by Gary Gregor
With Foley and Rose following, officers Sparrow and Smart led the way to Papunya approximately forty-nine kilometres north of Haasts Bluff. Sam drove, while Foley made notes in a Crime Running Sheet.
“What are your thoughts?” Sam asked.
Foley tossed the Running Sheet onto the dash and leaned back in his seat. “I don’t know. We’ve got a bus carrying eleven school kids, and their teacher, hi-jacked at the side of the road and driven away to who knows where. As to why, we can only speculate. It’s a lot of bus and a lot of occupants to hide. Where are you going to keep all those kids where no one will notice them? Where are you going to hide the bus where no one will see it?” He turned his head and studied the barren countryside passing by.
“Maybe the bus is no longer out here in the desert,” Sam suggested. “Maybe it is back in Alice Springs where there are a lot of busses and a lot of school children. A bus full of students is not going to arouse any suspicion driving through Alice Springs.”
“It would eventually, Sam,” Foley said. “Eventually it would have to stop, somewhere. The kids will have to be kept hidden, somewhere. We have a BOLO out there, every cop within a thousand kilometres will be looking for the bus. If this is not already all over the news, it soon will be. People will notice.”
Suddenly, Sam pointed out to the right-front of the vehicle. “Something’s burning.”
Russell Foley looked to where Sam indicated. A large, plume of smoke, dense and black, rose high against the pale blue of the sky on the far distant horizon. “How far away is that?” he asked.
Sam shrugged. “I don’t know. Bloody long way. Up near the Tanami Road, looks like.”
“There’s nothing out here that would burn that severely,” Foley said. “Except perhaps the Tilmouth Roadhouse.”
“Shit! Sam exclaimed. “Could that be it?”
“I guess we’ll hear soon enough.”
Then, Foley’s mobile phone chimed. He fumbled in his pocket, removed the phone and flipped it open. “Got a message coming through,” he said.
“Anything important?”
Foley quickly read the message and then closed his phone. “Stop!” he said loudly.
“What,” Sam asked, glancing across at his partner.
Foley nodded towards the distant smoke. “Stop! It’s the bus!”
“What?”
“That smoke. It’s the bus.”
Sam braked hard and skidded to a stop at the side of the road, close to where the school bus was taken. “The bus?”
“The message is from the boss,” Foley explained. “The Flying Doctor pilot on his way to Papunya to pick up the bus driver’s body spotted it. He called it in to his base and they notified our chaps in Alice.”
“Should we check it out?” Sam asked.
“No, it’s too far away. It’ll be dark before we get there and back again.” He read the message again. “According to the pilot, it’s at the junction of the Tanami Road and Gary Junction Road. There’s a couple of units on the way from Alice Springs; two of our chaps and a Forensic unit.”
“Do I dare ask about the school kids and their teacher?”
“The pilot couldn’t tell from the altitude he was flying, but there were no obvious signs of life.”
“Shit!” Sam cursed. “I hope our chaps don’t find a bus full of charred remains.”
“You and me both, Sam,” Foley said.
Up ahead, the OIC of Papunya police station, “Spog” Sparrow glanced in his rear-vision mirror and noticed Foley and Rose had stopped. He steered to the roadside and stopped.
“What?” Maxwell Smart asked.
“They’ve stopped,” Sparrow answered.
Smart looked into the vehicle’s wing mirror. “Broken down?”
“I don’t know,” Sparrow answered. As he watched, the following vehicle began to move forward. He waited until it pulled up alongside his own vehicle and then wound down his window.
Russell Foley pointed to the smoke in the distance. “That’s the school bus,” he called across to Sparrow.
“The fire?”
“The Flying Doctor spotted it,” Foley explained. “It’s up near the Tilmouth Roadhouse. There are units on the way from Alice Springs.”
“What about the children?” Sparrow asked.
“And Tracy?” Smart leaned forward and called across his partner.
“The attending units will let us know when they get there,” Foley said.
“Should we go?” Sparrow asked.
“No,” Foley said. “Let’s get to Papunya and re-cap on what we know. The attending units will fill us in with details when they reach the scene.”
7
The third, and the fourth rooms in the ‘container house’ were identical to the first two. Tracy and the children stood close together in the third room of the four-room complex buried beneath a hill in the middle of nowhere. There were mattresses, lots of them, spread around the floor. None of them looked new; some of them even bore stains of unidentifiable origin. And, there was an odour in the room. It was faint, but it was there; an old smell, like the room needed air flowing through it to carry away the stale odour of mold and mildew that lingered in dark, dank, confined places.
The children pressed close against Tracy’s body, some of them clinging to her dress and sobbing softly, their red, confused, watery eyes looking up at her, pleading, silently begging her to help them.
Tracy gagged audibly, suppressing the urge to throw up. If she did, it would spew all over the shuffling, pressing, disorderly gaggle crowded around her feet. She was so afraid she could almost taste it. An acrid, bitter taste lingered in the back of her throat, like the after-taste she remembered from when she vomited once, a long time ago, after drinking way too much at her university graduation party.
The man with the gun stood at the open door between the second and the third rooms, casually leaning against the jamb like this was a normal, everyday occurrence for him. Tracy looked across and caught his eye. Did the bastard ever stop smiling, she wondered? What did he have to smile about? What horrors did he have in store for her and the children? She immediately looked away and cast her eyes once again at the mattresses scattered haphazardly around the room. Were they expected to sleep in this place? How long would he keep them here?
When the man spoke, his voice startled Tracy. She looked across to where he stood in the doorway. He inclined his head towards the right-hand wall of the room, and the open door leading to a fourth room.
“That’s the last room,” he said. “There’s a lantern in there, and a portable toilet, as well as water for drinking and washing. There is also a couple of boxes full of packaged food. Use the water and the food sparingly, that is all there is. That is the only door to and from that room. The only way out of this place is through this door.” He patted the door jamb where he stood. “This door will be locked at all times and, if by some miracle you were able to get it open, you would have to get past me and my friends.”
“How long are you going to keep us here?” Tracy asked.
“As long as it takes,” the man answered.
“As long as what takes?”
The man took a step into the room and stopped. “Tracy,” he began. “I really don’t believe you are so dumb you haven’t worked it out yet. You and the rug-rats have been snatched! Hijacked! Kidnapped! You will be held here until we get paid to let you go. It’s not fucking rocket science!”
“Don’t swear!” Tracy said, defiantly.
“What?”
“Don’t swear. There is no need to use foul language in front of the children.”
“I’ll use whatever language I choose,” the man said. “You don’t make the rules here. This is not your classroom. You and the brats will do as you are told.”
“And if we don’t?”
“Don’t go there, Tracy. Just… don’t… go… there. Right now, you are all in good health. If you want to stay that way, I suggest you cooperate.”
Tracy indicated the mattresses scattered around the floor. “These mattresses are disgusting. Do you really expect us to sleep on them?”
“I don’t care if you sleep on them or not, Tracy. Sleep on the hard floor if you prefer. But as you can see, the floor’s no cleaner than the mattresses.”
“At least let the children go,” Tracy said, knowing full well it was a hollow request. He was never going to let the children go. If he didn’t need them, he would never have brought them to this horrible place; he would have left them at the side of the road. It was not a brave request. There was nothing remotely heroic about asking him to let the children go. The thought of being all alone in this place terrified her. She hated herself for what she considered a cowardly thought. They were little children. They were probably more terrified than she was, if that were even possible. But there was a degree of comfort, albeit only perceived, knowing she was not alone in this awful place.
“No one leaves here until we get what we want,” the man responded. “In the meantime, you need to keep the kids under control. Make yourself comfortable and relax. Behave yourself, and you will all get to go home.” He stepped back out into the second room, reached out, and grasped the heavy metal door.
“No!” Tracy cried “Please leave the door open! There’s no air in here! Please!”
The man hesitated for just a moment. Then, he smiled that familiar, smarmy smile, and swung the door closed.
The door clanged shut and Tracy heard the sound of a bolt sliding home, locking them inside the room. An ominous darkness engulfed the room as the small amount of light that had penetrated the gloom while the door was open was now gone. She stepped away from the huddle of children, moved cautiously to the door, grasped the handle, and pulled at it. It did not budge. Acting purely on hope, she tried pushing against it. It was locked tight. Frustrated and overwhelmed with helplessness, she leaned forward and rested her forehead against the door, the metal surprisingly cool against her skin.
She felt a light touch on her arm, turned and looked down at the upturned face of one of her aboriginal students, eleven-year-old Milly Ungwanaka. Milly, from Hermannsburg, an aboriginal community approximately two-hundred-and-sixty kilometres south-East of Hassts Bluff stared up at Tracy with big, wide, brown eyes.
“What is it, Milly,” Tracy asked.
“We all be scared, Miss Tracy,” Milly said. Her voice, just above a whisper, displayed traces of the deep, guttural tones common in many of the aboriginal people.
Tracy looked across to the centre of the room at the group of children huddled together. Through the gloom it was difficult to see all the faces but she knew they were all watching her, every face projecting confusion and fear. Tracy felt a brief, sharp ache in her chest. Her heart was breaking for her beloved students. What could she say to them? How could she help them? She lowered her eyes and looked at Milly. “It’s going to be okay, Milly,” she said softly. She gently turned Milly towards the centre of the room. “Come on,” she ushered. “Let’s join the others and talk about what’s happening.” She took Milly’s hand and together they crossed to stand in front of the crudely assembled children.
“Alright, children,” Tracy began. “I want you all to listen closely to me.” She waved her hand at the room around them. “We have to stay here for a while,” she said. “I don’t know how long we will be here but we are all together, and we will stay together. As you can see, there are mattresses on the floor for us to be comfortable, and there is water and food in the next room. There is a toilet in there also, if you need it,” she added.
Twelve-year-old Mitchell Lord, clinging tightly to his twin sister Rachel’s hand, raised his free hand.
“Yes, Mitchell?” Tracy invited.
“Who are those people?” Mitchell asked.
Tracy paused, thinking of just how she might answer the question. She looked at Mitchell, then at his sister Rachel, then she cast her eyes around all the other faces. “I don’t know who they are,” she said. “But they are not nice people.”
“What do they want?” Mitchell asked.
“They want money,” Tracy said. “You remember the photo?” she asked. “They took the photo of me tied up so they can show it to the authorities. They want people to pay them to let us go.”
“Are they going to kill us?” It was a question from Dana Smith, daughter of the General Store managers from Haasts Bluff. It was not a question Tracy expected to hear from any of her students, let alone from the mouth of a naïve, eleven-year-old school girl. But children often say things impulsively without a lot of forethought into their words. The kids were scared. Their captors carried guns. Given the circumstances they found themselves in, Tracy decided it was a reasonable question, albeit inopportune.
“No, Dana!” Tracy said sternly. “They are not going to hurt us. We just have to stay here for a while. They will get what they want and then they will let us go.”
“It smells in here,” Toby Miller said, sniffing loudly. The only child of the local pastor at Haasts Bluff, Toby had a reputation of being an over-confident, self-assured twelve-year-old boy teetering on the brink of adolescence. Often outspoken to the point of being disruptive in class, he was perhaps the most difficult of Tracy’s students. He needed a strong hand to guide him, something he did not seem to get from his devoutly religious parents.
“It’s mildew, Toby,” Tracy said. “This is an old place. There is not a lot of fresh air in here and that allows mold and mildew to grow.”
Toby sniffed loudly again. “We’re probably all gonna suffocate,” he said, his voice filled with disdain and just loud enough to send a soft hum of concern through his fellow students.
“No!” Tracy said loudly. “We are not going to suffocate, Toby. You are one of the older children here, and I need you to show some leadership. I expect you to be strong and not frighten the rest of the children!”
“Yeah, whatever,” Toby said with an indifferent shrug of his shoulders.
“I need all of you to be strong,” Tracy continued, addressing all of her students. “This is not a nice place, and,” she looked at Toby Miller, “I know it smells a little bit. But these bad men will get what they want and then they will let us go. Until then, we are all together and we must all stay together. We must support each other and take care of each other. It’s like when we play a game on the school oval, we are a team, and teams work together, don’t they?” She cast her eyes over the small group, waiting for a response. “Don’t they?” she asked again.
A soft, hesitant chorus of “Yes, Miss,” filled the confined space.
“Excellent,” Tracy smiled. “Now, let’s all find a mattress to sit on. There is some food in the next room. We can have a picnic lunch together.”
Eleven-year-old Lucy Gunging, a young aboriginal girl from a dysfunctional, fractured Alice Springs family and now living with her grandmother at Haasts Bluff, raised her hand.
“Yes, Lucy,” Tracy asked.
Lucy lowered her head in obvious embarrassment. “I need to pee, Miss,” she said, in a very soft, barely discernable voice.
“Okay, Lucy,” Tracy said. “You have to go into the other room. Would you like someone to go with you?”
Lucy nodded. “Yes, please,” she whispered.
Tracy turned to Rachel Lord. “Rachel, will you go with Lucy?”
“Yes, Miss,” Rachel answered.
“Thank you,” Tracy said. “Anyone else want to go to the toilet?” she asked the group. When no one raised their hand, she moved across to the mattresses spread haphazardly around the floor. “Okay, boys,” she said to the mail students. “Who wants to help me organise these mattresses so we can all be close together?”
8
Thirty-six-year-old Craig Andrew Garrett was once a highly trained, skilled, and efficient soldier. In Garrett’s own mind, he was still all of those things. He figured you never really un-learn any of the things the military went to great lengths to train into you,. The fact that he was u
nceremoniously dumped from the military had no bearing on how he perceived himself now.
He learned quickly that the Army was all he ever wanted. It was his life. It was all he knew and all he ever wanted to know. He took to the strong discipline, the ball-breaking training, and the camaraderie of his fellow soldiers like he was born to it.
He joined the Army as soon as he left school at age seventeen and knew almost immediately that this was where he belonged. After living most of his young life to that point as the only child in a dysfunctional, broken family where heated arguments and petty squabbles between his parents were almost a daily occurrence, the army was escapism for Garrett. He had hoped all the bickering and yelling might change when his parents separated and eventually divorced when he was just twelve years old, but it only got worse. Then it became an emotional, bitter, and often violent tug-of-war between mother and father over who should have custody of young Craig.
All through his secondary-school years, all he thought about was getting away and never going back. Any love he might have once felt for either, or both, of his parents was long gone; or buried so deep in his psyche it would never resurface. He never told his mother he was joining the army until the day he was due to report for the first day of his training. He walked out of the house, never looked back, and never saw either of his parents again.
Garrett served in Afghanistan with the Army’s elite commando regiment, 4th. Battalion Royal Australian Regiment. As a young twenty-six-year-old, combat hardened soldier with almost ten years of distinguished service behind him, including two tours of duty in Iraq, the army had become his new family. His army mates were his siblings and his superiors were his parents. The future looked bright and his career prospects even brighter; until the day he shot and killed a young Afghani mother and her infant child.
During a short lull in what had become a sustained attack by the men of Garrett’s unit on a known enemy stronghold; an attack where withering small-arms fire, both from the house by heavily armed Taliban insurgents, and at the house by the Australians, rained heavily on both sides, the woman suddenly burst from the front door of the battle-scarred, mud-brick house. Carrying a swaddled bundle clutched to her chest with one hand, and a Kalashnikov rifle in the other, she charged directly at the slowly advancing Australians, screaming the words “Allah Akbar” over and over again.