Extinction, page 33
Even though Doyle had rejected Catholicism a long time ago, he thanked God most fervently for having been delivered.
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The word extinction hung in the air. Cash was stunned by the scientist’s revelations. Everything finally made sense—the craziness of the killers, their hatred and brutality, the rituals, the taunting. And it even explained Gunnerson’s mysterious comment about asking Barrow what he thought he was doing up there. Along with his refusal to explain the same question—because it would have exposed his son and daughter-in-law as having come to Erebus to get themselves a designer baby.
The thought of babies gave her an idea. “You told us earlier that your resurrected animals couldn’t reproduce. But … can the Neanders reproduce?”
At this, Karman’s eyes seemed to glitter. “Yes. We thought not and tried to stop any liaisons of that kind. But you know how it is: the Neanders themselves showed us they could. And the babies they had were perfect—fully Neanderthal, of course.”
Cash tried to wrap her mind around this idea—that they could reproduce. “Can they … interbreed with humans?” she asked.
“They did before,” said Karman. “There’s no reason why they couldn’t do so now.”
A brief silence fell on the group while they contemplated this.
Colcord asked, “How did word get around that people could get a souped-up baby at Erebus?”
“A genetically enhanced baby.”
“Whatever. How did people learn this service existed?”
“Through Barrow. He lives in an exclusive world of billionaires. They move in cloistered circles in places like Davos and Bohemian Grove. Very quietly, he spread the knowledge of our gene-editing platform for couples wishing to conceive. Barrow recruited the rich families—that was his role. He was the salesman. And of course, the customers had every incentive to keep the secret.”
“And how much does this … baby enhancement cost?”
“Twelve million.”
“Twelve million dollars for each baby?”
“The megarich will pay anything to have perfect children.”
“The parents had no idea Neanderthal genes were being stuffed into their precious little embryos?”
“They wouldn’t have understood. But let me be clear: resurrecting the Neanders wasn’t just to exploit their genetic heritage.”
“What else?” Colcord asked.
“To right the great wrong we did to them. They’re humans too, of course. Now that we have the technology to do it, I believe it is a moral imperative to bring them back. This was the reason I became involved.”
“They don’t seem grateful for being de-extincted,” said Romanski.
“Of course they are! It’s just that a poisonous ideology took hold. We gave them wonderful lives. You saw the playground. That was just one of several, and they had excellent teachers and classrooms, books and movies, world-class sporting programs, nice clothes, and good food. They put on Shakespeare plays, they had a chess club, some of them played music and had a rock band—we gave them the best of everything. Of course, we had to be careful what knowledge they had access to. It was decided—against my wishes—that they shouldn’t know who they were or where they came from. They would live their lives in a walled garden, content with the carefully curated information we gave them.”
“How did it go wrong?”
“We consistently underestimated their cleverness. They learned enough—little clues here and there—to fill in the gaps, piece things together. They realized they were experimental subjects. They figured out they were Neanderthals, that they were being held prisoner, and that they were being used by us Sapiens for some purpose. It was quite astonishing how clever they were. Perhaps …” He hesitated. “Perhaps I was partly responsible. I encouraged iconoclastic thinking in some of the brighter ones. I see now it was a mistake to teach them so much about science and technology and give them computers. I truly regret that—I thought I was doing good. But they figured out so much more than we expected and turned it all against us. Making it worse, Neanders are susceptible to conspiracy theories and magical thinking. They turn too quickly to violence as a way of solving problems. This cannibalism thing is horrific—I had no idea they were capable of that.”
“So it was a little like The Truman Show,” said Colcord. “Until they found out what was really going on.”
“You might say that.”
“I can’t believe you would think resurrecting Neanderthals would be a good idea,” said Colcord.
“I raised these Neanders—some of them are like my own children. They’re not evil or murderous. We had no idea they would create a religion out of taking back the earth from Sapiens. And in the early days, genetic errors led to some mental issues. I refused to let those unfortunates be put down. But because they were dangerous and unpredictable, we had to keep them in secure conditions, humane conditions. Some of those were among the ones who initially escaped—and poisoned the minds of others.”
“Hey,” said Reno, who was taking up the rear. “Down there—lights.”
They stopped and looked back down the slope. Cash could see a patch of distant, flickering lights from where they had come, maybe half a mile away.
“Son of a bitch,” said Romanski. “Your dear misunderstood friends are chasing us.”
“You know these Neanderthals,” said Cash. “You got any ideas on how we might deal with them?”
Karman looked pale in the moonlight. “We can’t outrun them. We can’t lose them—they’re expert trackers. They have a keen sense of smell, so it won’t do any good to try to hide. They’re far more adapted to the cold than we are.”
“Nice,” said Romanski. “So let’s just give ourselves up to be cooked and eaten. With fava beans, of course.”
“So what can we do?” asked Cash.
“I can talk to them,” Karman said.
Romanski laughed bitterly. “And earn your own personal decollation.”
Karman didn’t answer.
“We’d better just keep going,” said Colcord. “Standing around jawing is not an option.”
Karman said nothing and turned away. They continued up the slope, struggling to move as fast as possible. Cash found herself gasping for breath in the thin air, and Colcord wasn’t doing any better. The lights were coming up the ridgeline fast. There were a lot of them—it was a mob.
“What are their weaknesses?” Cash asked Karman. “Aside from a lack of empathy.”
“Weaknesses?”
“What I’m getting at is: How can we use those differences between us to our advantage? We were able to defeat them once—can’t we do it again?”
Karman shook his head. “No. We can’t. They’re really fixated on wiping out the Sapiens—that’s given them a purpose. They might end up squabbling and killing each other later, when they’re sitting around a campfire, but right now—forget it.”
“So you’re saying there’s nothing we can do,” Cash said.
“Except he’s going to talk to them,” said Romanski.
“They know me. I understand them.”
Cash looked down the slope. It was frightening how fast those lights were coming up—and how many there were. It was almost as if they were running uphill—in fact, they probably were.
“Listen,” Cash said to the group. “We don’t have a lot of time until they’re on top of us. We’d better find a defensive location and get ready to fight.”
“Fight? With what?” Romanski cried.
“Rocks,” said Cash.
“Rocks? Is that a joke? We’re gonna throw rocks at them?”
“I’m going down fighting.”
The lights below them were now spreading out in a line. They were no more than a quarter mile below. It looked like the whole mob—everyone.
And then came a muffled rumble from deep within the mountain. It grew rapidly in intensity, and then a blast of fire shot from the mine entrance far below with a roar, and elsewhere among the nearby mountains fire and smoke jetted out like great cannons blasting into the night, the thunderous echoes bouncing off the peaks. The entire side of the mountain to their right cracked and began to slide, collapsing into a giant, fiery avalanche.
The laboratory complex had been blown up.
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The earth shook so violently that Cash and the others had to brace themselves against rocks and each other to avoid being thrown to the ground. She heard, in the background, cheering and whistling from the pursuing mob. After a long moment, the earthquake subsided enough for them to move again, and she looked around for a defensive position. Not far above them was an outcrop and a cluster of fallen boulders that they could take cover behind. It wasn’t great, but it was the best they were going to get.
“Up there. That outcrop.”
They turned and angled toward it, running and gasping for breath. Cash stumbled. Her strength was ebbing fast, and she struggled to suck in enough oxygen to keep going. Below, the lights were spreading out in the mob’s apparent flanking maneuver to trap them.
Romanski reached the outcrop first. Cash heard a burst of gunfire from below, and rounds snicked up around her as she threw herself behind the protection of the rocks. A moment later, Karman came sprawling in with Colcord and Reno. They huddled behind the boulders. As a defensive redoubt, it was not what she had hoped, but they were out of time, and it would have to do.
“Collect stones,” she whispered.
They began scouring the area, grabbing and piling up rocks. It was pathetic, but it was all they had. They were totally screwed.
Through a narrow gap in the boulders, Cash could see the Neanderthals spreading out on the slopes below the outcrop. Most of them were dressed in preppy outdoor clothing, with Nike athletic shoes, some carrying burning torches, others with flashlights. Many had spears, and one, the leader with the braid, toted an assault rifle.
The leader came to a halt at the bottom of the outcrop below them, an enigmatic smile spreading across his odd-looking face, no longer covered by a mask. Instead of the homemade camo outfit, he was wearing a button-down shirt, a down Patagonia jacket, and cargo pants. His face was so pale it almost glowed in the moonlight, his white-blond braid descending to his waist. There was nothing “primitive” about him, not in the alertness in the eyes, in his charisma, or in the smile playing about his lips. He was all too human.
The others were dressed in similarly neat clothes, some with long hair, braided or loose, others with shorter cuts. It appeared this was the same group she had seen around the bonfire in the mine—around twenty men, women, and children.
The leader raised the assault rifle and pointed it at them, casually spraying fire, the rounds smacking and zinging off the boulder they were huddled behind, showering them with chips.
The firing stopped, and the man said, “Greetings, Sapiens!” his strange whistling voice cutting through the thin air.
The other Neanderthals had moved up the slope on either side of the outcrop, and now Cash and her group were essentially surrounded.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” the leader sang, imitating the warbling voice of Glinda, the good witch from The Wizard of Oz.
“We’re not gonna stand up to be mowed down,” Cash called out. She tried to think of how to engage him. “Can we talk? We mean you no harm.”
The leader’s head tilted back, and he let out a thin, whistling laugh. “You mean us no harm! Now that’s a really funny joke!”
Cash glanced over at Karman. His face was covered with sweat, his eyes glittering strangely.
The leader went on, “I see you’ve been gathering rocks to throw at us. Really? Rocks? What are you, a bunch of dumb Neanders?”
He and the Neanders all laughed uproariously. He was clearly enjoying himself.
“Dr. Karman! You remember me?”
“Of course I do,” said Karman weakly. “How are you, Joey?”
“You read me pirate stories. Walking the plank, keelhauling, all that good stuff. And then later you taught me Shakespeare, remember? And yet to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me; no. I have not seen you in a long time, Dr. Karman. Come out. I want to have a look. For old times.”
Karman didn’t move.
“Afraid?”
“Yes, to be frank.”
“I won’t shoot you. Promise.”
Karman was shaking.
Suddenly, Joey fired his weapon again, three rapid shots, the bullets smacking the rock, whining off into the dark. “Stand up. Now.”
Cash looked at Karman and shook her head. He was going to be shot.
Karman started to rise.
“Don’t,” Cash said.
“I have to.”
He stood up, his legs shaking.
“The good doctor!”
Karman said nothing. At any moment, Cash expected a burst of gunfire to cut him down. But it didn’t come.
The leader turned to the group. “Who’s your daddy? Karman is your daddy!”
This was going from bad to worse. None of them were going to get out of there alive. She tried to drive out of her mind not only the thought of dying but what they might do to her body afterward.
Karman spoke. “All right, Joey. Easy now.”
“Sure, it’s all right,” said Joey sarcastically.
“I want you to think about something.”
“Of course! Here comes the lecture!”
Karman stepped around the boulder and began walking slowly around the outcrop and down toward the man. “Not a lecture but a thought.”
“What thought?”
“We kept many secrets from you.”
This caused a brief silence. Joey frowned.
Karman quickly went on, “They were very careful with how you were raised—with what knowledge you were allowed to have. They allowed you to learn only so much—and no more. They were afraid of what you might become when you grew up. They shut off your education just before critical mass. But you! You all were too clever for them—especially you, Joey. You filled in some of the gaps and figured out things that made you angry. And rightly so. I was not part of throttling down your education. I argued that you should be taught your heritage and learn to be proud of it. I was on your side. Always.”
“All lies. You’re just another Sapiens.”
“No, I’m not. I’m your friend, and I think most of you know that. There is still much I can teach you.” He took a deep breath. “Do you remember the story of Adam and Eve and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?”
Joey stared.
“God created Adam and Eve and put them in the Garden of Eden. They were told they were free to do whatever they wished, except to eat the apple of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But … they picked and ate it. They couldn’t help themselves. They ate the apple.”
A silence had fallen over the group.
“That choice has now come to you. I am offering you the apple from that tree. Will you take it?” Karman took a step toward Joey, his hand outstretched.
At this, Joey laughed—but it had a note of uncertainty in it. He raised his rifle and pointed it at Karman. “Keep your apple.”
Here it comes, thought Cash.
Karman said, “Take the apple and eat of it. Ye shall be as gods, remember? Learn the secrets of being human.”
Joey’s sarcastic laugh cut through the night air. “You’ve got it all wrong. You actually think we want to be like you? You Sapiens, with your bleak and apocalyptic history? What a grim and self-loathing species you are! Look at what you worship as progress. The agricultural revolution turned you from free wanderers into slaves to the land. The Industrial Revolution robbed you of your souls and made you cruel. And the IT revolution gave you loneliness, hatred, and misery. What’s next for Sapiens in the glorious march of progress?”
A murmur of approval rose among the Neanders, like a congregation responding to a preacher.
“You’re the species of the apocalypse. You exterminated us, and you’re doing the same to thousands of other species. You’ve mortally wounded the earth. You didn’t just eat the apple; you destroyed the garden. And yet you go on and on, consumed with greed, addicted to comfort, soft and degenerate as grubs. You think we want to be like you?
His whispery voice had taken on the cadence of a preacher, generating sharp murmurs and expostulations of approval from the crowd. Some began to raise their hands in a fluttering motion to the sky.
“You speak of eating the apple? No! We’re starting over with God. We’re going back to His garden. We’re returning to His wilderness. We’re rewilding ourselves, and we’re going to start anew, in harmony with His creation.”
Harmony, murmured the crowd, swaying. Harmony.
Karman didn’t respond at once. He stood a little unsteadily on the slope as Joey raised the weapon and aimed it at him. “We have our God, Doctor. Time to pray to yours.”
“No,” said Karman. “No. Please don’t.”
Joey aimed slowly, his eye on the scope.
“Joey,” said Karman, shifting his tone into something soft and cajoling. “Wait. I can tell you where we found the DNA that made you.”
At this, Joey became still.
“You want to learn it? If you kill me, you’ll never know.”
A long silence. Joey continued aiming the weapon but did not fire. The others fell silent.
“Your DNA came from a burial found in a cave in France—a cave with beautiful paintings in it. Those bones were the remains of a Neanderthal man, one of the last of his kind. We used to think those paintings were done by Sapiens. No longer. Now we know Neanderthals created the oldest of those paintings and the bones in the cave belonged to one of those artists. We extracted DNA from the skull—drilling out bone powder from the cochlea, to be exact—and with that DNA we made you. That person buried in the cave, that artist, is you.”
The weapon faltered. Joey wobbled on his feet. He seemed completely unnerved by this.
