Human (2 page)

“You okay Ky?” Ivy received a nod back and a squeeze of her hand. Taking that as acquiescence, they continued on their path, navigating service roads and buildings for another ten minutes.

The buildings dedicated to Physics were imposing steel and glass. They reached far higher into the chilled blue sky than the sandstone walls Ivy was familiar with. She didn't come to this part of the university very often. She supposed it was quite pretty, with its angular abstract art installations and glistening water fountains running down glassy sheets. Very modern. A bit intimidating, really. Less greenery.

Kyah loped contentedly, holding Ivy’s hand. The bonobo’s dark eyes sparkled as she watched the water fountains throw rainbow prisms of light into the amber glow.

Ivy liked this time of day the most, when nightfall was almost touching. Most students and staff had left for the day and the monumental grounds were serene. A chilly breeze messed Ivy's fringe into her eyes and she tucked it behind her ear. Building 246.

This is it.

Adjusting her heavy satchel, Ivy reached her arms out. The bonobo climbed into them and held on like an overgrown child, balanced comfortably on her hip, arms wrapped around her neck. Kyah’s body heat radiated through Ivy's cardigan.

A striking water feature embellished the multi-level physics building where she found herself hesitating.
Okay, deep breath.

In front of Ivy, the glass doors and floodlights of the foyer illuminated a gleaming hallway, mirrored elevators and an unoccupied administration desk. A twinge of jealousy caught her. She imagined the laboratories hidden behind those walls. New equipment using state of the art technology.
What we could do with that level of support in the residue lab…
Ivy laughed out loud, despite herself.
It seems I'm fraternising with the enemy.
She adjusted Kyah's weight and walked through the glass foyer. Scanning a departmental map, Ivy navigated to Laboratory 179.

Dr Orrin James, Astro-physics
was printed on the door plate.

“Okay Ky, behave yourself. I'm trying to make a good impression.”

As if to consolidate that thought in her mind, Ivy once again tried smoothing her unruly fringe behind her ear. Admitting defeat with a sigh, she held Kyah close and turned the silver door handle. She walked into the laboratory.

In an instant, everything changed.

Streaks of lightning clawed toward her. Her skin burned. A glimpse of white walls became a blur of black and swirling grey. Ivy jerked her head around, searching frantically for logic. A small blue sphere pierced with vertical white stripes trapped her eyes like a blinding sun somewhere in front of her. It shattered into a haze of broken colours and it screamed, deep and broken, as if the colours themselves were in agony. They dissolved into the swirling dark.

“You gave us no choice, Hiranah”, whispered a man’s voice, deep and sinister behind her ear. Ivy spun again, but there was nothing but haze. A suffocation of harmonic noise filled the air and hysterical screeching pierced her eardrums.
Kyah!
The bonobo’s lips were pulled back in terror and she lurched closer, clinging to Ivy’s neck. Beyond Kyah’s face, was nothing.

There was suddenly no floor, no walls, no ceiling.
Nothing.
The siren scream reverberating through her skull was the only solidity left and Ivy’s knees buckled in the nothingness. She gripped Kyah’s back, struggling to envelop the animal with her own failing muscles.

Everything was black. Ivy’s feet were slipping. Before her, a pinprick of darkest black expanded. It swirled as it grew. Her mind was slipping.
No. This isn’t real.
From the vortex, a swarm of tiny disembodied hands materialised, wisplike and macabre. Fingers raked at her clothes like insistent children, pulling her forward. They were ghostly, like vestiges of solid flesh lost in thick smoke. Ivy twisted away, horrified.
No!

The harmonic noise intensified. The sound distorted. Black smoke congealed on Kyah’s back.
Please, god no!
Infantile hands dragged the animal from Ivy’s arms. Kyah screamed in terror. The bonobo’s fingers clawed at Ivy’s cardigan, drawing lines of blood under the wool as nothingness pulled her from Ivy’s grip. Ivy struggled, screaming into the hurricane blackness, fighting for Kyah. The vortex pulled harder.

She was gone.

“Kyah! No!” Ivy’s scream was lost in pounding air. Time ceased as her heart wrenched forward, desperate to follow. Suddenly, there was nothing else. No life. No university. No reality. Just devastating, heartbreaking
loss.

The vortex swelled around her, pulling Ivy in.

Like lightning, clarity broke the chaos of her mind.
No! You can’t have her!

She made a choice. So simple and pure, it broke her fear in one swift blow.

I’ll save her.

Ivy leapt. Suffocating blackness engulfed her, tearing and twisting her mind.

Existence was shred from her bones.

One week earlier: Archaeology Department, Melbourne University.

Ivy's brow furrowed in concentration as she peered into the microscope eyepiece. A twist of long, bright red hair fell across her face; she scooped it up absentmindedly and tucked it behind her ear. A moment later, it escaped again, forcing her to break meditation of the small arrowhead illuminated on the stage.

She blinked in the dim light. Ivy’s emerald eyes were shadowed by dark circles and didn't sparkle as they usually did. Textbooks and research papers lay scattered on the desk around her, scribbles and notes adorning many of the open pages. Her previous night’s research had reached into the early hours of the morning and a second coffee had not yet entirely woken her.

The small office in which Ivy sat could easily be mistaken for the storeroom of an old museum. Artefacts from long-forgotten cultures ornamented the shelves, once integral pieces of human lives, now collecting dust. Shards of pottery lay in piles, each imprinted with the signature style of its maker, like ancient jigsaws waiting patiently to be reassembled. A chipped coffee mug brimming with colourful African beads acted as a paperweight for a large pile of photocopied journal articles on the floor. Good intentions to organise the ever-expanding piles of highlighted papers were always lost during feverish attempts to keep up with new research.

Her elderly laptop buzzed quietly to her left, lopsided. Its corner rested on the faded cover of a leather-bound journal; fat and well-loved, complete with thumbed pages, loose additions and a soul’s worth of thoughts, inspirations and sketches. Fallen from the back sleeve were two photographs. The first was of a teenage boy with grey eyes and a carefree laugh, his arms wound around sixteen-year-old Ivy’s waist as she twisted to meet his smile. The second was a fading photograph of a thirty-something year old woman with runaway red hair. Her mother's wide smile and shining eyes were mirrored in Ivy's at rare moments of restful joy; when Ivy’s porcelain face, more beautiful in its intense concentration, transformed to reveal a sweet vulnerability masked by a wicked sense of humour. Such exposures seemed rare these days and the woman in the photograph, gone nearly eight years, would have been worried at the growing isolation of the young woman who spent so much time buried in her work. As it was, however, Ivy's intense dedication went largely unnoticed, which suited her perfectly.

Ivy peered once again into the eyepiece, her fingers shifting the fine focus ever so slightly. The unassuming arrowhead on the microscope stage zoomed back into clarity. To the naked eye this stone was simple, functional, and smooth. An axiom of days long gone. However, as Ivy stared intently, the pencil in her right hand was busy creating the story of the arrowhead's last use. Spectacular blood striations swept across the blade from a deadly impact long ago, barely hidden by the dirt and organic material clumped to it now from its long slumber. Later, she would analyse the dried blood to identify its unwilling victim, but for now, she was engrossed in preserving the markings. Determining the sequence of layers was paramount in maintaining the integrity of the arrow’s life history.

Carefully finishing the last detail on her sketch, Ivy pushed her pencil back into the crowded jar. She preferred pencils; they seemed somehow softer and friendlier than pens. Perhaps it was their ability to be erased. The chewed end of this one stood out horribly against the others, a casualty of her fatigue.

Stretching her legs out, Ivy grimaced at the pins and needles she’d given herself. Stepping gingerly to the small window, she yanked the wooden frame open. A gust of chilly autumn breeze did the caffeine's job. From the first floor of the Social Sciences building Ivy looked out across the sprawling grass courtyard where students sat eating lunch, chatting and sleeping between lectures.

A loud laugh drew her attention to a familiar face below. Jayne Williams had spent long hours over the last month assisting Ivy in the Molecular Archaeology lab. As the department’s newest postgraduate student, she’d been bounced by preoccupied staff and had finally landed under Ivy’s wing.

Ivy's feverish late night attempts to make progress on her PhD research were now frequently accompanied by Jayne’s spirited assistance. In return, Ivy offered copious amounts of chocolate, the occasional beer and the mellow tones of light classical from the battered radio in the corner.

Ivy mused as she watched Jayne chatting below to a disoriented first-year student. Jayne’s olive complexion seemed to soak up the sun's watery rays. Ivy drew her hand up her forearm self consciously. Too many hours under the fluorescent laboratory lights were taking their toll. Although naturally pale, Ivy wondered if her scattering of freckles and quick make-up attempts were recently the only thing that kept her from disappearing altogether.

Somehow she always manages to find the good-looking ones,
Ivy thought
.

She watched the scene below with a smile touched by grudging admiration, as Jayne gave animated directions to the bewildered and smitten teenage boy. Jayne tossed her short, honey-blonde hair with a giggle, fully aware of the effect. Puffing up, the boy left somewhat reluctantly, a smirk playing his lips until the corner of the sandstone wall stole his attention. He ducked away with a red face.

Ivy leaned out of the window as Jayne turned once again for the building entrance.

“He's a bit young for you isn't he?” Ivy teased down.

Startled, Jayne stopped and looked up. Her corn-flower blue eyes were all innocence, but an impish grin tarnished the facade.

“No such thing, Ms twenty-four-going-on-fifty!” Jayne yelled back. “It's about time you got your eyes off the microscope and onto some of the scenery here, especially today!”

Ivy laughed. By now several people strolling between lectures were looking up at her with curiosity. Their long-distance exchange was louder than the general chatter and shuffle of passers-by. Suddenly acutely aware of the attention she was getting, Ivy dismissed Jayne with a wave and made to bend inside the window frame again.

“Hey, wait!” Jayne called. “I've got a message for you. I've just been up to Lab Six.
You’re wanted.
Apparently I'm second rate…”

The words hit the empty window as Ivy grabbed the brown woollen jacket slung over her chair, and swept from the room.

“Hey, Match-stick!”

Ivy was rolling her eyes and grinning before she even turned around. She hugged her brown woollen jacket tighter across her chest. As predicted, the unruly mop of blonde curls calling out to her was waving a beer glass in one hand, while the other clutched a handful of poker cards. At least a dozen undergraduates were crowded around him in the refectory beer-garden. Some held playing cards but all carried boisterous enthusiasm and glassy-eyed veneration for the man in the middle.

“Come hither and join the revelry! A celebration is afoot! Tonight we raise ale in thy honour, My Lady.” The man stood up and bowed theatrically, knocking the wine-barrel table with his knees and sending the cohort of poker players around him into a tirade of good-natured abuse. “Grace us with thy red-haired beauty that doth eclipse the setting sun itself and shame it into hiding this eventide,” he called with a flourish. “What say you?”