The League of Sharks (15 page)

‘Never heard of it,' said Junk.

‘No, you wouldn't have,' said Otravinicus. ‘It would have been a good while after your time. Falakite is virtually indestructible, as far as anything can be. It weakens, hence it being on its side now, but it'll be there for another three million years and maybe three million years after that. No one knows exactly. There are bits and pieces of falakite all over the planet.'

Otravinicus turned his attention back to the map in front of him. ‘This is what your world looks like today.' He wafted a hand across the book.

‘Ireland's gone,' is all Junk could think to say.

‘Land masses change over such a period of time. Usually with some help. Countries come and go.'

‘What does that mean?' asked Junk. ‘Help? What help?'

‘Technology and industry from your time and for several centuries after, possibly even for millennia,
ravaged the planet. Absolutely devastated it. You were a short-sighted bunch. Your cities grew bigger and bigger. You cut down forests. Decimated the ice caps. Sea levels rose. The Final War split continents. I mean that literally. I'm massively oversimplifying thousands of years of misuse and stupidity of course. The thing is, geologically speaking, ape-descended man was a blip. A footnote. We try not to make the same mistakes but end up making brand-new ones.'

‘What do you mean, “blip”?' asked Junk.

‘There are no ape-descendants on the planet any more. Humans who evolved from apes died out completely about two thousand years after your time. So that would be what? About the mid-forty-first century? Am I correct? I studied your calendar system, but it's been a while.'

Junk just nodded. This was a lot to take in. ‘So we destroyed ourselves?'

‘Don't feel bad about it. You would have been long dead by then, and your children's children's children's children would all be dead too. No one's quite sure now, but they think there were about eighteen billion people on the planet by the end. Earth just wasn't able to sustain that kind of population. You tried to cheat nature. You tried to play God in so many ways: genetically modified foods and genetically modified people and genetically modified animals. In the end it was a disease, we think, of your own making that wiped you out. Your legacy changed the face of the world to what you see now.

‘Ironically though, many people, myself included, believe that it was your playing God that's responsible for us –' he gestured to himself, Lasel and Garvan – ‘being here today.'

‘I don't understand,' said Junk. ‘What does that mean?'

‘Well, history is …' he searched for the word, ‘… patchy at best' was all he could come up with. ‘You see, a few hundred years ago the Church had a cull of sorts. A cull on the past. The Church doesn't believe we are the result of scientific endeavour of course. The Church never does.'

‘Same in my time,' said Junk.

The doctor continued. ‘They tried, and for the most part succeeded in, eradicating history. There are huge gaping holes in our knowledge, but as far as we can tell, you – by which I mean ape-descendants – were tinkering with the DNA of our ancestors. You know DNA, right? That wasn't after your time?'

‘No, I know all about it. Did a project on it at school. Deoxyribonucleic acid – DNA.' Junk repeated it for no other reason than that was pretty much all he remembered on the subject.

Otravinicus went on. ‘Well, at the same time you were destroying yourselves by perverting your own DNA you were pushing forward the building blocks of our evolution by perverting our DNA. In much the same way that your distant ancestors were apes, I can trace my genetic code to the genus
Capra
.'

Junk looked blank.

‘Goats,' said Otravinicus to clarify.

‘Goats?' said Junk, wondering if this was a joke. Though when he stopped and looked at Otravinicus, he could see something a little goat-like about him. Otravinicus was a small, slight man with a puny, insubstantial body. His neck didn't look robust enough to be able to hold up his oversized head, which was looking more and more bulbous to Junk now he scrutinized it, but it did, so appearances must be deceptive. His limbs were long but anorexically thin. When the man sat, it was clear through the material of his trousers that his thigh was only a little wider than Junk's (admittedly muscular) forearm.

‘Mr Fiske here clearly shares his ancestry with the noble elephant.' No argument there from Junk. That made perfect sense. Otravinicus continued. ‘From his size, I would say genus
Loxodonta
. For Ms Mowtay, I would hazard a guess at
Cervine
.'

‘What's that?' asked Junk.

‘Deer and the like,' replied the doctor. He looked to Lasel for confirmation and she nodded. That made sense too. The big round eyes and impossibly long legs. Maybe her agile movement as well, but then Junk thought about it and he assumed his ape ancestors were a lot more agile than he would ever be, so Lasel's grace was less a product of her evolution than a result of her environment.

Junk looked at Lasel. ‘You're a deer?'

‘You're a monkey,' she pointed out with a smirk. Junk smiled back.

‘We're no more goat and deer and elephant than you are an orang-utan,' said Otravinicus. ‘Your descendants gave our ancestors a prod in the right direction. Everything else was evolution.'

‘You know how crazy this sounds, right?' said Junk. ‘Back in my time, there were still people who didn't accept that we evolved from apes. Who knows what they'd make of the idea of all animals evolving.'

‘Not all,' said Otravinicus. ‘Many but not all. Look around you. Not just at us but at everyone you've seen since you arrived here.'

‘Made more sense when I thought I was on an alien planet.'

‘I suppose you are in a way. Three million years is a very long time.'

‘You're telling me,' said Junk. He tried to process all this information. It made his head spin so he changed the subject. ‘Why do you have an American accent?'

‘I suppose for the same recent that Mr Fiske here sounds a lot like you,' said Otravinicus. ‘I learned to speak your language from an American.'

It took a few moments for the implications of that to register with Junk. ‘You mean someone from my time?' he asked.

‘Correct.'

‘Then I'm not the first to find the Room of Doors,' he said.

‘No, you're not.'

‘Who is he? Is he still here? Are there other people here?' asked Junk.

‘That I cannot answer. He and I had an agreement but unfortunately he chose not to honour the deal.' From the way he spat the last three words, it was apparent that this was still a sore point for Otravinicus. ‘His name was Solo – Han Solo.' Junk laughed, but Otravinicus didn't get the joke. ‘What's so funny?'

‘Sorry. I wasn't laughing at you. It's not his real name,' said Junk.

‘How do you know?' asked the doctor, frowning.

‘Han Solo's a character in a film. Called
Star Wars
.'

‘Oh, I see,' said Otravinicus, evidently feeling foolish now. ‘Well, it doesn't matter. He agreed to show me the Room of Doors for myself. It would have been the perfect end for my book. In return I was to help him find an island.'

‘An island?' said Garvan, who hadn't said anything for a while. ‘Why did he want an island?'

‘He didn't say. It wasn't a specific island, you understand. I got the impression it was where he wanted to live.'

‘So you mean he could still be here?' asked Junk.

‘He could, but I have no idea where. He vanished without fulfilling his promise to me. But I would still like to find the Room of Doors. Prove to the world that what I wrote in my book was accurate. Which brings me to what it is you want, young Junk.'

‘I'm looking for the man who killed my sister,' said Junk.

‘I suspected you might be,' said Otravinicus.

‘All I know is he's part of a group called the League of Sharks. Help me find him, and I'll help you find the Room of Doors,' said Junk.

Otravinicus didn't reply for several moments as he considered Junk's proposal. When he spoke, it was to say, ‘I've never heard of this League of Sharks.'

‘Well, your doorman is one of them,' said Junk. ‘Same race anyway. I'm not saying he's part of the group, but he's one of their kind.'

‘He's a Pallatan. That's what we call people of his race. You want me to ask him what he knows?'

*

A short time later and Otravinicus had ordered the doorman up to his apartment. His name was Alsk. The shark-man was strangely obsequious in Otravinicus's presence, all of the previous aggression gone. Otravinicus translated for Junk's benefit.

‘He's heard of them but doesn't know anything about them. They're an extremist group. Almost a cult.'

‘Ask him if he has any tattoos,' said Junk.

Otravinicus relayed the question to Alsk who shook his head firmly.

‘I don't believe him,' said Junk. ‘Get him to show us his arm. This one.' Junk tapped his left bicep.

Otravinicus hesitated before asking Alsk the question. Alsk frowned. Clearly he didn't want to oblige.
Because he has something to hide, thought Junk. It was apparent that Otravinicus felt uncomfortable asking and didn't press it. Alsk considered what to do and then stood up. He took off his coat, unbuttoned his jacket and shirt and pulled them down, revealing his left, bare bicep. He showed it to everyone but particularly to Junk. He showed the right one too. Also blank. While he was re-buttoning his shirt Otravinicus asked him something else, which he considered before answering. They spoke and then Otravinicus showed him to the door.

‘Well, that was embarrassing,' the doctor said when he returned.

‘Sorry,' said Junk.

‘He suggested someone else we could ask, though I warn you, it's not in a very good neighbourhood.'

*

It was only a short journey from Otravinicus's apartment, but they could have been in a different world. The street looked like something out of a Dickens novel. It was dark and wet and the light was almost non-existent. They found a bar with a picture of a walrus outside.

‘This is the place,' announced Otravinicus and he entered brazenly. His confidence gave the impression that he had no idea what to expect inside rather than that he was someone who belonged here.

‘Maybe you shouldn't come in,' said Junk to Lasel. It was unclear if she understood, but she frowned and followed Otravinicus.

Junk looked to Garvan to share his concern, but the big man seemed oblivious to anything untoward.

‘Are you coming?' he said, and held the door open for Junk.

Junk and Garvan went inside. The place was dark and loud and hot. The stink of sweat and alcohol was like a yellow cloud in the air. Garvan coughed and waved a hand in front of his face. The music was so loud it reverberated through their entire bodies from head to toe and back again. Junk could feel his teeth vibrating.

He looked around but couldn't see Otravinicus or Lasel. He did see lots of aggressive, sweaty faces glaring back at him. Without even realizing what he was doing, he leaned back a little, making it clear he was with Garvan, who was easily the biggest guy in here. Though Junk had a feeling size meant nothing in this place. There was a tiny man at the bar. He had a Mohican of blue hair and three eyes; all were looking at Junk. As he got closer he saw that the third eye, on the man's cheek, was a tattoo. Despite his diminutive size, Junk felt he was capable of springing off his bar stool, doing something horrible and disfiguring to Junk and being back on his stool before it had even stopped spinning. He looked away quickly and tried very hard to avoid eye contact with anyone – especially people with three eyes.

Lasel stepped out from a nook in the back and gestured to Junk and Garvan to join her. ‘Dusco,' she said, beckoning.
Here
.

The nook contained a round table. Otravinicus was
sitting there with a woman. She was the biggest woman Junk had ever seen. Like Ambeline's killer and Alsk the doorman, she was also of Pallatan descent. She was bald and muscular but strangely feminine nonetheless and her huge slit of a mouth was ringed with red lipstick. Though her shoulders were broad, Olympic-swimmer broad, she had a definite neck that the males of her species seemed to lack. She was wearing a flimsy vest that exposed her powerful and heavily tattooed arms. Junk searched for the mark of the League, but he couldn't see it.

‘Junk,' said Otravinicus, ‘I'd like to introduce you to Cascér.'

Cascér looked Junk up and down and chuckled. ‘Tootu shhnoova,' she said, and made a strange clicking sound with her tongue. Junk had no idea what she had said, but it didn't sound as if she was speaking Jansian.

‘What?' he asked, a little nervously.

‘You don't want to know,' said Otravinicus.

‘What language is that?' Junk asked, his question directed at Cascér. She looked at Otravinicus.

‘Trara ju,' he said in her language.

‘You speak it?' Junk asked.

‘I do,' said Otravinicus. ‘It's called H'rtu. It's a Sitan dialect.'

Junk had to trawl through his memory. He remembered Garvan's map. Sita had been the African continent in his time. It was now divided into four separate land masses.

‘I have explained to Cascér what you are looking
for,' said Otravinicus. ‘She knows all about the League of Sharks.'

Junk couldn't contain his excitement. He looked at Cascér. ‘Well?' he asked expectantly.

One of her great fin hands tapped the table and she said nothing. Otravinicus dug into his coat and pulled out some money. He laid it on the table and Cascér snatched it up like a rattlesnake spotting a mouse. She didn't bother to count it, which made Junk fear her all the more for some reason. Then she turned to a morbidly obese man behind the counter and barked at him in H'rtu. A moment later a bottle of green liquid was brought to the table along with five shot glasses.