by Ely, Jo;
Antek pulls a slightly torn document out of his left, front pocket. Zorry believes that the Egg Boy is bringing her an official death notice, but who for? The document is colour coded pink, meaning that it’s for a child. She stumbles, feels rather than sees the Egg Boy moving forward fast to catch her. It is her elbow not her head which breaks her fall on the step.
When Zorry looks up she sees Zettie, standing over her. Waiting.
The child looks unreal. Shattered. Blank amazed expression. Soft button eyes.
Zorry rises, “Wake. Wake up Zettie.” Zorry waves her hand in front of Zettie’s eyes. Pulls the child into her arms. Zettie blinks. There’s a small sign of life, a flash of recognition, and then it’s gone. A kind of stiffness passes over her. The child gently resists being held.
“You’re cold.” Zorry takes off her scarf to warm her. The child looks away. Zorry rubs Zettie’s cool arms. “Zettie?” She says the child’s name. Soft as she can. Says it twice.
Zettie had gotten all the way to the edge of the killing forest then circled back again to run from the fence and then from Jengi. To find her mamma. Jengi had caught Zettie in the copse with only moments to spare, hid them both in the leaves at the edge, pinned his elbow in Zettie’s back, hand over her mouth, stopped her going to her mother just in time. Hardened as he was, even Jengi had to close his eyes when they dragged Mamma Ezray out, bloodied, by her feet, just seconds later, that sickening bump, bump and the soft thud of her skull hitting stone. Jengi couldn’t pin Zettie and cover both her eyes and her mouth at the same time, not without three hands, three arms.
Only the child saw her mother dragged down the two hard back steps.
Mamma Ezray was hauled, feet first, toward the van with the crown for a headboard, which the red-headed Egg Boy had parked in the stoney country lane just beyond the cottage. Only the child saw them drag her mother’s body over every stone, cracked rock, earth ruck and puddle in the Sinta’s long front yard. Only the child saw what she imagined were small signs of life in Mamma Ezray’s left hand, reaching out and sliding fingers through the yolk of a crushed hen egg, or Mamma Ezray’s head turned, as though looking blindly out toward the quickening in the copse.
Only the child saw the end.
Zorry finds that she can’t look at Zettie now and she can’t not look.
“Zettie.”
Zorry wraps her arms tighter around Zettie. The child is stiff for a little while longer, but then becomes limp, unresisting. This seems to be worse.
Zorry has forgotten about Antek. When she looks up, startles softly. Antek is now standing to one side of the Sinta cottage. He steps back, avoids her gaze, sliding into the green shadow that runs beside the house. She listens to the sound of Antek’s footsteps, slipping quietly around to the front of the house and away.
Zettie gazes up at Zorry with a blank, amazed expression.
“Was the Egg Boy bad to you, Zettie?”
The child looks at Zorry in surprise.
“He ain’t a Egg Boy, he is a Antek. He breaked the window.” She says in her small voice. “Jengi gived him a paper. For me.”
“A paper? What paper?”
Zorry looks down. There is a certificate of tameness poking out from Zettie’s apron front. A little of Antek’s blood is on one corner of it and it’s been signed by the general’s wife with her very own hand.
Zorry stares at the certificate for a long time. “You are safe. You are safe now, Zettie.” And then, looking up, “It seems you have … You have a lot of friends, Zettie. Important friends. Do you know what that means?”
Zorry looks up toward the path which Antek just took.
“No.” Zettie says.
“No more do I.”
Dust rising, leaves, as the wind gets up. And now Zettie is clinging to her older sister. Zorry doesn’t take her into the cottage, she doesn’t move from the spot.
No-one comes home, not yet. Not Zorry’s father, not Zorry’s aunt in the next village. Though you’d expect them to have heard by now, the Sinta message systems are hidden and effective and the Sinta are expert at reading the signs and quiet codes in the slightest rearrangement of their surroundings, so that a child in trouble can be identified, located and swooped up quickly. There are rules in place for such times which have taken a hundred years to configure and cowardice amongst the Sinta is unusual, especially when it comes to children in danger. And yet … no-one comes for them.
Zorry guesses it was the Egg Man’s scream that did it. We are untouchables now.
Zorry tries to think, but again her thoughts rattle, blur, and move too fast for her to catch them. The sense of things coming undone. She looks down at the child in her arms. The night-freeze is coming, and they’ve no shelter but … Goose bumps are appearing on the child’s arms and legs. They must go back into the house. Where else?
Now Zorry drags Zettie into the kitchen, the child resists this at first and then seems to give up. Zorry holds her tighter now, to try to stop her shaking. The child still feels cold in her arms. The lights in the house are out. The fire is not yet lit. Zorry gets up to light it, transferring the child to her hip and going at the fire now, clumsily one-armed, with the poker. She gets a small fire going. It’s mostly smoke.
Through the kitchen doorway Zorry can still see the curves and angles of things tilted in the wrong way, menacing upside-down shapes of old, familiar items. Everything’s changed. There’s a burning feeling in her throat, Zettie coughs and now they watch the flames lick upward. A crack and snap like gunshot, causes Zettie to startle. The hewn branches in the log-fire curl and turn quickly to ash. Zettie watches the fire waver and hiss. Wide eyes.
Zorry hears her name called twice. And then Father’s nervous voice carries from the front door of the cottage. At first he doesn’t come into the house. Now there is the sound of her aunt, rattling through the house, kicking at piles of rags and opening cupboard doors. “Children?” And now Father seems to find the courage to follow Aunt in.
Zorry listens to his footsteps getting louder, hesitating. And then coming closer again. Zorry can’t raise her heart high enough to answer, but Aunt quickly finds the two girls by the kitchen fire. She breathes out heavily. She puts her arms around them. And then Father’s voice again.
It briefly occurs to Zorry that Father might report her presence here, which could be a problem as she is no longer certified tame, as of tonight. Zorry is ashamed at once of mistrusting Father. She tries to put the thought away. Steels herself. And then looking down at Zettie.
“That’s your father,” Zorry says, trying to break through the child’s emptiness. Zettie nods robotically. It’s hard to tell if she hears the words or not. It is like someone came and sucked life out of her, Zorry thinks. Zettie presses her face into Zorry’s neck.
“She’s shaking,” Aunt says. And then bending to peer closer. Lifting up Zettie’s matted lock of russet coloured hair, examining her small face underneath. “She’s in shock!” Aunt says loudly. “The child’s in shock.” These words seem to wake something in the children’s aunt. She checks Zettie over, wraps her with every shawl she herself is wearing. And then, gently scooping her out of Zorry’s arms, holds onto her tightly. “We have to get her warm.”
In a bit, Father tries to pull her clumsily out of Aunt’s arms, but the child clings resolutely to her aunt. In a bit Father stops trying. “We need to get her some sugar. Fruit.” Aunt says. And Father shambles outside toward the pear tree in the front yard. To see what the Egg Men have left them, knowing in advance that it will be nothing. Nothing.
“Zettie,” Aunt says. And then she seems to remember something. Rustles in her basket. “Keep her warm,” she says brusquely, plonking the child back into Zorry’s lap. “There now, there.” She pulls Zorry’s shawl off her roughly and then re-wrapping it around both Zorry and the child.
“Take off your coat, Man,” she barks at her brother when he reappears at the front door. Now he ignores her, stumbling a little over the door jamb.
Zettie holds Aunt’s oat biscuit in her mouth as though she’s forgotten how to chew or swallow. And then in a bit she seems to remember. A little of her colour returns.
Father seems decisive suddenly. Yanks the child out of her coverings by one arm. Sits down and pulls her on to his lap. “Your father is here now.” He says. Squaring his jaw. “Here to take a hold of this … madhouse.” Brief, cold glance at Zorry, as if she did this. All this. And now the infant is shuddering uncontrollably. Aunt rushes forwards to wrap the child again, but Father raises his right arm against her, warningly. Now he turns his back toward both women, as though to defend himself.
“At least let her under your coat, Man. Can’t you see she’s frozen? The child’s in shock.” And now the whole of Zettie’s upper body is hidden by the flap at the side of her father’s jacket, the fabric of which is torn open at the back now and moves like a small, boneless wing, covering the child only just, but covering her. “She’s alright,” Aunt breathes out. And then turning to examine Zorry briefly.
“She’s alive. Zettie is alive. That’s the main thing.”
“She’s alive,” Zorry repeats her aunt’s words. And then looking at Zettie’s small blue-tinged, bare feet. As though she sees them for the first time in her life.
“It’s a miracle.” Aunt sniffs. “And no thanks to your mother. Damned radical. I told her. Bringing trouble to a house with children in it.” Aunt purses her lips. And then turning back to Zorry.
“Are you alright, Zorry?”
A wave of exhaustion washes over Zorry. She can’t say what she feels just now. Can’t even feel it. And again that feeling of being untuned, of drifting six feet over her head.
The morning after’s cold and bleak and the sky is thick and grey and heavy, rain clouds gathering. Zorry, waking just a little, watching the low light filtering in, lets herself understand it for the first time.
She’s gone.
Mamma Ezray is gone and now no place is safe. Or ever will be again.
REPORT 4: PLANNING
“IS THAT YOU, JENGI?”
“Yes.” Long pause. “What do you want?”
“What do I want?” Clears throat. “Well, since you mention it, Jengi … I need the name of the last Seed.”
“And why is that exactly, Sir?”
“Jengi. No games. Give me the name. Half of Bavarnica has a Z in their name. I know it wasn’t Mamma Zeina. Or Mamma Ezray. I know that now.”
Silence.
“Jengi?”
“I don’t report to you anymore.”
“Jengi!” Sharply. There’s another silence. And then, in a different voice, just as though another person entirely were speaking, “Jengi, how do you expect me, us, to help your revolution, if you won’t file reports.”
“Well, I’ll be straight with you, Sir.” He stops, takes a breath. “I haven’t seen enough evidence that you are the helping kind.”
“Jengi!” The voice is loud now, too loud. Jengi holds his hand over the receiver and then gazing down at the roots of the baobab.
“What is it you want? What exactly are you cooking here, Sir?”
“Forget that. Are you going to stick to our plan, Jengi?”
“I may stick to a plan.” Jengi says. Gently switching the receiver to Off. Replacing the excavated patch in the tree with the jigsaw piece of tree bark. He looks up. He’s thinking.
“Jengi!” Muffled voice from inside the baobab.
Soft clicking sounds as the line dies slowly. Buzzing. Now Jengi hears two voices. Jengi can only just make out their words.
“What’s Jengi doing?”
Sigh. “Jengi is negotiating.”
THE FORGETTING MEDICINE
NEXT MORNING THE EGG Boys come with clipboards instead of guns. The red headed Egg Boy takes off his helmet. Runs his right hand through his hair.
“Extra doses of the memory erasures today.” He stops talking, gazes around him. Takes in the room. And then a small, weak smile, “For those Sinta feeling delicate this morning.” He taps his clipboard, “Shop’s orders. Special offer.”
The red-headed Egg Boy points at Zettie with his pen. “Even her.” He says. “We can give her the medicine a little younger than is strictly good for her brain.”
“No.” Says Zorry quickly.
“Yes,” says Zorry’s father. “We’ll take it.” Turns slowly toward Zorry, “After all, I am her sole remaining parent.”
“It’s true.” The red-headed Egg Boy checks his clipboard. “Yes, it’s your choice, Sir.” He makes a faux-bow to the child’s father, which Zorry finds humiliating on her father’s behalf.
“No,” she says again. “You have to …”
“I have to what?” The red-headed Egg Boy gazes ironically at Zorry.
“We’ll take it.” Father glares at Zorry. Looks away.
Now Zettie looks from her father to her sister, and then back at her aunt. Quick checking gestures. Aunt pauses. She nods.
Zorry’s father takes his medicine mechanically. Zorry watches him swallow, a small shudder and then it’s gone. She notes he looks calm, changed. He’ll have forgotten Mamma Ezray by nightfall.
Zorry turns toward Zettie. She examines the child.
Zettie has developed a tremor in her right hand, since last night. An eye tic. There are large dark circles under her wide eyes, from lack of sleep.
“Will the medicine let her forget?” It’s Zorry’s aunt who asks the question, looking from her brother to her eldest niece.
Father impatiently pushes his own medicine box towards Zettie. “Wait!” The Egg Boy says, just a little too quickly. Checks behind him. “This one’s for her.”
Now he taps his clipboard again. Hands the forgetting medicine to the child’s aunt. “Well?” He says. And now Aunt realises that he’s waiting for the child to take it in front of him.
Father looks up, he seems to note his sister’s hesitation. He yanks the child’s arm abruptly, dragging her away from her aunt.
“Well after all, he is the child’s father.” The red-headed Egg Boy says, and bowing a little again toward Father.
Zettie is stiff in her father’s arms, she tries to push away, and now Zorry’s holding out her arms to take her. “This is my child,” Father repeats, as though it’s himself he’s trying to convince.
Now Father takes the medicine capsule with Zettie’s name on it, expertly flicks it open and, pinching the child’s mouth open at the cheeks, squeezes the medicine down her throat. Double dose.
Zettie can’t help but swallow the medicine. She looks panicked and her eyes become large. Her pupils expanding softly until they consume the coloured iris. Just a moment later and Zettie is quiet, relaxed. Her limbs seem to lose their stiffness slowly, the soft shuddering goes and her eyelid tremor with it. She gets up and starts to move around the room. “It’s like she’s waking up from a bad dream.” Aunt says, amazed. The child stretches and yawns. The Egg Boy ticks Zettie’s name off his long list of names.
Zorry refuses to take the government meds in front of the Egg Boy, claiming she will take it later, and the Egg Boy dutifully notes this down. Places her sack of capsules on the table. And then the warning, which the Egg Boy appears to be reading off his clipboard.
“If you refuse five erasures Zorry, then you will be greened and after that the general himself will wash his hands of you.”
He looks up from his clipboard, points at the blood stained boot-print at the kitchen back door. “Well. You know what happens next Zorry.” He looks at her. Shrugs. And then more softly, “Ain’t your sister been through enough?”
It’s as though something takes a hold of her throat, “So you are Batch Forty Seven.” Zorry says, quite recklessly, as far as her aunt’s concerned. “And … This is your mission. Is it, Egg Boy? You’re going to kill us with what you write on your clipboard. Kill us with red ink?”
There is a long, strange silence in the room.
Zorry is eye to eye with the Egg Boy. “Yes.” The Egg Boy says. �
��This is my mission, Zorry. What’s yours?”
Something seems to pass between them.
Zorry listens to the gentle ticking sounds of the Egg Boy’s feet walking away. She gets up from her squatting position and walks over to the window. Gazes out through the gaps in the blind. The red-headed Egg Boy pauses at the gate. And turning back, looking in the direction of the kitchen window. As though he senses her there. He pulls his head protection back on. Zorry quickly ducks beneath the kitchen sink.
In a bit, Zettie gets down from her aunt’s knee. Pads over the room toward her sister. Zorry tries to read the child and, for the first time, finds that she can’t.
“I have to go, Zettie. Soon. It’s important. Will you remember … Know it’s me? I mean, when I come back?”
Zettie takes out her thumb.
“Here. Have this, Zettie.” Zorry pulls off both her twine rings roughly. Places them, one by one, onto Zettie’s thumb, where they will not be so loose. Aunt, looking down at the child’s small hand, sighs, “Zorry. Don’t do something stupid now. It’s all I ask.”
Zettie’s eyes glitter.
THE REBOOT
“SHE’S TRYING TO BURN the chair.” Zorry’s father says.
“Who is? What chair?”
“The chair with the patchwork cushions. Zettie put the whole thing in the fireplace.”
Zorry scratches her head. Gazes into the flames. And then turning toward Zettie.
“Yes, it was the … The spare chair.” Father says. Bangs his ear. Bangs it twice. And then a soft, amazed expression. He seems to tune out.
Zettie seems mesmerised by the fire. The heat rises and the fire spits out glowing ashes, landing one by one around her outstretched feet. She draws her legs up. Hugs her small knees and rests her chin there. Soft, wide eyes.
Flames slowly lick along the wooden limbs of Mamma Ezray’s chair. There are sparks along the edges of Mamma Ezray’s slow-patched cushions. Small fires in the seams.
