The Second Cure

by Margaret Morgan

  The customers were silent as they waited. Charlie realised she was the only women not wearing a mask. She’d forgotten it, being so angry at Richard and so preoccupied by her late period. Her nakedness made her feel even more anxious about being outside the sanctuary of the flat, even more exposed and conscious of the cameras everywhere. How could she have got used to hiding herself so quickly?

  Whatever the elderly woman being served at the counter wanted from the pharmacist it was apparently complex and time-consuming. Charlie tried to restrain her agitation. Behind her, others were queuing. A teenaged boy, carrying an armful of tissue boxes. A woman with a fretful baby. Another, older, wearing an ornate mask.

  A second pharmacist appeared at the counter, calling out, ‘Next.’ Charlie moved across to her.

  ‘Hi, I’m looking for a pregnancy test kit.’

  The conversation next to her ceased and Charlie realised that everyone was staring at her.

  ‘Why do you want that?’ the pharmacist asked, glancing at her colleague.

  ‘To find out if I’m pregnant?’ she answered. Obviously.

  ‘Where are you from?’ The first pharmacist was frowning.

  ‘Sydney. Is there a problem?’

  ‘Yes, there’s a problem. You must know that they’re illegal.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  A voice from behind, stentorious and monotone: ‘“If you are sexually active, you should be prepared for motherhood. That is why sex exists.” Those are the words of the Mother of Light. There is no reason to question God’s will.’ It was the woman in white. She moved to the counter, staring at Charlie with ferocity.

  ‘Amen,’ the staff and customers were intoning. Charlie’s stomach spasmed. Everything had felt so normal only moments ago.

  The woman with the baby said, ‘You and your husband should go to the doctor. That’s what we did to find out.’

  ‘Do you have ID?’ asked the pharmacist.

  ‘Why would you need that? You’re not selling me anything, apparently,’ said Charlie, feeling the shop’s cameras staring at her.

  Just then, the boy behind her stumbled, his tissue boxes scattering around them. His arm flung out to catch one, but instead hit a display of manicure instruments, which toppled and its nail files and clippers fell to the floor. Automatically, Charlie got down to help him collect them.

  His mouth drew close to her ear and in the chaos he whispered, ‘She is a Daughter. Go. Now.’

  Charlie began to speak, but his voice, now urgent, hissed, ‘Just go!’

  So she did. She stood and, without looking back, left the shop and its terrifying rules and creepy ‘daughter’, and didn’t slow down until she got to the flat.

  Brigid pulled off her VR game console as Charlie entered and looked at her empty hands. ‘Where’s the takeaway? Did you change your mind about lunch?’

  ‘Sorry, I forgot.’ Charlie told her what had happened at the chemist’s.

  ‘Jesus, Charlie, you didn’t realise that you can’t get pregnancy tests here? If you’re married and registered with a doctor and trying to get pregnant, sure, but you can’t just go into a chemist!’

  ‘I just assumed. Having an abortion isn’t the only reason people want to know they’re pregnant, is it? Maybe they just want to start planning the nursery?’

  ‘I don’t make the laws. You’ve got to be more careful, you know.’

  ‘It’s okay, they didn’t know who I was.’ She’d sat on the sofa, but now stood again, pacing the room.

  ‘Of course they do. Those CCTV cameras everywhere? They’re not for decoration, you know. They’re linked to face recognition software. They’ll have been tracking you since the minute you got off the plane.’

  Charlie absorbed that, mortified. Capricornia seemed so ordinary on the surface, so harmless. Maybe it was if you played the game. If you knew the rules. If you didn’t care.

  ‘Do you really think you might be pregnant?’ Brigid asked.

  ‘My period’s late and I’ve been vomiting.’

  ‘Crap.’

  A thought hit her. ‘If I am … is this going to be a problem? People can’t leave Capricornia if they’re pregnant, right? That thing about “abortion tourism” or whatever they call it?’

  ‘You’re not a citizen, so it won’t be a problem. They’d deport you if anything.’

  ‘Shit, Brigid. This place …’

  ‘Tell me about it.’

  Each new day didn’t bring Charlie’s period, but it did bring another bunch of flowers, mainly from colleagues getting the news that Brigid was home and recovering. She was growing stronger daily and so was her need to get back to work. Charlie was in charge of putting the flowers in vases, or in jars and glasses as they ran out of the former, and dosing Brigid with antihistamines.

  ‘I am so over white flowers,’ she said to Brigid. ‘What I’d give for a great big sunflower!’

  ‘I know. It’s Sissinghurst in here.’

  ‘It’s what?’

  ‘Nothing. Who’s that lot from?’ she asked, gesturing at this morning’s delivery, still in its paper and sitting on the counter. Charlie checked for a card. There wasn’t one.

  ‘Mystery admirer, apparently. But at least this one has broken the drought. Look!’

  She held up the bouquet. In among the usual white daisies, chrysanthemums and gerberas was nestled a single red rose, tightly furled.

  ‘Shit.’ Brigid struggled up from the sofa and hobbled over to Charlie. She took the bouquet and pulled it apart.

  ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong … I hope.’ She had extricated the red rose and was pulling apart the petals. Then she examined the stem and found, just above a thorn, a tiny silver disk, like the head of a pin. Charlie looked on, bewildered, as Brigid used her nails to pull out a long, thin piece of metal from the flesh of the rose. A data pin.

  ‘Brigid?’

  ‘Yes!’ It was what she’d been waiting for. Seth had come good.

  ‘What is it?’

  Brigid held her finger to her lip, pointed at the wall, and then her ears. Charlie nodded, getting the message. Brigid grabbed a notepad, and as Charlie watched she wrote a quick account of Seth Effenberg’s decision to turn whistle-blower.

  ‘Dunno what this vid is, but he said BIG,’ she wrote.

  Charlie took the pen and wrote, ‘Can we watch?’

  Brigid shook her head. ‘No,’ she wrote. ‘Encrypted. Plus not safe.’

  They took turns writing. ‘So now what?’

  ‘Airport.’

  ‘No! You’re not well enough.’

  ‘Ha! Lot less healthy if I stay.’

  ‘…’

  ‘Hold off? 1 wk?’

  Brigid’s sardonic look was enough.

  ‘OK. I’ll pack.’

  ‘GOOD GIRL,’ wrote Brigid.

  Brigid had loud music playing as she directed Charlie on which items of clothing to go into suitcases, explaining that she had rent paid until the end of the month. If they parked the car at the airport, with the spare set of keys left back at the apartment, the landlord could have the car in lieu of notice. It was an old bomb, but must be worth a few bucks, and the furniture too. She’d deal with details like getting the electricity disconnected once they got to Sydney. Brigid had no intention of returning.

  ‘Is the car an automatic?’ asked Charlie.

  ‘Manual. Can you manage?’

  ‘It’s been a while. Like … fifteen years. But maybe it’s like riding a bike.’

  She collected all the flowers, including Seth’s dissected rose, and put them in a garbage bag along with the contents of the fridge. She’d dump it all in the bin on the way out.

  ‘Good thinking,’ said Brigid.

  ‘I know your fridge’s default state is as a science experiment, cultivating new life forms, but let’s have pity on your landlord.’

  ‘Ouch.’

  Brigid had to leave a lot behind. Her three suitcases, plus Charlie’s own
, were already tempting the gods of baggage limits. She looked around the living room, checking she hadn’t forgotten anything vital.

  Mr Darcy still sat on the shelf.

  ‘You don’t have any room left in your carry-on?’ she asked Charlie.

  ‘I do, but I’ll put him in my suitcase. I really don’t want a dead cat in the overhead compartment, you know?’

  ‘Such an old-fashioned girl.’

  The data pin she’d put in her toiletry bag, along with nail clippers, tweezers and a mini sewing kit. It’d show up on any security scan, but shouldn’t look suspicious in that context.

  Charlie packed tampons in her handbag, hoping she’d need them soon.

  By her eighth Intervention, Tricia felt she had mastered the role. Three tattoo parlours, one failure to tithe, a contraception supplier, a homosexual couple cohabiting and one bookshop selling thete art books. She’d even started improvising, adding her own flourishes to the script. Her comprehensive knowledge of Bible verses was invaluable. She’d include little-known quotations from Leviticus or Deuteronomy and could tell by the chastened responses of the impure that the messages were hitting home. Her work was satisfying in a way she’d never experienced before, not only because it was important, but also because she was good at it, and her talent was being recognised. She felt some smallish niggles, she had to admit. The family that hadn’t tithed were clearly stretched financially and the mother was ill, but it was a worthy lesson for others to learn when they saw it on the news.

  She was proud to be working today, a public holiday. It might be a holy day, but it was her duty to God: He doesn’t rest and nor should she. Tricia stood next to the CSSA officer holding the battering ram. She’d insisted she no longer be in the background when the Interventions began. When the sergeant had quibbled about the dangers, she reminded him that she was a Daughter and her God would protect her. He didn’t argue further.

  ‘One, two, three …’ he mouthed, and then the device plunged against the apartment door, shattering the lock.

  Tricia recognised the women inside instantly. Winnie’s daughter. Her name? Brigid. Yes. And Richard’s partner, the scientist. She hid her shock. Pride cometh before a fall. She’d only noted that it was a case of potential unwanted pregnancy. She’d been sloppy. She looked at Brigid’s face, bruised horribly, and wondered what had happened.

  ‘This is an Intervention by the Daughters of the Song of Light!’ the sergeant was shouting. ‘On your knees with your hands on your heads!’

  Brigid and Charlie were staring at her. She hadn’t seen Charlie since Winnie’s funeral, but she’d seen Brigid’s news reports. They were regularly on the edge of sedition. The women clearly recognised her, too. Their faces were pictures of terror.

  ‘You’ve been warned,’ barked the officer. He took his Taser from its holster. Charlie put her arm around Brigid, helping her get down onto knees. Tricia saw that Brigid was wincing in pain.

  ‘Never mind,’ she said. ‘I know these women, Sergeant. That is Dr Charlotte Zinn. She invented the Cure. And this is her sister-in-law. Hand me the paperwork.’

  She scanned the documents. Charlie was there from Australia on a visitor’s visa. She had been reported for requesting a pregnancy test kit and absconding from the scene while being questioned by a Daughter.

  ‘Are you pregnant?’ she asked Charlie. Pregnant with Winnie’s grandchild … She thought of her own grandchild, killed by the Plague. Winnie, killed by the Plague. Was Charlie carrying a survivor, the last link to their past?

  ‘I … I don’t know,’ she stuttered.

  ‘Test kit,’ demanded Tricia of the officers behind her. One of them extracted a small blood test device from a pocket on his thigh.

  ‘Do it,’ she commanded, and the officer held Charlie’s hand and pushed the device into her thumb. Tricia saw her flinch.

  The sergeant leant in to mutter sotto voce into her ear. ‘The suitcases. They’re doing a runner.’

  ‘Are you going on a trip, Brigid?’

  ‘Only up the coast to stay in a motel. Oak Beach. I’m recuperating from an injury. We just need a break away from the city.’ There was none of the smug, snide manner she employed on her news show. She was humble, supplicating.

  ‘Negative.’ The officer held up the test kit to Tricia.

  While the relief on Charlie and Brigid’s faces was obvious, Tricia’s emotions were mixed. Winnie’s grandchild.

  The sergeant was looking at Tricia with expectation and she knew she had to make a decision. Her mind was whirling. Running away from a Daughter was a criminal offence. There was no risk of an abortion now, though, and the absconding from the chemist could be explained by a lack of familiarity with the ways of Capricornia. But should she allow favouritism? She thought of Winnie’s family in a prison cell, or worse. She thought of Winnie and how she had suffered.

  Voice shaking, she spoke. ‘By the authority vested in me by the Daughters of the Song of Light, I forgive you your trespasses. You are free to go.’ She raised her hand above them. It was trembling. ‘In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.’

  ‘Amen,’ murmured the officers. Tricia stared at the women.

  ‘Amen,’ said Charlie and Brigid.

  Tricia nodded her satisfaction, then led the officers out of the flat. Her legs felt weak as she returned to the CSSA vehicle. As the car door was closed behind her, she was infused with doubts. She wondered why the documentation hadn’t made mention of Charlie’s history. The Daughters must have realised who she was. A note of her work on the Plague was surely cross-linked in the records with the complaint from the pharmacy, so why wasn’t that part of the briefing?

  Then a chilling thought occurred. Perhaps the Daughters not only knew about her history, but they also knew about Tricia’s own connection with Charlie and Brigid. With Winnie. Perhaps this was a test to see where her loyalties were: with the Daughters, or with her previous life. Of course they would be testing her. They wouldn’t just assume her devotion. It was a trial, another trial from God, and she had failed. Is that what had happened to her predecessor?

  Her car veered onto the turnoff to the hinterlands and the Effenberg compound, and Tricia closed her eyes tight and prayed. She prayed for forgiveness and for redemption. She prayed she would be safe. She prayed she would not be judged.

  Twelve kilometres away, Brigid and Charlie were stuck in a traffic jam. They’d left the apartment with its broken front door and most of Brigid’s life the moment Tricia and the CSSA had gone, scarcely able to believe she’d protected them. Why she did it, they didn’t know, but they weren’t going to give her a chance to change her mind. The relief of Tricia’s ‘forgiveness’ on top of the discovery that Charlie wasn’t pregnant was still rushing through them. What had looked like the regime being unleashed on them had ended up with news that made Charlie feel lightheaded with a sense of freedom.

  In the passenger seat, Brigid was checking the flights. They’d just missed one, but if they could get through departures security in record time, they might make the next. She checked the traffic reports. ‘All bloody Saints Day!’ she told Charlie.

  ‘That’s why the traffic’s like this? All Saints Day?’

  ‘Yep. I’d forgotten what day it was. They do this procession thing every year. Look, try taking a left here.’

  Charlie edged the Suzuki to the left of the traffic, and, by flipping the front tyre over the kerb, squeezed through to a narrow one-way lane. Brigid was checking the navigation on her vocomm, the map image appearing on the car’s smartscreen. ‘There should be a right up here and that might get us past the crowd.’

  They emerged onto a main street where hundreds of devotees filled the space, waving palms and singing. Through the open car window, Charlie caught a few snatches of lyrics from those nearby. Lots of hallelujahs. Some in the crowd had their hands raised to the sky and swayed, eyes closed.

  ‘Shit, shit, shit,’ mutte
red Brigid. ‘I have no idea how long they’re going to be here. I’ve really screwed this up.’

  ‘How come the women aren’t in white?’ asked Charlie, still looking out the window. ‘I thought that at a religious celebration it’d be pretty much compulsory.’

  Brigid glanced at the crowd, then stared at her.

  ‘They are in white, Charlie.’

  ‘What?’

  Charlie looked back at the people. She blinked, trying to clear her vision, trying to make sense of it.

  She realised she wasn’t seeing coloured fabrics. The colours were swirling in time with the music, changing hue with the changing pitch of the singing. It was like her one and only acid trip when she was seventeen, but calm. Serene. She looked up at the sky. The white of the clouds was flecked with oranges and pinks. Greens were streaking down and breaking into golden starbursts above the singers’ heads.

  ‘Charlie?’

  ‘My god. Brigid … I’m seeing … Brigid, it’s synaesthesia.’

  ‘But you’re vaccinated.’

  ‘And with a booster. This is insane.’ She found it hard to speak, mesmerised by the colours around her.

  ‘Hang on. Seth Effenberg was infected recently. He was vaccinated.

  And the woman at the airport I told you about, the one who was taken away from her children? She said she was vaccinated, but had tested positive. How possible is it that the vaccine’s failing?’

  ‘Not as likely as the parasite evolving a resistance to it.’

  ‘So … not gondii, not pestis, but something else?’

  ‘Not necesarily,’ she answered, trying to concentrate on finding words. ‘It mightn’t have speciated, just mutated enough to be resistant.’ Her gaze was drawn to the world around her as its colours spun and sparkled with the singing. At that moment, it began to rain, and the sunshine, still low, shone through. The colours mingled with the illuminated raindrops.