Redwood: Servant of the State (8 page)

“Thanks.”

Thoughts of Professor Kalinowski brought me back to my weeks at AES 3.

“He never told me he was a Professor while I was there.”

“You never told him you were hematophageous.”

I smiled. He had me there.

“Professor, Cruz? I’ve been wondering. Why does Professor Kalinowski stay so isolated out there? I mean, doesn’t he visit the station every now and then?”

“No. Milton hasn’t been to the Ranger station in eighteen years or so.”

“Why? Is he just anti-social?”

I didn’t think that was the reason. He’d seemed plenty sociable to me during my stay. But I had to ask.

The Professor took a deep breath and paused, as if to collect his thoughts.

“When we first came to Redwood, about twenty years ago, we were both single. So was Melody. We all worked together. It was an exciting time. A new world, new discoveries daily. Primates in the woods, all that. We were all very close, and the Ranger station was considerably more crowded back then.

“Anyway, in the middle of all our work and all the excitement, we both fell in love with Melody. It was a classic love triangle. I think she loved him, too. But, she loved me more. In the end, she chose me over him. It broke his heart. He moved to AES Three and has stayed there ever since, experimenting on tobacco and other crops in isolation. Colt is the only one of us who has actually seen him in years, on regular supply trips. Your time there is the longest anyone’s spent with him.”

We sat in silence for a while longer as I digested this newfound knowledge. I thought about the emotions Kalinowski must have felt, driving him to separate from the rest of the group like that.

“Surely he would have come back after a while.”

“The fact we have so few people at the station … Remember we lost the majority of researchers after the State banned most humans from Redwood. The fact we have so few people now means he’d be in almost daily contact with Melody and me. I don’t think he wants that.

“Besides, I think he enjoys the isolation now. He’s been performing experiments out there for years without anybody telling him what he can or can’t do.”

I nodded. Makes sense, I thought. We stayed out there a while longer in silence.

“You should get some sleep, Marcus. You’ll need it for tomorrow.”

Chapter Eight

I woke up to the savory smell of forbidden Redwood cow steak sizzling on a grill somewhere. I crawled out of the sleeping bag and made my way to a makeshift mess, where Ranger Jenkins prepared thin slices of skirt steak, potatoes and scrambled eggs on a camp stove.

“Morning, Marcus. Help yourself to some breakfast tacos.”

After eating, I made my way over to Dee Dee, the triplets, and the Professor who was fiddling with some equipment.

“Try it now, Dee Dee.”

She flipped a switch and a hologram popped into existence: a three foot sphere, showing branches and trees. Dee Dee looked up and smiled when she saw me.

“The transmitter works. This is a scale hologram of what the omnicam is picking up. It has a 100 yard range, and the hologram is one yard.”

I looked in fascination, watching slight movement in the leaves. The clarity was very high.

A bird glided into the sphere. I’d seen one like it before. Its body was about the length of an Old Earth horse. It had a wingspan of twenty feet or so. In the hologram it appeared very tiny, but visible.

It swooped down suddenly and grabbed a bug out of the air that must have been the size of a softball. It stopped on a branch to chew and gulp down the meal, then flew off, gliding out of the cam’s range.

The Professor nodded in satisfaction.

“We should have a front row seat for the show.”

The show took a long time to start. The triplets fidgeted, bickered, fought, and eventually left to explore every square inch of the branch we were on. Mrs. Jenkins corralled them and put them to work packing up all our tents and sleeping bags.
Idly watching the hologram seemed preferable after that, so they rejoined the Professor, Dee Dee and me to keep an eye on the instruments.

Ranger Jenkins produced a box of cigars.

“Redwood’s finest. Compliments of Professor Kalinowski.”

We all took one and lit up with a lighter he passed around. I did a double take when I saw Dee Dee take one.

“What, haven’t you ever seen a girl smoke a cigar before?”

“No, actually I haven’t.”

Jeremy snickered.

“You’re the first girl he’s ever seen, Dee Dee.”

“Actually, that’s not true. I’ve seen lots of girls before. I’ve seen them on just about all my layovers on other planets.”

The triplets were rather jealous of my trips off planet. I didn’t bother to explain to them that being a pilot on an automated ship was not exactly prestigious.

I changed the subject.

“Who came up with the name, ‘Fred?’”

“That’s a good question, Marcus,” the Professor said. “I don’t know.”

“It stands for First Real Enemy Detected!”

“Really, Jason? Where did you learn this?”

“Aw, I just made it up.”

“I see. Well, it sounds as plausible as anything else.”

-+-

We had smoked turkey sandwiches for lunch, along with some dried fruit.

“Go ahead and pack the mess up, Colt,” the Professor said. “I hope to be home before supper.”

Ranger Jenkins nodded.

“Let’s hope Melody’s statistical model works out.”

“Daddy, the sensor grid is showing the hunting party leaving the city!”

The Professor and the Ranger looked at each other and smiled. Physician Patel walked up.

“So it begins?”

The Professor nodded.

“They’re doing their part. Let’s see if Fred shows up.”

Some time later, the party’s scout showed up in the omnicam’s hologram, jumping onto a branch on the outer edge. He looked around, jumped down to another branch, stood up on hind legs and sniffed the air. He hooted, apparently giving the green light to other members of the party.

One by one they came into range and appeared in the hologram, a dozen of them. The last four were laden down, arms crossed, carrying fruit close to their chests. The fruit looked like berries of some kind, purple and each about the size of a tennis ball. The others ran around from branch to branch, inspecting a small bush-like outgrowth on some of them. When they found a berry or two, they’d rush back and put them in the arms of those carrying the fruit.

Jason chuckled. “Twelve little monkeys. Only, they’re not so little, are they?”

We watched as the party gathered fruit, jumping from branch to branch, making a slow arc through the omnicam’s field. Everybody seemed to be holding their breath.

“There!”

Dee Dee pointed to the edge of the hologram. A new monkey slowly slid into view, climbing along the trunk of a tree at the omnicam’s outer periphery.

Then it stopped and remained still. The other monkeys slowly made their way toward his position.

The scout approached Fred’s position first. He stopped and rose on two feet. He sniffed the air and his ears twitched. He remained like this longer than before. Finally he looked in all directions, then jumped to a higher branch and repeated the process. He dropped down to a lower branch and repeated it a third time. Finally he scratched his head and called out the go ahead signal to the others.

They slowly approached, hunters inspecting bushes, fruit carriers in the rear.

One of them came within a few feet of Fred. We found out later it was a female. She approached one of the bushes near a branch on Fred’s tree.

Suddenly, he leaped from his perch. She screamed an alarm and jumped down and away just before he landed on her. The other monkeys screamed and scattered in all directions. Fred howled in rage, and ran after his intended victim.

She jumped from branch to branch, scrambling along open areas, jumping to trunks, climbing higher, jumping again.

Behind her, Fred followed, howling.

The other monkeys ran too, but without Fred chasing them they eventually slowed down. We were able to examine the sensor data later, and saw they all went back to the settlement on their own.

“You getting all this, Diane?”

“Yes. But, Daddy, they’re coming this way.”

We watched as the chase continued through the hologram, in the direction toward us. The female monkey jumped off a final branch in the sphere and disappeared from view. Fred followed her.

“Where are they on the grid?”

Dee Dee waved her hands over the controls. The hologram disappeared to be replaced by a larger sphere. It was translucent, but didn’t show all the branches or details of the omnicam’s. This was the grid. Data points only. Our location was marked by nine green circles, one for each member of the team. On the edge, purple circles were scattering, but mostly headed for the sphere’s center which was darker and represented Monkey City. But one purple circle headed straight for our position, followed closely by a red circle in hot pursuit.

“Daddy, they’re coming straight for us.”

“I see it, Diane. I doubt they’ll get to this particular branch, but we need to be prepared if they do. Everybody gather round! Colt, get your weapon ready.”

Jenkins nodded and pulled out a pistol. He racked the slide, loading a round.

We gathered round, watching the sensor grid hologram nervously. The purple and red circles came ever nearer. Eventually I thought I could hear something scampering through the trees.

She jumped onto our branch near the trunk, just yards away from us. We were all bunched together and stunned to see her appear, even though we’d been following her progress on the grid. She froze, just as surprised to see us.

Almost immediately Fred was on top of her. He howled, and with one swipe of his paw removed half her throat.

Then he stopped. Slowly he shifted his gaze toward us. Jenkins held his pistol up, the barrel shaking slightly. Fred’s mouth stretched into an angry rictus grin, showing every tooth. He howled and jumped right into the middle of us.

We scattered. Equipment scattered. He swung out with a paw through the grid hologram and scratched up the instruments near it. The back of his paw caught Jeremy in the face, who went flying backwards. He snapped his jaws at me. I dodged out of the way. We all scrambled back. Dee Dee slipped. He jumped on top of her and bit her shoulder.

Bang!

Fred stopped, and looked up at Jenkins. Blood trickled from the giant monkey’s left breast.

Bang! Bang!

Fred leaned his head back and howled. A long, angry, bone chilling sound. He leaped off Dee Dee, jumped to another branch, and disappeared through the trees.

-+-

Physician Patel stopped Dee Dee’s bleeding, patched her up, gave her a sedative and pain killer. Jeremy had a bruise on his face that promised a black eye. That was the extent of our injuries. After seeing to Dee Dee and Jeremy, the Professor salvaged the equipment that wasn’t damaged and reactivated the grid hologram to provide us a warning if Fred decided to come back. He ordered the rest of us to pack up what we could and get ready to leave. Then he went over to the body of the monkey that Fred left behind.

Physician Patel set up a sling to carry Dee Dee between Jason and Jacob. Jenkins set up another sling to carry the dead monkey, and asked me to help. We left a lot of stuff behind, but we vacated the premises within twenty minutes of Fred’s attack.

We flew slower on the way back. It took some getting used to, carrying the dead weight of the monkey between me and Jenkins. Eventually I figured it out, though, and we were able to make good progress through the trees along with the others. Likewise Jason and Jacob were able to figure things out while carrying Dee Dee back.

Several hours later as we approached the Ranger station, a large group met us. Back home they’d seen the action on the sensor grids, and realized we’d met up with Fred.

Mrs. Patel and her daughters were there with extra medicine and first aid supplies. The O’Donnells were there to check on the triplets. Mrs. Cruz was there, too, and wailed inconsolably when she saw Dee Dee flown in on a sling.

Together we all made it back to the landing platform by nightfall. The Patels rushed Dee Dee off to the medical ward, closely followed by the Cruzes and several other concerned friends. Mrs. Cruz’s bitter weeping drifted through the night air as they hurried through the city.

I heard somebody say, “That’s her adopted daughter, right?”

Somebody else nearby said, “Yes, but they raised her as their own.”

Jenkins rounded up volunteers to move the monkey’s body to an examination facility. I took my PHU off, stretched, decided to follow the others and check on Dee Dee.

A large crowd gathered around the medical ward entrance. Mrs. Patel stepped out, closed the door behind her. She turned to address us.

“She’s fine. She’s going to make it. But it’s been a long day and she needs rest. Everybody go home. You can see her tomorrow.”

The crowd slowly dispersed.

I lingered. I decided to go around back, sneak a peak through one of the windows, and make sure she was really okay.

I knew I was close to where I wanted to be when I could hear Mrs. Cruz crying. I crept up next to the window and peeked inside. Professor Cruz held her tight. She sobbed into his shoulder.

“Why? Why did you have to take her? I told you not to take her.”

“I know, sweetheart. You did. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?”

Her head shot up from his shoulder. Anger snapped across her face.

“You took her into the most hostile environment on this planet! You risked her life! You …”

At that moment, a door opened and Physician Patel entered the room.

“Curtis? Melody? You need to see this. She’s changing.”