by Justin D'Ath
‘Can you bring lots more food?’ he asked it. ‘I need to eat heaps to become strong again.’
The animal stared at him for a few moments, just as it had when they first met on the ledge under the wharf. Almost as if it was thinking.
Did rats think?
All family help, it said finally, then it turned and went scuttling off into the darkness.
What family? Colt wondered.
He didn’t have to wonder for long. His superhuman hearing was normally better than Birdy’s, but Colt was still battling drowsiness, so Birdy heard it first.
‘What’s that noise?’ she whispered.
He jerked his head up and listened. Rustle, rustle, rustle. It sounded like a forest in autumn, when a warm afternoon breeze wafts through the dry yellow leaves. He and Birdy stared down the pipe in the direction of the noise. It grew steadily louder. And, perhaps because Colt was nervous, the light from his eyes grew slowly brighter, pushing back the darkness and lighting up the source of the rustling noise.
‘O.M.G!’ gasped Birdy.
It was rats – hundreds of them.
‘It’s okay,’ Colt said. ‘They’re here to help.’
It wasn’t just ghost rats this time. The majority were either dull brown, grey or sooty black. Normal rats. No doubt every last one of them carried the old rat flu virus, but Colt didn’t care. He was immune to RF1.
And he was hungry.
Every animal, regardless of its colour, brought something in its little toothy mouth. There were more pizza leftovers and more apple cores; there were old, curled-up crusts of bread, slimy ribbons of pasta, dried out french fries, half-eaten biscuits, the discarded pickle from a soyburger, pumpkin seeds, fish heads, the spiky end of a pineapple and several grit-covered lumps of what looked suspiciously like second-hand chewing gum.
Birdy cowered, covering her face, while the rats heaped their offerings around Colt’s legs and lower body then went scuttling back the way they’d come.
‘Thanks, guys,’ he said.
Thanks rat, said the white one that could talk, dropping a stick of limp celery next to his right elbow. Become strong.
Colt nodded. That was the idea. ‘Birdy, I need you to feed me again.’
She peeked out from behind her hands. When she saw the mounting pile of scraps that now covered half of Colt’s body, she nearly gagged. ‘You can’t possibly eat that – it’s garbage!’
‘It’s food,’ he said.
‘Maybe for rats,’ Birdy said. ‘Not for people.’
But Colt wasn’t an ordinary person. And he’d eaten rat food before. Proper rat food – the kind that scientists used to feed to laboratory rats back in the Animal Days. James had given it to him. James, the mysterious scientist who’d discovered Enzyme-C. Who had come to the wharf to save Birdy’s life, not knowing that his discovery had already saved her. Who’d been wrestled to the ground by rat cops, security officers and police, and who had probably been arrested for his efforts. Colt had to find him. His mother wanted them to get in contact with each other. It was the last thing she’d said to him on the phone, so it must have been important.
A big brown rat was about to drop a soggy piece of Kentucky Fried Tofu next to his left hand. Colt wiggled his thumb to get its attention.
‘Can you understand me?’
‘Of course I can understand you,’ Birdy said.
‘Not you, this rat near my hand.’
It was looking up at him, its black whiskers twitching.
‘If you can understand me, brown rat,’ Colt said, speaking slowly and clearly, ‘please bring the food up to my mouth.’
And he opened it, to make his meaning clear.
The rat came scurrying up his arm and popped the piece of KFT into his mouth.
Behind him, Birdy made a gagging sound and turned her face away. ‘That settles it, Colt Lawless. I am so not ever going to be your girlfriend!’
Colt chewed quickly and swallowed. ‘Suits me,’ he said. ‘I actually prefer blondes.’
After about fifty more rats had followed the brown rat’s example, Colt felt strong enough to feed himself. Some of the scraps smelt a bit iffy – the fish heads, for example – so he left them for the rats, but most were okay. It wasn’t long before the entire pile was gone. He was a fast eater.
Is enough? asked the talking ghost rat.
Colt flexed his muscles (they bulged), then rolled over onto his hands and knees. ‘I reckon,’ he said. ‘Can you show us how to get out of here?’
Follow us.
The animal turned and scurried off along the pipe.
‘It wants us to follow it,’ Colt said for Birdy’s benefit.
She nodded. ‘I kind of guessed that, Doctor Dolittle.’
They crawled off after the rat. It led them to a square concrete chamber about the size of a fridge, with pipes leading off in four directions. There was a fifth pipe overhead. It was vertical, like a chimney. Rusty iron rungs were set into the pitted concrete. At the top, only about two metres above their heads when Colt and Birdy stood up, was a round steel manhole cover with slots in it. Pale strips of daylight shone through.
The rat went scampering up the rungs, jump, jump, jump, and squeezed through one of the slots. A moment later, its pointy head reappeared in the gap, peering back down.
Is it coming?
‘I’m on my way.’
Colt climbed the rungs until he was just below the slotted cover. Placing his hands flat on the big metal disk, he pushed upwards. It rose with a protesting creak of metal-on-metal, then tipped out onto the street above.
CLANG!
Colt poked his head up through the hole. He was in a narrow alley. There were no footpaths, just tall brick buildings on either side. A light glowed behind the grimy pane of an upstairs window, but nobody was looking out. It was barely daylight. Colt climbed up into the alley and Birdy followed him out.
‘Where did the rat go?’ she asked.
Colt turned a full circle. No rat. ‘That’s strange.’
Then he heard a quick intake of breath behind him. ‘Oh no!’ Birdy whispered.
A small, hairless tail poked out from under the upturned manhole cover. Dreading what he was about to see, Colt bent and lifted the heavy iron disk off the road.
For a few moments, neither of them spoke. Birdy slipped one arm around his waist.
‘It was an accident, Colt.’
Accident or not, the friendly ghost rat was dead. And it was Colt’s fault. He carried its limp, still-warm body over to the side of the alley, where there was a half wine barrel with a miniature citrus tree growing in it. Scooping out a shallow grave, he buried the rat in the cool, dry soil.
‘I wonder why it was helping us?’ he said sadly.
Birdy didn’t answer. She was looking up the alley, where a street crossed at right angles.
‘Someone’s coming!’ she hissed.
There wasn’t time to hide. A teenage girl and a boy of about eight, both wearing surgical masks, came strolling around the corner into the alley. The girl carried a carton of soy milk and a virtual newspaper. The boy, who must have been her little brother, was swinging a loaf of bread in a recycled envirobag. They froze when they saw Colt and Birdy. The girl’s mouth dropped open. Her eyes flicked down to the VN, then back up to Colt and Birdy.
‘It’s them!’ she cried.
Dropping the VN and the soy milk, she grabbed her little brother’s arm and dragged him back around the corner. Running footsteps pounded off into the distance.
‘What was that about?’ asked Birdy.
Colt darted forward and picked up the VN. Shashlik! He and Birdy were breaking news. A five-second holovid of their escape from the ambulance was playing in continuous loop across the virtual front page. Above it was a flashing 3D headline:
CONTAGIOUS!
He showed it to Birdy, whose eyebrows shot up.
‘Who took the holovid?’ she asked.
‘Probably that helidrone we saw.’ Colt gl
anced nervously up at the sky. ‘Anyway, we’d better get out of here before those kids call the rat cops.’
DoRFE’s emergency number was printed right below the holovid, along with the promise of a $10,000 reward for anyone who assisted in Colt and Birdy’s capture.
‘They make us sound like wanted criminals,’ Birdy said.
Colt picked up the milk carton. The top had split open and white bubbles came oozing out. ‘More like public enemies,’ he said.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked, watching him widen the split in the carton.
‘What does it look like?’
‘But that’s not ours.’
‘They won’t want it now,’ he said, glugging down half a litre of soy milk. He offered the rest to Birdy. ‘Here, have some.’
She took two steps backwards – as if the carton was full of scorpions. ‘No way!’
‘What’s wrong? It’s only milk.’
‘I don’t want to catch your rat germs!’
Colt rolled his eyes. But there wasn’t time to argue. ‘Come on, then. Let’s go.’
They ran back down the alley past the manhole and the half wine barrel where the ghost rat was buried. Colt was carrying the VN and the opened carton of soy milk, and holding up his saggy pyjama bottoms. Birdy had both hands free. Her wet nightie slapped against her legs as she ran. She looked scared. Colt was scared, too, but at least he was feeling strong and wide awake. All that rat food (germs or not) had done its job.
They came to another intersecting street. It was wider than the alley and had footpaths on both sides. They stopped at the corner and peered cautiously both ways. Most of the shops weren’t open yet, but a woman wearing a pale purple sarong and a surgical mask was putting buckets of fresh flowers on a ledge outside a florist’s. They waited until she’d gone inside, then darted across the street and continued down the alley. Colt kept looking back over his shoulder. The girl must have had a phone. Would she call her parents first, or the rat cops?
The alley ended at a T-intersection. The cross street was busier than the last one. Several people were getting out of their cars and going into buildings. Everyone wore surgical masks. One man even wore transparent latex gloves.
Birdy was out of breath. ‘Which way?’ she puffed.
Colt didn’t know. He looked over his shoulder once more. The alley was empty all the way to the other end. They’d been lucky so far. But even if the girl hadn’t reported them, how long could two kids in pyjamas go unnoticed in a crowded city? Two kids who were breaking news, whose 3D images were probably being viewed on a million virtual newspapers, holovision screens and personal devices at that very moment? Two kids with a $10,000 reward on their heads?
A siren whooped. They held their breaths as a police car shot across an intersection two blocks down.
‘That way,’ said Colt, pointing in the other direction.
They hurried barefoot down the footpath, bent over, keeping their heads lower than the roofs of the parked cars. A taxi came slowly along the street and stopped on the other side. They froze next to a van. Colt heard a woman asking the driver if he accepted Virtual Money.
‘Whoops-a-daisy!’ said another voice.
An old man on a mobility glider had come swooping out of an arcade and nearly crashed into Birdy. He’d slammed on the jet-brakes so hard that two oranges fell out of a shopping bag in the basket on the front.
‘Sorry,’ said Birdy, picking them up.
The man smiled. He was the first person they’d seen who wasn’t wearing a surgical mask. ‘No, no, it was my fault. I’m still getting used to flying this thing.’
He looked closely at Birdy, then at Colt. ‘Have you been to a pyjama party?’
‘They’re karate outfits,’ Birdy said.
That was quick thinking, Colt thought. He did a couple of karate moves, spilling some of the soy milk.
The woman from the taxi appeared from behind the van. She asked, ‘Is everything all right here?’
‘Right as rain,’ said the old man. ‘These two karate kids were just giving me a martial arts demonstration.’
Taxi woman frowned. ‘Well, you should all be wearing your masks. Haven’t you heard of the rat flu epidemic?’
The old man waited until she’d disappeared into the arcade. ‘What a load of nonsense!’ he scoffed. ‘If the RF2 virus is as bad as they say it is, no amount of silly paper masks are going to save us.’
Birdy and Colt watched him go flying off along the footpath.
‘Do you think he’s right?’ she whispered. ‘Do you think everyone will die?’
Colt hitched up his pyjama bottoms. ‘Let’s hope not.’
Her eyes filled with tears. ‘I want to go back to the circus.’
‘Me too,’ said Colt. He wasn’t just worried about the animals, he was worried about his mother. If what the old man said was true, he might never see her again.
There was a movement in one of the office windows above the arcade. The blinds flicked open. A woman was peering down at them – it looked like taxi woman. She had a VN in one hand and a phone in the other, and she was talking flat-out.
They ran through the arcade and found themselves back in the street with the florist’s shop. The woman in the purple sarong was setting out some more flowers. This time she saw them. And recognised them, judging by the shocked expression in her eyes and the way she went racing back inside. Colt and Birdy ran off in the other direction.
Luck was with them. They didn’t encounter anybody else. And the street led down to the dock area. There was the wharf where they’d escaped from the ambulance. There was the ship that had rescued them from Plague Island.
And there, all alone in its parking spot 200 metres along from the wharf, was James’s green station wagon.
The car was locked. But one of the doors rattled when Colt tried it. It was the mismatching blue one. It must have been replaced some time from a car wrecker’s and didn’t fit in its door frame as snugly as the others. Colt pulled it a bit harder. Rattle, rattle. He flexed his muscles, then pulled a lot harder. Snap! The blue door flew open. He and Birdy jumped inside.
‘Why are we stealing a car?’ she whispered.
Colt pulled the door shut behind them and ducked down out of sight. ‘We aren’t stealing it. I can’t even drive.’
‘So why did you break in?’
‘It’s James’s car,’ he said. ‘How weird is that? I thought we’d just hide here for a bit until we work out what to do. Put your head down so nobody sees us.’
She slid down next to him in the narrow space between the front and back seats. ‘You’re really bossy, you know that?’
‘I’m just trying keep us from getting caught,’ Colt said. He drank some more soy milk. ‘Here, you must be thirsty.’
Birdy shook her head.
He sighed. ‘So I ate some food scraps that the rats brought me. That doesn’t mean I’ve got RF2.’
‘How do you know?’ she asked.
‘I’d be showing symptoms by now if I did.’
She studied his face. ‘You look a bit pale.’
‘I’m always pale,’ he said. ‘I’ve got pale skin. Here, have some milk.’
Birdy shook her head again. But he could tell she wanted some. And she must need it, he thought. When was the last time she’d eaten?
There was only one thing to do.
Before she realised what he was doing, Colt leaned across the car and planted the biggest, wettest, smackiest kiss he could on Birdy’s lips.
‘Eew!’ she cried, pulling back. She began rubbing her mouth vigorously on the damp sleeve of her nightie. ‘Gross! What did you do that for?’
‘I’ve changed my mind about blondes. We should get married.’
Birdy rolled her eyes. ‘As if. I’m only ten, Colt Lawless. That’s way too young to have a boyfriend.’
‘Yeah, I guess,’ he said, trying not to smile. ‘But now you’ve got my germs anyway, so you might as well drink some milk.’
She did.
‘What else does it say about us?’ Birdy asked.
Colt was scrunched down between the car seats, reading the VN. He couldn’t believe his eyes.
‘It says we’ve both got RF2!’
‘No way!’ said Birdy, leaning over to look.
He pointed at the article. ‘It says they did tests on the ship and the results were positive.’
‘But they didn’t do tests!’ Birdy cried. Her eyes suddenly went big. ‘Unless Hayley sneaked in while we were asleep and took blood samples?’
Colt shook his head. ‘You couldn’t take a blood sample without waking someone up – it hurts too much.’
‘You’re a pretty sound sleeper after you’ve used your superpowers,’ Birdy pointed out.
‘But I had all that food to make me strong and wide-awake again,’ he said. ‘And anyway, what about you?’
She shrugged. ‘Well, I was pretty tired after everything that happened on Plague Island.’
‘So check your arms,’ he said. ‘Look on the inside of your elbows and see if there are any needle marks.’
Birdy checked her inner elbows for puncture marks or bruising. ‘Nothing,’ she reported. ‘What about you?’
There was nothing on Colt’s inner arms, either. But that didn’t prove anything – one of his superpowers was his body’s uncanny ability to heal itself after receiving an injury. Completely heal itself! The only scars on his whole body were two tiny rat-tooth marks on his right thumb. He’d got those when he was a baby – before he had superpowers.
‘Hayley must have lied to the reporters,’ he said.
Birdy asked, ‘Why would she make up a story like that?’
‘Maybe she was covering up,’ Colt said. ‘She was supposed to take blood samples, but we tricked her and she didn’t. So maybe she just said she did so she wouldn’t get in trouble.’
‘I guess that makes sense,’ said Birdy, nodding to herself.
Colt nodded, too. ‘I just wish she’d lied the other way – said the tests proved we didn’t have rat flu, instead of the other way around.’