Chapter 28
The supervisor noticed Pieter's startled look and stepped straight up to him. He was breathing heavily, his round face was swollen in an unhealthy red-purple hue. As he was getting closer, Pieter realised how big the man really was. He bent forward making Pieter to stare at his irregular rosaceous nose. He had small, pale blue eyes that seemed to swim in a yellow watery fluid. The man looked straight into his face. A penetrating stale smell of alcohol surrounded him, making Pieter wonder whether he had a bad aftershave or a bad distillery.
“You know that man?” he asked with a heavy South African accent.
“It is Jonathan Stratford. US Navy officer who was located at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.”
“And who might you be?”
“Pieter Van Dyck. Arrived yesterday and I am here on a tour with those people over there.” He pointed at Jane, Iveta and Francesca who kept together, shocked by the view of the mutilated dead body. Jane had also recognised the body of Jonathan.
“Ah Francesca. Sorry, I had not yet noticed you.”
Without giving Pieter another look he joined her. “Not a pleasant day to show tourists around. Have you seen anything?”
Francesca recounted that, as they drove by, they had notice the herd running away all of a sudden as if they were frightened by something. And basically that was it.
Pieter had walked to the fence where on the other side some of the large animals had gathered. The herd had calmed down again and the animals started to return to the meadows. People were still debating in small groups what happened. He joined one of those small groups where a keeper, heavily gesturing, was giving an explanation in the local language.
“What kind of animals are these?” Pieter asked.
“What you see over there is a Bos Primigenius. Better known as the aurochs or urus. We were able to bring together the genetic material of the urus with that of our domesticated species. The result is a colossal yet very friendly animal. The shoulder height of the cows is minimum two meters. Some of the larger bulls reach a shoulder height of over three meters. The warm climate and selected food contribute to their development. This all results in a meat quality that is superior to the finest Argentinean or Irish steaks. And I am not even talking about the production of high quality milk.”
The man certainly loved his job.
“So the chances that they would attack someone is non existent?”
“Well, as good as. Of course they are animals with a highly developed instinct. But the only thing that scares them is when they see their natural predators. And we used to have some trouble with that.”
“I thought that the area was secured by some sophisticated system?”
“That is correct. But it has to function properly. Well, we had quite some teething problems with the system. The OR technology was certainly not flawless, especially at night there have been issues. I told them numerous times that the software was not ready for release, but no, the big shots wanted to implement it without listening to me.”
“OR technology?”
“Object Recognition. Do you see those little stakes at the edge of the meadow? Those are laser sensors. They continuously scan the field and compare their results with a database of forms and temperatures. For instance a lion, a tiger or a hyena. When such a form gets recognized an alarm is triggered and security robots are activated from their sheds. The robots are rather large, very mobile, devices producing a high pitched sound to chase away the attackers. With the laser stakes we know the exact place and direction of the rogue animals so the robots are perfectly controlled and can even be ordered to pursue the predators till they run away to a safe distance.”
“And because the system is not hundred percent reliable, it is quite possible that a lion or another animal has scared the herd,” Pieter concluded
But the man shook his head and corrected him: "well, actually that would surprise me a lot. At this time of the year most of the predators are located at the large wallows where there is plenty and a variety of food. Those wallows are twenty, thirty kilometres away from here. The exceptional animals that are still hanging around here are already conditioned, so hard to imagine that they will try again. Maybe a sick or cast-away older beast that got lost here, that could be a possibility.”
“Is the system keeping track of all the data?”
“Of course, what do you think. We, engineers are high on data. Yes, everything gets logged in order for the system to learn. Artificial intelligence. Only when there are new objects that it cannot recognize than we need to assist by programming manually.”
“How does the system react on human beings?”
“Not. It is programmed in such a way that it does not react on human forms. It gets registered when someone walks in the meadows but there will be no robots activated. It better not trigger them, it's not fun to be chased by such a machine. And they are fast, I can tell you.”
“Is there a way that I can look into those log files?”
The helpful man was about to answer when the supervisor appeared. “Don't you have work to do?” he barked unfriendly. With a stammering “yes, of course, much to do,” he disappeared in one of the huge stables.
“It is not up to you to nose around here. We alerted the official instances and they will investigate. You must go back with Francesca to the hotel.”
Pieter understood that a discussion was not going to be appreciated and obediently got into the car where Iveta and Jane were looking blank from the back seat. Francesca was talking in fast Italian on her phone.
He turned to Jane and Iveta: “how are you doing? I am sorry that you had to see this. It was not a pretty sight.”
Francesca ended her call so Pieter could ask her: “who is that unfriendly urus?”
“He is Kik Von Wielligh.” She had trouble with the pronunciation. “He was one of the marshals in the Kruger Park till he had to escape South Africa. Something to do with the rather unorthodox treatment of his people. But he knows the region better than anyone else, speaks the local dialects and knows the tribal chiefs and their ancestors better than they do. The rumour goes he was a mercenary in Somalia for a period of time and that is why he knows this place so well. Not the most pleasant person, but perfect for the job and the circumstances.”
“Can we go back to the spot where we saw the herd getting into a stampede?”
Francesca hesitated but agreed: “we need to take the same route back anyways. It will be an estimate. I really did not check our position when the incident happened.”
They all looked tensely out of the window hoping to recognize some orientation point when Pieter showed a small indent alongside the road. “There it was. I remember that I was thinking why on earth they had built a hard shoulder.”
Francesca stopped the car and Pieter quickly crossed the road. The road was separated from the meadow by a wide ditch. From the still dark water Pieter suspected that the ditch was rather deep. He retreated some steps to make a running jump. He just did not make it and plunged with both legs in the water. Embarrassed he crawled up the muddy, steep bank, hoping that Jane had not been looking too attentively. With sopping shoes he walked on the soft dark-green grass in the direction from where he estimated the herd started to run.”
Some of the large animals curiously approached him. They kept at a safe distance and observed their visitor with large spherical eyes. One of them was somewhat braver than the others and she pushed her flat wet nose against his shoulder. He had difficulty to keep his balance although the animal certainly had no hostile intentions. Pieter clapped his hands and the animal jumped away. Probably Pieter was more scared than the massive cow that left a slimy moist spot on his shirt. “A bit touchy, missy?" he shouted at the animal while he tried to smear off the slime with one finger. He started to walk in circles and after a while he had found the place where the animals had been frightened by something or someone. It was the beginning of a muddy spur through the field with trodden rumpled gr
ass. A bit further he saw the footsteps where they had found Jonathan. He was horrified by the sound of the hundreds of flies nervously circling around a puddle of clotted blood mixed with mud and excreta. Pieter stooped to take a closer look, holding his hand in front of his mouth to shield off the unbearable stench. He took his mobile phone and made some pictures of the ground and the surrounding area.
He heard a noise that reminded him of an approaching electrical golf cart. To his surprise, and although he had never seen one, he recognised the thing that was speeding into his direction as one of the security robots. Pieter straightened himself, not knowing exactly what to do. When the robot was about to hit him, and Pieter was ready to jump aside and start to run, the machine stopped abruptly. It drove backwards to disappear at the edge of the meadow. Pieter could see that it returned to a discretely sub terrain mini-garage.
At that moment two four wheel drives stopped next to Francesca's car.
Three in military uniform dressed and armed men jumped easily over the ditch and stepped resolutely towards Pieter. “Sir, you are trespassing a restricted area. Please follow us back.”
Pieter thought that the young man addressing him had seen a bit too many Hollywood war movies, but on the other hand his tone did not sound like an invitation for an open debate. Meekly he followed the men. Meanwhile a small foot plank had been laid over the ditch so that Pieter was spared the shame of taking a second bath.
He walked, still flanked by the soldiers, to Francesca who was heftily gesticulating with what apparently was their superior officer. Even from a distance he could notice that she threw in all her Italian charm to convince the man that she tried everything to stop Pieter.
“I hope you understand that you have entered a crime scene. Maybe you have destroyed important clues or made evidence useless,” the officer snarled at Pieter. He shrugged his shoulders: “I really believe that these thousand kilo ur-animals have destroyed more traces than I with my eighty kilos.”
“That is completely beside the point. You must return immediately to the hotel. The border checkpoint has been alerted and they need to inform me if you are not crossing there within fifteen minutes. That's the time you need and get to return.”
He addressed Francesca: “and you should know better to let someone nose around here.”
Without saying a word, but with a haughty sway of her long black hair, she got into the car.
Pieter broke the silence: “I am sorry that I brought you all into this. I should not have jumped over that ditch.”
Francesca answered: “and I should not have stopped but instead taken you immediately home. It is as much my mistake.”
Jane exclaimed in disbelief: “it is not about whose mistake it is or not. You could have been killed Pieter. Or are you all of a sudden a farmer? What were you thinking of? Less than an hour ago a man got trampled in a stampede and mister I-will-quickly-investigate-it is walking as cool as he pleases between the same herds. Are you completely out of your mind? I really don't feel to become a widow even before I get married.”
Francesca smiled: “oh, how nice. I did not know that the two of you knew each other that well. So you are getting married? When? As you can imagine we don't have that many marriages here, yet. And don't forget the guide.” She laughed with her own joke. “Remind me that I need to update your file now that both of you will be living in the house. Strange that nobody has told me that. Ah well, probably a bug in the system.”
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