Rei seemed content to sit silently away from the vehicles and seemed so still that Mathew wondered if she was meditating. He took his sleeping bag to the far side of the camp, and lay on top of it, lost in his thoughts of the day. Occasionally he’d activate the c-pac that Deon had lent him and it would beep and blink, but that was not something that he felt inclined to deal with tonight. Deon kept updating it with notes to himself, input into the paired machine and Mathew had stopped checking these each time they appeared; most made no sense anyway, and Deon had probably forgotten that the two devices were still linked. He’d listen to them tomorrow in the truck, it would make a good distraction.
As he lay on his sleeping bag Mathew wondered when he’d last slept out in the open, and came to the conclusion that he probably hadn’t ever done this before in his life. The night was warm and cloudless and stars hung in the sky in swirls of abstract design. The stars were ancient and their light old and frozen, Clive, his mother’s brother had told him that as a child. And that meant that if you looked at a star you were looking back in time.
“The light takes centuries to reach us,” Clive had said, pointing out the constellations to the nine-year-old Mathew, who sat in awe at the knowledge that poured from his uncle’s mouth. “When you see a star, think of the things that have happened in the past while the light’s been travelling to Earth. When the light left some of them stars there weren’t no dinosaurs, or even people. P’raps not even an Earth. What do think of that then Matty?”
“Wow!” he replied, unable to think of anything more suitable.
“And after we are all gone them stars will still be shining for people to see for years to come. For centuries to come, even.”
Mathew sat on the grass to edge of the makeshift camp and pulled the fabric of the sleeping bag around him, feeling the cold that seemed to radiate from deep within him, and stared into the night sky. There were so many things he didn’t know. Clive must have died long ago, but he had no idea when, and it occurred to him that he probably would never know. He hadn’t spoken to him much after Mathew’s mother had died when he was 14 and as he lay in a field somewhere in the Berkshire, sometime in the twenty-first century he wished that he’d made more of an effort. He’d spent long enough talking to his father, and Clive was a much nicer man than he was.
He heard the noise of someone approaching and he looked up to see Rei walking towards him.
“May I sit with you?” she said. Mathew gestured that he had no objection and Rei lay down alongside him under the sky.
“Strange how things turn out,” Mathew said softly, not really wanting the rest of the camp to hear, although he was unsure why not.
“Thinking too hard?” Rei looked across and sat up next to Mathew.
“Maybe. Just thinking that I don’t know if I’ve slept out like this before.”
“I wouldn’t make a habit of it in this country.”
Mathew laughed. “No maybe not. Although the sleeping bags are better than they used to be.”
“Is that what you called them? It’s a rather quaint descriptive term.”
“What’s it like where you’re from?”
“Have you never been to Japan?”
“I’ve only been abroad four times. France with the school, Turkey just before mum died, a week in Greece in 1984 and a fortnight in Ibiza a couple of years ago…except it’s not a couple is it?”
Rei smiled at him and touched his hand lightly. “You should think of your past as a foreign country. We do things differently here.”
“That sounds familiar,” he said.
“All I mean is that you must think of this like travelling. It all looks different to you, I imagine, but beneath the surface the fundamental aspects of life are still the same. Nothing really changes.” They sat in silence for several minutes before Mathew spoke again:
“There’s been another bomb in London.”
“Yes, I heard about it. It’s very bad there.”
“I was talking to Phil about it. He seems ok, but when I was speaking to him earlier, before the first bomb went off, the one near to us, we had a bit of an argument. I don’t think he really likes me. I reckon he thinks I’ve done what I have for all the wrong reasons.”
“Philip doesn’t really like anyone, especially himself. He likes to intimidate people by his appearance – the fact that he looks like a thug should not affect how you talk to him. He has problems and has not addressed them. I don’t know what his problem is, but I know he needs to look into himself more. He deals with it by concentrating on other people and, well basically by hating everyone and being cynical about everything he encounters. It is not just you. But he has a reason for being like that, and he has a purpose; he just needs to understand it. Like all of us do.”
“Do you think everyone has a purpose then?”
“Yes. We all exist for a reason, we all have a role to play in life. That’s how I see it. You might think at this moment that you’ve made a dreadful decision about your life, but I’m sure there’s a reason for it, and you just have to discover that. There really aren’t any such things as coincidences. What you do, the choices you make, the people you meet, there’s a reason for all of it. Do you believe that?”
“I don’t know. Never really thought of it before.” Mathew thought for a moment and went on: “Are you saying that you think all of our lives are sort of worked out before, like in a play?”
“No, not exactly. You have to have choices otherwise you have predestination, and that means that whatever action you take is the right thing to do because it was preordained. That way of thinking is very dangerous and brought much of Europe into war. What I am saying is that you have the choice to do something or to do nothing, but there’s a reasoning, a guiding force behind it all.”
“God?”
“If you like, but it wasn’t what I meant. Most people these days do not believe in a god of any sort. But what I mean is a guiding force within you. You can do what you like, but you still know what’s right and wrong. If you choose not to follow your conscience, then you have to answer to yourself one day.”
“Is that why you’re here? Phil reckons you could have made a mint if you’d used your skills in Japan.”
“‘Made a mint.’ What a charming expression. Yes, I suppose I could have stayed at home and made money. But I wanted to achieve something first. I wanted to work in a place, like England, where I could feel useful and valued. And maybe later when I return home I can be successful, financially that is, but that is not what I want right now. For now I am achieving what I want to do. I’ve helped people here, and now we’re doing something that is the right thing to do. And so is Philip, although he will tell you that he is working on a story that will get him fame and recognition, that is just his way of dealing with the fact that he is doing something good for no other reason than it is the correct thing for him to do.”
“You make it sound so easy. Why’s there so much shit going on all the time if everyone’s doing the right thing?”
“Well they are not, obviously. Some people are doing what they do for greed, or because of negative emotions: lust, fear, hate, jealousy and such forth. While others are just misguided. Think of the bombings that have happened recently. Those people are setting explosives and killing themselves because they truly believe that they are doing God’s work. This is the influence people have on each other. Others influence those people with their negative emotions. Perhaps because they are scared. Everyone you meet has a message for you of some kind. But it is important to understand that message. Take Deon. He believes that he keeps a box with an ancient relic in it, and he believes that this relic has an answer, a message, for him. He is convinced that there is a message from an earlier time that is waiting for him, and that this box contains it. But he has been spending the last few days talking to a person from the last century, and not listening to their message. There may be a relic in the box. There may not be. We are all keepers of the past. But you
must recognise that your past shapes your present and your future. In a way, you are a relic from another time.”
“Thanks. None taken!”
Rei ignored the sarcasm. “But who is the keeper, the person responsible for you? Deon? Philip? Me? Or perhaps just yourself. Receiving a message is easy. Understanding it is harder. One must understand the influence of yourself on others, and others on yourself. If someone tries to influence you with their bigotry, then you should see the errors of being a bigot, but if instead you follow that lead, then you are heading down the road of nihilism. The attempted genocides of the twentieth century show that very clearly. It’s strange actually that towards the end of the twentieth century half of the world was poisoning itself through over-exploitation of mineral and fossil resources, while the other half were too busy killing each other in the name of their respective religions to notice.”
“And now it’s the other way round,” Mathew noted.
“Yes, maybe it is. Perspectives change, but not human nature. Perhaps that is what your message to me is.”
“Are you religious then?”
“Not really. Why do you ask?”
“Well, the only people I’ve heard talk like that have been people like, well like Deon.”
“I have a set of beliefs and ideals, but I’m not really religious. Very few people today are,” Rei explained. “Deon and people like him are the exception. He had a rough childhood from the things he has said and I think he takes some comfort from his God, but he’s easily influenced. I really don’t understand all that business he was involved with before the massacre. But like many people today he has trouble reconciling what he believes in with the world around him. I think that leads him to be confused and keeps him away from other people. If he just lets go a little and, how did they phrase it in the twentieth century? ‘Lightened up.’ If he did that he’d better understand himself. He’s looking for answers to his life, but he’s waiting for some reason to his existence to leap in front of him and show him why he is here. He needs to look at himself more and find his own reason for being. Deon sees God in every burning bush, but he fails to notice the forest fire.”
They sat in silence for several more minutes. Not talking, just letting their thoughts meander through their minds in the warm late night. The moon cast some light, and in the distance was the red-orange glow of a city, quietly half-asleep. No owls, foxes or other nocturnal beasts made themselves known to the pair as they sat in an open field in the far side of the twenty first century.
“What will happen?” asked Mathew eventually.
Rei looked across and her pale gaze made Mathew feel less anxious before she even spoke.
“We’ll find your daughter, piece together what has happened to your family and then get you out of the country as we have arranged. You have to be prepared that she may not want to come. You have been gone a long time. You may be able to return to England one day, but we need to get you to a safe place first. Once we are out of England I can arrange transport to Japan. You should be there within two weeks.”
“What if something happens? What if Deon doesn’t join us.”
“Then we will make another plan. Whatever will happen will happen. But there is no reason that we should fail. Now, try and get some sleep.” Rei picked herself off the ground and started to walk away.
“By the way,” he called after her.
“Yes,” she said turning and smiling.
“What message do you have for me?”
“I don’t know, only you can answer that.” Then she added with a laugh: “Maybe my message to you is not to antagonise Philip too much before he kills you.”
Mathew lay back and fastened the sleeping bag around him. It was warm and comfortable, despite the thinness of the material. He had been through hell and was still alive, he told himself, and Rei was right, what could go wrong? Sleep made him think of death now, although it had never done so before he undertook the suspension. A series of possible outcomes to the events that they’d planned started to crawl through his mind as very gradually he let himself sink into a much-needed sleep. His c-pac beeped once to show that another update from the parent machine had been received. Mathew was already half asleep and didn’t acknowledge the note. Had he listened to it Mathew would have been puzzled that Deon was reporting an unexpected visitor.
43
“Hello Brother Deon,” said the familiar voice as the door opened.
Deon stood in the doorway, looking surprised at the guest who had arrived unannounced at his apartment. He stood aside to let the visitor into the room, all the time wondering how anyone knew where he was. He had been constantly busy since Mathew, Rei and Philip had left the night before. He’d watched them leave the block and checked the watcher to ensure that they exited the building without incident. It had been early enough in the evening for their departure to be uneventful, but this was a bad neighbourhood, and he liked to check, so he kept a vigil as they headed into the city. As he watched them walk on the screen that shimmered while it was projected into the air, he had speculated whether he was right not to go with them. While it was true that the four of them would attract more attention, and also that someone might recognise him, especially now that his face was being broadcast in relation to a crime he knew nothing of, he also knew that he understood the Roamers better than any of the others. They had customs and traditions that were unique and values that differed to the rest of society, that went back decades. He had a responsibility to Mathew, and he hoped that his mission would be guided to help him make the right decisions.
Deon had quickly started work on scheduling the next phase of the journey. He knew some people in the south still and spent a little time setting up a new identity for himself so that he could contact them without being noticed. He managed to find a series of boats headed across the channel, and narrowed down his search so that he had a choice of several commercial ferries or a couple of private vessels that were officially involved in moving personnel to and from the aquacultural fields off the south coast, but in actual fact dealt in transporting anything across the water – at the right price. The main items moved were small firearms and contraband alcohol, but it was not at all uncommon for people to wish to move in or out of the country undetected. For a fee they could keep any questions at bay, the only problems he could foresee were that either Mathew or himself would be recognised. But he doubted anyone would be keen to report Mathew, and who would they tell anyway. As for himself, he would just have to trust in the greater scheme of things and hope that few smugglers would be willing to contact the police. He arranged for a choice of crossing and left this open for a last minute change of plan should it be required.
As he worked on his arrangements Deon became increasingly focused on the ethervision screen that floated in front of him. In the far distance he could hear people outside arguing and shouting in apartments down the corridor. Fights and attacks were common here and he hardly ever noticed them anymore, not since James Peacock had hammered at his door as his life dripped away from him in the corridor. Today though, some of the voices from outside seemed nearer. It was almost as if they were in the room with him, and he looked up several times for the source of the sounds, and even checked to see if his c-pac was receiving incoming calls, but there was no one there.
“Deon,” called a voice. He looked around. It had definitely called him by name, but there was no physical entity to the voice. It came again, calling his name from the air.
“Who’s there?” he called back, alarmed. The room swam into a confusion of blurred colours and the voice and the screen remained his only point of attention as the fog around him began to form.
“Deon, you know who I am.” He stared at the ethervision screen, blank but for lists of sailing times. He was on a mission and was being addressed by name from nowhere. This could be the aid he had needed and waited so long for.
“Deon, you are tired. You are in trouble. You need to rest. You may rest forev
er if you want. You know how to rest, Deon. End your mortality. End your life here, Deon. End your critical life.”
“He’s fucking shit,” a second voice added. Deon looked around, but still saw no one, he just heard the words resounding in his ears. “Deon, he’s a cunt. He’s a cunting, cocksucking fucking piece of shit. Who cares about him? No one does, ’cos he needs to die. He’s a wanking, motherfucking arse. The scum that can do no good. Those other three are better off without this cunt. That’s why they left. If he was with them he’d fuck it up. He fucks everything up.”
“I don’t. Leave me alone,” he screamed.
“He thinks he can help, but he’s too shit to be of help. He’s not critical. He’s just a wanking cock, a cunt, fucker, lonely, useless cunt. CUNT!”
Deon screamed at the voice while the first one carried on talking directly to him, always suggesting that he could rest forever. He clamped his hands over his ears, then clenched them into fists, flailing blindly, but the voices remained loud and obtrusive, more so than ever before. He staggered about the room, his eyes shut and tears pouring from them, and then, suddenly, the voices stopped, and he was again sitting alone in front of the screen. He looked at his hands and saw the red imprints his nails had made on his palms. He looked at his hands for a long while. The marks were almost like stigmata on them. And now all was quiet. There was no sound at all either outside or in the room. He sat still for a long while. Although he had no sense of the passing of time he remained on the floor for nearly two hours while the fog slowly dispersed. Then he heard something outside. A rap at the door. Directly on the door, too, not using the intercom system, or contacting him first through the c-pac. Someone was actually knocking at the door, like people had done years ago to attract attention. Like James Peacock had done as he lay outside dying. The knocking remained persistent. He waited but it did not cease, and when he checked the watcher he could see a shadowed figure in a large coat and hat. He put a message onto the c-pac:
The Relic Keeper Page 24
