Aftertime- Chapter Twelve

Chapter Twelve

“Doctor Moro?”
Moro looked up at the nurse standing in the doorway—a matte plastic lab coat whispering with the movement. “Yes?”
“The hunters failed. 134 and 176 were killed, but 108 is only injured.”
“And 55?”
“Escaped.”
Dr. Moro tapped four more entries into his computer, watching half a dozen relevant pages float to the surface of the screen. “No great loss—that one was obsolete anyway. A pity about 108, though, but no point in keeping a failure.”
“Are you suggesting we destroy 108?”
“No. Just remove the collar.”
“I don’t follow...”
Moro sighed. He didn’t expect his co-workers to study the hunters’ behaviour quite as thoroughly as he did—they didn’t share quite the same...understanding...as he did—but they could at least take the time to look over the basics. “108 has always been unusually violent towards 55, even in a controlled environment. Even outside of our control, there’s no reason for that reaction to change.”

**

Shalvir gazed on in horror at the hunter’s face. Two cold, slitted amber eyes stared at him, set deep beneath a scaled brow. Every now and then, they would be lost for a moment behind a thin, translucent film as the hunter blinked. A narrow, forked tongue flicked out between rows of needlepointed teeth, the nose above merging with the face as a wide, flat shelf. Shalvir would have mistaken it for some exotic alien being—if it hadn’t seemed so distinctly...unnatural. Though there were no seams, no stitches, like the mythical Frankenstein Monster, Shalvir knew the hunter was a chimera—even if the joins were on a genetic level, they were still visible.
Silently, Fifty-Five popped the broken glass out of its eyepiece and re-fastened the gasmask. Though Tasche seemed to take this bizarre turn of events in her stride, Shalvir couldn’t help but stare. Despite the thick, concealing fabric that disguised the hunter’s face, he was still fixated by the single, gold, reptilian eye that loomed through the vacant lens.

“Allet.”
It was Tasche’s frantic gesticulating, rather than what she said, that suggested it was time to leave.
Shalvir finally plucked up the courage to ask a question that had been bothering him since the hunters had appeared. “Is there anybody else looking for us right now?”
Fifty-Five didn’t answer. Shalvir wondered if the gasmasks interfered with their hearing—but the first hunter had attacked when Tasche had spoken, so...
“Can you understand me?”
Fifty-Five didn’t answer, it just glared through the gasmask with its icy, withering stare. That was a ‘no’ in any language.
Shalvir was almost glad. Even as an ally, the hunter’s mere presence was terrifying. He would rather not have to talk to it as well.

**

It was late evening by the time they reached the village, which Shalvir learned, from Tasche’s endless repetition on his behalf, was called “Starvold.” It was far larger than he had expected.

Though the buildings were either very, very old, or of the same, shantytown construction as Tasche’s home village, some of them reached an impressive height. The village, really more of a small town, occupied a sizable clearing near the forest edge, and extended some way into the trees where, Shalvir was delighted to see, lights flickered as a small ship landed. This tribe had vehicles! Maybe he would finally be able to get to Genefa. After such a long journey, however, he was willing to wait until tomorrow to form any more of a plan.

**

As the door of the transport slid open silently, Wye checked outside. Fortunately, the quiet, cold engines hadn’t attracted any attention from the village. It had been risky to land so close, but Zedd’s immense, mechanical body wasn’t suited to rough terrain. Hopefully he wouldn’t be needed—Wye wanted to keep the amount of force used to a minimum, especially in such a highly populated area.