Shame. It would have been nice to know there were children left in the world.
The girl’s red eyes scanned the trees. Hunter froze into stillness. The Vay could hear the beat of a swallow’s wings; yes, and seize it midflight too and gulp it down in one bite. Or they might just let it go. There was no telling with the Vay. They had little or no feelings of compassion, and they were as curious as monkeys, but a great deal more intelligent. But compassion or no, they had excellent hearing. Hunter pressed into the branch and tried to still the thumping of his heart.
The boy tugged on the girl’s hand, let’s go, and the girl smiled, showing Vay teeth, and walked on.
Eventually Hunter dared to move. Cautiously, he lifted the radio to his lips. Problem: these things began with a burst of static and the girl would be sure to hear it. But just then a wind gusted through the canopy, sending leaves flying and smothering the sound.
“Activate Gingerbread,” Hunter whispered. “I say again, activate Gingerbread.”
“Roger,” replied Controller. “How many? Over.”
“Two. Male and Female. Children. Over.”
A pause. “Children? You’re sure?”
“Male about eight, female about ten years? Twelve?” It had been a while since he’d seen a child.
Another pause.
“Controller? Come in.”
“Sorry. Yes. Roger, I mean. Gingerbread it is.”
Hunter slid down from the tree. It was possible there were child Vay, although they’d never been seen before. But what worried him was the way the boy had clung to his sister’s hand. The way he’d held onto her – he had looked almost like a human child. And she had held his hand as though she cared for him. But the Vay, caring? They didn’t care for anyone, not even other Vay.
The Vay had arrived, if arrived was the right word, nearly seven years back. At first they had been described as curiosities, odd sightings in out-of-the-way places of red-eyed people with a vicious hunger. But all too quickly, the numbers spread. An air-borne virus, a mosquito-mediated infection, a man-made nightmare; these were all theories. No one really knew the cause. All that was known was that a person might go to bed a Normal, only to wake with those eyes and an inexplicable hunger.
Hunter slipped through the woods, following as close as he dared. Would the trap work?
It was Controller who had organized the traps. Better to have information, she argued, than a life of fear. Privately, Hunter thought traps were a waste of time – who in their right mind wanted a live Vay? But still, he went along with it. After all, what else did he have to do?
With the wind came the forest scents: damp earth, decaying leaves, animal scat. And something different. Fruity, spicy, and enticing. Like fresh baking, all warm butter and ginger and cinnamon. The smell of home, of her mother’s cooking. When she breathed it in, Christine felt dizzy. It was like drowning.
“Christine? What’s wrong?”
“That smell.” She almost moaned. “It’s like baking.” She half-smiled. “You remember how Mom made ginger cookies? You remember? Before?”
Dylan closed his eyes, tried to think. “She put them on a rack to cool. On the bench. She covered them with a towel.”
She hugged him. Dylan really was amazing, remembering things from Before – he was so small then.
Christine’s life was split into “Before” and “After”.
“Before” had: No Vay. Dad. School. Mom’s baking. Dylan, aged two. Running, laughing.
“After” had: No Dad. Feeling yucky. Jeremy. Mom in the lab, then not there at all. No baking. Vay.
Christine preferred Before.
“That’s what I can smell. Ginger Cookies.” Christine looked around. “Perhaps there’s a Normal camp here?”
“They won’t like us.” They, being the Normals. The untouched ones.
“They’ll like you. Perhaps they’ll give you a cookie.” Dylan’s eyes lit up. “If you ask nicely.”
Hand in hand, the children walked on, following the scent of gingerbread. “Do you remember …” they asked each other as they walked. It was their favorite game. The color of the walls in the dining room. The make of Mom’s car. Dad’s shoes. Mom’s apple pie. The smell of Mom’s lab, her white coat. The mobile in Dylan’s bedroom, the stuffed toys in Christine’s. They didn’t talk about Jeremy. He meant well, Christine knew that now, but still, she didn’t like what he’d done. And he hadn’t liked her, not at all. Which wasn’t fair, because it wasn’t her fault she was Vay.
Dylan tugged on her hand. “Remember Finding Nemo?”
Christine smiled. “Yeah!”
“I like Dory best,” said Dylan.
Christine liked Bruce, the shark who was trying not to eat other fish. She could relate to Bruce.
The trees opened into a clearing. Before them stood an old building with an arched doorframe. There was no door in the archway, just darkness.
“Christine,” Dylan whispered.
The ginger scent was strong here, almost overpowering. She stopped. Something was wrong.
“What is it?”
Christine heard the net before it fell. She pushed Dylan back, so hard that he stumbled. Too slow. A fine mesh fell from the tree above. Then, quite abruptly, it lifted, taking her with it. Christine was suspended in a net cage, hanging in midair. The net twisted in the wind, twirling until she felt dizzy. She looked down at Dylan, standing below, with his mouth open. If she fixed her eyes on him she didn’t feel quite as sick.
“Christine!” he wailed.
She bit at the fabric with her sharp Vay teeth, but it wouldn’t give.
Normals! This was a Normal trap!
“Dylan! Run!”
The Vay didn’t use nets. They just pounced and cut or stabbed or pulled things apart. She had seen them do it to people, and once to a Vay with a broken leg. It wasn’t personal, it was just because they were hungry or because it was the most sensible way to deal with an injury. They would do the same to Dylan if she lived with them. That’s why she couldn’t live in the colony with the other Vay.
A Normal, dressed in green and brown and carrying a bow and arrow, stepped from the undergrowth. He wore a khaki-colored mask across his face. He whistled and another Normal, smaller, joined him. They peered up at Christine, held fast in the net cage, then at Dylan, still sobbing beneath.
The smaller Normal, her voice amazed, said, “I thought you said they were Vay.” Crouching down, she put a hand on Dylan’s shoulder. “Ssh, child. Ssh. You’re safe now.”
Dylan looked up at Christine, eyes filled with tears. “Christine!”
The man slipped the mask off his face, stared up at Christine. Beneath the mask his dark skin was stippled with sweat. “He isn’t. But she is.”
The woman looked up. “Oh my. Is that even possible?”
Christine glared at the two Normals, and the strong hand holding her brother. “Don’t hurt him.”
The Normals looked at each other. Then: “If you come quietly,” said the woman, “we’ll not hurt him.”
In the confusion of the net and being hoisted into the air, she’d almost forgotten about the gingerbread smell. She sniffed. It had gone.
Dylan watched her taste the air. “Do you have cookies?” he asked the man.
The man looked surprised, and the woman began to laugh. “Gingerbread,” she said, still laughing. “Of course we were going to catch kids.”
The man glared at her.
“Stop looking at me like that, Hunter. Don’t you read your fairytales?”
“There’s no cookies then?” Dylan sounded disappointed.
Hunter swiped at the net with a knife, and plop, Christine dropped from the air. She somersaulted as she fell, landing on her feet. But the man, Hunter, was upon her, knife at her neck. “That’s enough, girly-girl.”
“I’m sorry, hun,” said the woman. “We don’t have cookies. But we do have bread. Do you like bread?”
Dylan gasped, a sound that spoke louder than any
words. He looked at Christine, wide-eyed. “Can we?”
Slowly, careful of the knife, Christine nodded. She didn’t trust these people, but they had food and Dylan would be safe. That was the main thing; that Dylan would be safe.
Chapter Three
Safety is a Poisoned Cage
Hunter put Christine in a cage. He told her it had once been used for dogs, but Controller spread a thick layer of hay on the floor, so it was almost comfortable. There wasn’t room to stand up, but she could lie down flat. Christine tried to pretend that it was fun to have her own room all to herself, but Dylan wasn’t fooled, and started to cry.
The Normals lived in this huge open space, so large she could barely see the roof. There were hundreds of people, walking about or sitting in small groups, chatting. There was a fire, all red and gold. Its smoke drifted up to the ceiling, spreading like a gray fog.
She and Dylan, half hidden by arches, were in a corner, away from the main groups. This suited her, stuck behind bars like this; she didn’t want Normals poking sticks at her, like some people had done with animals at the zoo.
“It’s alright,” the woman said to Dylan. “We won’t hurt her.”
The woman’s name was Controller, a weird-sounding name, more like a job. Like Bus Driver or Policeman. Christine had told Dylan about buses and police. Dylan thought she was making it all up, until she showed him the pictures in the book as proof. Perhaps she had it wrong, perhaps these books were about people called Bus Driver. This worried her, that she was telling Dylan things that weren’t right. It was important that Dylan knew what the world had really been like. It had been a world where Mom made ginger cookies and where you could get on a bus and go places, any place you wanted to, and not have to walk.
This place stunk of Normals. People, their stink and sweat; food; unwashed bedding. Off to one side were the latrines, she could smell them, too. For a moment she thought she might be sick.
Controller squatted beside Dylan. “What’s your name?”
Dylan looked up at her with his wide blue eyes, oh Christine knew that baby-blue gaze, like he was a cute little boy. He could pull that look real well; he always got out of trouble with it. “Can we have the bread?”
“Sure.” Controller waved at a woman beside the fireplace. “Hey there, anything for a hungry kid?”
The woman brought a loaf of bread over, set it beside Controller. “Here you go,” she said, “fresh bake.” She looked curiously at Christine.
The moist yeasty smell was almost overwhelming. Christine stretched full length on her stomach, and stared at the golden crust. Steam rose from it. Lines had been cut along the crust, as though for decoration. Why would anyone need to make it more beautiful? It was bread – beautiful in itself. Her mouth filled with saliva. She swallowed.
Controller turned to her. “You want some too?”
The serving woman glared at the other Normal. “You feeding a Vay?”
“She’s my sister,” Dylan said. “Her name is Christine.”
The server had a badge on her chest. It said Baker. “You’re kidding.”
Dylan shook his head, and did his cute little boy smile at the woman. “Please? Can she have some? We’re awful hungry.”
Baker blinked. “Okay. I guess it’s okay to feed her. Just don’t you let her out.”
“I’m Dylan,” Dylan announced, as Controller cut two slices of bread from the steaming loaf.
“Thank you!” hissed Christine.
“Thank you,” Dylan added.
Baker’s eyes went round as plates. “Did I just hear a Vay teach manners?”
Hunter came around the corner, settled beside Controller.
“She better keep being a well-behaved little Vay,” Hunter said grimly, “or we’ll skin her alive.”
His face was forbidding. Christine shrank into the corner, as far from his as possible.
Dylan’s lower lip stuck out and two big tears slipped down his cheeks. He put down his piece of bread.
“Hunter!” Controller sounded irritated. “Why did you need to upset the kid?”
“She’s not one of us,” Hunter said flatly. “Don’t forget that. She’d be at your throat if she could.”
Christine shook her head, no-no-no. “I don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
But she couldn’t answer, not with those hard eyes staring at her and his knife tap-tapping the cage.
“Christine doesn’t eat people,” Dylan announced.
Baker gathered up the platter, but left the loaf and the knife.
Hunter stared at him. “You sure about that?”
Dylan nodded. Helping himself to another piece of bread, Dylan shoved it into his mouth and chewed noisily. His manners! Christine wanted to say something, to remind him to be polite, it was important to be polite, that’s what Mom always said, but Hunter’s knife scraped along the metal bars of her cage and stopped her tongue.
“Why doesn’t she, hun?” Controller asked.
Controller was nicer than Hunter, or perhaps she was pretending to be nicer. With Normals it was hard to know. Sometimes Jeremy pretended to be nice, but really he was just watching her all the time. Trying to work out her weakness, even though Mom told him to stop, to leave her alone.
Christine pushed the bread into her mouth, chewed steadily, with her mouth closed to show the adults that at least one of them had manners.
Dylan shrugged. “Cos of me.”
Hunter looked surprised. “Because you don’t like it?”
Christine swallowed. The bread filled her stomach in a way that nuts didn’t.
Dylan nodded, then shook his head as if to say that was partly right, but not quite the correct answer. “I asked her not to.”
“No you didn’t,” Christine said.
“Yeah, I did.”
“You asked me not to kill squirrels.”
Dylan looked at her. “And people. Don’t you remember? I said: Don’t kill squirrels and people.”
“Oh.” Christine looked away. He was trying to send her a message. Dylan did that sometimes, and it was confusing, because his smell didn’t match his words. He wanted her to lie! Lying wasn’t something Vay did, what was the point, but it was common for Normals. Jeremy had done it all the time. Mom hadn’t seemed to notice, but Christine could tell.
“That’s right,” she said. “Squirrels and people.”
“So can she come out of the cage?” Dylan asked, little-boy-blue eyes wide.
Controller laughed. Even Hunter smiled.
“Sorry, kiddo,” the man said. “Not about to trust your lovely sister. Or you, for that matter.”
Dylan put his lip out.
“No sense in crying at me,” Hunter said. “Ain’t going to change my mind.”
“But you can sleep next to her, though,” Controller said hastily. “Will that be okay? I can make you up a bed, right here.”
Dylan nodded, but he still looked sad.
“It’s okay.” Christine put a hand through the cage, touched her brother’s shoulder. “Really. They’re right. It’s safer this way.”
Hunter looked surprised.
Controller introduced them to two more Normals: Guard One and Guard Two. Guard One was a tall man with dark eyes and a heavy frown. Guard Two was a woman. Christine couldn’t see what colour her eyes were because the woman wouldn’t look at her.
The guards wore bow and quivers full of arrows across their shoulders. Thick, heavy-looking clubs swung from their belts and knives stuck into black scabbards strapped to their thighs. Their clothes were dark, so they seemed to blend into the night.
Controller stood beside the cage. “They’ll take you to the washrooms. You know, let you do your business.” She handed Guard One, the man, a square of fabric and a strong-smelling white square. “Soap,” Controller said, in answer to Christine’s stare.
Christine shook her head. “No soap. Thank you.”
“You sure?”
“It’s the smell.” Chr
istine wasn’t sure why she had to explain this to Controller, but it seemed important not to be ungrateful. She wanted Controller to think of her as a person, with manners, not an animal who could be killed at any moment.
Controller nodded, and with a jangle of keys, unlocked the cage door. She hesitated, then jerked her chin at the guards. “Look after her. She could be important.”
Christine crept slowly from the cage. It was good to stand tall and stretch.
The guards said nothing, just tied her hands together. They didn’t look at Christine, didn’t acknowledge her at all. They smelt of nervousness and anger. They wanted to kill her.
The man grabbed Christine’s elbow. “Come on.”
Guard Two’s fingers tightened on her club. She said nothing.
“My name is Christine,” she announced, as they walked along. Well, she was shuffling; they’d tied her feet together, too. Not too tight, there was enough slack to walk. The guards said nothing in reply, but the smell of their fear and alertness grew.
They moved into the open area, where the fires and the people were. It was warm here, warmer than Christine had felt for a long time, since she left the Colony. In the Colony they didn’t have fires; they used body heat. Like animals in a burrow. Unless it was real cold, like it could be in winter, then they might light fires, perhaps. She hadn’t been there in winter. She hadn’t been there long at all, because of Dylan.
“HEY!” An unshaven Normal staggered toward Christine and the guards. “That’s a Vay. Chrissakes, a frigging VAY.”
Heads turned.
The male guard stepped toward the unshaven man. “Take her,” he growled to Guard Two.
The woman grabbed Christine by an arm, pushed her into an alcove. The darkness hid them.
Without warning, Guard One punched the unshaven man hard, in the gut. He folded, squealing. The guard propped him up and glared at the crowd of men about the fire. “Nothing to see, folks.” There was a warning in his voice.
Upon a Time Page 10