by Meg Buchanan
*
We run out of ammunition and get ready to leave. I put the gear into the pack, sling the pack over my shoulder.
“I’m sorted now.” Ela hands me the rifle. “Watch out vermin.”
I rest the rifle on my other shoulder, holding it by the stock, then we start walking back through the bush to the bikes. The dogs hear us coming and are waiting at the fence, noses through the wire and tails wagging.
*
We’re eating lunch by the waterfall. We’ve checked the vault and filled in the logs. It all seems good. I’m sitting propped against a tree. Ela is sitting close, leaning against me.
The only sound is water falling into the pool. The air has a silver sheen to it. A damp smell of leaf mould and moisture rises from the ground.
“What’s your house like?” I ask. Ela is warm, soft, smells good. I’m having pleasant thoughts about the spare bed in Jacob’s house. It’s still unmade after Ela pulled it apart the other night. I’ve stayed at Jacob’s some nights when we’ve been working late, so I know it’s comfortable. And I’m aware of the pack of condoms in the top right-hand pocket of my Swanndri too. There are some advantages to living in a pub. The steady flow of contraband is one.
“Why?” asks Ela.
“You know all about my life. You’ve met my mother, seen me working, asked nosey questions. I know nothing about you except you’re still at school and want to be a doctor.” I lean over her, find another sandwich and pull her closer.
“I don’t know,” she says. “New. Big. It’s twenty storeys up. You should see the kitchen, it’s huge.”
“What’s your room like?”
“Untidy.”
“No kidding?” I take a bite of my sandwich. A piece of crust falls off. “You’ve got crumbs in your hair.” I blow them away.
Ela giggles and looks up at me. “Mary, our housekeeper, makes the bed and does a bit of dusting. Keeping it tidy is my job.”
“But you don’t bother?”
“No, that’s how I rebel.”
“A real rebel. Who are your friends?”
“Isabelle’s my best friend. She lives just down the road.”
“What about Amon? Is he your boyfriend?” She doesn’t answer. Perhaps the spare bed in Jacob’s house isn’t as close as I thought. “What is he?”
“An ex sort of a friend. Like Katie is.” The spare bed comes back in view. Ela snuggles in deeper and lays her head on my shoulder. I plant a kiss on her neck, nice curve. I keep asking questions.
“Do you play any sport?”
“No. Elite girls don’t do sport. We’re ‘Sweet and Elite’.”
“Why the running gear then?”
Ela giggles again. “Because it looks good.” She’s right there. But after the Egan incident, I don’t think that’s exactly true.
“What do you do when you don’t come to Jacob’s?” I ask, stroking her hair.
“In summer we swim, surf, water ski, fish.”
“What about winter?”
“Sometimes we go skiing. Sometimes Mum takes me out of school, and we travel to Europe or Africa or America. Travelling gets boring.”
“Poor little Elite.” I stretch a bit, move away a bit, turn around and lie on my back with my head in her lap. I lie there quietly, her hand on my chest, my head on her legs.
Ela, looks down, examines me in the shadowy light. “Why do the Willises dislike you so much?” she asks after a while.
“Not everyone likes me.”
“It has to be more than that.”
“We’ve got a bit of history.”
Ela brushes the hair down over my eyes, like she’s testing how it would look. She studies the no eye effect. “It makes you look like a sheep dog,” she says. I push the hair back, so I can see. She gives up on the sheepdog look. “What history?” she asks.
“We had a run in last year, a bit the same as at Scott’s place.” I look up at her and she nods. Her hair falls forward, and I push it back. “I went to a party and walked into a room, and they were having a threesome. It was like they were trying to make a porn movie with no camera. Charlie’s with Katie, with Henry telling him what to do. She’s making it clear she doesn’t want to be there. It was a really bad situation. So, I told them to leave her alone.”
“And they did?” Ela asks.
“I was pretty persuasive. Anyway, Katie went to Fitzgerald and laid a complaint against them. They were charged with assault. Their mum paid for a big shot lawyer, so they didn’t go to jail. But Jacob thinks Vector got to them. He thinks they had to make a deal, act as informers or go to jail. It was probably them that dobbed Lucinda in. They get their breakfast pies from her mum’s dairy every day, they would have seen her.”
“And they blame you for getting them in trouble?”
“Yeah, especially after I started to go out with Katie.”
“But you don’t go out with her anymore?”
“No. She wants to be friends now. I think she just went out with me because she was grateful.”
Ela strokes my hair again. “Do you ever look in a mirror?”
“Sheepdogs don’t need mirrors.”
Ela giggles again, then goes back to the Willis topic. “If the Willises hate you why do they drink in your mum’s pub?”
“I don’t know. To prove they can, or maybe because they’ve been banned from everywhere else.”
“Henry and Charlie aren’t very nice?”
“I think they’re dangerous, just haven’t reached their full potential yet,” I say. I stay quiet for a while. Then Ela leans forward like she’s going to unlace her boots. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going for a swim.” I sit up, and she takes off the boots. She puts them and the socks on the grass and stands up.
“I thought you were supposed to wait for an hour after eating.” I lean my elbows on my knees and watch her. Swimming wasn’t in my plans.
“No. Mum says that’s a myth.” She walks across to the pool.
I guessed as much when I was about ten. I always thought that rule had more to do with Mum and Dad not wanting to get off the picnic rug than any concern for my health.
“Come on. It won’t hurt you.”
She takes her Swanndri off and lays it on the ferns near the waterfall.
“I didn’t bring a towel.” I lean back on the tree, cross my legs, fold my arms, and keep watching her.
“Use your shirt.” She unzips her jeans, pushes them down her legs and steps out of them. I’m not sure if she is moving slowly or if my brain speeds up, but suddenly everything is happening in slow motion. I figure she’s prepared. Has a bikini on under those clothes. Her family have swum here forever.
She crosses her arms, picks up the hem of her t-shirt, and lifts it over her head. A white bikini, and those Chinese factories use even less fabric for bikinis.
If she looked good in clothes, she looks great out of them. She drops the t-shirt on the Swanndri and jeans.
“Are you coming?” she asks.
Quite likely. Everything about her flares and curves and hollows in the right way. She’s beautiful, standing there, the waterfall behind her, the filtered light making her body glow. She reaches her arms up, gathers her hair on the top of her head, twists and knots it the way girls do. Curls escape and sit around her cheeks. She looks at me and smiles. Beautiful lips.
“Too slow.” She turns back to the pool and dives in.
*
Making love to someone for the first time, outside, in the bush by a waterfall on a pile of clothes on a layer of ferns beats an unmade bed in the guest bedroom any day. And as we lie there together, breast to chest, hip to hip, thigh to thigh, I touch her face, and her lips. Run my fingers along her arm. Watch her eyes watching mine.
And it’s like…
It’s like I’m seeing her for the first time.
I’ve known her all my life.
But not this way.
Not like this.
And it’s like…
I’m hers…
She’s mine… Forever.
Never had a moment like that with Katie.
Chapter 22
LATE AFTERNOON, me and Ela are lying on her bed. She must have decided I can be trusted because as soon as we get to her room, she takes the thumb drive off the necklace.
“It’s lucky my Tablet’s old. There aren’t too many Tablets left with a USB port.”
She undoes the chain, slides the memory stick off it and removes the cap. She sits on her bed, slides the stick into the USB port and the Vid file opens. The small icon spreads out, slowly the hologram forms, and there’s her dad. It’s like seeing a ghost except he looks real. He reaches over, adjusts the focus on the ImageMaker, then smiles directly at us.
He pauses for a while as if he’s thinking about what to say and then starts to speak.
“Hi, Ela.” He pauses, smiles sadly. “If you’re watching this I guess I’ve missed all the years it’s taken for you to grow up. But I can imagine how you look. Tall and slim like your mother, but with my colouring, the grey eyes and black hair. Am I right?”
Ela bites her lip, close to tears. It feels weird that her father looks just like he did six years ago.
He reads the notes he has in his hand.
“I’m in hiding. I don’t think it’ll be safe to try and see you or your mother again, so I’m leaving you this message. I know your mum will have done what we planned, and so you’ve grown up in the City. It’s the only way to keep you safe. But she has promised to make sure you keep in contact with Jacob.”
Her dad looks down at the notes again.
“In the next few days,” he says when he looks up, “either I’ll escape and go to Australia where Mike Fraser is. He was lucky he got out in time. Or I’ll be dead. I don’t have time to explain it all, just some of it. If there’s anything you don’t understand, ask your grandad.
“I don’t know what they will have taught you about the history of the Quarantine, but in 2025 when the UN closed New Zealand to the rest of the world, they said it was to protect the population. We were one of the few countries in the world still able to have children. There had been stories of children being snatched and smuggled away.
“The Quarantine seemed like a good thing. Nothing would be allowed to contaminate New Zealand. The UN put an Elite team of researchers, doctors and administrators into the country to assist our scientists and keep us safe. That’s how I met your mum. She was part of that team, and I was a research scientist already working on what had happened. I hoped we could stop it happening to us.
“At first the Quarantine worked, The Commissioner oversaw our protection, and the population lived in peace. I thought the Quarantine would give my team time to discover why we could still have children when no one else could. But the answer eluded us.
“Your mother and I married. We gave up our work and went to live on the farm with your grandfather. Then you were born. We hadn’t thought it would be possible because your mother is Elite, and no Elite female had given birth for nearly ten years. But we had a beautiful baby girl.
“I started to look at all the things that might’ve made it possible for your mother to conceive when no other Elite could.
“At about that time, Commissioner Leblanc replaced the old Commissioner, and the Quarantine changed. A barrier was built around the City where the Administration was based. The UN Team became ‘the Elite’. The Vector Guards were given more power, and after a while the rules imposed on us became more and more difficult to live with. We’d been taken over. We were prisoners in our own country. Some of us started to fight back, but any resistance was handled brutally and efficiently. I worked against the Administration, and it has brought me to here, a fugitive who probably won’t survive tonight.
“Ela, go to the farm and talk to Jacob. He knows what happened. But be careful. Commissioner Leblanc is in league with Eugenics Corp. I think he may be one of the owners. TransSeed and Humicrib are subsidiaries of the Eugenics Corp Empire. Eugenics Corp is rich and powerful and ruthless. Its wealth is tied to Genus 6, and you are the proof there is a solution to the problems caused by Genus 6. You are the answer.”
Suddenly there is a loud noise, a crashing, and her dad looks behind him then back at her.
“There’s no more time. I have to go. Remember how much I love you and your mother. I wish things were different. Take care.”
Her dad reaches forward. He turns the ImageMaker off, fades back and disappears until all that is left is a small square icon on the screen of the Tablet.
“Nothing has changed from the last time I watched it.” Ela touches the screen, and slowly the icon grows and becomes her father again. We watch the message three times before she shuts it off, takes the memory stick out, puts the cover back on, finds the silver chain lying beside the Tablet and slides the thumb drive onto it.
I guess it hasn’t made her dad come back; he’s still stuck there in the message. She hangs the chain around her neck.
I’m a bit disappointed too. “Not a lot about my dad, but it sounds like what Jacob said is true. They were working together, doing something to fight against the Administration.” I lie on my back, link my fingers under my head, cross my socks, look up at the ceiling, think about something her dad said. “That’s what this is all about,” I say.
“What’s what all about?”
“All this stuff about Genus 6, and you being the proof and the answer.”
“I don’t get it.” She leans on her elbow supporting her chin with her hand.
I brush the hair back off her face. “Do you know how babies are made?”
“By Humicrib,” says Ela.
Is she serious? “And your mother’s a doctor?” I give her a bit of an eye roll. “Did your mum have ‘the talk’ with you?” I ask, sort of edging towards something.
“What talk?” She’s still puzzled.
I get to the point. “Do you have sex education at your school?”
“Yes, it’s like a history lesson. ‘This is how people used to make babies, isn’t it disgusting?’” Ela imitates the sound of a voice over on a Vid.
That’s funny, and we all thought the Elite kids must hump like bunnies, the way the girls dress, and because no one can get pregnant.
Maybe they don’t have sex all the time. Ela hadn’t.
“Don’t laugh,” Ela says. “That’s what they teach us. ‘Humicrib babies are better. Genes shouldn’t be allowed to select themselves.’ Blah blah blah. Elite don’t even hug or kiss. Remember it’s been nearly thirty years since an Elite had a baby.”
“Except your mum, she did,” I say.
“Did what?”
“You’re a Natural. She had a baby.” Talk about having to state the obvious.
“Okay,” says Ela slowly.
Then I talk slowly too, sort of thinking it through as I’m talking. “Your mum and dad were living with Jacob when your mum got pregnant. Everything Jacob eats he grows himself. Maybe it is all about the food. The effects of Genus 6 can be reversed if you don’t eat the food with the progesterone in.”
Ela thinks about that. “It could be true,” she says after a while. “All the food in the City is imported. It’s sort of logical. Do you think your mum knows? Do you think that’s why she was so angry the other night?”
“It doesn’t take much to upset my mum.” Then my Com flashed. “Fraser,” I say.
“It’s Nick,” says the Com. “Where are you?”
“At home. Where are you?”
“Outside. I’m coming up.”
“Okay.” I roll off the bed, put the Com back in my jeans pocket. And me and Ela go to the kitchen to wait for Nick,
Nick appears a few minutes later. “Is your mum here?” he asks.
“Nah, just me and Ela. Mum’s still working.” I fill the kettle. “What are you doing here?”
“Curley’s found out where they’re keeping Lucinda.” Nick runs his fingers through his hair looking anxiou
s.
“Where?”
“At the Outpost like we thought. There’s a lock-up at the back of the infirmary.”
I know what’s coming next. Nick and Joe are going to want to go and get her. They’re going to want my help. I’m not too sure how I feel about it. I feel sorry for Lucinda and Joe, the way it has worked out, but I don’t think I want to risk getting shot.
“What did Fitzgerald say?” Maybe Fitzgerald is coordinating this.
One look at Nick’s face and I know that was wishful thinking. Fitzgerald isn’t part of this. I open the fridge and get out a jug of milk.
Nick pulls out a chair and sits down at the table. His hair gets another combing. “Nah, we’re not telling him. Joe thinks Fitzgerald won’t do anything. What’s one more girl to Fitzgerald? He’d just say leave it to the people who know what they’re doing.”
“Doesn’t sound like a bad idea to me.” I’m cautious. Since the Egan debacle, and Scott’s house, I’m trying to be careful. I get three mugs out of the cupboard. “Vector shoots stray Locals if they find them at the Outpost.”
Nick picks up a pen Mum left lying on the table and draws a few squiggles on the shopping list. “Well, Joe says he’s going to get her out himself no matter what anyone else decides. I’m going with him. Are you in?”
I put the mugs on the bench in a straight line and think about this rescue idea. There’s plenty against it.
Ela’s watching Nick and me and is looking keen to be part of his plan. But we can’t take her with us again. We nearly got caught last time. Some babysitter I am, but she’s not going to take too well to being left behind. And Jacob and Fitzgerald have just decided I’m responsible, and here we are thinking about doing something that’s going to fire up Vector like you wouldn’t believe.
“Who else have you got?” I ask, giving myself time to think. The jug is jiggling and steaming then it clicks as it turns itself off.
Ela goes to the pantry, gets the tin of chocolate off the shelf and gives it to me.
“Scott and Curley.” Nick’s watching me put the chocolate into the three mugs.
“Five of us, some more use than others.”