Immortal

18

‘What the hell were you thinking?’

Colin Manx’s face was taut with rage, his frizzy hair trembling as he glared at Saffron Oppenheimer.

‘I was thinking,’ Saffron said without concern. ‘That’s the difference between you and me.’

Manx struggled for a response, glancing at the thirty or so people gathered round them and an aged NAPCO GMC Suburban. A mixture of hippies, college drop-outs and petty criminals with nowhere else to go, they represented a small army of individuals who didn’t possess the sense to realize that their actions against the state and science would get them nowhere except jail. They stared wide-eyed at Saffron Oppenheimer, and for a moment she thought that they might go down on their knees and prostrate themselves before her. She, alone, had led them to what they considered their greatest ever victory since casting themselves out from society into the Pecos Wilderness.

Saffron Oppenheimer, for her part, despised each and every one of them.

‘Is that what you call it?’ Manx raged. ‘Thinking? You fired a shotgun, put several scientists in hospital, stole all the animals and then you blew up the computers in the goddamned laboratory.’

‘Go, Saffron!’ Ruby Lily squealed from nearby. A ripple of delighted chuckles fluttered through the watching groupies as Ruby pointed at Saffron. ‘You should have seen her, she was awesome!’

Manx scowled.

‘Yeah, awesome enough that we’ll likely have the FBI hunting us down now!’

Saffron sighed, examining a small cut on her finger from her escape out of the laboratories.

‘If only you were that important, Colon,’ she murmured to another round of sniggers from behind them.

‘We were supposed to make a statement and free one of the chimps,’ Manx snapped, his bluster losing conviction in the face of her disinterest. ‘Not blow the place sky-high!’

Saffron shrugged.

‘If a job’s worth doing…’

Manx glared at her while occasionally peering sideways, seeking support from the crowd. Saffron could tell that none was forthcoming as Manx pulled himself up to his full height, building up to something.

‘You’ve gone too far,’ he snarled. ‘It’s time to cut you down to size.’

With a startling howl of what Saffron presumed was rage, Manx lunged toward her. His big, dirty hands shot out to her wrists in an attempt to force her to the ground. Saffron acted without thought or worry, stepping not away from Manx but toward him, turning sideways and ducking down as his hands shot past her face. With a heave of effort she drove her right elbow deep into his stomach just beneath his ribs. The howl was cut short as Manx gagged and a blast of foul air rushed from his mouth. He doubled over, just in time for Saffron’s knee to jerk up and smash across the bridge of his nose with a dull crunch like an eggshell crushed beneath her boots. Winded and blinded in less than a second, Manx flipped over and collapsed gasping onto the hot desert sand. Saffron looked down at him.

‘Good work, Colon,’ she murmured without pity.

The group around her laughed openly now. They were hers without a doubt. Manx struggled to his knees, coughing and spluttering, tears staining his dusty face as he squinted up at her.

‘You’re insane!’ he bleated.

Saffron turned her back to him, walking away toward the camper van. ‘And you’re pathetic. Get lost.’

Another round of laughs followed. Saffron saw in the windows of the GMC the reflection of Manx staggering to his feet, clutching his face and stomach as he made his unsteady way toward the main road, a quarter of a mile to the south. She waited until he was out of earshot, busying herself with cleaning her shotgun. From behind, she heard the groupies tentatively approaching, and the gentle noises made by the chimpanzees in the back of the GMC as they guzzled from recently refilled water bottles.

Ruby Lily’s voice squeaked again.

‘Let’s free the monkeys!’

A chorus of delighted cheers burst out as Ruby Lily dashed to the rear of the vehicle to open the main doors, where the cages were stacked. She had almost reached them when Saffron took two paces toward her, gripping her wrist in one hand and twisting it sideways. Ruby Lily cried out in alarm as she dropped onto one knee, trying to get away from the pain. Saffron glared down at her.

‘Are you a complete idiot?’ she demanded.

Ruby Lily looked up at her in confusion as Saffron released her and looked at the rest of the crowd.

‘These are Bonobo Chimpanzees from West Africa. They were raised in captivity and have learned to trust humans.’ She paused. ‘To a point. They have also been experimented on, kept in cages, and watched members of their troop go into operating theaters and never return. Chimpanzees have a muscle density far greater than ours, and are easily capable of tearing a human being to pieces with their bare hands.’ She let the point sink in. ‘What do you think they’ll do if they get out and can run free?’

Saffron waited until they realized that an answer was expected.

‘They’ll hurt people,’ someone said in a voice that sounded thin, as though they’d been up all night smoking dope.

‘Well done, Einstein,’ Saffron mocked. ‘They can also carry diseases that can kill, Ebola Zaire being the most lethal. We have no idea what was being done to them in the laboratories, therefore we don’t know what dangers they pose to us. We’ll take them to the nearest zoo in the morning and leave them there.’

Dismay soured the faces of everyone in the group, and Saffron slammed the GMC’s door shut.

‘Okay then,’ she said. ‘What do you think we should do with them?’

Silence enveloped the group and the desert around them. Saffron waited, feeling like a teacher in front of a kindergarten class. She doubted that the thirty of them could muster an IQ of a hundred between them, doped, drugged and mindless as they were.

‘Maybe I should put all of you in the van and let the chimps decide?’ Saffron snapped. ‘Get their water bottles refilled, and then get the van covered with brush and whatever else you can find. It’s going to get hotter and they need shade, understood? I’m going to scout the area, make sure it’s secure. We don’t want the FBI searching for Colon out here, do we?’

With a mixture of chuckles as well as some discontented mumbling, the group dispersed. Saffron turned and aimed for the nearest hill, hiking up through thick brush along a ridge that lined one of a series of gullys descending down into the valley floor behind her, where the Jemez Reservoir glittered. The blue water was formed by the Jemez Canyon Dam, built in 1953 and owned by the US Army Corps of Engineers. It took almost twenty minutes to reach the high point she sought, where the hot desert winds rumbled. She surveyed the surrounding terrain and fished in her pocket for a cell phone, then dialed a number from memory, waiting for the line to connect and watching the windows of distant vehicles flashing silently in the sunlight on the distant I-25.

‘Go ahead.’

The rattling, croaking voice filled her with a loathing that she struggled to conceal.

‘It’s done.’

‘Good. Where is Tyler Willis?’

‘Your men took him when we hit the labs,’ Saffron said. ‘You’ll have to ask them.’

‘Excellent work, Saffron. I’m very proud.’

‘I want your word,’ Saffron demanded. ‘Not a mark on him, understood?’

A moment later, the line went dead.

Saffron shut the phone off and slipped it back into her pocket before gazing out over the cruel beauty of the New Mexico wilderness. She sighed and wondered again if she was doing the right thing. Colin Manx was a weak man, and weak men did the bidding of the strong. All that she could hope for was that she had hit Manx hard enough, both mentally and physically, for him to fulfill his role.

And that she had the strength to do what she had planned for so long.