The Night, page 18
“We believed at the time that the night hunters were a localized phenomena,” Cage agreed. “When the comments stopped, when people used what we used, and their night hunters went away, we believed they were eradicated.”
She nodded. “But now we think we're wrong about that.”
That part she didn't know now. The lab results brought up too many questions. She shrugged, dropped the chip that she was holding and took a bite of the sandwich which suddenly seemed more appealing instead. “I mean, it's possible that we only got the numbers down low enough that no one could see them, but they were still there. They would just need a couple of breeding pairs here and there.”
“If that's the case,” Cage pointed out, “Then we probably weren't the only ones to do that. Have you been checking the locations of the comments where they're popping up now?”
She had.
“Are they in the same places as they were the first time?”
“No. We've got comments coming in from all over now. And that's what I missed.”
He nodded. After she’d pointed out that more comments were coming in, her brother had looked, too.
Their parents had always told them that two sets of eyes—two brains—were better than one. As both the kids had learned early on, it was possible to open the refrigerator looking for the ketchup and miss it sitting right in front of you. At which point, their mother would come along, saying that it was exactly where she’d told them it was. Joule almost smiled just thinking about it. But if she was ever looking for something, and she couldn't find it or couldn't identify it, she was always more than willing to bring someone in as backup.
She’d told Cage, “Look over my shoulder and tell me what I'm not seeing.” He'd gone into the comments on the videos.
“They started popping up again about three years ago,” he said. It was just a fact, no blame, but Joule noted the part she was struggling to forgive herself for. She'd been monitoring the comments for a while, but when they died down and stayed dead, she'd walked away.
It had been too much. Bad memories were brought to the surface when she read some of the comments. People had lost their families. One man had seen his brother attacked by the pack and go down. Joule remembered the noises from the night her mother had hid them and told them she had it. So she’d stopped looking.
“Don't blame yourself,” he said again, seeming to read her.
“But how can I not?”
“If you blame you, you have to blame me, too.”
Joule frowned at him.
“I walked away before you did. And I walked away for my own mental sanity. It was really hard to read all of that even knowing that things were going the right direction.”
“There was a lot to process.” They’d not talked about it, but they understood each other. They'd been dealing with the deaths of their parents. In the very immediate space and time after that, they’d spent their time fighting for their lives—not able to grieve, not able to process. Joule, more than her brother probably, had put that grief on hold in part by burying herself in work. Both the work that needed to be done and also the work she’d created to fill the space.
When she occupied her time, she was able to avoid coming to terms with the loss of her mom and then her dad. She was now finally reaching a point where fundamentally and logically she was working on not blaming herself, but the guilt was still lodged deep.
Clearly, the paranoia had never truly left.
“In their initial run,” Cage added, pulling her back to the present, “The hunters were very local to this area. But in the past couple of years, they've popped up in all kinds of places, including on other continents, like I learned in Texas.”
Joule was impressed with his ability to talk about certain things from the time that he'd been held captive. She'd had her own therapy involving more than a touch of survivor's guilt for not being the one that had been captured, spending so much time in such fear of having lost her brother.
She’d even worked to clear another helping of guilt for having worked her way through how she would live her life without him if he didn't come back. Her therapist had told her those were all necessary and human things, and that she should do them because they would help her if anything did happen to her brother.
But Joule was more than grateful to be sitting across the table from him now. “You think there's every possibility that these are new? That they aren't night hunters?”
“We won't know until we open it up,” Cage added though Joule wasn't sure they would even know then, because she felt like she had looked at it and seen what it was. Only now they were doubting what they saw. What they knew.
Five-thirty could not come fast enough.
45
Joule’s anxiety only ramped up through the day though she tried to keep herself busy. She was ready to walk out the door, but it was still too early.
Her attempt to round up family members and herd them toward the car found Kayla in her office working intently on something. “Are you coming?”
“I don't think I should.” Kayla didn’t look up.
“Why not?”
“Well, I have other work to do, and I don't want to crowd the space.”
Sensing Ivy coming up behind her, Joule turned to find the woman in her paint smock, palette in hand, still working on the piece she was doing for Cage and Joule. The art historian perfectionist seemed to be coming out in her, and Ivy was less following a “paint by number” like she said, and more lovingly restoring an image that she'd created digitally. She didn’t look like she was going anywhere.
“You either?” Joule was a bit disappointed.
Ivy at least seemed more comforting in her tone. “I wouldn't know what I was looking at. There's nothing about this that deals with lathe and plaster or what pigments were historically available in what areas and when.”
Joule had to laugh at that. It was a good point. They had Dr. Glenn, and they had the two of them. While Joule had an engineering degree, it was a bio engineering degree, and she did have a good deal of knowledge when it came down to it. She might be one of the few people on the planet who actually had a practical understanding of the night hunters.
“We wouldn't know what we were seeing or how to help,” Ivy reiterated, even as she looked down at her palette and seemed to be mixing two colors and not enjoying the outcome.
Joule conceded. Even so, she pushed, “You saw the night hunters the first time. Maybe you can look and see the differences.”
She’d showed them all the lab reports watching as, one by one, they reacted, first stunned and then concerned.
Kayla hadn’t even lost her focus on her work and didn’t respond. But Ivy, still standing close, though looking at her own paint palette, offered only, “It was years ago. Even if I thought I remembered something, I don't know that I would trust it.” Then she looked up, as if proving her lack of knowledge she asked, “Necropsy is an autopsy but on an animal, right?”
Joule nodded as they turned away and walked down the hall, away from Kayla, whose decision was clearly made. It seemed Ivy’s was made too but she was still talking, at least. “I’m not a big fan of autopsies. Honestly not a big fan of hunting and killing, but willing to do it out of necessity. I think the three of you would spend far too much time explaining things to me and that would counter any value I could provide. You two go. Give Dr. Glenn our best.”
There was something else in it that Joule couldn't quite place her finger on, as if Ivy seemed to think they were auditioning Dr. Glenn to replace Dr. Brett. The idea felt callous but on the other hand, Dr. Brett had fulfilled a very necessary position on their little team. While they deeply missed him as a person, they also simply missed having someone with that kind of veterinary knowledge working with them.
With the clock and her anxiety both ticking, she told Ivy goodbye and went to fetch her brother. Joule found him lacing up the shoes that he generally didn't like to wear around the house and was grateful he was ready.
“Come on.” She motioned him to go, keys already in her hand, but he held out his own palm, up and waiting.
“I'm driving, you’re too keyed up.”
He wasn't wrong. “Then get moving.”
Joule plopped the keys into his hand and headed out. The two-car garage held Kayla and Ivy's vehicles but the twins car, that they shared, either sat out on the street or to the side of the driveway. Joule was in the passenger seat and buckled in before he could even open the door.
She tried not to complain, knowing that the issue was hers and not anyone else’s. She just wouldn't be satisfied until she was standing around the table, gloves on her hands, instruments held tight.
It was one of the staff members, Teresa, who answered their knocks at the locked back door and led them in. “Doctor Glenn's in with the last emergency patient. He'll probably be another fifteen minutes?”
She said it like a question mark. Not comforting.
“Can we get started?” Joule asked.
“I don't see why not.” Teresa shrugged. Dr. Glenn seemed to have told the staff to give them some kind of carte blanche and Joule was more than happy to take advantage of it.
When she asked about the metal table that seemed to be there for autopsies, Teresa asked back, “Do you know how to use it? It’s surgical. It can tip in various directions.”
She demonstrated the foot pedals and that there were straps underneath, though Joule almost laughed. “This thing better not come back to life and need to be strapped down.”
“We're not making any cuts without Dr. Glenn,” Cage said as soon as Teresa headed out, leaving them alone in the surgical suite.
“I know.” Joule grabbed the handle to the small morgue door and slid the almost human sized tray out. On it, she found two cats, a hamster, and a dog. Before she closed that door, she opened the other and found the night hunter. It took up almost as much space as all the other animals combined.
“What are they here for?” She asked her brother, pointing to the full tray.
“Sometimes necropsies. If they died under mysterious circumstances, the family will pay for it. A lot of times they're just here until they can be transported to a crematorium.”
Joule felt her heart fall. Their family had moved a lot, the Mazur parents often working in think tanks and taking new jobs as the urge hit them or the opportunity arose. They hadn't had large pets. Cage and Joule had had pet rats as kids, but that hadn’t lasted as long as she would have liked. Though there had been several veterinary visits, there had been no need for a necropsy. Their beloved King Arthur and Twitch had been buried in the backyard without veterinary intervention.
She slid out the drawer with the hunter on it, still wrapped in the tarp. She untucked the edge and lifted it to look, both to be sure that it was the correct animal and that it had stayed dead. Over her shoulder, she asked her brother, “Help me?”
Even as she asked, Cage appeared at her side, a thick pair of blue nitrile gloves in hand. He held another two out for her.
Good thought, even though she was going to lift the creature by the tarp, it was better to be gloved. What if it had been rabid? Within a few moments they had the creature on the table and the tarp thrown back, revealing it. While Joule was sure Dr. Glenn would have some better technique than this, it would do for now.
She went first to the mouth, lifting the lip though the skin had grown stiff with time. The move was a little harder than she anticipated, but she could see the teeth. She pointed one blue gloved finger and motioned to her brother. “Three canines. These are night hunter teeth.”
He nodded, and while Joule looked the creature over thinking how much it looked like a night hunter, her brother was commenting on how it didn't.
“He's larger. Look at the fur, it's patchy, almost shaggy. And as good a job as they did of camouflaging themselves last time?” He let it rise like a question. “I think they're better at it this time.”
Joule couldn't fault that. The twins should have been much better at spotting them now, not worse. So should Kayla and Ivy. She wasn’t the biologist, but she knew memories formed in trauma lasted longer—often an entire lifetime. They should all be better at finding them. And all four of the humans were notably worse at it.
Thirteen minutes had passed, and luckily there was still more to look at without making the first cut, because Dr. Glenn hadn't showed up yet. She checked paws and claws and felt for basic musculature, though she didn’t have one of the old night hunters preserved to compare to.
A chirp came from her bag. It was tucked into a small locker in the corner, as Teresa had shown them. The sounds of her ring continued but Joule ignored it until it came a second time and Cage motioned for her to just get it.
Peeling her gloves, and honestly grateful for the interruption, she dug out the phone. It was an unknown number, but the phone wasn't flagging it. It had a local area code, but it wasn’t a number she or the phone recognized. She answered with a questioning “Hello?”
Why would anybody even just call her?
“I am looking for Joule Mazur.” The words were odd, almost too perfect, as if the struggle wasn't just with her name—which people often mispronounced. All the words of the sentence were slightly accented, but she didn’t recognize it. Was it a scam?
Joule wasn’t a fan of talking on the phone, but she did know the formal English and it sounded like this was a situation that called for it. She wasn’t about to let anyone record her saying “yes.” She offered, “This is she.”
“My name is Dr. Vanessa Banza. I apologize . . .” Again, the words were formalized, and Joule detected more than a hint of the accent this time. Something about it reminded her of Dr Achebbe from the CDC.
“I reached out to you, on the video that you had online, but you did not reply.” The voice continued. “If that was intentional, you can tell me now and I will not bother you anymore.”
Joule didn't remember any comments that she hadn't responded to or any that she wanted to but hadn't. So she waited.
Dr. Vanessa Banza then added, “We have seen these night hunters in the Democratic Republic of Congo.”
Joule felt her eyes fly wide.
46
Cage watched as his sister turned frantically looking for a surface to set the phone on. She was peeling her other glove, punching at the screen, and waving him over. Whether she was excited or panicked, he couldn’t quite tell.
Joule motioned again as she spoke to the screen. “I have you on speakerphone. Dr. Banza.”
“Thank you, with whom am I speaking?”
“This is my brother Cage Mazur. He was also in the video you saw.” Though they hadn’t shown their faces, both their torsos and hands had been demonstrating their techniques. Both their voices might be recognizable from the recordings.
“Yes, I remember him.”
“How did you find me?” Joule asked as Cage tried to catch up. Whoever she was, she’d seen the videos from years ago?
“I have a friend at home. Who is—” She paused, seeming to search for words. “Very good with computers.”
“A hacker?” Joule laughed, seeming unbothered that someone had found them and called them from the videos. They’d worked hard so that couldn’t happen.
“Yes, a hacker. He was able to follow information and find your name and a phone number for me. Again, I apologize. And I will not follow or bother you if you tell me no.”
Though his only connection was over a phone line and while he couldn't say he was psychic by any measure, Cage felt no ill will coming from the woman on the other end. Still, the language was highly formal. It took him a moment to realize there were no contractions, no slang or idioms.
“What made you call us?” Cage asked, finally jumping in, and completely bypassing the question of whether or not the twins were willing to be bothered. Maybe they could rescind the welcome at a later time. But this woman had gone to a lot of trouble to find them.
“They have night hunters in Congo,” Joule told him.
He felt himself pull back as if slapped. He must have missed that in the early part of the conversation. But he understood now why he'd seen Joule’s eyes fly open as she tried to get him on the phone. That explained the panicked, frantic motions. It took him a moment to formulate a question. When he did, he tried to match the formal tone, and not offer anything that would confuse a foreign speaker. Though nothing so far suggested her English was poor, just different.
“When did you start seeing them?”
“About two years ago . . . Will you wait one minute?” An odd request, he thought, but it was followed by, “I would like to introduce you to my colleague, Nikkiki Mulongo. She is my . . . associate?”
It ended with a clear question mark and made Cage wonder if Dr. Banza simply lacked the correct word for whatever Nikkiki Mulongo was. She could be anywhere from a lab tech to a doctoral student from what he could gather.
“Hello, this is Nikkiki.” Another voice added, the lilt pleasing to his ear. He tried to remind himself that his appreciation of the accent did not necessarily correlate to the purity of the other’s actions.
He asked, “What is it that makes you think your night hunters are the same as ours?”
“The description matches,” Nikkiki told them, “as does the description of the happenings before we see them. Small animals went missing from farms near us. Sometimes there was evidence of a vicious attack. People were missing. At times we found only a limb.”
Cage felt his eyes squeeze shut. The last thing he saw was Joule’s eyes flying wide again. He hated that. He wasn't sure of the history of Congo, but he knew in Rwanda that humans had perpetrated such acts in the past. That finding only a singular limb of a loved one was not necessarily new in the area.
