CHAPTER 9

2001, New York

‘Are you sure?’ shouted Sal.

‘That’s what Bob says.’ Maddy’s voice echoed from the archway through the open door into the back room – ‘the hatchery’ as they cal ed it now. ‘He says to at ach the end of the protein-feed pipe to the growth candidate’s bel y but on.’

‘How do we do that?’ Liam replied. ‘It’s not like there’s a socket to screw the thing into.’ The smal slimy foetus squirmed gently in his hand, stirring in its slumber. He grimaced as it did, feeling smal fragile bones shift beneath its paper-thin skin.

It looked as vulnerable as a freshly hatched bird fal en from a nest, and yet he knew that this tiny, shifting, pale creature in the palm of his hand would soon be a sevenfoot-tal leviathan, bulging with genetical y enhanced muscles, with a deep, intimidating voice rumbling from a chest as broad as a beer barrel.

‘Bob says you need to push the feed pipe through the bel y but on,’ Maddy’s voice came back.

Sal’s lip curled. ‘You mean … like … as if we’re stabbing it?’ she cal ed out.

‘Wel , obviously don’t stab it with the pipe!’ Maddy’s

‘Wel , obviously don’t stab it with the pipe!’ Maddy’s voice echoed back. ‘Gently do it!’

Liam looked at Sal and shook his head. ‘I can’t do it. I’d be sick. Here …’ He passed the foetus to Sal.

‘Oh, right … thanks, Liam.’

Sal cradled the thing in her hand and then gingerly reached into the perspex growth tube beside them to retrieve the feed pipe dangling down inside. She grimaced as she fumbled in the slimy growth solution, nal y pul ing out the tip of the feed pipe. As the slime dripped like mucus from the end of it, she could see the pipe ended with a sharpened tip.

‘Bob says you shouldn’t have to push too hard. The bel y but on skin is very thin and should … Oh, that’s just gross …’ Maddy’s voice faded away.

‘What?’ cal ed out Liam. Maddy didn’t answer immediately.

‘Maddy?’ chirped Sal. ‘What’s gross?’

‘He says the skin should pop just like a blister.’

Liam looked sheepishly at Sal. ‘Real y, I can’t do it. I’d be … I’l be sick over the poor lit le fel a.’

‘Shadd-yah,’ Sal mut ered, ‘you are hopeless sometimes.’

She took the end of the pipe between her ngers and gently drew it up until it hovered an inch above the foetus’s tiny bel y: translucent skin criss-crossed with a faint spider’s web of blue veins and a smal inward twist of rubbery skin.

She took a deep breath. ‘OK … here goes.’

She gently pressed the sharp end of the feed pipe into She gently pressed the sharp end of the feed pipe into the smal whirl of esh. The foetus shuddered in her hand; nger-length arms and legs suddenly ailing, its walnutsized head slapping against the palm of her hand.

‘Uh … Maddy! It doesn’t like it! It’s struggling!’

‘Bob says that’s perfectly normal … just push it in until the skin pops.’

She heard Liam mut er something about Jesus before his legs buckled beneath him and he sat down heavily on the oor, then slid over on to his side.

‘I think Liam’s just fainted!’ shouted Sal.

‘Never mind him,’ Maddy replied. ‘We need to get the foetus hooked up before it starts starving.’

‘OK, OK.’

She pushed the tip against the bel y but on again, this time pushing despite the foetus’s protests, until she felt the skin give way, as promised, with a soft pop. A smal trickle of dark blood oozed out on to its bel y.

‘It’s in!’

‘Right, now, put bonding tape round the pipe and its bel y to hold it in place.’

Sal picked up a rol of tape and wound it round as the thing squirmed indignantly in her hand.

‘OK. What next?’

‘Just lower it into the growth tube.’

Sal stepped towards the plastic cylinder and lifted the foetus up over the open top. ‘OK, Bob Junior,’ she ut ered.

‘See you again in a lit le while.’

Gently she lowered the foetus into the murky gunk and Gently she lowered the foetus into the murky gunk and then let it sink. It set led down through the pink soup, like a descending globule of wax in a lava lamp, until the feed pipe drew taut and it came to a rest.

‘OK, he’s in!’

‘Now close the growth-tube lid and activate the system pump!’

Sal closed the tube’s metal lid and clamped it in place. She squat ed down to inspect the panel at the bot om of the tube. There wasn’t much to see down there. A manufacturer’s name – WG Systems – and a smal touch screen. She tapped the screen and it lit up.

[Filtration system active]

[Set system to GROWTH or STASIS?]

‘It’s asking me to set it to growth or stasis … shal I pick growth?’

Maddy’s answer echoed back from the archway a moment later. ‘Growth for this one.’

Sal tapped GROWTH and con rmed the instruction. Immediately she heard the soft hum of a motor whirring to life somewhere at the bot om of the tube. A light winked on inside, making the pink protein glow and lighting the foggy form of the foetus from below. She could see its struggling form set le, content now that it was get ing its feed despite the earlier discomfort of having the tube pushed into its bel y.

‘Al done!’

‘Good. Now we’ve got to do the same thing for the others. Only we’l be set ing those to stasis.’

others. Only we’l be set ing those to stasis.’

Sal looked down at the open case on the oor, and the other vials containing growth candidates. Then she looked at Liam, stil out for the count, his face resting against the cold concrete oor amid a smal pool of spit le and vomit.

‘Great. Thanks for the help, Liam.’

‘Bl f i f wheeeel y gloob!’ said Liam, his mouth ful to bulging.

Both girls looked at him. ‘What?’

Liam chewed vigorously for a moment, then nal y swal owed. ‘I said this is real y good! What is it?’

‘Lamb korma,’ replied Sal. ‘It’s nothing like how Mum used to make it back home. You have it much sweeter over here. I suppose Americans like their food real y sweet?’

Maddy nodded. ‘Sweeter the bet er. I could live just on chocolate.’ She reached across their table and pul ed a carton of mango chutney out of the brown paper takeaway bag.Liam hungrily loaded another forkful of korma into his mouth.

Across the archway, music streamed from the computer. Maddy had an Internet radio station playing music she remembered her parents listening to: the Corrs, REM, Counting Crows.

‘It’s kind of weird just us three, though,’ said Sal. ‘I miss Foster.’

‘Me too,’ said Maddy.

‘We’re never going to see him again, are we?’

‘We’re never going to see him again, are we?’

She shrugged. ‘Probably not. He had to go.’

‘Why?’ asked Liam.

She hesitated a moment. ‘He was sick.’

‘Yeah,’ said Sal thoughtful y. ‘He didn’t look wel .’

‘What was wrong with him?’

Maddy played with the rice on her plate for a moment.

‘Cancer. He was dying of cancer. He told me that.’

‘Poor, poor fel a,’ sighed Liam. ‘I real y liked him. Reminded me a bit of my grandfather, so he did.’

They ate in silence for a moment.

‘It’s strange, though,’ said Sal. ‘We’re part of this … this agency, but it doesn’t feel like we’re part of anything, if you know what I mean.’

‘I know what you mean,’ said Liam. ‘Like it’s just the three of us in this lit le archway al on our own. No contact with anyone else.’ He looked up at Maddy. ‘Did he not say there were other groups like us? Other eld o ces?’

She nodded. ‘He did.’

‘But we never ever hear from them. There’s no information about them, or about this agency. No one has contacted us, right?’

‘No one.’

Sal put down the poppadom she’d been holding. ‘What if it real y is just us, just us alone … here?’

The other two looked at her.

‘What if we are the agency?’ she added.

Liam’s eyebrows arched and his jaw dropped open. Liam’s eyebrows arched and his jaw dropped open.

‘God help us al if that’s the case.’

Maddy shook her head. ‘It’s not just us. Someone else stashed those foetuses back in 1906, right?’

‘Could that not have been Foster?’

‘Could be.’ Maddy shrugged. ‘But then you’ve got to ask who genetical y engineered the foetuses? That’s got a need other people, some facility somewhere.’ The other two had no answer for that. ‘Fact is,’ she continued, ‘there’s more to this agency than just us. There are others out there somewhere or somewhen.’

‘So how do we talk with them?’ asked Sal. ‘How can we meet them?’

‘I think that’s exactly the point. I think we’re not supposed to.’ Maddy slurped her Dr Pepper. ‘Maybe we’re a bit like some sort of terrorist organization; for al of our safety, no one group can know where another group is. We operate in isolation. It’s just us … until …’ Her words tailed o and they sat in silence for a while contemplating where that sentence ended.

‘Not much chance of a big Christmas get-together, then?’

mut ered Liam.

Maddy snorted drink on to the table, relieved that he’d found a way to break the sombre mood.

‘At least,’ said Sal, ‘we’l have a brand-new Bob to protect us soon.’

‘Aye. I miss the big ape.’

Maddy pointed to the bank of computer monitors. ‘He’s just there!’

just there!’

‘Naw,’ said Liam, wrinkling his nose, ‘it’s not quite the same him being in there.’

‘You can’t exactly hug a computer monitor,’ said Sal. Liam chuckled. ‘Quite right. I miss his tufty round coconut head.’

‘And that dumb, total blip-head expression on his face,’

added Sal.

‘Aye.’

Maddy nished a mouthful of curry. ‘Wel , we’l have him around soon. Foster’s “how to” manual says the growth cycle should take about one hundred hours.’ She pushed her glasses up her nose. ‘Lemmesee … that’s just over four days.’

‘We’l need some new clothes for him,’ said Sal. ‘I’l see what I can nd for him downtown tomorrow.’

Maddy nodded. ‘Good idea.’

They nished the Indian takeaway and bagged up the rubbish. Liam volunteered to take it out as the girls changed for bed. He crossed the archway oor, crisscrossed with snaking power cables, and lifted the front shut er enough to duck under and step out into their backstreet.

A ickering blue light dimly lit the street. Above him, bright halogen oodlights il uminated the thick metal spars of the Wil iamsburg Bridge arcing across the at docile water of the Hudson River. On the far side – a sight he was stil yet to get used to – was Manhat an, a vibrant inverted crystal chandelier of winking city lights and inverted crystal chandelier of winking city lights and nudging tra c.

He dropped the bag into the trash can, and sucked in the cool night air.

Tonight al was wel with the world. Tomorrow was the day planes crashed into buildings and the sky was a dark smudge al of the day.

He hated the Tuesdays.

‘Good night, New York,’ he ut ered under his breath. The city replied with the rumble of a train along the bridge overhead and the echoing, distant wail of a police siren racing through a Brooklyn street several blocks away. As he prepared to duck back inside and wind the shut er down once more, he found himself wondering if Sal was right. If they real y were alone. If the agency was, in fact, just them.

As it happened, the answer to that speci c question was to arrive the very next morning.