60
When he landed at the docks in Chicxulub, someone was
waiting for him. Chava, the boy who had told Ada and him
about the body on the beach. He was standing there in the
dim light, shivering. Beside him was the town drunk who
had lost his name.
“I knew you were coming,” said Chava as Altman tied the
boat off. “The bruja told me. She is dead and yet she told
me. She has asked me to tell you that you must go back.”
“I don’t want to go back,” he said.
“You must,” said Chava, his eyes innocent and sincere.
“She needs you.”
“And why are you here?” said Altman to the drunk.
He wasn’t drunk now, or at least didn’t appear to be so.
He crossed his fingers and made the sign of the devil’s tail.
“The only way to beat the devil,” the man told him, “is to
take the devil inside you. You must open yourself to the
devil. You must learn to think like the devil.”
“I don’t have time for this,” said Altman. “I need to find
help.”
“Yes,” said Chava. “We will come with you.”
He left the docks and set off, the old man and the boy
following him. When it became clear that he was heading
toward the DredgerCorp compound, Chava hurried to
catch up, tried to hold him back.
“You will find no help there,” he said.
He shook the boy off and kept going, heading for the
gate. When he looked back, he saw the boy and the old
man had stopped, were standing motionless in the dusty
road.
“We will wait for you here,” the boy called after him.
He tried his card on the gate and it opened. He crossed
the stretch of empty ground to the compound and tried the
card on the door, without result.
He knocked, pressed the buzzer, then waited. For a long
moment there was nothing and then the vid panel next to his
face flashed on, to show a wavery black and white image of
Terry.
He stared at Altman, pushing his glasses back on his
nose.
“I’d like to come in,” said Altman.
“I’m sorry,” said Terry. “No admittance for anybody at the
moment.”
“It’s important,” said Altman. “Something’s gone wrong
with the facility,” he said. “We need to do something about
it.”
He heard the sound of someone speaking, a voice too
low to make out, just outside the frame. Terry turned his
head and looked offscreen. “It’s one of them,” he said to
someone on his left. “I don’t know which one, I don’t
remember his name. Alter, I think.” He was silent, the other
voice rumbling again. “Yeah, that’s it,” he said. “Altman.” He
listened intently and then turned back to Altman.
“You can come in,” he said.
“Who were you talking to?” asked Altman.
“Nobody,” he said. “Don’t worry about that.”
“I need to know I’ll be safe,” he said.
“You’ll be safe,” said Terry after a moment’s hesitation,
but by the way he looked sideways as he said it, Altman
knew he was lying.
· · ·
He had almost reached the outer gate by the time Terry
opened the door. He kept going, not even turning around.
“Wait a minute,” asked Terry, “where are you going?”
“Sorry,” said Altman. “Can’t stay.”
“I’ve got a gun,” said Terry. “Don’t make me shoot you.”
Altman stopped.
“Now be a good boy and turn around and come back,”
said Terry.
He did. He turned slowly and went back. Terry held his
gun casually, almost desultorily. The safety, Altman noted,
was off.
“What’s that you’re holding?” he asked, glancing down at
the plasma cutter.
“What’s this about?” said Altman. “First I can’t come in
and then you’re insisting I come in?”
“Orders,” said Terry. “You’re to come inside and stay
put.” He gestured at the plasma cutter. “I think you’d better
drop it,” he said.
“Whose orders?”
Terry just shrugged.
“I don’t want to come in,” Altman said, moving slightly
forward. “There’s something I need to finish first.”
“And I don’t want to shoot you,” said Terry. “But I will.
Drop that thing and put your hands up.”
Suddenly the gate started to rattle, someone banging on
it. Terry’s eyes flicked toward it just for a moment, just long
enough for Altman to lunge and knock the gun to one side. It
fired, the bullet sparking off the fence, but Terry didn’t drop
it, indeed was already starting to bring it back to bear on
him. Altman flicked the plasma cutter on and flashed it
toward him in the same movement. The energy blade
sliced through his forearm, the gun and the hand holding it
tumbling to the ground.
For a moment Terry was too shocked to realize what had
happened. He just stood there, unable to figure out what
had happened to his arm. And then, it hit him. Eyes wide,
he stepped back and took in a deep breath to scream.
Altman, not knowing what else to do, ran, trying not to
hear the screams of the man behind him. He darted out the
gate and was joined by Chava, who ran along beside him.
“I came and knocked for you,” he said, “and now you
come.”
“A good thing you did, too,” said Altman. “Where’s the
old man?”
“El Borracho?” asked Chava. “He had to go. He was
thirsty.”
He started back down the street, the boy following him.
What now? He turned and crouched beside the boy.
“I have to destroy some devils,” he said. “Like the thing
you saw on the beach.”
“I will help you,” said Chava. “Together we will kill them.”
“No,” said Altman. “It is not a game. You cannot come. I
must find weapons and go alone.”
The boy thought a moment and then smiled. “You will
come with me,” he said. “Follow.”
The boy led him down through the streets and to the
shantytown and then to the edge of the jungle. He went to a
particular tree and put his hand on it and then carefully
pointed himself in a particular direction and, stiff-legged,
started to walk, pounding his footsteps hard against the
ground. When the sounds of his footsteps changed, he
stopped.
“Here,” he said, and pointed at the ground. He crouched
and began to brush the dirt away until he had uncovered a
steel ring and a wooden trapdoor about two feet wide and
six feet long. He gestured to Altman to open it.
He put the plasma cutter on the ground and reached
down and pulled on the ring. The door creaked up on its
hinge, revealing underneath it a coffinlike space lined with
rocks. One half was full of guns and rifles, maybe a dozen in
all. The other held axes and mauls, tree-spikes, a machete,
a can of fuel, an old-style chain saw.
“You may use these,” said the boy solemnly. “But you
must bring them back. They belong to my father.”
“What exactly does your father do?” he asked.
“He is for the people. He is . . .” For a moment he couldn’t
think of the words, and then it suddenly came to him.
“Ecological guerrilla.”
“Thank God for tree huggers,” said Altman.
He took the chain saw, left the rest where it was, though
this confused the boy.
“These monsters,” he asked, wide-eyed. “They are
trees?”
At first Altman thought to answer him properly, but when
he started speaking, he suddenly realized how complicated
the response would be. He just nodded and said, “Yes,
trees.”
But this created new complications. “How can trees be
monsters?” the boy wanted to know.
“It’s hard to explain,” said Altman.
“And what kind of tree?” he asked. He began to rattle off
Spanish tree names, following Altman.
Altman ignored him. He was almost back to the boat, the
boy still following him, when his holopod sounded. When he
answered, Krax’s face appeared on the holoscreen.
“Altman,” he said. “Hello.”
He switched off. Krax called again immediately. He
thought of not answering, but knew Krax would just keep
calling until he did. So he answered. But this time he kept
walking.
“This thing you did to Terry,” said Krax. “Hardly subtle. I
could have you arrested.”
“Somehow I don’t think you’re going to do that,” said
Altman.
“Probably not,” he admitted. “But I have to say, I think you
overreacted. We just wanted to talk to you.”
“You didn’t just want to talk to me,” he said. “You wanted
to keep me there.”
“It’s for your own good. Don’t do anything foolish, Altman.
Come back.”
“No,” said Altman.
“What about your girlfriend, Altman?” he said. “What
about Ada? Would you come back for her?”
Altman stopped. “Put her on,” he said.
For the first time, Krax’s composure cracked slightly.
“She’s not available right now,” he said.
“You can’t because she’s dead,” said Altman.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Altman. Why would she be dead?”
“I started hallucinating her,” said Altman. “Either you killed
her or she killed herself. Which was it, Krax?”
“Hallucinations don’t mean anything,” Krax insisted.
“She’s alive.”
Altman started moving again. “Show her to me, then,”
said Altman. “If I see her, I’ll come back.”
“As I said,” said Krax, “that’s not possible. You’ll just have
to trust me. Your girlfriend’s life is in your hands.”
He was at the dock now. “Good-bye, Krax,” Altman said,
and disconnected, powering the holopod all the way off.
He loaded the gear into the boat and climbed in himself.
Chava tried to clamber in, but Altman stopped him.
“Stay here,” he said. “I already have enough deaths on
my conscience.”
61
As he navigated the boat through the swells and felt the
spray on his face, there was a lot of time to think. I’m crazy,
he thought at first. I shouldn’t be going back. I was lucky to
escape alive the first time. And indeed, he might have
stayed on land if Ada hadn’t been dead. But no, as it was,
there was no reason to go back to land. He felt he had to
end it.
And then he began to think of what the old drunk had said
when he met him on the dock: The only way to beat the
devil is to take the devil inside you. You must open
yourself to the devil. You must learn to think like the devil.
And how would the devil think? Or how, in this case,
would the Marker think?
If anyone would know, Altman thought, it would be him.
He had seen the Marker many times, had survived close
proximity to it even when it was broadcasting fully. It had
spoken to him by way of hallucinations again and again.
What had it said most recently, through his memories of
Ada? I need you, Michael. I need you to finish what you
started. That was vague—like most of what the ghosts told
him, it was hard to pin down. Earlier, in the dream, it had
been much more specific. But was it really the Marker
speaking to him through the dream or was it only a dream,
or even something else? A dream was a far cry from a
hallucination.
But maybe the dream was his subconscious mind trying
to tell him something. What exactly had Ada said? I need
you to do something for me, she had said. I want to have a
baby. That’s what I need. It’ll bring us closer together.
But was a dream the same thing as a hallucination?
Maybe it was a different force altogether—maybe not his
subconscious at all but something else. What did she mean
by having a baby? Were these creatures, the crewmen that
had been transformed after death into monsters, the
Marker ’s offspring? Well, yes, he supposed so, in a
manner of speaking, if he was right in thinking they’d been
created by the Marker ’s transmitted code. But unless he
was mistaken, his dream about Ada had not raised the
issue with him until after the creatures, whatever they were,
had been spawned. Indeed, he must have had the dream
just after the creatures had appeared, even though Altman
hadn’t known about them until a few minutes later, when the
alarm woke him up.
Maybe he should take the dream literally. Maybe that was
exactly what the Marker was demanding of them: that they
reproduce it. Maybe if he could convince the Marker that he
understood, that he could reproduce it, things would return
to normal.
It was simple, he thought.
And then doubts assailed him. He was basing it all on a
dream, and it didn’t jibe perfectly with what his
hallucinations had been telling him. It could mean nothing,
or even be something else, another force, trying to
manipulate him. It was almost too simple. And even if he
was right, who was to say that if he did what the Marker
wanted things would go back to normal? Maybe they would
just get worse. What if the Marker had no stake whatsoever
in the survival of the human species but saw humans only
as a means to an end? If that end is fulfilled, he thought,
will it still need us, or will it crush us, almost without
thinking, as if we were flies?
What if we’re trapped between a rock and a hard place?
he wondered. What if humanity is going to die either way?
He shook his head. It was the best he could come up
with. He’d have to take a chance. But what choice he would
make, what he’d choose to risk, he didn’t know. Altman’s
wager, he thought. In any case, the Marker was the key.
There was no choice but to return to the Marker, no matter
what stood in the way.
It was nearly dark now. There, up ahead, were the lights of
the floating compound, dim, running on the emergency
backup, but still there. Soon he would be there as well.
Soon he’d either have his answer or he’d be dead.
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