by Liz Grzyb
“Let’s go see what they’re doing!” I hissed at Pete.
Pete was fifteen and he’d lived in Melbourne. He’d seen people from the Arcologies before and it made him a big know-all.
“Nah! Bet he’s a recruiter. Looking for people who want to go back with him.” He chortled. “Shit won’t find no one here. No, Rama you stay put. You too, Shell. He might steal you away.” He grabbed at me but I ducked out of his grip and ran off into the darkness.
I hunkered down in the salt bush and watched the One Percenter. Sure enough, he moved among the people by the fence asking them something. Each one shook their head. We’d had a good season and it was almost harvest time when all hands were needed.
The man’s face scrunched up with displeasure. He was younger than the others and not as lush round the waist, even though he was still thicker than two of us.
He stepped away from the crowd by the fence and started looking around, scanning the riverbank. Looking for something to take? He wouldn’t find anything but old dugouts and salt bush on this side. All the houses were up on the hillside now.
Was he old enough to be a father? My father? Hard to tell with a One Percenter. Their fresh skin made them all look so young.
He started strolling along.
“So who’s the bossman round here? That guy we were negotiating with?” I heard him say.
“We are a co-operative, sir,” said Sanjeet. “We have a mediator but no boss.”
The One Percenter let out a harrumph of laughter.
“Course you don’t,” he said. He sounded disbelieving. He paused by one of the earth mounds that covered an old dugout where the goats sheltered during the blazing heat of day and sniffed. “So you all live underground. Makes sense. Must be hot as hell here in the day! So what’s that in the river, then?”
“That’s dry land wheat, sir. We grow it there because the soil doesn’t blow away and it has shelter from the afternoon sun.”
“But what do you do when the river flows? Doesn’t it wash your crops away?”
“It’s only flowed twice in the last ten years, sir. The second time was in the hot season when there was no crop in. It doesn’t rain here much anymore.”
“It’s a hellish wilderness alright. All those dead trees. Give you the creeps. My dad says this was lush dairy farming land before the Big Fires. Do you have cows?”
“No!” lied Sanjeet, clearly afraid that this One Percenter might take our two skinny cows which were now hidden in up in the hills with the rest of the stock.
“Wouldn’t this countryside be better for running beef cattle than growing crops?”
“If you could show us where to get cattle, sir, and how to keep them alive during the summers . . . And find enough for them to drink . . . And get them to market . . . ”
The One Percenter let out a grunt. Subject closed. The four of them strolled on, him still looking all around and me creeping along in barefoot silence behind them.
“So what are those big things up there? The leader’s house?”
He pointed the round towers that stuck up above the hillside.
“They’re the moisture farms,” said Sanjeet.
“Is this why you call this place Tatooine? Like in Star Wars? Because of the moisture farms?”
“They capture the dew in the night air,” began Sanjeet.
Inwardly I groaned. Here came the lecture. The poor old One Percenter didn’t know what he was in for. The moisture farms were Sanjeet’s baby. They might have made it possible for us to live out here, but Sanjeet was so boring when he spoke about them. Any minute now he was going to say “beautiful elegant simplicity”
I wished I’d stayed with Rama and Pete. Maybe something was happening over at the table now and I was missing the whole thing. I wondered if I should go back. So, of course, I wasn’t watching where I was going and I tripped on a bucket someone had put down, careless, and fell over with a yelp. Only just kept my face out of the dust.
Things hissed suddenly—things I later realised must have been weapons.
“No!” yelled Sanjeet.
“Stand down!” snapped the One Percenter. “It’s just a little kid. Hey kid, you fall over? Are you hurt?” A hand reached out for mine and helped me up.
Such a beautiful hand—not like any hand I’d felt before. So smooth and soft, I thought my own hand was going to sink into it.
“Are you hurt, kid?” said the voice again. I blinked in the white glare of the lights, which seemed to be coming out of tiny sticks that the guards were holding in their hands. Such bright light from such tiny sticks.
“Shell! Get back to the others,” snapped Sanjeet.
The One Percenter had me in his grasp. He was kneeling in front of me and he put his hand on my face and pushed the hair out of my eyes.
“Hi there! You’re a pretty kid, aren’t you? Would you like some gum?”
Sanjeet let out a sound of protest, but I had already shaken my head. I knew never to take anything from the One Percenters.
He was so beautiful, this man, and he smelt lovely. Sharp and sweet and spicy. His face was so fresh and handsome, his skin smooth and round over his cheekbones. He was pale, like one of the ghosts out of Col’s scary stories. No sign of a beard. And his dark hair was so fine. I put out my hand to touch it. He didn’t flinch away but let me touch his hair and face. So clean! Like my hair after a wash only cleaner. No grit anywhere on his face! The tiny rasp of stubble under my fingers was reassuring. Like a normal guy.
He grinned lopsidedly. “Hey kid. You like the finer things of life, don’t you?” He said it like it was a bad, dirty thing, and then he said, “So you wanna try your luck in the Arcologies?”
Here it was: the enticement; the attempt to steal me away. Terror stabbed through my gut.
I threw his hand away from me and ran and ran, and didn’t stop running until I reached the safety of the other villagers and was able to disappear amongst the crowd.
The deal for the fossils had been struck. It looked like Mum had done well. The fossils were gone and two sets of infrared glasses lay on the table, while one of the security guards was lifting down shiny new irrigation pipe from inside the helicopter. Two other guards loaded big black padded bags into the helicopter. Col was shaking hands all round with the One Percenters, while behind him, Mum scowled with concentration as she counted through a bundle of tattered-looking notes.
I was still full of shivers. I slid my hand into Old Jack’s. The roughness and hard bits of his skin were comforting.
He squeezed my hand and said, “Howzat kid? Don’t be scared. They’re almost gone. We got a good deal even though Alma wasn’t here. Where’d she go? Let’s go find her, kid!”
He pulled me away and we went and looked for Gramma.
Which was lucky ‘cos when we rounded behind the biggest dugout, there she was.
She had the big gun that had taken down a raider tank a few years ago, hoicked up on her shoulder. She was aiming towards the landing field, to where the helicopters were going to rise into the sky any minute. Their rotors had already started spinning.
Jack dropped my hand and jumped on her. He took her by surprise and after a brief struggle got the gun off her and shoved it down behind the wicking beds while I was still gaping. They were yelling, she hitting at him and screaming, but by now all I could hear was rotor noise, as the helicopters thundered and squealed up into the air and took off over us. Through the dust Gramma was silhouetted in their lights, lifting up her fists in the air. She was screaming and screaming, mouth open but with no sound, drowned out by the roar of the rotors. It looked like one of those horrible dreams where you try to call for help but can’t move. She screamed and screamed. I stood like a ninny not knowing what to do, while Jack seized her and put a dust mask over her mouth.
The helicopters didn’t notice. They circled and flew away along the black wall of the hills—their thunder fading, their dust settling over us.
When they were gone, Gramm
a fell out of Jack’s grasp and sank to the ground, beating her fists on the earth, sobs wracking her whole body.
I’d never seen her so raw before. It was like my Gramma had been replaced with some kind of yowling beast. Like a fox I’d seen caught in a trap once, snarling at us and wailing in pain at the same time.
“Get a rug,” Jack told me. Terrified she was having some kind of fit, I ran to fetch our spare possum rug from the dugout.
He was sitting beside her, patting her shoulder when I got back. She was still now, hunched over, face in the dirt. She was sobbing softly, which was worse than her temper. Gramma was always so strong.
“Gramm! What’s wrong? Don’t cry!”
I fell in the dirt beside her and put the rug over her. She sat up and seized me, pulling me into her lap and squeezing me hard, kissing me on the head and rocking me. Her hot tears leaked down my back as she held me.
“Sorry, Shell. So sorry. So sorry.”
“All this for one useless sack-a-shit man?” asked Jack.
Gramma gasped.
“You recognised him?”
“’Course I did. He must have had a lot of work to look so good, but it’s him, alright. Still smooth and silky.”
“Who was it?” I asked.
“Graham Hawthorn. He used to be Prime Minister. Twenty-six years ago. When the climate first turned against us and stuff got bad.”
“The shit. The shit!” Gramma was starting to sob again.
“Now Alma, don’t . . . He was just one man.”
“He betrayed us. I got my union behind him. We all did. We marshalled the voters. We . . . He promised he’d get us into renewables: that he’d pull back on emissions. He . . . The shit, the shit.”
I hugged her as hard as I could because she was shaking all over.
“I know, Al, I know,” murmured Jack. “I voted for him too. So did poor Mimi. But he was just one man. There were lots of them and a whole lot of people who just didn’t care enough . . . Didn’t realise how quick the tipping point would come.”
“He sold us out. For a buck. To big businesses and the mining companies. And now he’s living fat in the Arcologies while the rest of us live in dirt.”
She turned. Her words were angry and precise, like bullets. “I remember how relieved I was when he won the election. Don’t you? Doesn’t that betrayal still burn? Or have you lost your balls?”
“No, of course not. But what good are balls when you’re dead?” Jack snapped back. “What do you think would have happened if you’d shot down his chopper, hey? They’d come for us, that’s what. We’d all be killed or at least have to run off and leave the crop. And for what? For some futile . . . stupid . . . For revenge. What do you mean by it, hey? What would it change?” His voice had risen to a shout.
Gramma bowed her head over me and rocked silently, taking deep breaths to calm down. My neck was getting cricked but I didn’t complain. I felt she needed the hugging.
Jack gave a rueful laugh.
“Fine socialist you are. Getting us all killed without warning. If I’m going give up my life, I want at least two days of meetings first.”
Gramma let out a snort and seemed to relax. The number and length of our meetings was a constant joke in the Co-op.
“Here Al. Have a drink,” he said.
She let me loose and I quickly slid off her knee and straightened my neck. But I stayed close, leaning against her side.
Gramma always said Jack’s moonshine was better for starting fires than drinking, but now she took a good big gulp and a solid gasp afterwards to cool her throat. She wiped her face and her dusty hand covered the tear-stains on her face with more dust.
“Thanks for stopping me, Jack. I knew it was wrong even while I was aiming. Hopefully, I wouldn’t have taken the shot.”
“But they might have seen you and shot first.”
“Just so angry. Lost three children in those Changes. And everyone else. All that hunger and disease and fighting. And he might have stopped it, if he’d just . . . held firm. And you know what? I bet he doesn’t even feel guilty. I bet he sleeps peacefully every night.”
“Between silk sheets . . . with a companion whose beauty would make you weep with desire,” added Jack. This was some kind of quote they often used from a writer they had both once read.
Gramma let out a huff of rueful laughter.
“There’s no justice in this wicked old world, Shell,” she said, taking another small sip out of the flask.
“I bet he drinks single malt scotch,” she muttered, passing it back to Jack.
“Come on, Alma,” said Jack. “Don’t complain. At least you’ve managed to make the socialist utopia you always wanted.”
“Oh shut up, you stupid old man. As if any of this was worth it,” snapped Gramma, but she was grinning now. Somehow Old Jack had made things better. Talking. Talking always did that. And a joke.
“There you are!” cried my sister, Ingrid, coming round the dugout at us.
“I can’t believe it!” cried Mum, bursting up to us. “Those bastards. I can’t believe it.”
“Is the money fake?” cried Gramma.
“Nah!” said Ingrid. “But those people, they’re animals.”
“That guy—the recruiter that went walking around. He said Shell would scrub up pretty and that he could take her up to Melbourne if I liked,” cried Mum. “She’s only twelve, I said. And you know what he said? She’s a bit older than I thought but she looks younger which they’ll like and we can give her something to keep her a kid. I’ll give you a good price. Well I don’t shock easy but . . . I mean, I ask you! At least I’d turned in to a woman when I . . . ! Do those people have no limits? As if I’d sell my kid into that! Bloody shit bags!”
All four of them started comparing notes about what scum the One Percenters were, and having a good old flame session. Gramma told them about the man she’d recognised and Old Jack said that we might not have much but at least we could still count ourselves better than the One Percenters.
I crawled off Gramma’s lap, under the possum skin rug. Unlike Mum, Gramma had had an education and she could roll some wonderful words off her tongue. To the sounds of unconscionable bastards, morally bankrupt, I fell fast asleep. All that emotion must have worn me out because I didn’t wake up till Ingrid brought me a plate of ’roo meat, spit roasted on the signal fire. By then dawn was showing pink along the dusty horizon.
As I lifted the hot roast meat to my mouth, I smelt the scent of the One Percenter on my hands from when I had touched his soft skin. Spicy, sweet, delicious, but sharp too. Like someone you wanted to take care of you, who just wanted to use you. The scent of betrayal.
* * ** * ** * *
First Flight
Ian Nichols
It lay like some vast, pale jellyfish on the surface of the Swan River, so big that it almost blocked out the view of the headland behind it. The entire top surface glittered in the March early morning sun, glaring diamonds of light. It threw shadows onto the cool, green lawns of the university and the old sandstone buildings behind them. A hubbub milled around the jetty that led out to the huge airship, and I nudged Mike, the photographer, to get some pictures of it.
The ruckus was caused by the packed sightseers on the shore holding up the loading of the passengers. They were having trouble getting onto the wide gangway that led out into Matilda Bay from the University boatshed, and traffic was interrupted all along the highway. My phone rang as I tried to work out how we could avoid the crush to get on board.
“David Clark,” I said into it.
“I’m getting a feed from there. It looks like a riot.” It was my editor’s voice.
“It’s crowded as a Myer sale. They’re never going to get off on time. I’m buggered if I know why they chose this as a embarkation point.”
“They’re not allowed to use the airport or the docks, so they swung a deal with the local council and the University.”
“Christ, is the university that de
sperate for students?”
“They’re using a tent outside the Somerville Auditorium as a corral prior to departure, and all the dignitaries and such are being breakfasted in the University Club. It’s great PR.”
“If it works.”
“Yeah. If it works. Can you get on all right?”
I looked at the crowd. “I do not know. I’d like to get some shots from the ship and a few sound grabs as the bigwigs come on board, but that’s going to be pretty bloody difficult.”
“Hang on.” I heard him punching buttons and talking on another phone. “Okay,” he said when he came back, “I talked to the captain, and she’s going to send someone to bring you, Denise and Mike in through the crew entrance. Where are you?”
“On the lawn beside the Somerville, towards the Club.”
“Is Denise there with you?”
I looked around and saw our social columnist frantically taking shots with her own camera and a long lens. “Yeah.”
He talked again into the other phone. “There’ll be a crew member there in a few minutes. Catch their eye and show them your press pass and they’ll get you.” He paused for a moment. “And David, this is a once in a lifetime story. We’ve got a centre spread ready for it on Saturday. Don’t fuck it up.” He hung up.
People think it’s all very wonderful being a travel writer for a major newspaper, and it has its perks, but you have to get it right. Over and above everything, you have to find the story. It’s not enough to just describe a place or an event, you have to nail that feeling of being there, and why anybody else would want to go there. You have to be able to put the punters into the scene, and you have to be able to make it interesting. You’d think the first voyage of the first transcontinental airship, Perth to Sydney, would be interesting enough, but it can be as dry and boring as any air travel. There has to be a wow factor, a sizzle, to sell the story, and that was my job. Denise was along to report on the first night cocktail party and ball, to be held somewhere above the Great Australian Bight. I was there to make it interesting.
