Hunters: A Trilogy (44 page)

Then there were the lecturers, standing in their suits before on-looking audiences and pointing to diagrams and models, their eyes shining excitedly as they explained the various technicalities of a particular invention or idea. The seated crowd turned to each other with much nodding of heads and note-taking, the room seemingly filled with an electric atmosphere as the orator held them captivated within their verbal palms. There were doctors, surgeons, politicians and teachers, all were there happily engaged in their passion. They shared two things – firstly they were all smiling, obviously happy and excited with the love of their subjects. It shone from them with an almost visible aura.

The second item of commonality, which they unknowingly shared, was displayed within the digital box flickering underneath each person as the screen showed them to Mike and his audience. As the subject appeared on the screen, the box below them was filled with a line of words, rather like the ‘ticker tape’ at the bottom of a news programme on the television. It was the same for all of them, and it wasn’t good, in any way. It showed their endings, their untimely deaths before they were ever to reach these wonderful stages of their lives.

The middle-aged scientist turned and used his laser pointer to underline some important point to his gathered pupils. The technical drawings held them riveted, their heads looking from the screen to their books and then back again, three or four of them raised their hands.

Questions and answers, he knew them all.

‘Breaking news’ Bad news…

The words flashed eerily beneath him.

‘Ethan Martin Williams, future Professor. Deceased, aged twenty-one years. Cause: Heroin overdose.’

A tall, brown-haired woman bounded girlishly down the spiral stairs leading from the observatory. Her blue shoes were flying down the steel steps as she spoke into her mobile telephone. Her fate flashed beneath in Mike’s little box.

The warning was invisible to her, but there nonetheless.

‘Breaking news’ Bad news…

‘Mary-Ann Blake, future Astrophysicist. Deceased, aged nineteen years. Cause: Murdered whilst engaged in prostituting herself.’

A handsome Asian stood upon the steps in front of some huge courthouse, the gathered throngs of press and TV reporters jostled for position as he spoke into their lenses. Flashlight bulbs fired their luminescent bursts, each one showing his smiling face in perfect clarity.

‘Breaking news’ Bad news…

‘Sher Agha Khan, future Lawyer. Deceased, aged fourteen years. Cause: Killed in a hit-and-run traffic accident. Perpetrators untraced.’

Behind him, a waved banner shouted out the words, ‘Go Sher, GO! Rock the Hydr-O!’ The white sheet with the green writing reminded Ken of the ‘MJW’ scribbling he had seen on the church wall in Kandahar. The two women holding the banner jumped up and down as Sher smiled and waved at them.

A short, overweight young man, with an awful pink jumper stretched over his podgy midriff, peered owlishly at the strange machine lying before him – the device looked like the cigarette case that Ken and Mike had seen in some other place, only bigger. There were several of them in various stages of construction, sitting upon the work surfaces in front of the man.

‘Breaking news’ Bad news…

‘Kristopher Stephan Merkel, future Hydro-Cell Engineer. Deceased, aged six years. Cause: Murdered by kidnappers, body never recovered. Perpetrators untraced.’

The man looked up briefly, the workshop lights glinted off the surface of his rimless spectacles as his face contorted into a ruddy-cheeked smile. Turning back to the machine, he puffed his cheeks out and whistled whilst he worked. He certainly appeared to be happy with his lot.

The list rolled on, always the same thing, the little screen below bringing the unknown, bad news for the particular person on display. Their lives seemingly never destined to see the place they had very obviously reached on the screen. People from every nation and culture were shown to them, countless beings hell-bent on their particular subject. All of them shared the ominous box that flickered below their briefly-illuminated moment in George’s spotlight.

‘Breaking news’ Bad news…

‘None of these people will live to see their fulfilment if we don’t take on this task,’ Mike’s voice broke the scene as he stopped the show. ‘This is but a small example of the type of thing we are talking about.’

‘How many people do we have to help?’ Ken’s question was in many ways a pre-emptive acceptance of the ‘Gift’ George had laid before them.

Mike thought for a while before he spoke. Then, with a wry shrug, he said, ‘Umm, well, it depends really, depends on who George decides is within our sector.’ Looking at them in surprise, he said, ‘We’re not the…’

Jane finished the sentence for him. ‘Not the only ones involved…there are others doing this!’ Her voice mirrored the surprise Ken felt.

‘You’re joking, aren’t you, Mike?’ he whispered. ‘You mean that this is already going on as we speak?’ He felt the enormity of the task roll over him again.

Mike laughed, saying, ‘Well, yeah! You didn’t think we were gonna save the entire world on our own, did you?’ He shook his head and looked down in mock pity at his best friend.

Ken looked back at him, he felt pretty stupid. ‘No, but, well…I mean…’ His voice tailed away and he gave a sheepish grin. Turning to Jane, he shrugged his shoulders and said, ‘It must be this hole in the back of my head!’ His humour helped to take some of the pressure off the moment.

Mike looked at them and then reached over and topped his drink up with a little splash of Coke, ice clinking as he swirled it around with a rotating motion of his hand. ‘Does anyone else fancy a refill?’ he asked, raising the drink to his lips.

They declined – Ken felt as though he was approaching his threshold anyway. Jane stretched out lazily, saying: ‘No thanks, sweetheart. I’m just about done for the night, any more and I’ll be nodding off!’

Her statement was amazing, here they were, learning about something truly shocking, frightening really, and she was starting to think about some kip. Seeing the befuddled expression upon Jane’s face, Ken grinned at her and said, ‘I know, it’s weird, just bloody weird is what this is!’

Mike spoke again. ‘Anyway,’ he said, ‘there are others involved in this, but no-one except the Council knows who they are, and we will never be privy to that information, either. I guess it’s for the best really. I mean, can you imagine it? You know, meeting up and asking how things were going in their sector…’

It was a fair point they supposed, after all it was hard enough just trying to get their heads around the small part it looked as though they were going to play.

Mike now spoke to them in a very business-like manner. ‘No, the way it works is like this: we get the call from George, if we accept the initial offer then we will receive the full briefing. After studying the details we’ll then do a reconnaissance, and if we still think it’s a goer then we’ll carry out some rehearsals if need be. After that, we receive a final briefing from George, get the equipment, and do the job.’

‘How do we get to meet George? I can’t wait!’ Jane said, her eyes lighting up.

Mike had bad news for her. ‘Ahh, now for the nasty part, Jane…You’ll need an implant, which is no big deal in itself, but it’ll make you feel poorly for a while,’ he said, grimacing.

‘Urrghh, an implant, what implant? I don’t like the sound of that at all!’ she said, looking at Ken for reassurance.

He pointed to the scar on his cheek and raised his eyes towards the back of his head in an indication to the hidden plate, which lay there. ‘Show her yours, Mike. Wait ‘til you see this for a scar!’ he said, whilst looking at Mike.

‘Mate, I don’t think that’s such a good idea,’ Mike said, shaking his head.

Ken winked at him behind Jane’s back. ‘It’s only a little one, go on, show her the transplant scar, go on Mike… don’t be shy!’

Mike grinned in acknowledgement. ‘Well, if you insist,’ he said, starting to unbutton his shirt. Their teasing backfired on them, somewhat…

‘Excuse my French, lads, but you can all piss-straight-off if you think I’m having anything as horrible as any one of those!’ Jane pointed in horror at Ken’s head with a slender forefinger. It was very rare for her to swear, but when she did then Ken knew he was approaching the edge. ‘No bloody thanks, count me out. Yuk!’ she said, crinkled her face and then stuck her tongue out at the two men, who by now were laughing out loud.

Mike fastened the loose buttons on his shirt and leaning across, touched the screen. A tiny device appeared for them to observe. It looked like a miniature Ladybird, one without any limbs or antennae. It reminded Ken of a minute teardrop, ‘A mercury teardrop…’ The thought trotted through his mind as he heard Mike speak to Jane again.

‘You won’t be getting anything like the ones we have, they just used our injuries as a place to insert our transplants,’ the Australian said, with a smile. ‘Plus, there’s the fact that now they have embarked upon this plan, the implants have been massively refined!’ He pointed at the screen, saying: ‘This particular one is no larger than the head of a pin, and it will be inserted into your inner ear – it takes ten seconds to insert, and about two days to get used to.’

Jane sat and looked at him, breathed out, and then asked: ‘Does it hurt, and what does ‘get used to’ mean, exactly?’

Mike strove to set her mind at rest. ‘It doesn’t hurt at all, not in the slightest, and getting used to it means, well…it means just that,’ he said. ‘You might feel a bit dizzy at times, like you most probably felt in the pub tonight, and you’ll have some amazing dreams, too!’

Ken said, ‘Except they’re not dreams, are they? No, not at all, they’re when you travel, or ‘jump’ to other places, see George and probably go and look at the next job, I’d be right in that assumption, wouldn’t I?’

‘Almost spot on, I would say, my friend – almost spot on!’ Mike smiled at him. ‘Anyone would think you’ve had previous experience at this game.’

Ken grinned at the pointed sarcasm and rose to his feet. ‘The one thing the implant will do, if I remember rightly,’ he said, ‘is to make you feel bloody tired. I didn’t even know I’d been given one, but I do remember feeling knackered a lot.’

‘Talking of which…I don’t know about you,’ Mike said. ‘But I’m bushed! I reckon we should finish off tomorrow, if that’s okay?’ He yawned, making a failed attempt to cover his mouth as he did so.

They were all in agreement, as Mike headed for the downstairs room, where his belongings had been dumped previously, Jane and Ken padded up the stairs. Within ten minutes the old building was in silence and almost total darkness, almost total darkness except for the dim green lights that the device sitting on the coffee table began to emit.

Even at this late hour, George was still busy – the data he sent caused the machine to glow softly as its inner mechanism began to decipher the stream of information it received from him. Of all the secrets the old lodge held, these new ones must have been amongst the most bizarre.

The child’s father was large, an enormous tree of a man, one who stood towering over the boy cowering before him. The child himself was a huge specimen in his own right, and that was half the problem. Well, almost the entire problem, if the truth was really to be told. His father had never forgiven the boy for being the perceived cause of his wife’s premature death. Yes, indeed, if he hadn’t been unfortunate enough to inherit most of his father’s oversized genes, then his mother wouldn’t have died during childbirth.

Certainly, if it wasn’t for his fault, for being so damned large…‘Then you’re Momma would still be alive, woodent she now?’ That little ditty always pre-empted the usual lecture on: ‘How Goddamned difficult thangs are tryin’ to raise a boy o’ your size on my own!’ The man always followed the lecture by dragging the boy around by the ear, or hair, and giving him a guided-tour of the empty cupboards. The trip would usually end with him shoving the child’s large head towards the few slices of stale bread, which lay moulding in the cracked earthenware container. ‘I ain’t gonna buy no more bread ‘til you finish what we already have, now eat it boy, eat it!’

The musty taste of mould stayed in the child’s mouth for hours afterwards. The boy didn’t mind listening to the lecture – he would have quite happily stayed a thousand times and listened to it over, and over again. He would much rather the lecture than endure one of the far more regular beatings his father dished out.

They weren’t really beatings, as such – it was more like a fight with a giant bully. A beating would have been a damned sight better; at least it would be over quickly. Bang-bang, one-two, and down you go. No, his father’s method was much worse than any old beating. It consisted of nipple twisting, hair pulling and all manner of other painful things, handed out whilst the tear-filled sneer upon that beer-sodden face looked unmercifully down at him. Ball-crushing blows to his groin, solid, leg-deadening punches to his thighs and calves. Skin-wrinkling ‘Chinese burns’ seared his arm to the bone. And then, worst of all, the dreaded arm-lock. It always ended in the arm-lock, always.

When the child had finally been pummelled into a tearful submission, his father would then encircle the boy’s neck within a giant forearm and drag him to his feet. With his windpipe crushing beneath that thick, ginger-haired forearm, the child would stand shaking and wait fearfully to be told to say the words.

It always ended this way, always.

‘Now…you tell your Momma that you’re sorree, and you tell her loud, now, you hear me? She is uppen heaven and she needs to hear that your sorree, boy!’ It was the same thing every time, every time. ‘Say the words, an’ say ‘em loud, boy. Say ‘em!’ The vice around his neck would slacken, and with mouth open he would gasp a lung full of air and then say the words, say them over and over again.

‘I’m sorry Momma, I’m sorry Momma – I never meant to kill you, Momma. I didn’t know I was being bad, Momma, Momma, Momma!’ But his anguished shriek only fell upon the deaf ears of the old farmhouse, his father seemingly unable to hear the words, or see the abject sorrow and terror within his son. On one occasion, the boy had been held upright by the hair and made to say the words repeatedly for fifteen minutes, before finally being hurled to the floor with his father’s words still ringing in his ears.