The Islanders

by Christopher Priest

  ‘I can’t say anything. I’ve got to go.’

  ‘Please don’t!’ She started to get off the bed, to stand against him, but he seemed to sense what she was doing and moved quickly in the dark. She felt his hands on her shoulders, pushing her down. ‘Couldn’t you just put your arms around me?’

  ‘Lorna, I needed to say this personally, because I want you to believe me. It’s impossible to break it to you gently, but I won’t be coming back. It’s over. I’m really sorry, but that’s all I have to say. Stay away from the island, stay away from me.’

  He was already heading towards the door, because his silhouette moved away from the curtains. Lorna swivelled around, fumbled with the light switch and threw it on. For two seconds, three seconds, she saw Tomak in the electric light as he dived hurriedly for the door. He was wearing green-grey fatigues that made him look bulky and overweight. His hair was long, rolling around his neck, but there was a bare patch on top. Something had happened to his head: it was larger than she remembered, a different shape.

  As he reached the door, in the final half-second, he turned back to look directly at her and then she saw his face. Burn scars bulged and reddened and sucked at his features: he had become disfigured, scarred, broken for ever.

  The door slammed behind him and moments later the outer door closed too. She heard a key pinging as it bounced across the wooden floor.

  She sat there on her bed and almost at once she began to cry. The tears broke out of her, an unending outpouring of misery. She soaked half a dozen tissues, wept into her bed covers.

  Then she stopped.

  She remembered the time she had spent with Patta earlier that evening, consoling her friend. Quickly, her unhappiness turned to anger against Tomak, and she remained awake the rest of the night, loathing him for what he had just done and the way he had done it. Then, in distress, she would remember loving and missing him so much and for so long, and in hot confusion she would veer inwardly from rage to wretchedness.

  When the sun came up she dressed and went to walk along the edge of the cliffs. Tremm lay golden-hued across the blue-white sea, glowing in the morning light.

  * * *

  Three weeks later, after several sweltering, steamy days of unbroken summer rainfall, Lorna and Bradd went down to the harbour in Meequa Town and loaded food and drink on to his sailing boat. It was much smaller than Lorna had imagined, but it was almost new and was fitted with modern navigation and steering devices. In particular Bradd pointed out the two main sails, which were of material that was non-reflective and almost transparent. Undetectable after dark by sight or by radar, he said, and made of the same material used on the wings of the drones.

  The sun, heading down towards evening, was still radiant and waves of humid air rolled in across the harbour. Bradd pulled off all his clothes except a pair of shorts, and set to work preparing the boat to leave. Lorna also stripped down to her bathing costume, and sat half in shade, half in the blistering sunlight until Bradd said they were ready to cast off.

  Once they were beyond the harbour wall there was enough wind to provide at least an illusion of temporary coolness. Tremm stood towards the horizon, green-brown in the distant shimmering marine heat.

  Bradd steered the boat away from the town, hugging the coastline of Meequa, and within an hour they had reached a small secluded inlet where no other boats were moored. They anchored the yacht, then dived in and swam in the calm cove until the shadows from the setting sun were dark across the water.

  Back on board, they snacked on some of the food they had brought. They both kept looking out to sea towards Tremm, where the mountains were catching much of the sunlight slanting horizontally from the west. As night fell the humidity seemed to increase. Lorna lay breathless on the prow of the boat, dangling an arm towards the water, watching the movement of phosphoresence in the shallow sea below.

  Bradd went below decks and switched on his night-time navigation gear. Lorna continued to doze in the muggy air, feeling Bradd’s movements in the cabin directly beneath her but thinking yet again about Tomak, what had happened, what he had said that night, the suddenness of everything. It continued to hurt, but it also made her feel resentful of him. It was torment if she dwelt on it but she believed she was recovering at last.

  When Bradd emerged from the tiny cabin she sat up to look at him, admiring his supple back, his strong arms. She watched him working one of the hand-winches, liking the calm way he moved, the compact angles of his torso, remembering the times when they had been lovers, thinking the best of him.

  By some unspoken accord this trip had been arranged almost as if it had been planned in detail and agreed in advance. Bradd announced two days earlier that he was ready to sail across to Tremm, and Lorna quickly said she would go with him. They had both taken days off work, not knowing how long they would be away. Lorna told herself she needed a break, was owed some time off by the MCI.

  There was only a single bunk in the confined space of the cabin. Lorna noticed this as soon as they were on board, but she said nothing. Too much had been said between them in the past. But then before they sailed Bradd casually showed her that in one of the lockers there was a hammock that could be slung on the deck in the open air. She was assuming nothing, and it seemed that neither was Bradd.

  With the aid of the inboard motor they left the cove, then Bradd and she hoisted the nearly invisible sails and they began to move out to sea, silent but for the sound of the water against the hull.

  Several minutes later one of the instruments gave a quiet warning signal and Bradd immediately used night-sight binoculars to scan the sea near Tremm. After staring through them he handed them to Lorna, indicating where to point them. It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the artificially enhanced image, but she was soon able to make out a long power launch, lying low in the water. Because of the foreshortening effect of the powerful lenses it appeared to be close against the foot of the Tremm cliffs. It did not seem to be moving.

  Bradd took the glasses back and stared at the vessel for a long time. Meanwhile their yacht sailed slowly on, using the automatic steering device.

  ‘What do we do?’ Lorna said.

  ‘Nothing. We’re in international waters. We’ve every right to be here. In theory, we also have the right to land on that island. Every island in the Archipelago is neutral territory – that’s what the Covenant is for. But in reality the moment we cross into Tremm’s waters that launch will come out to find out what we’re up to. It’s a fast-response patrol boat, armed to the hilt. Those people have moved in, grabbed the island, and set up armed patrols to keep everyone else out. It makes me angry! They’re abusing our neutrality by making it into their domain. They do what they want and we can’t stop them, because if we tried to get rid of them they’d claim we were breaching our own neutrality by doing so.’

  He glanced towards the sky: it was clear of clouds, but because of tropical atmospheric haze a pale orange wash from the sun, which was now below the horizon, was faintly visible against the stars. The air was warm, but both Lorna and Bradd had put on lightweight shirts. The breeze was steady.

  Lorna continued to watch the patrol launch through the glasses. After a few minutes it began to sail away. The movement was also picked up by the navigation gear in the boat. The launch travelled fast along the coast of Tremm, and soon it was difficult to make out the shape of it against the dark rocky cliffs, even with the night-sight boost. Not long afterwards, Bradd’s onboard navigation equipment made a different sound, signalling that the target the radar had picked up was now out of range.

  Bradd continued to sail calmly, then as the darkness on the sea became more or less complete, he swung the wheel and the boat headed directly towards Tremm.

  ‘Are you still intending to land?’ Lorna said.

  ‘Not this time. That launch is not the only line of patrol.’

  Since Tomak, since his visit in the night, Lorna’s inner determination to find out what was happen
ing on Tremm had dwindled. Tomak had at least succeeded in that. It remained a deep impulse in her to find out where he was and what had happened to him, but it was an impulse she found easier to resist with every day that passed. The hurt he caused had stiffened into a defensive anger, now more or less under control, but that remained harder to put behind her than the sense of loss.

  Soon after they left the shelter of the cove Lorna went aft to sit beside Bradd in the tiny cockpit, because of the boat’s movements in the waves. The night was hot, making her feel breathless. She leaned back against the coaming, feeling the wind in her hair and the occasional splash of droplets – both cooled her deliciously, while the mild plunging and yawing of the yacht gave her an inner feeling of physical suspense. Her muscles were constantly tensed against the rocking. In spite of her earlier reservations she was succumbing to the sensual nature of this venture. Bradd was close beside her, often pressing up against her as he manoeuvred the boat. She was tingling with awareness of his body, and whereas only two or three weeks earlier she would never have admitted to herself any such response, she was relishing the feeling that somehow she was yielding to him, giving herself up. But it was free of persuasion and without conscious decision.

  Here she was, here he was. She could smell the dried salt on his strong forearms.

  The lights of Meequa Town had been in view for some time, but as a pale blur against the darkness of the inland hills. Tremm was much closer to them and the immense size of the central range made a dark block against the stars. There were hardly any lights visible on that shore.

  ‘Something’s moving!’ she suddenly cried as she saw a light sliding low over the sea. It had appeared quickly from behind the bulk of the island. She realized she was tensed against discovery by the patrol boats. Bradd stared across, reaching down into the well of the boat to find the binoculars.

  But before he switched them on he said, ‘You know what that is! It’s one of our drones.’

  Lorna took the glasses from him but then laid them down. She stood up, balancing herself against the swaying of the boat. The steady, low movement of the aircraft was of course completely familiar, but never before had she been so close to one as it passed across the sea. It traversed their course ahead of the boat, vanishing into the night as the beam from its LED moved away from them.

  Soon more drones appeared, heading towards Tremm from all distant directions. The first sight of them was as pinpoints of light, easiest seen when they were grouped together. At first Lorna tried to count them, as she had often done in the past, but was soon unable to keep up. Because of their proximity buffers, the drones always weaved around each other, like strands of wool in an unravelling skein. Before long the first group of them was passing close by their yacht, low and steady over the waves, the multi-coloured LEDs glittering. Lorna was thrilled to see them.

  Bradd stood beside her, balancing on the deck over the cabin. The boat was rocking and Lorna held his arm.

  He had brought the map of Tremm and now he turned on his torch and held the map so they could both see it.

  ‘I just took a fix on our position,’ he said. ‘We’re more or less here, still outside Tremm’s waters.’

  He indicated the shallow bay on the western side of the island. They were right at the edge of the map. Even though it was dark and much of the island was unlighted, Lorna could pick out the major features – in particular the steep crags of the mountains. The tallest of these, which was the one furthest to the south, was where Yo had carried out many of her test drills. Bradd pointed the torch at that part of the map, where there were the marks of dozens of Yo cavities clustered on the side of the mountain facing towards them.

  The first wave of drones passed towards Meequa, some of them flying directly over their boat. Lorna gazed up at them. Their hyaline wings glimmered as they passed beneath the stars. The hush of their motors could barely be detected because of the sounds of the sea. She watched the drones as they wove away from her towards the main island.

  ‘There are more coming,’ Bradd said, pointing to the south.

  Towards the horizon they saw another group of the pinpoints of light, turning in towards Tremm and Meequa. At this distance the lights of the LEDs all looked white, but as they gradually came nearer Lorna was able to see the many different colours. At first they were manoeuvring no differently from the first wave – they all steered around the landmass of Tremm, following the line of the coast, staying low above the waves – but without warning the leading group banked sharply away from the island and began to gain altitude, heading out to sea. Some of them appeared to be flying towards the yacht.

  One by one the drones banked again, turning back towards the bulk of Tremm, then circled, continuing to gain altitude. Behind them, the other waves of the drones were beginning the same manoeuvre. For a minute or so the sky above the yacht was a mass of different lights, circling around, gaining height.

  Lorna and Bradd stood together on the gently swaying deck, their heads craned back to watch the swarming planes.

  At some unexplained signal, every LED on the drones was suddenly extinguished. A transparent darkness soared above them.

  Bradd jumped down to the cockpit, retrieved the binoculars and tried to locate the now invisible drones. After a few attempts he passed the glasses across to Lorna, who also tried and failed to see any of the drones.

  They could sense the machines were still circling around above them. The warm sea air seemed to hum with the light pressure of their passage.

  As her eyes adjusted, Lorna realized she could just pick out a faint disturbance of the starlight, as wings of the drones passed high overhead. She pointed this out to Bradd and they stood together, faces turned skywards, seeing the stars shimmering through the drones’ wings. When Bradd’s hand slipped into hers, Lorna did not resist him.

  The first explosion came while they were still trying to spot the drones above them. They heard a low, deep thud, then a rumble, but by the time they had turned towards the source of the sound all that could be seen was the residue of flames and fire-glowing smoke on the upper slope of the most southerly Tremm mountain. While they were still looking, there was a second explosion, and this time they saw the flash before the sound reached them.

  ‘It must be the drones!’

  Another explosion occurred before Lorna could reply. This was lower down the mountainside, almost at sea level.

  ‘Are they crashing?’ Lorna cried.

  ‘There’s nothing on board a drone to make it explode like that. It’s just a motor, a guidance system and the scanning equipment.’

  But now the explosions were occurring with such frequency that the side of the mountain was half-lit by the flames that had already erupted. Lorna grabbed the binoculars and focused on the mountainside where it was most brightly illuminated. The swaying of the boat, and the fact that she was having to balance, made it almost impossible to keep the glasses trained on any one spot, but she soon found that it was easier with the night-sighting switch turned off.

  Bradd took the glasses from her for a minute or so, during which something like twenty more big explosions occurred, then he handed them back to her.

  ‘Point them close to that high shoulder on the right,’ he said. ‘You can see the drones flying straight into the tunnels!’

  Because of the high magnification, and her unsteady hold, Lorna was not able to spot any of the drones in the constantly jerking image. But in the light from the flames she could see that where the drones were crashing in was the area of many of Yo’s tunnels. Lorna repeatedly glimpsed the dark apertures, oddly, precisely shaped: round, square, triangular, asymmetric, tall rectangles, wide rectangles, long ovals.

  One bulged with devastating fire as she managed to keep the glasses steady. Something deep within the mountain was exploding or discharging when the drones went in.

  * * *

  The explosions did not continue for long. There was a sudden eruption along the lower flanks of the mo
untain, like the final flourish of a fireworks display, and then the mountain was quiet once again.

  They became aware at the same moment that the navigation gear in the cockpit was emitting a steady warning signal. Bradd turned sharply, looked towards the south.

  ‘The binoculars… quickly!’

  She handed them over, flicking on the night-sight as she did so.

  ‘Climb down to the cockpit, Lorna! That patrol ship is coming for us.’

  In the dark it was impossible to see unaided anything on the surface of the sea, but as soon as she scrambled down into the cockpit Lorna saw the radar display. A continuous signal revealed something large approaching them at sea-level, and at high speed. There was no doubt what it was.

  Bradd crashed down into the cockpit from the deck, brushing hard against her. He grabbed the wheel, spun it about. The boat responded at once, turning away from Tremm, heading north towards Meequa.

  ‘We’ll never outrun them,’ Bradd said. ‘But this takes us further away into international waters.’

  Lorna took the binoculars into the cabin and placed them somewhere out of sight. She returned to the cockpit.

  When she looked back the patrol boat was so close it was possible to see the dark shape of it unaided. It was speeding towards them, throwing up a huge white bow-wave.

  ‘They’re going to ram us!’ Lorna cried.

  ‘I hope not!’

  They were both shouting. Terrified, Lorna put her arm around Bradd’s waist and held close to him. The patrol boat was on them in a few more seconds, veering away at the last moment, but passing so close that the bow-wave drenched them and flooded into the cockpit. There was no engine noise audible from the launch, just the rushing of the water.

  The little yacht yawed and rolled violently in the immense wake of the larger boat, shipping more water. Lorna and Bradd fell away from the wheel, soaked by the deluge of seawater that flooded into the cockpit. Lorna landed face-down and Bradd fell violently on top of her, his uncontrolled weight forcing her face down into the water. After a struggle to regain equilibrium he managed to lever himself away. He helped her back to her feet, while she spluttered and tried to breathe again.