nobody inside the house? Why don’t they notice what’s happening? Why doesn’t anybody come out and save me? Anyway, where does the rhinoceros come from? Does it belong to us? Have my parents bought it as a pet? Or has it in fact sprung from within my own mind, this being why it knows me so well?
There’s no time to think. It has that look in its eyes again. Oh well, here it comes: the pantomime chase like an old silent comedy. And the point of the horn heading for me but never quite making it because…
The two of us. The garden. The pampas grass and the yucca. The high hedges and fences all around to stop the prying eyes of neighbours. I look at you, for you are the rhinoceros and the rhinoceros is me, looking at me. The two of us stare at each other, knowing everything there is to know about anything, especially about me. And then you charge, or I charge, and really, then, I realise that this is why it’s happening.
The rhinoceros, with its two probing, mineral horns and iron hide, its composite organic/inorganic form, transformed into a monster of hate, and I, we are the same thing. We absolutely deserve to have become each other, in the absence of any onlookers to save us, and to feel the guilt we hold. Together we are me and my nonhuman, electronic, plastic, silicon and copper parts. My nanochips, my digital parasite, my rhinoceros.
And slowly I wake up.
I wasn’t there when he woke up, but Cheri called me at home and, as I wasn’t far away, I said I’d be there in half an hour.
It was a Sunday. The streets of London were even less crowded now that most of the shops had closed down. The pandemic had changed everything.
But I was trying to put aside my cares. I told myself I must see Johnny as a separate person from my need, with his own worries and concerns. If I pushed too hard, I would lose the possibility of his help.
The fact that Johnny had no eyes or mouth, and no voice of his own, only a computer-generated one, made it hard to know what he felt. The only clue was whatever he chose to display on his monitor. When I entered, it was showing a slow-moving animation of abstract images. Relaxing music—was he singing?—was seeping from his speakers and swirling around the room. I took this to mean he was feeling better.
Angie was adjusting his pillow. She smiled at me and left the room. When Johnny spoke, his voice was different from before: higher, softer…but still abrupt and without the preamble of a greeting.
“When can I leave?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s not up to me. Don’t you like it here?”
“It’s OK.” He shrugged. “They gave me this leaflet.” He held it up: a brochure explaining all the facilities at Salvation House. “Shall I read this part to you? ‘All patients, whether attending on a daily or drop-in basis, or residential, must be registered with the Home Office.’” His camera fixed me with its unwavering stare.
“Yes. Well, that’s because they’d close this place down otherwise, wouldn’t they?” I looked at my hand and phone.
“You promised I wouldn’t be registered.”
“As far as I know you haven’t been,” I said tightly. “Do you feel better now?”
He turned away. “A little. But I had a weird dream.”
I sat next to the bed and handed him the carnations I’d brought. He mumbled some thank-you words; perhaps no one had given him flowers before. As he took them, the sleeve of his hospital gown slipped back to reveal more points where bits of a keyboard seemed to protrude from his lower inside arm. I couldn’t help staring—it looked horribly inflamed and bruised and I’d never seen anything like it. The sleeve quickly slipped down again and I looked directly at the small camera embedded in his forehead like a third eye. Beneath it his pixels formed a smiley face. Perhaps that was Johnny’s way of saying thank you for the flowers, but it betrayed nothing of the pain or discomfort I knew he must feel.
“I have a question. Why are you helping me?”
I took a deep breath. “You know how I found you on the Internet and read your blog. There’s your manifesto, isn’t there?”
“‘Declaration of the Rights of Hybrids’, yes.”
“It’s really good. Everybody’s talking about it.”
“Really? I just did it so I wouldn’t feel so alone. I mean, it’s fairly obvious stuff.”
“Cheri likes it. The trustees have got it pinned up in the foyer. They hold debates here. But I don’t know if I can do anything brave like you,” I said.
“When your back’s against the wall and you’ve got nothing to lose it doesn’t seem brave. It seems the only thing to do.”
“You give examples. Things people can do. Like… refusing to co-operate with the Gene Police. Not registering hybrids…”
Johnny was sitting up now, clearly animated. “Hacking medical companies’ files, disabling government databases.”
“Yes. Tell me, have you done that yourself?”
There was a pause while his screen went still. “Maybe I have, maybe I haven’t.” I understood that he didn’t want to incriminate himself. “But you still haven’t told me why you wanted to meet,” he said.
“That’s kind of why. It’s about Maman.”
“Your mother?”
I nodded. “Three months ago she caught Creep, probably from me though she said not.”
His monitor screen stopped swirling so fast and turned to a blue scene. “I’m sorry.”
“Papa thought she could be cared for at home like me, but hadn’t got around to registering her yet. She was still a Grey. But then—”
“She disappeared. One day. Just like that. While out somewhere,” Johnny interrupted, question marks flashing on his screen.
I stared at him. “How did you know?”
“’S common. Sometimes people’re picked up by the GP, other times…”
“…Vigilantes.” There was silence for a moment. “I know. It’s what I’m most afraid of.”
“When did she vanish?” he asked.
“Ten days ago. We’ve tried everything to find her. Oh, Johnny, I’m getting so desperate. I miss her so much. You must know how I feel…”
“I don’t think my situation’s quite the same as yours,” he intoned.
“What do you mean?”
“I came home from school one day and my parents weren’t there,” he said in a low voice.
“Just like that?”
“Uh-huh.”
