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44.
He felt a terrible urgency now that he knew where the women’s birthing cave was.
Maryan Shurey filled his dreams with memories of their intimate nights together. He could almost look over his shoulder and follow the latest detective drama or comical commercial, except that his passion kept bringing him back into her arms even as he awakened at night, filled with need. The purpose of things was falling into place in a vague manner. He knew that Beacham University had been pivotal in gathering genetic material. He knew something terrible had happened leading to mankind’s extinction. He sensed the desperate manner in which things had been done, to land him and his fellow clones in this far-distant exile beyond time. He knew, most of all, that he must find a copy of Maryan Shurey, though the realization weighed heavily on him that something in the unseen master plan had gone wrong: all the clones were sterile. Was there a point in going on at all?
Yes, because I am lonely, and I have a right.
He spent every daylight hour patrolling the cliffs from a safe distance away from the valley. His most immediate task now must be to neutralize the rippers so he could get close to the birthing cave.
He studied the individual rippers, getting to know them and their habits. How could he get over there—and how get into the birthing caves without being seen by the rippers?
What if he hunted the rippers one by one and killed them? How many days or weeks before the next pride entered the valley to take charge? Not a worthwhile plan. But maybe he could thin their numbers for a while, keep them on the run, fill them with fear if that was possible, maybe even scare them off for a time until their natural hunger and greed got the better of them.
How long until the next birth in the caves? A day? A month? A year? A century? This process had been going on for ages.
He must get into the opposite hill and make a determination, once and for all, if he had any hope of having a sound, sane mate in this world. What would he not give for her sweet company, her warmth beside him at night, someone to talk to? Just think—he’d never ever gotten a hug, a kiss, a kind word. He’d been struggling so hard to survive that he’d forgotten the depths of the misery he lived in.
He made himself a deadly new bow, stronger than the first, and a set of arrows. He would carry two bows—one a back up if the first failed. He would carry thirty arrows, each two feet long with a fire hardened point dipped in excrement. He would tie them in bundles of five, and five bundles together into one roll on his back, with five arrows in hand for quick use. These weren’t the all-purpose hunting arrows he’d been making. These were beast-killers.
At dawn, after eating a good meal, he climbed down from his plateau. He jogged across the beach carrying his weapons. Quickly he pushed the boat into the water and jumped in. He sailed along the coast with his bows and arrows on his belly neatly bundled, his spare arrows slung together and trailing in the water.
He passed the valley and came ashore on the other side, in a slightly different place as he did each time to keep potential stalkers guessing. He clambered up the hill, one hump at a time, until he came to the top of the coastal hills. He followed the canyon edge as slowly and noiselessly as he could, with one arrow ready to cock and fire and more at hand.
He stayed out of sight from the river. He saw the rippers lazing in the sun, unaware of him. Something long and white lay tattered among them, and he felt revulsion at the thought of what—or who—that might be. One of the adults was gnawing on something Alex was almost sure was a torso.
He searched up and down the ridge, going back finally away from the rim. He was becoming more paranoid by the moment, thinking he’d been crazy to come here. The more time went by, the more likely the rippers would come up here, as had that recent big one he’d slain. He kept checking the wind, which was very light and blowing northeasterly. Damn, it could shift just as easily and blow east, and they knew his scent. God, they loved his smell. It must be like an aphrodisiac, their holy grail.
Then he found something.
About 200 feet back in the woods was a pile of brush that looked oddly as if it had washed up somehow. He pulled some of it away, and found underneath a kind of slate slab. There might have once been a handle on it, but that would be worn away by now by the simple night wind over so many eons.
Looking over his shoulder constantly, he labored at the slab.
It wouldn’t budge.
He heard a distant roar.
He lay down and pushed against the slab with his hands, pushing his feet the other way against a tree trunk.
Nothing. He threw himself on the slab and frantically brushed off several feet of dirt and rocks.
Then he stretched out again.
He heard another roar, and froze listening.
Nothing. His heart pounded in his ears and his breath came in gasps.
Silence.
He pushed, and the slab moved aside. It made a stony noise almost like metal dragging on stone. Then he realized that it was what was left of a manhole cover.
A wan shaft of light fell inside, and he saw a hill of earth piled up. Over the ages, tiny rivulets of sand and water must have leaked in. But the tanks were still active. He lowered himself in resolutely. With an arrow cocked, he waited just below the hole for his night vision to return. He saw dim glowing objects, and knew what they were - mushrooms growing on the walls.
The cone of soil on which he stood yielded a bit, sending down a shower, and he sank a foot or so into it, but then his feet hit firm, compressed soil. He sat on his haunches, arrow ready, and waited.
He listened intently.
Wind moaned faintly across the hole above him.
Below, in the caves, he heard splashing. He heard a dull sound, like a voice.
He went down, cautiously, one step at a time.
He heard a murmur. Laughing? Crying?
A sharp cry. Pain? Fear?
Step by step, he made his way forward. In the darkness, his pupils opened wide, and the soothing light of the mushrooms began to let him see how his skin glistened a faint bluish-white.
He heard laughter, crying, then a scream.
He inched forward, his heart pounding.
Then he heard Maryan’s voice: “Please, no!”
He ran forward, splashing through puddles.
Here were the birthing galleries still active. He smelled the familiar freshness of the greens, and his ankles sloshed through liquid. His soles began to feel soft and comfortable—hadn’t realized how hard they’d become.
Despite the healing fluid, a smell of death hung in the air.
He took it all in in a flash: three galleries... one dark and empty... The second with a shape in a tank... in the third, three figures: two mutants, one normal...
With a yell, he stepped into the room.
They barely looked up, the two puff-girls gnawing at the viscera of Maryan who lay naked and sprawled against the wall. She was immersed six inches in the healing green water that could do nothing for her now.
Using his bow as a whip, he beat the two unfortunates until he saw red welts on their backs. One tore out a piece of meat and ran cowering toward the front of the cave. The other he had to kick and beat before she would take her arms out of the torso.
He kicked the second mutant out of the way and knelt by Maryan, but there was nothing he could do. He touched her—she was still warm—so this was the one who had begged for mercy.
Numbed with horror and disappointment, he staggered out of there and went into the second gallery.
The figure he’d seen was a mummy. Her shriveled face and hands peered out of a dry, empty tank. He saw what must have happened—her killers had devoured the nutrient rich abdomen with their umbilical cords, and must have been so rough that they tore the stem of the umbilicus out of the bottom of the tank, so that it drained. The mummy’s bottom half was missing. As he went by, the wind of his passage made her topped over forward like a chunk of papier-mâché.
“No!” he yelled. “No!”
He had risked his life for nothing, chancing the rippers to come here.
He went from tank to tank—nothing.
Then he heard a rumbling sound. He felt a rush of adrenalin, and clung to the nearest tank. A slat of light stabbed into the cave.
He listened for roaring noises, but none came.
His curiosity compelled him to rush toward the cave entrance, though his mind screamed for him to stop.
He saw the two misshapen creatures run out side. Rippers pounced on them.
He just rounded the corner into the front cave as a ripper loped out, carrying in its jaws the body of the women who had just died.
He heard a squeak that sounded like fabric tearing: the tendons on the wall were moving, contracting the giant brownish muscle tissue that operated the door—and the door slammed shut, sealing him in darkness.
He wanted to cry, but he was beyond emotion, in shock. He staggered dimly about... realizing that he could stay here, that he could kill any mutants that developed, that he would rescue the next Maryan.
He broke a piece of mushroom off the wall. He knelt on the floor and drank the healing water. Between bites and gulps, he made a meal of the liquid and the mushroom bread.
Then he climbed up the mound and pushed the slab back into place, shutting himself in.
He would stay here as long as it took.
He would die here if he did not succeed. He wasn’t worth going into the world again alone.
He sat down with his back to the wall and began the wait.
Slowly he sagged downward until he was lying down. His thoughts began to drift, and he must have fallen asleep.
Alex was with Maryan, holding hands and running along the shore of a lake. She was so beautiful, with her healthy red cheeks and fine face. Her blonde hair hung in pigtails—ah yes, that trip to Lake George in 2010! They’d made love there for the first time, after two years of intense petting. They’d already vowed to marry, and this was their first vacation together. They were both 20.
It had been dim in the bedroom at the motel, with the Venetian blinds drawn, and the summer sunlight filtered to a honey-brown glow. Alex had held her thighs against his ribs, feeling the softness of her knees under his armpits as he thrust, so wonderfully, and thrust again, and each time she moaned. She clutched the rumpled bed sheets and turned her head from side to side...
...Not moaning, but sobbing.
Cold wet hands shook him, and a bloody tangle waved before his eyes.
He threw himself against the wall in recoil at the horror before him.
The monstrosity fell over Alex; he felt its cool flesh against his; and it landed with a splat of flesh in a shallow puddle of green parsley.
He could smell blood about it. Had it been feasting somewhere in the darkness?
He stood over it, his bow raised to come down on its neck and kill it.
It turned, raising one hand in supplication.
“Please,” it said.
He sagged in wonder. It was she.
“Maryan?”
“Alex?”
“I can’t believe this!” He was on his knees, hugging her. She felt slippery and wet, and cried out in pain.
He looked down and saw the torn umbilical dangling from her.
“Where are we? What’s going on?”
At that moment he heard the door again, crazed with the ardor of giving birth again and again.
A stab of light.
A cautious, questioning growl rumbled powerfully through the caves.
He looked down the corridor, through the open cave mouth, and saw a ripper prowling on the distant river bank. Another of the powerful animals just then slipped into the caves with searching eyes and open, hungrily dripping snout.
Alex held a hand over Maryan’s mouth. “You have to be absolutely silent,” he whispered.
Wide-eyed, she nodded.
He took her by the hand and they retreated deeper into the cave. He chambered an arrow and looked watchfuly behind. The majority of the rippers were busy on the river bank or in the entrance and had not yet scented Alex and Maryan. The rippers were busy chewing on white puffy objects, and their muzzles were red.
Alex noticed that Maryan was doubled over in pain, and he kept his arm comfortingly around her. She was perfectly formed, and he knew that the tree-knot of umbilical matter should fall off soon as her abdomen healed. He examined the ends briefly, saw teeth marks—the mutants had gnawed them off, causing her to birth prematurely as he had. “We have to stay in the caves until you are healed,” he told her. “You need the green water to heal you.”
He didn’t mention his fear that a massive infection would kill her as surely as the attentions of the rippers.
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