romanticized historic design. There is never anything on the desk and no one has ever seen him work there. His work, everyone knows, is done behind the closed doors of his office and secure laboratory suite.

  Today he is using the Director's Chair, luxuriously padded, at the head of the sixteen-place conference table that dominates the room. That raises tensions in the four men and two women sitting silently as he dickers his fingers under his chin as if praying to Father Dick. His eyes are distant, and he shows no sign of
starting the meeting.

  In the silence, they all know something serious has happened. They know, too, that Ali, the Center's psychology geneticist and Galen's strong left arm, is on her way. Galen will wait for her. After the meeting, however serious, however long, they will eat in the domes' restaurant, and Galen and Ali will disappear into his private dining suite for several hours.

  Galen can feel their tension. He is sorry to cause them stress but later they will realize that he must do it this way for everyone's sake. Most important of all, he must tell them just enough to increase their efficiency without giving away too much.

  Problem: rapacious human exploitation of the environment and nonhuman animals has to be stopped. Human animals must be eradicated apart from a captive few in zoos. Answer: elimination.

  Problem: numan2s used to squeeze humans to the point of extinction have replaced them as the all-consuming threat to the world. Answer: give numan2s DNA upgrades reducing reproduction to one offspring per female and reset longevity to forty years. We can regulate regional population densities to meet the service needs in each location.

  Galen's mind hits a wall of spikes. The numan2 DNA upgrade is not ready. I need another month for dissection analyses and simulations. And now the numan2 population has become emotionally unstable worldwide. The World Council and the military halfwits expect me to solve the problem with a DNA infusion to reestablish control before we can begin an orderly cull of their numbers. If I can upgrade myself to numan6, it should be possible. But time is against me. It is against all of us!

  Another problem is keeping the political intentions secret from Ali. He has difficulty calling her Ali, her cover name at the Center. She has always been "Balen" to him. And now, outside the Center, she is known by her human name, Alice.

  She agrees that human extinction is inevitable but she will never accept billions of numan2s being culled. She is brilliant; she matches me, of course, in every way except she does not have the genes that power my higher intellect and ambition. I need to add a touch more aggression to her DNA. Then she will enjoy helping me destroy the numan2s.

  Galen hears a car stop by his private door, the Director's Door that he and Ali use to avoid the security formalities.

  "I apologize for being late," Ali says as she bursts in and dumps herself on her seat by his left hand. "I have no excuse."

  "Perhaps we can start," says Galen, surveying the six pairs of eyes fixed on him and Ali. He scrutinizes the faces, willing their obedience and utter concentration.

  Mike and Eddie are a central part of Ali's human research team covering The Players, the whist club, the men's book reading group and, star of the research show, the fluctuating network of dog walkers. Grace is making a name for herself on the parish council and bringing in invaluable data on the stress, aggression and – excellent data – emotional rollercoasters of victories and defeats among council members.

  Galen is less familiar with the personalities of Patti, who monitors the social aspirations and intricate emotional networks of the village, and Reg, who mines worker-management hostility as a grunt manager at the slowly failing Frederick & Sons, the last surviving human company in the area.

  Patti always avoids me if she can. It was a mistake letting Ali recruit her. She feels she owes Ali loyalty and only duty to me. I've not been content with Ali's design for her to fit into Abbotsford's human society. His reservations about Patti's physical appearance resurface as she faces him from along the table. Her long black hair is too thick, her skin is unhealthily pallid like most humans, and that works, but her piercing blue eyes are far too bright. And she is ridiculously tall for a female. As tall as me!

  Galen knows the sixth person in the group well enough: Aleksi, a brilliant upgraded numan2 with a well-organized life and family. I'm glad I took him. He could be another me if he had more drive.

  "Thank you for coming," Galen says, his customary politeness genuine, as if they had a choice.

  *

  Jack retreats to his study, Max ghosting behind him. The morning storm is working up to a frenzy and Alice has taken his car to get to her meeting. Jack and Max settle into their usual thinking places, Jack in the deepest of the armchairs and Max soon asleep within easy stroking distance. The mediamat, as ever, is close and running.

  I can't delay any longer. Today is the day. Jack reaches for the pwood box where he stores the banya. The emotional pain of his first banya trip is still in him but he must go on. It's a risky street drug but it does what I need. Others might use it for emotional and physical pleasures but for him, it is a route into the minds and emotions of creatures hunted to extinction.

  He tries to keep his mind off Alice. But she caresses her way into his thoughts as he relaxes for the banya ordeal ahead. Gradually, the banya box is forgotten – and he is back at Abbotsford's Mayflower Banqueting Hall for a dinner to raise funds for The Players.

  He is sitting at the table with three other people and two untaken places. He is bored and waiting to get away when he senses a woman, her perfume an advance guard, taking the seat next to him. A companion, her husband or boyfriend maybe, takes the seat opposite her and levels his hitman eyes on Jack.

  Jack nods and turns a polite smile towards the woman – a surprise hitting him like 40,000 volts wrapped in the softest velvet. He catches his breath, he cannot think. He can only gaze at her and utter a few trite words in her direction. "Hello," he says, "pleased to meet you."

  "Hello, Jack," she replies, not at all trite. "I'm pleased to meet you too." How does she know my name? She turns her smile on the other three guests at the table, indicates her companion, and tells them, "Everyone, this is Galen. We don't see him much but he is a huge fan of the Abbotsford Village Theatre and The Players in particular."

  This is enough for Galen to rise from social invisibility to real person status. Everyone wants to talk to him at once, to ask about his favorite production, which actor he remembers most.

  Jack tears his mind off the woman and fixes his eyes on Galen. He is short – a lot shorter than the woman – and dark like the descendants of human miners in SubFedEngland's southwest. But there is nothing humble about him: no impression of scrabbling for a living, no lack of confidence amid this flock of theatrical peacocks. What he lacks in stature, he gains in an overwhelming charisma of power and authority. His jacket, in the latest human elite fashion, is the blue-black of the empty seas and engineered to disintegrate after seven days. His ice-white shirt is throttled with a light blue tie. But, more than his clothes, Galen shocks and fascinates: his short blond hair, jagged and aggressive, electrifies his dark skin; his eyes, walnut and as hard as charity; and his voice, a rumble of thunder. No wonder he can attract a woman like her.

  "I saw your name on the list, Jack," Alice says. "Now I want to know more about you." A blue vein at her temple pulses gently, intriguingly, against her clear, slim features. Her soft, hazel eyes look into his as they both twist in their seats. He is aware of Galen watching them. Take care, Jack tells himself. Don't make a fool of yourself with another man's woman. Don't be the human animal that has no choice.

  Jack gradually disengages from his conversation with Alice, a hopelessly unsuccessful effort to stop every sense in his body crying out for her, and looks at Galen, who is coldly studying him as if he is a specimen in a jar. "Are you thinking of joining the theatrical group?" he asks Galen, the first thought in his mind.

  "No, not really," says Galen. "Ali asked me to help the fundraising."

  "He's my boss and my friend. He has to do what I tell him," Alice says in a stage whisper to Jack, and then engages the others in bright, informed banter about the theater group and the hot issue of the moment – whether to do an end-of-the-year panto.

  As the others grab the hot issue, she leans back towards Jack, who finds himself turning and leaning in too. Galen and caution are swamped by her closeness. She tells him, "You must join our troupe, Jack. We have auditions on Thursday evening. You must come."

 
Jack looks at her, alarmed and embarrassed by his reaction. He feels an emptiness fluttering around his full stomach, an irresistible urge to let his eyes feast upon her. This is the last thing he needs: this is a chapter straight out of his book – uncontrollable sexual obsessions making the human animal vulnerable to extinction.

  "I would like that," his body voice says as all reason drains like a waterfall disappearing into the blackness of a subterranean mystery.

  Jack's foray into the pleasant past ends abruptly. Outside his cottage, thunder explodes and rain hammers the windows. He wonders if Alice got to her office before the worst of the storm hit.

  He pats Max, reassuring him, and reaches for the banya box.

  *

  "You are all aware of the growing numan2 crisis," Galen tells his researchers. "The World Council and Military High Command are losing control of numan2s everywhere."

  No one blinks, no one moves, no one even breathes under the Director's scrutiny. The dull roar of rain lashes incessantly at the dome's ecocovering and windows. Galen has their attention, if only because he might fling a question at any of them.

  "I am not interested in the future of humans but my research urgently needs to identify the genetic trigger points for numan2 instability. Those trigger points can be found in your human emotions research. Today, I am going to tell you about numan history and numan DNA animal rootstock. This will open your minds to analyses censored from your previous training."

  I must get them to face up to the disturbing origins of their existence. I need them all, but any who cannot accept the facts will have to be replaced.

  *

  Jack slows his mind, groping for relaxation, gradually feeling the day seeping out of him, and he unthinkingly pulls forward a tray with his mediamat unrolled and ready for use. The mediamat is old and a clunky two millimeters thick – the image resolution is only enhanced ultra-high definition. It's enough. The real work will be in my brain.