"What's the matter,
Grandpa?"
Patrick lifted his head out of his hands and stared down at Holly as she
joined him on the soft blue and white couch. It was part of a matching set in
Helen's house, and just a moment ago Josh MacKenzie had come by with the latest
updates of the case. How could he possibly tell her? But it would soon be in
the news, and Patrick knew what children were like with their iPads - she'd
find out almost immediately. Besides, it turned out she really did have
MacKenzie's tweets on notification alert.
He patted her head, smoothing down her short, jet black hair. She'd dyed
it a few weeks ago, and was counting the years until she could get her lip
pierced. But her wide blue eyes still held the love of Tayburn Zoo in there, he
knew it.
"It's... it's not good news, honey." He stopped himself and
cleared his throat. He'd been a grandfather for over a decade; he could do
this. "Holly, what did Josh MacKenzie say to you in the hall? I couldn't
really hear through the door."
Holly smiled, but immediately wiped it off her face. She swallowed and
said, "Oh, nothing much. Just that I should come give you a hug."
"Alright, good," Patrick muttered, "Well, I guess he
could have given me some time, but I'm glad he didn't tell you anything more.
You need to hear this from me."
But the words caught in his throat, jagging into the walls of his
gullet. The memory of a few moments ago washed over him and he couldn't drag
himself back to the present, no matter the insistent tugging of Holly's gaze.
Helen had let MacKenzie in, which she hadn't seemed overly pleased by.
Patrick was still flushed with gratitude that she'd agreed he could stay with
them while the trial was suspended, but her hurried stride into the kitchen
once she'd alerted Patrick of MacKenzie's arrival told him she still wasn't
happy to have the children around so much drama. Still, she'd brought them each
a cup of tea. And he was about to break her child's heart.
MacKenzie had sat down, hair cut a little but still unkempt. He spoke in
a clipped, neutral Scottish accent with a much quieter, softer tone than
Patrick had heard before. He brought no briefcase, no laptop, only his phone.
But Patrick didn't even need to see the phone. Why would he believe a screen
more than he believed the man who'd been his first and closest - if slightly
more comfortable with the camera than might have been desirable - ally.
"Patrick," he'd begun.
Now, Patrick looked Holly right in her eyes and said, "Holly."
She nodded. Alright, what had MacKenzie done next?
Holding her gaze, Patrick said, "The government weren't doing well
with 'reverting' the animals back to their 'natural' state. The public pressure
was working against them and frankly I don't think they knew what they were
doing."
Holly drew back a little and Patrick raised his own eyebrows at what
he'd just said. Okay, maybe he didn't need to parrot MacKenzie's attitude back
word for word.
He went on, "So they decided to try something else. It was very
experimental, but they thought it might enable them to cut off whatever was
infecting the other animals with that cleverness. You know, the way Aurora
started being able to talk? But... it didn't work."
"What happened to Treego, Grandpa?" Holly whispered.
"He's okay." Patrick forced the words out his mouth. They
tasted cold, felt fuzzy, like he hadn't brushed his teeth. "But he's not
going to be playing his game any more. What they did, it messed with whatever
had been making them clever, and now he's a totally normal frog. Chip's a
totally normal monkey. Aurora's a totally normal panda."
Holly didn't say anything, but her brow screwed up, her jaw clenched, as
she desperately held back tears. He wrapped his arm around her shoulder and
kissed the side of her head, just before the clip-on metal cuff around her ear.
He whispered, "It's okay. I'll miss them too."
After a moment Holly gave way to tears, and the eyeliner he hadn't even
realised she was wearing started to run. They stayed like that for a while,
completely still, but finally Patrick's stomach twisted as he realised that
this suspension of time was going to have to stop.
"Holly," he whispered, "Could you go get Scott?"
Holly wiped her eyes, grimacing as her hands came away grimy with
make-up. "I'm going to get washed up first."
Patrick allowed a tiny hint of a smile in the corner of his mouth.
"Probably a good idea."
She dragged herself off the couch, sliding along with her legs
outstretched until she really had to stand up. Once she was out of the room,
Patrick leaned back and let his back sink into the couch cushions.
The worst part was that he'd lied to her. And he'd lie to Scott to. How
could he possibly tell them the truth? It was true that the government had
tried that procedure, to stop them from being infectious. But how could you
express to a thirteen-year-old and a ten-year-old that the animals were driven
insane as the very essence of their consciousness was fiddled with. How could
you tell them that their friends had had to be put down, and had been dead for
a week?
---
Well this is humiliating,
reflected Treego.
Most of the poking and prodding that had been done to him up to this
point had at least had some grand scientific aim behind it. This was just a
technician who had no idea how to make clothes for his size. And yes, he
thought as he looked down from his little shelf in the underground tunnel, it
probably was a bit much to ask someone who usually made spacesuits for grown
humans to scale their designs down by a size of several hundred. Not to mention
turn it over so he had something that would allow him to walk on all fours.
But couldn't a little bit more care be put into not sticking him with a
needle.
He glanced over at Dexi, who grinned widely at him. The government had
apparently wanted to keep this whole thing as secret as possible, so they'd only
hired one goddam guy to make all of the spacesuits, which meant that literally
everyone he'd ever known at the zoo was staring at him as the needle came for
him.
"Alright, I think I can work with this," the greying,
pot-bellied man said. "Next!"
Treego sprang from the shelf to the ceiling of the strange, tube-shaped
room. The man was probably going to offer a hand to carry him back to the
others, but that was quite enough mocking ammunition for Dexi.
Next up was a penguin, Clover, whom Treego hadn't seen since they were
taken from the zoo. It had turned out that all the other animals were holed up
in another few rooms at the other end of the mansion, not even on one of the
underground floors, which meant that they got much nicer wallpaper. And now,
with this plan to send them all to space that still made him giggle, they'd all
been reunited.
As he glanced up at the much more sombre face of Chip, he remembered the
announcement Marie had made. There were some odd disturbances somewhere out
there. She'd said some science words there but Treego hadn't a clue what she
meant. But it didn't matter, they'd be going with a few select human astronauts
anyway. The animals would be doing most of the work, and really, Treego
figured, there couldn't be that much to do. The humans would just be there to
advise.
Yet for some reason, they'd decided to name a leader of the animals.
They'd said something about needing to ensure order amongst such a diverse
range of species, which didn't even make sense. But worse than that, they'd
chosen Chip, who Treego didn't really think should be leading anything.
This was a weird mission, and Treego was sure it was mostly Marie trying
to find something useful for them to do so the government would permit them to
continue living. But the thought of being up in space, the eyes of billions on
him... that dazzled Treego.
it's definitely meant to be a "wait... they're still alive? Patrick's been lied to? He thinks they're dead? Wait, why are they measuring Treego? They are going to 
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