PATCHER Read online

  “Smoke,” Pim says under his breath. “Perhaps it has only just emerged? The other one was smoking as well.”

  But Ak’klin knows a campfire when he sees it. “No, this is different.”

  “A rival troop then?”

  Ak’klin frowns. It’s the only plausible possibility… the alternative is unthinkable. “I hope so.”

  Pim gives a signal and they fan out, covering the desert sand with deft, fluid strides. The sand is warm and dry, reminding Ak’klin of his childhood home, so many lifetimes ago. In all that time, he doesn’t think he has ever witnessed a creature quite as strange as these, nor as helpless. They’ve been lucky for the most part, finding them hatched prematurely, usually in the last stages of death. A quick blow to the thick skull is enough to incapacitate them long enough for skinning and salvage, the body coming apart easily under knife and saw. They emerge from their eggs burned, weak, and fully intact.

  That alone is enough to suggest a low intelligence incapable of grasping the concept of Donation. Even the primitive Tenders know how to harvest and graft. It’s as natural as breathing.

  An overhang gives them a much better perspective on the camp and it’s clear that the campfire is far too large to be a rival poacher troop. A mixed blessing to Ak’klin, as he’s been hoping they’d be able to cull the hatchlings as much as possible before rival troops discovered the secret. But if the campfire was not made by one of his kind, then it means…

  “Look,” Pim points at the opening to the egg. The internal yolk, blood vessels and connective tissue have all been removed and strewn about the campsite. “Another premature hatching.”

  “No,” Ak’klin says. “I think this means we need to be far more cautious.”

  “What? You think…” But Pim falls silent as it emerges, truly a sight to behold.

  There is no record of large game, most of the legends being passed down through generations in stories. Ak’klin recalls tales of massive beasts that once roamed the land on four and six legs, huge grazing creatures with skulls large enough to house entire families. They are children’s stories, nothing more. The only actual evidence that creatures so large ever existed at all lies in museums—and even those are labeled hoaxes by some.

  And yet, there it is, moving ponderously to the egg entrails, moving them around, touching them. A small light appears from the center of one of the organs, and he and Pim exchange a glance.

  “What sort of creature plays with its own entrails?” Pim asks, the disgust clear on his face.

  There is another possibility, one that has occurred to Ak’klin in the past, and one he isn’t quite ready to admit to himself. Even as the idea forms again in his mind, forcing itself to the surface now, he finds it hard to accept. And he knows why. It’s because he is afraid of this possibility, more than perhaps anything.

  He turns to Pim. “If it’s moving, it’s dangerous.”

  Pim nods and then signals the other team on the far side of the camp. As he does this, Ak’klin watches the hatchling, still preoccupied with its own mess, watching the tiny lights as they glow and blink, unaware of the dart gun, now aimed at the back of its neck. Pim signals the gunner.

  Cheloola holds up his dart gun, inhales, and fires.

  The hatchling jerks, its massive hand slapping the back of its neck. It looks around with its strange flat face, those eyes searching. Oh yes, Ak’klin thinks, it is perhaps more intelligent than they have been giving these creatures credit. The other hand goes for something in its pocket, a stinger of its own. How odd.

  And again that itching, nagging thought begins to rise to the surface, questions he finds unanswerable. What if these are not hatchlings at all? What if they are not eggs? What if those are not entrails but something else? But these questions lie on the far range of his curiosity, and as Ak’klin watches the animal slump to the ground, he smiles. Questions are dangerous things; they lead to only more questions, leading one away from their task at hand. People such as Ak’klin cannot afford to follow such winding roads of critical thinking. To do so would lead to a mind full of questions and a belly empty of food. And Ak’klin is in the food business, not the question business.

  They wait for the toxin to run its course before proceeding down the rock face. The stinger lies just beyond the animal’s grasp. “Why could it not simply graft it to its arm?” one of his troop ponders. “It holds its stinger like some sort of Tender.”

  “Now is not the time to ask questions,” Ak’klin orders. “We must move quickly.”

  And they do, stripping the outer layer of skin, the dead skin, to reveal the pinkish flesh beneath. Knives and blades cut that away, exposing muscle, bone, organs, all neatly separated into their proper containers. There has been a rising need for tarpaulins, Ak’klin has noted, and the sheer size of the hide makes him optimistic of the profit potential. He looks down at the animal’s face, those eyes looking back. Does it feel pain, he wonders. Is it even aware of what’s happening to it as they strip it for saleable parts?

  The toxin isn’t meant to kill. They’d run into that problem before in the past. The last two had even defecated inside their birthing skins, making a mess none of them wanted to deal with again. It also ruins the meat, which needs to be sold quickly to the nearest market. No, this toxin was just the right dose to incapacitate the animal, allowing them to harvest as many parts as possible while it lays paralyzed. Death will come sooner or later, but waste is unforgivable.

  At last the game’s eyes lose their focus, leaking water into the soil until even those are harvested. If he didn’t know better, Ak’klin would think it was weeping, perhaps grateful for a clean and efficient death, knowing as all Donors do that its body will live on in another.

  “You are eternal,” he says to the eyeless face.

  They gather the entrails from the egg, but most appear to be hard and inedible—connective tissue perhaps, cartilage, or maybe the egg itself is only the vessel, passing on all its life to the hatchling so that it might live. Either way, the entrails that emitted their bioluminescent light go dim soon, and Ak’klin orders them to be thrown into the packs with the rest.

  At the end of the day, it is a good haul. The bones are huge and heavy, but a value beyond words. In only a short time, his products have become a sensation among the Grafter Barons and the Meat Mongers, their messengers reaching him from across the Red Mountains, asking to sample his wares. Some ask where he’s found this new species, where he could possibly have uncovered a new type of animal in a world where all animals are rare. He ignores them. Trade secrets.

  In all honesty, it is this time of great scarcity that Ak’klin feels he is the most fortunate. For it is with great scarcity that come the fattest prices. Demand is high, and Ak’klin is more than happy to meet his clients’ needs for the right price.

  Before the sun sets, they have all but the shell packed and loaded onto the orehorses and carts. After a brief celebration, roasting some of the spare meats over the campfire, they prepare to set off, and Ak’klin takes one last glance back at what has been an exceptionally profitable day.

  “You have yet to inform us of our next hunting site,” Pim says as they walk back across the cooling sand.

  “There will be time for that,” he says with confidence. “Informants are easy to buy.”

  They both look back at the empty husk of the egg, the dwindling campfire, and smile. Nothing has gone to waste.

  Chapter 12

  HE’S STANDING at the edge of the rec field outside Blainepark Elementary. He isn’t attending elementary school, and the only reason he has for being there at all is that Jessica and Brandon are there. He knows this because he’s followed them. Deep down inside, he knows this is wrong. He knows that what he is doing would be frowned upon by almost any sane person, but he can’t help himself.

  There are things in the world that are confusing to teenage boys, multiple signals and mixed messages of what is expected of someone at that age, magazines and TV shows and movies
, all telling you how you should be. It’s hard to separate the signal from the noise.

  “Be a man!”

  “Be strong!”

  “Be smart, rich, funny, thin but muscular, be handsome.”

  “Be sensitive, but don’t you dare act like a pussy.”

  He stands at the edge of the park in sweats and a ratty t-shirt. His worn sneakers have holes in the soles that let moisture in from the dewy grass. His mother bought his patched jacket at a thrift store. But he isn’t thinking about any of that right now. He’s only thinking of the two figures walking along the grass, nearly hidden in the shadows.

  They pause, talk, giggle, their fingers interlocked.

  Kendal watches all this with his hands in his jacket pockets. The gun rests heavily on his mind and fingers. He’d convinced himself that he could use it for protection, because after all, he was about to go for a stroll in the dead of night in unfamiliar neighborhoods. That’s as good a reason as any. Never mind that he was going for a stroll to follow Jess and Brandon.

  He isn’t sure what he is supposed to be anymore, only that Brandon seems to be hitting it closer to the mark than he is. Brandon is rich, funny, confident, strong, smart (well maybe not that smart) and certainly handsome. But Brandon is a monster. Anyone could see that. He’s a monster who hits women and then hides in his social camouflage, bewitching Jess and fooling everyone—everyone but Kendal.

  Somewhere beneath that façade of macho water-polo-playing jock lies the face beneath a mask. Kendal wants to expose that face. He wants Jess to finally see it, to finally understand what he really is. Without that mask, Jess would finally see all the horrible things that writhe beneath.

  He follows them further, through the playground where they swing on the swings then walk across the four-square court. He follows them out of the schoolyard and back onto the street. Cars buzz by, masking their footsteps and his. Advertisements, projected and scrolling on every wall, car, sign, and window, cast shifting colors across his face and clothes.

  He knows at some point Brandon will show his face, his true face, and when Jess starts to scream this time, Kendal will be ready to protect her. Maybe she’ll run for a change.

  He follows them to an area behind the library where there is an old oak tree with a bench beneath it. He stands in the shadows as they talk, but Jess seems reserved, no longer interested in what Brandon is saying. That or Brandon has said something to upset her. Either way, Kendal feels his hands around the grip of the gun as Jess stands. She yells something at Brandon and he grabs at her. She pulls away, but he grabs her again, this time squeezing her arm so hard, Kendal can see the pain on her face. Then he’s on his feet and he’s pulling her towards him, snaking a hand around behind her head and grabbing her hair. He goes in for a kiss and she slaps him.

  “Let her go.” Kendal steps out of the shadows as they both turn their heads. Jessica looks relieved, or maybe just surprised. It’s impossible to tell in the dark, and if memory is truly as malleable as people say, she isn’t anything. He cannot actually see her face, and he doesn’t even know what she is feeling until she speaks.

  “Kendal? What the fuck?” she says as Brandon glares at him—no, not a glare. He’s as unnerved as Jess is, his hand loosening from behind her head.

  “I said let her go.” Kendal feels the power of those words, the power of standing in the face of a monster to protect someone he cares for. “Let her go and stop hurting her.”

  He wants Brandon to speak, to step forward and put him in the position he’s hoping for. He’s saving the gun for that. It will be his grand finale in this scene. But instead it’s just Jess talking again.

  “Wait… were you following us?” Her shadowed face seems almost scared now, unsettled, and now Brandon is stepping forward.

  “I think it’s time for you to go home,” Brandon says. “I don’t know what creepy stalker shit you’re playing at, but you need to just go the fuck home.”

  “No, you need to go home, Brandon. I see the way you hit her. I see the monster in you.” These are the words he always wanted to say, but somewhere in the back of his dream mind Kendal knows it isn’t what he said at all. In fact, he wonders now if he ever said anything.

  “Let’s just go,” Jess says to Brandon and reaches for his shoulder. Then to Kendal, “Go home Kendal. And don’t talk to me again.”

  But Brandon isn’t moving and Kendal has a hard time wiping the smirk from his face. “She said go home,” Brandon says. “Or are you having a hard time hearing?”

  “Come on, Brandon.” Jess is trying even harder now to turn his body, but he breaks free and takes a step forward.

  “You can either go home with or without bruises, Ken Doll.”

  The nickname stings. Kendal knows he looks nothing like the iconic toy. His face is asymmetrical, his nose too big, his hair oily no matter how often he washes it, his skin marred with acne. His ears are too big, his clothes too ragged, his eyes dim, his coordination poor, his legs too long. He is a walking talking punch line to a genetic joke. He hates his name, and he hates his nickname.

  He waits for Brandon to take another step forward, wants him to get right in his face before he presents the surprise in the form of a Colt Mustang. But then he realizes that he is almost within punching distance, or the distance that Brandon could probably grab the gun for himself.

  Panic, uncertainty, and Kendal’s body makes the decision for him.

  The gun comes out and Brandon freezes solid as a rock, his eyes going wide at the tiny gun in Kendal’s hands. He holds it like his dad taught him: both hands steadying the weapon, arms straight out in front. He holds it like a police detective from a show probably as old as the gun.

  “Your move,” he says from behind the gun. Or maybe he never said anything at all. Now things are smudging together, the words he wanted to say blending with the words he might have said. Or nothing at all.

  “You going to shoot me, Ken Doll?” Brandon seems almost amused. This is the moment. This is the time when the mask comes off. Some monsters are great at hiding the fact they are monsters. You have to push them to make them reveal their truer nature. “You steal that from your dad?”

  “Just go home, Brandon. Go home and leave Jess alone.”

  But Brandon takes a step closer. “Maybe I don’t want to.” He’s grinning now and Kendal can hear Jess in the background pleading, but it’s as if she’s no longer real. It’s just him and Brandon. Him versus the monster. And now the monster has pressed its chest up against the barrel of the gun.

  “Your hand’s shaking,” Brandon says. His voice is low, intimate. “Good thing I’m this close or you’d never hit me.”

  And his hand is shaking, shaking like a leaf in the wind. He can feel the barrel sinking into the muscle there under Brandon’s t-shirt, can feel the monster’s heartbeat through the metal.

  The clip is empty. He’s made sure of that. This was only to make Brandon reveal his truer self, to unmask the monster, but now, it’s somehow all gone horribly wrong. He thinks about the clip lying on his dad’s workbench and wonders if he has maybe not thought this through entirely.

  A blur of arms, and the gun is gone, held by Brandon instead, and Kendal stares in disbelief as he looks that tiny black hole of death in the eye.

  “Brandon stop!” Jessica’s voice blows in on the wind, then there is a blur and he’s squeezing the trigger. There should be a click, but there’s not.

  There’s a pop.

  Instead there’s just Jessica now, standing where she nudged Kendal to the side, a hole in the blouse she’s wearing. And then he realizes he never checked the chamber, never made sure. It was the first thing his dad ever taught him. “You always check the chamber.”

  The gun lies on the grass and he picks it up.

  And then Jessica is staring at him and he sees her eyes start to glaze as she falls to the dewy grass. He sees Brandon, sees him running, sees him disappearing in the shadows. The monster has escaped, leaving the damse
l to die.

  She looks up at him from the grass, her hair fanning around her head seductively. For a moment she seems to open her mouth to speak, but only breath emerges. He thinks the words sound like “monster.”

  It takes him a moment to remember the tiny details, the varsity ring on her finger, the blood seeping around it, the tears in her eyes, the look of confused, disappointed hatred. Then nothing. Two glass orbs staring out from a mannequin.

  He runs home through the shadows, grabbing his mother and shaking her awake to see her terrified eyes. She asks if the house is on fire, and he’s crying too hard to get any words out. All he remembers is getting in the car and his mother driving him to his uncle’s house.

  “You’ll be safe here.” They shove him into his uncle’s pantry where it is cold and tight with hard walls and the smell of flour. “Don’t move. Can you do that for me?”

  The pantry begins to vibrate, the ship’s engines rattling the shelves. Then he is no longer on earth. Then he is no longer anywhere. Then the ship is falling, falling, falling until Kendal Harris screams himself awake.

  Chapter 13

  IT’S NOT flour he smells, but hay and other strange grains that exist in this cramped barn. He can’t be sure if he was actually screaming or not, because by the looks of the miniature ox next to him, his screams can’t be all that scary. The creature chews slowly, its large eyes following him with mild curiosity, as Kendal reaches up to wipe the sweat from his brow. His hand hits the shell there and he stops.

  Shells, husks, bits of pressed carbon composite remain stitched to his jumpsuit, and as he tugs on it, he can feel areas where the needle has gone through, grafting the found objects to his skin. There is no pain, but there is a growing concern in the back of his mind over infection. He pulls out a capsule from his med pouch and pops it in his mouth, dry-swallowing the bitterness. He holds out an arm, taking in the various items they have strapped and sewn into his jumpsuit, and he can immediately identify parts of the Luxemburg. It’s mostly heat-shielding, bits of ceramo-graphene tiles that should have saved the ship if it ever needed to enter an atmosphere, or simply skim the top. Could that have been what they were trying to do when the ship broke up?