The Second Wave (16 page)

“Next to the school.”

“Of course it is. And where exactly is the
school?”

Luke gave him a detailed description and
Peter dashed off, leaving his former assistant and his house mate
alone. He came back after a minute, though, to fetch the suitcase
with the equipment and readings.

Luke Reyes didn’t like John. So much was
obvious from his behavior around him, John gathered. He didn’t know
what Peter had told him, but he sincerely doubted the professor was
capable of bad mouthing anyone, so it probably wasn’t an abundance
of information that made the botanist feel uneasy around John. It
wasn’t until he saw the two of them interact just now that he
realized what was going on. It almost made him laugh. When Peter
disappeared for the second time, he raised an eyebrow at Luke.
“R.U.T.E. Historian Society sounds like a club I don’t want to be a
member of.”

“It stands for random unrelated time events,”
Luke explained stiffly. “We think we found one at the waterfall.
It’s what made the children age.”

An awkward silence followed. Finally Luke
cleared his throat, “Well. I should be going. The protection suits
need to get checked back in.”

“You were Peter’s assistant before you two
came here, isn’t that right?” John asked casually enough.

Dr. Reyes picked up the suits. “I wanted to
work at the research centre in Ryde, but at the time I applied they
weren’t hiring botanists. All they had open was a position as Dr.
Wagner’s assistant, so I took the opportunity.”

“And did you fall in love with him right
away?”

The suits almost fell to the floor again, but
Luke gathered his senses quickly. He straightened his back.

“I don’t like you,” he huffed in annoyance
instead of answering the question.

“We’re not together,” John told him.

The tension in the room dissolved
instantly.

“Oh,” said Luke after a heartbeat. “Peter
didn’t mention…” His voice trailed off. He wasn’t sure what Peter
had or hadn’t mentioned.

“He wouldn’t, would he?” mused John. A remark
that made Luke’s face lighten up ever so faintly.

“No. No, he wouldn’t.”

“Go now. And good luck with that.”

Luke, more confused now than annoyed, all but
fled.

* * * *

Two stone throws away from the stables was
the forest, which stretched out until the mountains began in the
North. The dusking sun now painted its treetops a glowing orange
and basked the mountains in warm light.

The workmen were using the last sunrays to
finish up their tasks. There were only very few exterior lights
they were able to use after sunset, but inside the forest it was
more or less fruitless anyway. They barely saw in broad daylight,
and the electrical torches they had on them merely cast a dim,
yellow light. When the last works and repairs at the village were
finished, Simon Jones went on to start building the next colony on
the other side of the mountains. He decided they’d need all the
trees that needed to be chopped down to make room for another
village anyway for firewood and as building material. It was a
logical decision to use the created space around the foot of the
range as a building site. His plan was to blow a passageway through
one of the mountains to the sea at the other side. This way they
could set up fishery science and aquaculture.

Fifteen men worked in the forest each
day—hewing trees, cutting away shrubberies, and clearing the glade
of undergrowth. The trees were then chopped up and dragged back to
the village by horse carts, where they were distributed to the
households to be used as firewood.

They were nearly one mile into the woods by
now. Foreman Ueno took a look at his watch. It was time. He up his
hand and gave a loud whistle; the sign that they were done for
today.

“Pack it in, lads,” he shouted. “See you all
tomorrow morning. And Erik!”

From among the group of people gathering
their things, a man looked up, “Yes, foreman?”

“Don’t forget your tools again.”

“No sir, I won’t.” The last time he forgot,
he had to go back into the woods in the dead of night. It was
freezing cold, and he roamed the spot for almost an hour before he
finally found the utensils under the detritus of some chopped up
timber.

Erik took out his flashlight, charged the
dynamo, and made his way back to where he knew he had left both the
chainsaw and an axe. But first he needed to take a leak somewhere
discreet.

The forest was large, larger than they could
assume. They had no pictures of the area from above; they made
their discoveries of the land as they went along. The trees at the
edge of the forest were younger, smaller, but the deeper they
delved the more ancient the flora became. Huge, thick-boled trees
stretched far into the sky, crowns interwoven with one another,
effectively creating a lightproof roof. The ground was covered in
mosses, fungi and debris—and they were the first human beings to
step on it.

Foreman Ueno shook off the philosophical mood
that overcame him when he, once again awestruck, paused in packing
his belongings together to gaze at the forest around him. He tied
the saddlebag of the horse he used today close, when Erik came
rushing towards him, shouting his name.

“What is it, Erik?” he asked. Ueno was tired.
He wanted to go home, have dinner and lie down.

“Come and see, foreman! And radio Mr.
Jones—he is going to want to know about this!”

“What is it, Erik?” he asked again, this time
with an impatient edge in his voice. But Erik couldn’t tell; he
wasn’t sure what he had found, he only knew he had never seen
anything like it before.

“Well, shiver me timbers!” Ueno exclaimed
once Erik had finally succeeded in dragging the man to the location
in question.

Between dried up leaves and moss lay the
carcass of an enormous beast. It was perhaps seven feet long, the
shoulder height an estimated five feet. The skin was covered in
short, stubbly fur that was smeared with blood, dirt, and
intestines. It had a relatively small head, compared to the rest of
its body, but a long snout and huge, sharp teeth. It was missing
one of four soft paws; obviously something had ripped it from the
dead body. It was impossible to tell what it was exactly, the decay
process was too advanced to recognize anything familiar. But it was
quite undoubtedly not a cow, neither was it a horse—the only big
animals the settlers had brought with them from Earth.

* * * *

“We have no idea what causes the time
events.”

Selena Moralez, the librarian, agreed to
speak at the agora later that evening, after Peter had explained to
her in great detail what they had encountered in the cave. The
agora was no more than a circle of stone benches in the centre of
the colony, arranged around a fire column. No roof or canopy
obstructed the view of yet another starlit sky.

Most people came to the meetings that were
held every other night. To keep tabs on everything, to stay in
touch, and to discuss important decisions with their mayor.
Rochester was the man in charge, but he believed that governing
anything, be it a school or a colony, could only be successfully
accomplished, if people worked together in an environment of mutual
respect and trust. Together they decided to stay on Alternearth
despite what had happened to the children; for the sake of the
people on Earth who needed a new home sooner rather than later.

Together they now listened to Selena
Moralez’s explanation. She stood next to the column in the middle
of the small place, turning here and there to see the faces of her
listeners.

“Some people developed theories,” she
continued. “But they were always far out and the society usually
doesn’t support them. We know what they are, but we don’t have a
clue as to what causes them.”

“You said those time events are still in
existence on Earth today?” asked a man.

“Indeed.”

“Do you know of any?”

“I do,” Selena elaborated. “Not eight years
ago, a ship sailed into the harbor in Homer, Alaska. A Japanese
whaling ship by the name of
Chô Chô Maru
. The crew showed
signs of disorientation when they landed, especially when they were
approached by other people. They wore old-fashioned clothes, spoke
in a dialect nobody was fluent in anymore, and when they were asked
what year they thought it was, they insisted it was 1432. The
Chô Chô Maru
indeed disappeared in March 1432, and thorough
investigations of both the ship and its crew proved that they were
speaking the truth.

“The matter was hushed up. There is evidence
that the sailors were re-socialized, but it is unclear what exactly
became of them after that. Rumors say they all committed suicide
together, other rumors state that only some felt the need to take
such a drastic action, while others began a new life in our
century. Whatever happened to them, it must have been a random
unrelated time event, because according to the captain of the
Chô Chô Maru
, the ship was at sea for no more than a month;
and yet for the rest of the world, several hundred years had passed
by.”

It was quiet for a long moment after Selena
ended her account. Some people, the curious ones, wanted to know
more, but since that was leading the assembly off-topic, Selena
suggested that those who wished to speak about it were welcome to
join her at her house afterwards.

Rochester, seated next to Summer Paige,
leaned towards the doctor and whispered, “Could it be at all
possible that what happened to our children is what happened to
Miss Gust?”

Dr. Paige mulled the question over, but
discarded the idea quickly. It didn’t make a lot of sense. “If that
was the case,” she whispered back, “then Eugenia would essentially
still be a three-year-old girl. But she talks and behaves like an
adult. No, I don’t think what happened to her has anything to do
with this.”

“Too bad. I faintly hoped we might have a
lead at last.” He sighed, giving way to his frustration for a
moment, “Any news from her and John?”

She shook her head. “Sadly no. They talk, but
apparently mostly about him.”

“Do you think this is a good sign?”

“I think she’s deciding whether she wants to
trust him. It could be a good sign.”

Rochester made a noise as if that information
needed some serious pondering. Then, out of the blue, he smiled
good-naturedly at her, “You’re jealous of him, aren’t you? You
spent all this time nursing her back to health, and she favors him
over you.”

“If I was, I wouldn’t tell you.” She smiled
as she told him that, even though the mayor’s observation was spot
on.

Their conversation was cut short, though,
when Simon Jones made his way to the mayor and Dr. Paige. He looked
slightly out of breath. Pointing first at Rochester than at the
doctor, he told them they were needed in the hospital’s lab
immediately.

* * * *

After a two-minute survey of the carcass in
the forest, Ueno had radioed Simon Jones. It took the architect
less than ten minutes to get there, a carriage in tow.

Together they heaved the remains of the
animal onto the cart, then carefully wrapped it so that it wouldn’t
cause alarm if someone accidentally saw it, and carried it to the
hospital. Fortunately, the administrative buildings were
immediately next to the North gate of the village, so they didn’t
need to drag the carcass through the colony and risk being seen.
The last thing they needed were panicky rumors before they even
knew what they were dealing with.

The hospital’s lab was in the East wing, up
the stairs and through the vet’s, which proved to be a difficult
task, as their burden was heavy and reeked of decay. But they got
the body there intact.

Ueno and Erik heaved it onto the operating
table. The stench it emitted made them gag when they uncovered the
animal to take a closer look at it in full light.

“By Jupiter!” mumbled Simon, overwhelmed.
“What is this?”

“Whatever it is,” replied Ueno, “it’s not one
of ours.”

Half an hour later both Summer Paige and
Mayor Rochester stared at the carcass in similar surprise.

“By Jupiter!” Rochester exclaimed.

“Just what I said, Heath,” Simon uttered.

“What is this? Where did you find it? But
most importantly,
what is this
?” Rochester demanded to
know.

Simon watched as Paige circled the operating
table once, twice. “I have no clue,” he admitted. “Maybe an autopsy
will give us some insight. That’s why I asked you here as well,
Summer.”

“It’s incredible,” she muttered, her eyes
sparkling at the challenge. “Let me just get my kit. I can get
started tonight.”

“Now?” Rochester gesticulated excitedly.
“Don’t you want to sleep on it? Maybe it’s dangerous!”

“It kind of looks like a wolf,” said Erik to
no one in particular. He was still around, although nobody seemed
to take any notice of him until he spoke. Mayor Rochester’s eyes
flickered over the dead beast. “A rather big wolf, don’t you
think?”

Erik shrugged and pointed out. “Alien planet,
right?!”

Summer Paige clapped her hands. “Out. All of
you!” she demanded. “I have an autopsy to perform.”

Whatever feelings of petty jealousy had
dominated her thoughts not twenty minutes ago made way for chipper
determination now. She loved a challenge. Even if it consisted of a
ripped open, rotting corpse of some unknown beast, covered in dirt,
larvae, and the sickly sweet smell of death.

It took Summer Paige all night to shed some
light on the carcass before her. She took blood samples and
isolated the DNA. Examined the few internal organs that were still
intact. Observed and categorized the various insects she found on
and in the carcass. Made x-rays, took out the brain for closer
study and weighed what was left of the body.