Only then did he see the missing finger.
On his right hand, his pinkie finger terminated just above the second knuckle.
HOSPITALS. SILAS had always hated them.
The surgery took a little more than an hour.
“We need to shorten the bone,” the doctor had said.
To Silas, this seemed counterintuitive, but a series of nurses assured him it was necessary so that skin could be pulled over the wound.
“It’s too bad you couldn’t find the finger,” one of them said.
“Oh, I know where it is.”
A finger. Not a pound of flesh, exactly. But it was something. It felt like payment.
They pumped him full of IV antibiotics. Then tetanus shots. Rabies shots were suggested when it was learned an animal bite was involved.
Silas explained to the new doctor at shift change that the animal in question wasn’t going to be available for brain tissue dissection. “Honestly, it’s worth more than I am. They might want to dissect my brain to make sure I didn’t give
The next morning, the calls started at nine A.M. The visits soon after that. Tay, the trainer, showed up, accompanied by several members of the team. After the condolences, “It’s time to shift gears on this,” he said.
Silas agreed.
“Past time,” Tay said. “We’ve officially transited the natal phase of the program. The training phase begins tomorrow.”
“I’m really sorry about this,” Tay said. “If I had any idea that it might be so aggressive so young …”
Silas shrugged as best he could while sitting in the hospital bed. “You did say it was a good thing that the gladiator associated humans with the arrival of food.”
Tay cringed.
Silas smiled. “Things happen.”
“You say that now. We’ll see if you’re casual when the drugs wear off.”
When Tay left, Silas made several calls to Benjamin, who was already on his way and had to reroute back to the lab. He showed up at the hospital a few hours later, arms laden.
Benjamin laid the requested papers on Silas’s hospital bed and collapsed into a nearby chair.
“That bad?” Silas asked, reading Ben’s expression.
“A bust,” Benjamin said.
“Complete?”
“Not a single match.”
“Damn.” Silas leafed quickly through the pile of papers that represented nearly two weeks’ work for his head cytologist. The DNA fingerprinting hadn’t turned up a single template match to any of the known existing orders of animals.
“Are you okay?” Ben asked. “You in a lot of pain?”
“Let’s not worry about me at the moment. Let’s worry about the project.”
“Well, I’m out of ideas,” Benjamin said.
Silas leaned back in his bed. He was out of ideas, too. He laced his remaining fingers behind his head and casually considered his friend. His hand throbbed.
Ben was one of those rare individuals, usually of Scandinavian extraction, afflicted with skin so profoundly devoid of melanin that the underlying blood vessels provided a kind of emotional broadcast system. When he was embarrassed, he flushed red to the ears. When angry, deep red ovals would form in the hollows of his cheeks. If he was merely overheated, a rosy glow would reach across his face to his forehead. It was a communication system both completely alien and completely fascinating to Silas.
As he looked at the younger man’s mottled pink face, Silas assessed that there was now a new emotion to be cataloged: frustration. “I think we’ll have to take a different angle on this. We’ve been trying to learn about Felix from the inside out. Now let’s try the opposite.”
“I don’t get you. You’re in the hospital, and you’re still thinking about work?”
“I’ve got nine and a half other fingers. What we need now is data.”
“You have a problem.”
“Exactly.”
“I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing.”
“We need to learn everything we can about the creature.”
“It’s all there,” Ben said, gesturing to the paperwork. “Right down to its raw code, but I don’t know what you expect to find.”
“Maybe I’ll know when I see it.”
“We’ve already done a head-to-toe workup.”
“Yes, but with the wrong mindset and the wrong people. We were looking for similarities to existing species, existing patterns. If this organism really is new, then we’ll have to relate form to function if we’re going to learn anything about what to expect.”
“So what are you saying—bring in some new talent?”
“Perhaps that wouldn’t be a bad idea.”
“We can do that. We’ve had teams of anatomists fighting over time to study it.”
Silas considered. He thought of the creature as it had hissed at him. That strange alien sound. “No, that would still be from the wrong perspective. Conventional anatomic study is still rooted in cladistics.”
“So is all of biology.”
“Not all of it,” Silas said.
He flipped open his notebook and scanned down the page, not wanting to look at Benjamin when he said what he was thinking. “I think we need a xenobiologist.”
Silas heard the smile in Benjamin’s voice. “Busy field, that?”
“You know what I mean. Theoretical xenobiology.”
“How is that gonna help?”
“Fresh eyes. A different perspective.”
Ben nodded. “Okay, you’re the boss. I guess it couldn’t hurt.”
“I want you to check who’s the best.”
“Sure.”
“And, Ben.”
“Yeah?”
“This is a silent program. No publicity on this one.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I assumed that.”
Part II
The Gathering Storm
How dare you sport thus with life.
CHAPTER EIGHT
