Descended from Darkness: Apex Magazine Vol I Read online

  "I did not cry," Chamberlain said indignantly. He pulled himself up. The Weirdy did not stop him. Chamberlain glared at the Weirdy. The trapped, exploding Bombie was still frozen by their side in its bubble of---of what?

  "What did you do to it?" Chamberlain asked.

  "Bombie? Make it sleep, only. Sleep small. You look?"

  He looked, and looked away.

  "Come," the Weirdy said. "You, me, go now. Take Bombie."

  "Go where?"

  "Home," the Weirdy said. "Source. Must change thing that is wrong. Fault of us, you. Never mind. All same."

  "I should kill you," Chamberlain said. He stood up. His hand was on the butt of the Vacuum 300.

  "Kill, not kill, all same," the Weirdy said.

  "Whatever," Chamberlain said, resigned.

  He followed the Weirdy. The Weirdy carried the frozen Bombie. What was he supposed to do? The alien could have killed him. It chose to keep him alive. Did that make him, technically, a prisoner of war? He'd never heard of anyone being captured by the Weirdies. And he still had his gun, so technically...

  He thought about it. If he threw down his gun, would that make him a prisoner of war? They couldn't blame him then, could they? I mean, didn't he have to obey some kind of convention then? He said, "Do you want my gun?"

  The Weirdy turned to him, the cat's eyes inscrutable. "You keep wind-toy. Gorp coming. Gorp no like you. Smell wrong."

  Gorp.

  "Where?" he said. Panic made him raise his voice. "Where Gorp?"

  "You must quiet. Gorp coming. Many Gorp. Like you no like you."

  What the hell did that mean?

  They walked through the jungle. Chamberlain felt the ground shake under his feet. They passed through the trees, and suddenly they were out of them and into open space.

  Chamberlain stared. He had thought this was all jungle, yet below him a vast open plane spread out in all directions, and in the distance he saw the outline of mountains, their peaks covered in snow, and a great, distant waterfall whose water rose again into the sky as it hit the ground, creating a haze of mist. Below, on the plane, were the Gorp.

  "What is this place?" he said.

  "Source," the Weirdy said. "Fly inside Fly. You say---amber?"

  "Amber?"

  "Fly in amber. Fly in Fly in amber."

  "I have no idea what you just said."

  The Weirdy seemed to shrug. "Matter no matter," it said. Chamberlain sighed.

  Below, the Gorp thundered past them.

  "Why are they---" he said, and stopped, thinking back on the Weirdy's words. "Like me not like me?"

  "Not Fly. Come from---not source. Like you. Now belong Fly. Like you. But different."

  "Not from Fly?" He stared at the Gorp. He had never seen so many. They ran past, appearing not to sense him, which suited Chamberlain fine. "Belong Fly, like me? How? I don't belong here!" Was that a wisp of panic in his voice? He stared at the Gorp and prayed they would keep on not noticing him.

  "Belong Fly long time. No matter. Fix source first time. See after."

  "What's the---where's the---what source? How do you fix it?"

  "You come. Wait first time. Gorp go. Gorp fight you, fight me. Like fight."

  They were aliens? That is, other aliens? Where did they come from? When? He said, "And the Bombies? Also from not here?"

  "Bombies?" The Weirdy sounded surprised. "Nice toy. Nice Bombie. Like play-play. All same wind-toy."

  Wind-toy? He meant his gun, Chamberlain realised. So the Weirdy thought the gun was a toy? He said, "Gun no toy. Gun kill."

  "Kill, all same play-play," the Weirdy said. "You no die. Like Bombie."

  Chamberlain gave up. They watched the Gorp in silence.

  When the last Gorp had passed, Chamberlain sighed with relief and the Weirdy, without speaking, began to flow down the hill to the plane. Chamberlain followed him.

  They walked in silence. It was a strange place. It should not have been there, he thought. There should be only jungle, living trees, darkness, mud, not---this.

  There were tracks in the dust, and as they walked Chamberlain's perspective seemed to shift uncontrollably, as if a great lens were pinpointed at him and he stared through it at the plane and saw---

  The tracks---made by the Gorp? By others?---seemed magnified, lines and circles running and criss-crossing each other, forming---

  Somehow they began to make sense. They were like a writing, if someone could write on an entire world. Not random, but carrying a meaning, like an ancient magic spell, and he could almost understand it...

  "Source," the Weirdy said, and it sounded sad. "You understand?"

  Understanding was hovering on the edge of his mind. It was there in the lines in the dirt, in the great rising mountains which shouldn't have been there, in the plane itself. The old song came back to him then.

  Firefly is dead and cold

  Monkey burns, Jaguar sleeps

  Wolf and Dog circle

  Elephant is home.

  "No!" the Weirdy said. It stopped and faced Chamberlain. Its cat's eyes were wide and unblinking. Its whirlwind body sent dust flying in the air. Chamberlain blinked back tears. "One, you see? You understand!"

  "One is missing?" he found himself whispering the words.

  "Must fix!"

  Was there another line to the song? There were six worlds, and he counted them, ranked based on their distance from the sun: Monkey, Jaguar, Wolf, Elephant, Dog, Firefly. Six.

  "No! Mistake! Never-mind, no fault. Must fix all same."

  "I wish you'd stop saying that."

  But the plane grew around him and he could see the world emanating from it, from that single point, growing outwards, and the script upon the world was like a curse, a seal, a---

  "What did you do?" he whispered. And then he thought---was it us?

  "All same," the Weirdy said.

  All same. And stop. And the world shrank around him, the lens lifted.

  "Source," the Weirdy said.

  "Here?"

  It was just another patch of dust, nothing to distinguish it. Nothing around them for miles. Something lying in the dirt, a metal cylinder half a meter across. He looked at it. Ours? he thought. Theirs?

  "Never mind," the Weirdy said. "You fix, now."

  "Me?"

  The Weirdy released the frozen Bombie sphere. "Wait," Chamberlain said, "What are you---"

  The Weirdy threw the Bombie high in the air. The bubble rose, rose, rose and then---

  "Shit!" Chamberlain yelled. He looked up---

  The transparent bubble disappeared. The Bombie explosion, as if there had been no interruption, expanded outwards from its nucleus.

  "Shit!" Chamberlain said again, and---

  * * * *

  Four: Elephant and Fly

  He was Shambalin, and then he was Chamberlain, and he was sent to Fly with all the others. He said goodbye to his parents. His mother cried. His father shook his hand, awkwardly. He wore his cadet uniform. There were many others like him. The Deputy Chairman of the Party gave a speech.

  (---What happened?

  No answer in words, but the scene disappeared, and was replaced---)

  He was on the ship coming to land. They were playing cards. Shen and Mastorakis were still alive. Shen said, "I wonder what's happening back home?" Mastorakis said, "Same old." A screen came alive then, a news-feed from home, the Chairman speaking. "Peace must be achieved at all costs."

  "Hear, hear," someone said.

  "Our boys on Fly are sacrificing themselves daily to protect our rights, our livelihoods, our very humanity against the monsters."

  "I don't want to be a sacrifice," Chamberlain said.

  (---Sacrifice, a voice said. Yes. Sacrifice.

  ---No!

  ---Doesn't matter.

  ---It does to me!

  Fade again, and---)

  He was on Fly, walking through the jungle with his platoon, and the Weirdies where coming out of nowhere, and he fired at them, bu
t always there were more Weirdies, more bloody trees, more exploding insects. Only when you found Gorp did you get a real fight; the Gorp were the worst, blood-thirsty and cunning and huge---

  He was at the base, relaxing after the fight. They'd lost three people that day, including Shen.

  He was in the jungle when the Gorp attacked. He remembered dying, now.

  (---what?

  ---Play-play. You, me, Gorp, play. Now tired---)

  He was at the base when Colonel Piet ordered him and Mastorakis on a scouting mission.

  He was in the jungle when Mastorakis was killed by a living tree and a Weirdy, coming out of nowhere, stole over Chamberlain and the wind ripped him apart---

  He was at the base when they brought Colonel Piet's body back from the jungle and he thought, so they got you at last, you bastard.

  He was at the base when Mastorakis came in carrying Shen's body, Colonel Piet watching dispassionately from the side.

  He was at the base when the Gorp attacked, screams, Shen dying beside him, Mastorakis, Piet and he was---

  He was in the jungle---

  (---Please. Stop!---)

  He was in the base---

  Mastorakis---

  He was in the base and the voice of the Chairman of the Party on the news-feed said, "We have peace."

  He was in the jungle and a Bombie was resting on his arm and he tried not to move and counted the planets based on distance from the sun. Monkey, Jaguar, Wolf, Fly, Elephant, Dog, Firefly. Monkey, Jaguar, Wolf---

  (---Fly!

  ---Fly. Fly and...Elephant.)

  Fly. Fly. Fly. Fly. It was there. It had always been there.

  And so had he.

  (---How long? he said.

  ---Don't know. Don't count time. Long time?

  ---How long?

  ---Many solar circles. Many many. Full up.

  ---And all this time---

  ---Play-play. Tired now.

  But---)

  He was on a plane and above his head a Bombie exploded, shards raining down, and he knew there was no escape. "Have I been here before?" he said.

  "No. First time. Last time. Fly now."

  The Bombie shards hit him, and he died.

  * * * *

  Five: Shambalin

  He was lying on the grass under the stars with Rashmi and they both had their shirts off and her skin was soft and dark and his heart was beating loudly in his chest.

  Rashmi said, "One day I'm going to go to the stars."

  "Can I come with you?" he said, and his fingers traced a line under her arm and she giggled. "If you like. Where shall we go?"

  "We could go anywhere. See what it's really like out there, on Firefly and Monkey, Jaguar and Wolf and Dog, maybe even further, back where people come from, I forget what it's called."

  "Mars," Rashmi said. He shrugged. "Whatever."

  "We can go to Fly," she said, and Shambalin said, "They say the forests of the living trees are beautiful."

  "I want to see a Weirdy!"

  "They're strange. Hard to talk to."

  "How do you know?" she said, and punched him on the arm and he rolled over her and smiled into her face. "I saw this programme."

  "I never want to see a Gorp though!"

  "No," he said. "No Gorp."

  He rolled on his back. Rashmi put her arms around him and nestled her head in the crook of his neck. He stared up at the stars, and said, softly, "Sometimes, when true night falls, and the living trees are quiet, if you stand still, you can hear the music of the Skaar-et-lam."

  "What does it sound like?"

  He thought about it, looking up at the stars. "Like dying," he said. "And then being reborn."

  "Where did you hear that?" she said, and he said, "I don't know. It just came to me."

  He turned his head and looked into her face and she smiled. He kissed her.

  The Puma

  Theodora Goss

  Mr. Prendick, there's a lady here to see you."

  I must have jumped, because I remember my knee banging into the desk. In the years since I had moved to this obscure corner of England, where even the trains did not come and I could walk over the hills for hours without seeing a human face, I had received only one visitor, the local vicar. There must have been something in my speech, perhaps even in my face, that agitated him, because he would not stay for dinner, and he left without urging me to attend services in the small stone church where he preached, in the valley below. I was sorry to see him leave. He had seemed like a reasonable man, although his inquisitive brown eyes and pinched face, a probable indication of early poverty, reminded me of a lemur. In all that time, I had never been threatened with a visit by anything that could remotely be described as a lady.

  "A what?" I wondered what Mrs. Pertwee meant by a lady, exactly. Perhaps one of the female parishioners who lived in the village that surrounded the stone church, with its post office, pub, and collection of six or seven houses, coming to solicit for some missionary society to help our savage brethren.

  "A lady, Mr. Prendick. She---" Mrs. Pertwee hesitated. "She calls herself Mrs. Prendick."

  I tripped over the chair. The next day, Mrs. Pertwee had to wash the spot where my fountain pen had sputtered on the carpet with strong soap.

  She was waiting for me in the parlor, a sanctuary that Mrs. Pertwee only entered to do whatever housekeepers customarily do to horsehair sofas and china ornaments. I had not used the room since renting the cottage, and had seen no need to alter it.

  She was heavily veiled.

  "Edward," she said. "How nice to see you again."

  We are divided beings. One half of me had known that it could not logically be she. The other half had known that no one else in the wide world could claim to be my wife. That other half had been right. I could not mistake her voice, almost too deep for a woman, with a resonance to it, as though she were speaking from the depth of her throat. Like a viol.

  "You look better than when I last saw you, on the island."

  "Catherine."

  "So I have a name now. Did you forget it when you wrote this?" She held up a copy of my book. The book I should never have written, that my alienist had urged me to write. "Did you forget that we all had names? What a terrible liar you are, Edward."

  "Let me see your face," I said. The veil was disconcerting. I needed to know, for certain, that she really was speaking to me, that this was not some sort of hallucination.

  She laughed, like an ordinary woman, and lifted her veil.

  When I had last seen her, her face had been seamed with scars, the remnants of Moreau's work. Now, her face was perfectly smooth. The high cheekbones were still there, the nose aquiline, the best I think that Moreau ever created. The eyes yellow and brown together, like Baltic amber. The tops of her ears were hidden by her hair. Were they still pointed? She noticed me looking, laughed again, and pulled her hair back. They looked completely human. I am a scientist, and no judge of female beauty. But she was the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.

  "How did you..."

  "Walk with me, Edward." She indicated the French doors, which opened onto the garden. Her gestures were unnaturally graceful. "Let's reminisce, like old friends. Eventually, I'll have a favor to ask of you. But first, I'll tell you what I've been doing with myself for the last few years. Since, that is, you left me to die on the island."

  "I didn't leave you to die."

  "Didn't you?"

  I followed her into the garden. It was an ordinary autumn day, the sky grey above us, with clouds blowing across it, and a herd of sheep like clouds in the valley below. I could see a dog driving them, first from one side of the herd and then the other. Somewhere, there was a man, and it was at his whistle that the dog ran to and fro. What dogs had done, and men had done, and sheep had done, for a hundred years. A quintessentially English scene.

  "To what fate, exactly, did you intend to leave me?"

  Her voice took me back to another scene, an entirely different
scene. The southern sunlight on Moreau, lying in the mud, flies crawling over his shirt where the linen was stained red.

  "The Puma," said Montgomery. "We have to find her."

  "How did she do this?" I felt sick, mostly I think with shock. I had never, somehow, imagined that Moreau could die. Certainly not like this.

  He pointed to Moreau's head. "She struck him. Look, the back of his skull is smashed in. Probably with her own fetters. She must have torn them out of the wall. Damn."

  As a word, it seemed completely inadequate.

  We followed her trail easily enough. She was heading, not toward the village of the Beast Men, but toward the sea. I wondered for a moment if she might try to drown herself, as I had tried to drown myself, my first few days on the island. But Beast Men did not do such things. They killed others, not themselves. It took a man to do that.

  "There she is." Montgomery gestured with his gun.

  She stood, up to her hips in the water. She looked at us, then shook herself, flinging spray from her wet hair. She walked toward us. So might Aphrodite have walked when she rose from the sea. But this was an Aphrodite with skin like gold rather than ivory, and the eyes of a beast. Everywhere, her body was covered with fresh scars.

  "My God," said Montgomery. "So that's what he's been hiding from me."

  "Hiding?"

  "For a month, he wouldn't let me into the laboratory. He said the process was working at last. And look at her. She's his masterpiece. Poor bastard."

  "I killed the one with the whip," she said. Her voice reverberated, like waves in a cavern beneath the sea. "Will you kill me for what I have done?"

  "We will not kill you," said Montgomery. "It was not right to kill him, but we will not punish you for it."

  "Have you gone mad?" I whispered to Montgomery. I aimed, but Montgomery caught hold of my arm.

  "Can't you see what he did to her?" he whispered. "The man was a brute."

  "It was right to kill him, and it gave me pleasure," she said. She walked out of the sea, like a statue of burnished gold.

  With that unprepossessing statement began our time with the Puma Woman.

  Her scars faded, but they remained visible all over her face and body. She looked like a south sea islander, marked with cicatrices.

  Montgomery took her to live with us, in the enclosure. He gave her his bedroom and slept in mine. We cleaned out the laboratory, releasing whatever still had its own form, killing the results of Moreau's experiments. We had food, guns, and M'Ling, Montgomery's favorite Beast Man, to guard us at night. We planned to wait until the next supply ship came, and then---what? I assumed that we would leave the island, leave Moreau's abominations to their own fate. But what about her? Montgomery seemed to have become particularly attached to her. She walked around the enclosure in one of his shirts, tucked into a pair of his trousers tied at the waist with rope. She looked like a gypsy boy.