Vulture's Gate

by Kirsty Murray

  Suddenly, the air grew clearer and Bo signalled for Callum to stop. She could just make out a flurry of movement ahead – the Wombator.

  ‘He’s broken through.’

  She swung one leg over the bike and gestured for Callum to climb on behind her. When his arms were wrapped tightly around her waist, she revved the accelerator. The Daisy-May sprang forward, its lights knifing through the darkness. Dust billowed around them as the bike picked up speed, hugging the tunnel’s curves, winding deeper into the earth. Suddenly the tunnel opened out into caves where rusty brown stalactites hung from the ceiling. Bo could feel the shift in their progress. At last they were climbing upwards. She dropped the Daisy-May down a gear and its wheels sent sprays of pelletty rock around their ankles.

  They were both blinded by harsh sunlight as the Daisy-May broke the surface. It surged out onto the desert plain like a wild animal released from a trap, fishtailing on the red soil. Bo swallowed the fresh air with relief. The empty wilderness spread out before them.

  Bo drove the Daisy-May in and out of the low, scrubby trees scattered across the plain. The air quickly began to heat up as the sun rose higher, and she pushed the release for the shield so they were enclosed by the cool blue cover. She tried to hold onto the sense of elation she’d felt when they broke the surface, but deep inside her, a hollow place was growing with every kilometre that took her further away from Tjukurpa Piti. The desert stretched to a distant horizon, waiting to swallow them both. From far away, they could hear the sound of yet more explosions and Bo knew her home was destroyed. She pictured Tjukurpa Piti, the roboraptors, the Wombator, all her possessions buried under falling rock and plumes of black smoke pouring into the desert sky. A gasping pain rose in her chest, as if she was spiralling away from all that was safe, lost in space.

  As if he could read her thoughts, Callum leaned forward and spoke into her ear.

  ‘Don’t look back. Don’t ever look back.’

  10

  LAST GIRL ALIVE

  Bo set the co-ordinates of the Daisy-May’s GPS to the waterhole. It was the only place outside Tjukurpa Piti that she had ever visited, the only place she knew of where they might be safe. She and Poppy had taken a week to drive there in his solar jeep, but the Daisy-May covered the distance in a matter of hours. The long, rugged mountain range came into view, purple in the distance. Up close, it loomed above them, a towering red. Once they drew near, Bo could read her way by studying every rock and twisted gum tree.

  The entrance to the gorge was wide but then the high cliffs narrowed until the two children were enclosed in a red vault with only a strip of blue sky above. In front of them lay the waterhole, its pale green surface dappled with shimmery light. Above, a breeze rippled through the leaves of trees edging the top of the gorge.

  ‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ she said, turning to Callum.

  She balanced Mr Pinkwhistle on the tank of the Daisy-May and jumped down onto the sand. ‘Poppy brought me here to teach me to swim. We were happy here.’

  She stood on the banks of the waterhole and was overcome by a desire to submerge her body in the cool green water, to wash away the dust of Tjukurpa Piti and her grief. In an instant, she had stripped off her clothes.

  Callum gasped. ‘What happened to you?’

  Bo looked down the length of her body, trying to see herself through his startled eyes. Her limbs were the same honey colour they had always been. She swept her long hair over her shoulder and stared back at him.

  ‘Nothing has happened.’

  ‘Have you always been like this?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Did someone cut it off ?’

  ‘Cut what off ?’ she asked, raising her arms in a gesture of confusion.

  ‘But you’ve got . . . ’ Callum climbed off the bike and took a step closer, leaning forward to peer at her torso. ‘It’s sort of like a front-bottom.’

  Bo pushed him away. ‘I do not have a front-bottom!’ she shouted. She stormed across the sandy bank and waded into the water until it lapped around her waist.

  ‘Then what happened to you?’ persisted Callum, calling to her from the bank.

  Bo glanced at her reflection in the rippling water. She folded her arms across her bare chest and spoke over her shoulder. ‘That’s the way I was born. What’s the matter with you? Haven’t you ever seen a girl?’

  ‘A girl?’

  Bo heard the incredulity in his voice and turned to face him. He was sitting on a rock, shivering.

  ‘Callum?’

  But he didn’t answer. His eyes were wide and frightened. Bo realised he wasn’t teasing.

  ‘What is it?’ she said, wading out of the water.

  ‘Don’t come any closer,’ he said, putting one hand out as if to ward her off. ‘I don’t want to catch anything.’

  ‘From the water?’

  ‘No, from you. If you really are a girl, then you might be toxic.’

  Bo stood before him, her fists clenched, fighting down her discomfort.

  ‘You have been with me for days and you are alive and well. Why are you afraid?’

  ‘When I was little, I thought maybe my dads made girls up to scare me,’ said Callum, averting his gaze as if the sight of Bo’s nakedness was too appalling to confront. ‘I can’t believe I’ve been with you this long and not realised. I knew you were different but . . . ’

  Slowly, he turned to face her. ‘Now I understand why you made that joke about “woman’s ’twitian”. I laughed. I didn’t think anyone had any women’s anything. But you weren’t joking, were you?’

  ‘Why would it be a joke?’

  ‘Women are extinct.’

  ‘Extinct? Like your instinct?’

  ‘No, that’s different. Extinct means everything’s gone. Like dinosaurs. There are no more dinosaurs, only fake ones like Mr Pinkwhistle. And there are no more women.’

  Bo lapsed into silence and pushed her toe into the sand.

  ‘I feel like I’m dreaming,’ said Callum, edging away from her. ‘I’ve heard men say they believed that somewhere in the world girls still exist, that someone would discover one some day. My dads said it was crazy, like imagining fossils can come back to life. Dinosaurs, dodos, girls . . . they’re meant to be ancient history.’

  Bo sat down beside Callum. ‘I’m flesh and bones. Like you. Not a fossil.’ She reached out for one of his hands. He had jammed them both into his armpits and she could feel his resistance but she persisted, tugging one free and then putting her palm against his, forcing him to touch her. ‘See, we both have exactly five fingers. Mine are a little longer than yours. Your hands are a little wider. But they’re the same. Two hands.’

  Then she put her foot beside his. ‘Same feet too, except yours are like flippers. Bigger than mine!’ Lastly, she took his hand and pushed it against her chest. ‘Feel that? That is my heart beating. Same as yours. I listened to your heart when you were sleeping. You have a strong rhythm. A good heart.’

  Callum kept the flat of his palm against her bare chest, his face growing still as he felt her heartbeat. He stared at her, his dark eyes puzzled. ‘I thought when you read me those stories with girls in them that they were fantasy. But you’re like one of those princesses or witches or fairies. Except you must be the last. The last girl alive.’

  They stood staring at each other warily. Their silence hung above the swimming hole. Bo flung a pebble into the water and the ripples spread in widening circles. Poppy had told her that her mother and grandmother had died in the plague. He never told her that every girl had perished. She turned Callum’s words over and over in her mind. Then she pointed to the end of the swimming hole where the gorge narrowed.

  ‘Sometimes animals fall into the gorge. When we came last time, I saw a dead kangaroo floating. It must have washed down into the swimming hole. I thought it was alive, the way it moved in the water, but when I swam out it was only a big, stinky carcass. Things are not always as they seem.’

  ‘So w
hat are you trying to tell me? Are you saying that you’re like a stinking carcass?’

  Bo’s smile fell away.

  She ran into the water and freestyled into the gorge, all the way to where a small cascade of water broke out of the high wall. She dived deep, trying to ignore the fact that Callum was calling her name. She swam until her lungs were bursting and she was finally forced to come up for air.

  When she surfaced and looked back, the look of relief on Callum’s face made her laugh.

  ‘I thought you’d drowned,’ he shouted.

  Bo did a leisurely backstroke and pretended to ignore him. He looked hot and miserable, sitting on the edge of the waterhole with his arms wrapped tightly around his knees, watching her as she swam.

  ‘Come into the water,’ she called.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you still afraid of me?’

  Callum kicked a spray of sand into the water. ‘Yes and no.’ ‘If no, then come and swim with me.’

  ‘I don’t know how to swim.’

  Bo waded back onto the shore and reached for his hands.

  ‘I am going to prove to you that girls aren’t scary,’ she said, pulling him to his feet. She held his face between her hands and stared straight into his eyes. ‘And I will show you that girls have their uses. Take off your clothes. I am going to teach you how to swim.’

  Callum let out an exhausted sigh. Slowly, he stripped away his tattered clothes until he was standing naked before her. He didn’t look at her body, only her face. Then he held out his hands. Bo smiled and slowly led him into the water, until it was lapping around their waists. ‘Are you frightened?’ she asked.

  Callum nodded. She stepped behind him and, very gently, pulled him towards her. ‘Then I think you are brave. Because these are two things you are afraid of, water and girls, and yet both of them are touching you. So now you are going to show you are truly courageous and let me hold you.’

  When she slipped her arm around his waist and tried to make him bend, his body was stiff and unyielding. ‘Relax. I promise you are safe.’

  She lifted Callum off his feet so that his legs floated free and then walked slowly backwards into deeper water until his whole body was afloat. She kept his head resting on her shoulder, their cheeks touching, as she moved deeper into the gorge. Callum’s golden limbs floated just beneath the surface of the swirling green water.

  For a moment Bo wanted to cry out in wonder, it looked so strange and beautiful to see another human moving like a free-falling angel through the watery space. Instead she spoke to him in a low, soft voice, explaining that he was safe, she wouldn’t let him go, he could relax and let the water and her arms support him. Then she drew him back to shore.

  Callum opened his eyes when his feet touched the sandy bottom. They sat together in the shallows, their eyes mirroring the sunlight sparkling on the waterhole.

  Callum wiped his arms and smiled as another layer of dirt sloughed from his skin. ‘I feel so clean,’ he said. ‘I feel all new.’

  ‘When you’re in this gorge, the rest of the world falls away. There is nothing but this moment. We could stay here for as long as we want.’

  ‘We definitely can’t stay here,’ said Callum. ‘They’ll track us, Bo. It’s not just me that I’m worried about. It’s you. We can’t let them catch you. I bet Outstationers have never seen a girl before either. Not a real one. They’ll put you in a freak show.’

  ‘I’m not a freak. I’m a girl.’

  ‘Don’t you understand? That’s freaky. Being a girl is . . . weird.’

  Bo wriggled uncomfortably, as if her skin no longer fitted her lanky bones.

  Callum knelt close to her, talking with a new urgency.

  ‘We have to go and find my dads. I promise, if we find them, you’ll be safe. They’ll take care of both of us. You could be my sister, like in those stories you read to me. Brother and sister. As long as it’s legal to have a sister.’

  Bo shut her eyes. ‘I don’t need anyone to take care of me. I take care of myself.’

  ‘How? You can’t go home.’

  ‘Neither can you.’

  Callum slapped the water, sending droplets into the air. ‘That’s not true! Even if the Outstationers did destroy the Refuge, my dads would build it again. It’s not like your place. There’s no one to rebuild Tjukurpa Piti. But my dads work for the Colony. The Refuge was an important outpost. Ruff and Rusty will be back there, rebuilding and waiting for me.’

  ‘There are yams and berries here. There is water. I have my hunting tools and Mr Pinkwhistle.’

  ‘Are all girls born stupid?’ Callum shouted. ‘Is that why they were wiped out? Or is it just you?’

  Bo got silently to her feet and dived into the waterhole, swimming to the far side of the gorge. She rinsed her hair under the waterfall and let the sound of the cascade drown out Callum’s voice. When she finally swam out into the open gorge, she could hear Callum shouting, ‘Get out, get out of the water!’

  ‘Leave me alone,’ she shouted back.

  ‘No, listen to me! Something’s coming. Something bad.’

  Bo turned to see what he was pointing atand saw a long, rippling darkness coming towards her. She made it to the shore as quickly as she could and pushed Callum away from the water’s edge. Snatching up her discarded clothes, she ran to the Daisy-May. Callum climbed onto the bike expectantly but Bo snapped her fingers to activate Mr Pinkwhistle and he leapt from the pannier. The roboraptor turned his head towards Bo, his eyes glowing with a soft green light as he scanned the gorge. Bo drew a long knife and a pistol from inside her string bag.

  ‘Wait. Don’t move. Don’t make a sound. You are bait.’

  Callum stared at her, his mouth open, but he stayed put. Bo stroked the underside of Mr Pinkwhistle and then, quick as a lizard, she scrambled up the side of the gorge until she was on a rock overhanging the water’s edge. When the crocodile finally emerged from the waterhole, she took aim.

  Mr Pinkwhistle stood between Callum and the crocodile, emitting a low, whirring growl. Distracted, the crocodile turned its huge snout towards the roboraptor and opened its mouth. Bo fired one direct shot to the back of its skull and the reptile slumped on the shore, twitching. She scrambled down from the rock and pulled a long metal spike out of the bike panniers. Sitting astride the crocodile’s body, she shoved the spike through its skull at the point where the bullet had entered. Then she dragged the carcass away from the water’s edge and squatted down beside it.

  ‘Are you sure it’s dead?’ Callum stayed on the far side of the Daisy-May.

  Bo didn’t bother to answer. She flipped the reptile over and cut a long incision into its belly, working her knife all the way down to its tail.

  ‘This will make a delicious dinner. White meat is sweeter than pudding.’

  Callum screwed up his face. ‘Meat doesn’t taste sweet. Pudding, donuts, chocolate – now that’s sweet. Not crocodile meat.’

  ‘Have you ever eaten it before?’

  This time it was Callum’s turn to stay silent.

  Bo concentrated on the task at hand. When she’d cut away the flesh from the tail and belly and wrapped it in a damp cloth, she shoved the parcel into Callum’s arms. Next she dragged the butchered carcass away from the waterhole and out of the gorge, leaving it on a stretch of flat desert ground.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he called after her.

  ‘It must not foul the waterhole,’ she called to Callum over her shoulder.

  Callum stood holding the parcel of meat awkwardly away from his body as he perched on the back of the Daisy-May.

  ‘It doesn’t matter if it fouls the waterhole,’ he said. ‘We’re not staying. It’s too dangerous.’

  Bo took the parcel from him.

  ‘It can’t bite you now. We are safe.’

  ‘Safe? We will never be safe until we find my fathers.’

  ‘I can protect you.’

  Callum flushed darkly and scowled. ‘Protect me? You made me bai
t. And now Mr Pinkwhistle has turned on me too.’

  Bo looked down and realised Mr Pinkwhistle was crouching as if to attack, watching Callum with sharp intent. She bent down and lifted the roboraptor into her free arm. Immediately, he stopped growling and began to nuzzle her chin with his snout.

  ‘Why was he doing that?’ asked Callum.

  ‘He’s programmed to sense emotion as well as movement. He understands you are frightened, so he thinks you are dangerous, or maybe good to hunt. But he will never harm you. I would not allow anyone to hurt you. You have nothing to worry about.’

  ‘Frankly, I think we both have a lot to worry about,’ said Callum. He walked away from her to dress in private. Then he sat down on the sandy bank and put his head in his hands.

  Bo stood up, shook the dust from her cat-hide clothes and put them on. They clung to her wet skin but she was glad to be dressed. She gathered her weapons and packed them into the panniers. Then she swung a leg over the Daisy-May and carefully positioned Mr Pinkwhistle on the tank in front of her. ‘Where is this place you seek? Your fathers’ Refuge.’

  Callum glanced over his shoulder and grunted. ‘I don’t know how to get there.’

  ‘We will find it. Mr Pinkwhistle and the Daisy-May will show us the way.’

  Callum blinked in surprise. ‘We’re going? Is it that easy to make a girl change her mind?’

  ‘No,’ said Bo, laughing. ‘Sometimes, what you say makes sense. If you have a home to go to, that’s where you should be.’

  Callum jumped onto the back of the Daisy-May. He wrapped his arms around Bo and rested his cheek against her back. She drove the Daisy-May slowly out of the gorge and kept the shield down so the desert wind dried her hair. Then she pushed the release button and the two of them were cocooned again inside the blue darkness of the shield. The Daisy-May skimmed over the desert, until the landscape was a blur on either side of them and the journey ahead was all that Bo could focus on. She had lost her Poppy, she had lost her home and all her herd but for Mr Pinkwhistle. But she had found this boy, and when he put his arms around her, she knew she had found a reason to go on.