Page 17 of Lagoon

Dr. Greyson winced, as if he thought this might be true. He turned on his heel and walked out of the building.

Riley went after him.

Outside, the muggy air clung to her like a second skin.

Dr. Greyson fumed, walking up the hill toward the lab.

Riley hurried to catch up with him.

“Dr. Stine,” he said, as if he hadn’t realized she’d come after him.

“Maybe you should call me Riley,” she said.

He glanced at her, giving her a wry smile. “All right. Call me Jonathan.”

“Sure,” she said. “Is it always like this with Harris?”

“Well, usually they stick to their business and we stick to ours,” he said. “But no, we’ve never gotten along exactly.”

“And Nancy?”

“Well, no one likes Nancy,” he muttered. “That doesn’t mean I want Bub to do… whatever he’s done to her. I just can’t make it make sense. He’s never behaved this way before.”

“I had a thought,” said Riley.

“Oh? But you just got here.”

“Well, I suppose I’d need to know more,” said Riley. “I heard… there was violence before?”

“It was Bub’s brother, never Bub.”

“Is it true that only you and Dr. White ever went up there to see him?”

“Sure,” said Jonathan. “It seemed as if we should be careful about who we exposed him to. We didn’t want to spook him. I can’t believe he killed Nick.” His lower lip trembled and he bit down on it to stop that from happening. “I feel betrayed, how stupid is that? As if Bub and I were friends. We were not. But I think I thought we were.”

She nodded. “I get that.”

He turned to her. “You do?”

“With chimps, it’s… sometimes, you get that moment, where it slaps you across the face, that they’re different than us. There’s a reason we’re the species who evolved to accomplish what we’ve accomplished. We’re not superior, understand, I’m not saying that, but we have something they don’t have, that’s all. There wouldn’t be such a gap between us and them if we didn’t.”

He bowed his head. “Right,” he breathed.

“But… about my thought?”

“Oh, yes, sorry.” He swerved while walking. They were coming up on the lab. He headed for the door. “What was it?”

“Was it only men who went to see him, then?”

Jonathan stopped short. He turned to look at her, eyebrows raised. “My God, I’m a fucking idiot.”

“So, then I’m right?” she said. “What did he… with his needle things? In my abdomen?”

“Oh, no, for heaven’s sake, Dr. Stine, we can’t mate with them. We’re not even remotely compatible.” He was walking again, quicker, head down, like a bull rushing the door.

“You know this, how?”

“I dissected the other one, of course. They have internal fertilization.”

---