‘Call me when it’s all taken care of.’
He put his phone away and shook the hands of Tarek and the Duchess as they stepped out of the elevator into the hangar, where his Range Rover was parked, with his driver waiting.
‘Well, that was nice and smooth, wasn’t it?’ he remarked jovially. ‘Got that big ol’ rhino as submissive as a lil’ puppy-dog. We’ll meet again tomorrow, but for now I bid you good night, because I have a lovely family dinner to get to. Adios, my friends!’
29
MR MA
8th October 2020. MANMO-M Technologies Testing Facility B-24, outside Shenzhen, China
Grim-faced troops, armed to the teeth, waited with assault rifles shouldered as the transport helicopter landed, its twin blades pulsating a deep, thrumming beat across the rooftop. Behind them Mr Ma and Mr Wang stood waiting, silent and expectant, while the chopper’s whirring blades started slowing down after the engines were cut. Mr Wang had his finger on the trigger of the MP5-K concealed within his suit jacket, but he didn’t think he’d need it.
The chopper doors opened, and there he was: Aboubakar, his ankles and wrists cuffed, looking sullen and defeated, his dark skin dulled with a greyish tinge, and his face as haggard and drained of life as brittle, sun-corroded plastic.
A soldier from the helicopter led the big Cameroonian out, while the troops kept their firearms trained on him all the while. Orders were called out, soldiers shifted positions and technicians in lab-coats waited with keen anticipation. Mr Ma stared at Aboubakar as he was escorted along, his gaze that of a crocodile eyeing out an oblivious antelope drinking from a murky river.
‘Well sir, here he is: the first beastwalker test subject for the D-Immz chip implant,’ Mr Wang said.
Mr Ma responded with some rapid-fire sign language gestures, which prompted a subtle smile from Mr Wang.
‘Yes sir, yes indeed. It could very well be a groundbreaking moment, this. If we can get the chip to work in this one’s head, and we can actually achieve full control of his thoughts, movements and actions, we would be one step closer to the ultimate goal, wouldn’t we? Of course, you’re right, we do still have to find them, and yes, the various Mothers have been hidden for centuries, with their locations still frustratingly secret … but we are closer, so much closer than we’ve ever been. Remember sir, it’s not only control of the present we can achieve in this subject’s mind. If Ms Wang’s theories are right, we will eventually be able to get inside his past as well. We can mine his memories, sir, all four-hundred-and-seventy-three years of them. And even though he was never associated with the Eastern Council, there may well be some invaluable clues as to the location of the lost Mothers, and everything else we’re seeking.’
Mr Ma and Mr Wang watched as Aboubakar was led into the facility, and after the troops followed him down the stairwell the pair of them stood together, staring without speaking at the rising sun – a red ball of burning plastic dangling on an invisible thread, smouldering in the distant wool-cloud of smog that smothered the artificial mountain range of skyscrapers on the horizon. Mr Ma eventually made a few gestures in sign language, and Mr Wang nodded slowly in agreement.
‘That’s right sir. It is a new dawn for us, a bright, fiery dawn for the Huntsmen. Soon we will have no more need of the Alliance, no! But your second point is brilliant; how much better it is to enslave them completely, to turn them into robots that we can control than it is to merely exterminate them! A new day is dawning for us indeed, sir, oh yes, it is dawning as we speak … with all its blood-red promise.’
***
Aboubakar sat alone in his cell, a loose, meaty fist curled against his lips, his eyes locked with defeated resignation at the white walls. Everything was white in here – the walls, the door, the bed, the furniture, the curtains, the bedding, as well as the medical gown he had been made to wear. The only trace of colour, the only living thing in here was him; his body, somehow still breathing, maintaining the functions of life, his ancient heart still pumping blood through his veins, as it had for almost five hundred years.
Despite the undeniable presence of life, though, death was all he could see. Its cloying darkness saturated his senses, clinging like mildew in spite of the painful, almost paralysing brightness of the room. He could taste the mould of the grave-soil on his tongue, could feel the suffocating weight of six feet of damp earth pressing down on his body, could smell the sourness of the onset of rot on his flesh. Was it merely imagination, this dark shroud in which he was enveloped … or was it a premonition?
He did not know, and did not care to think too much on it either. All that he knew was that his life had ended when they had taken his lands and his businesses. Without those he was nothing; he had nowhere to go, nobody to turn to. His friendships had always been fleeting, and had almost always been with mortals. People he could sleep with or make business deals with, or drink and do drugs with. There had rarely ever been a deeper connection, and besides, he had never felt the need to have one; he was a man for fast, intense flavours, for fireworks that burned spectacularly for an instant against the night sky and then vanished. Mortals, with their mostly limited sets of experiences and perspectives, constrained by their short lifespans and minimal exposure to different views, cultures and places, could hold no great fascination for him. And while he certainly had more to talk about with members of his own kind, he had never been able to forge a deep, meaningful relationship – whether platonic or romantic – with any
