It was hotter on the main road. Heat blasted from the tarmac, and the whoosh of the passing trucks was the only breeze. The setting sun was right in her eyes. She kept her gaze on her feet and off the heat mirages that made her even dizzier. She didn’t even know if Freel would help her when she got there.
By the time she reached the museum Alida felt like a driedout piece of jerky. She worked her tongue to get some moisture into her mouth and allowed herself the titchiest sip of water. The lawn was so green. Alida imagined she would sink into it and be covered with cool water if she stepped off the path. Shame she couldn’t swim.
An armoured bus was parked out the front. Plastic-faces must be visiting. She hoped that meant they were going to reopen the hubs soon. Demis were grumbling that the attacks had been for shit-all. News from Freel’s camp had been non-existent, so all sorts of rumours had flooded in to fill the silence. The most popular one was that Freel had wanted to shut down LeaderCorp in the Demi-Settlements so that he would have a monopoly on supplying grub and water.
Two of Freel’s goons stood on either side of the entrance, straight-backed with their hands clasped tightly over their privates and chins pressed into their thick necks. Smokes, the ultimate status symbol in the Demi-Settlements, hung from the edges of their lips.
‘I wanna see Freel,’ Alida said.
‘He’s busy right now.’ One of the goons took a deep drag.
‘Can you give him a message?’ Alida was tempted to touch the orange burning end of the smoke with the tip of her finger.
‘Do I look like a secretary?’ The jerk blew smoke in her face.
‘Come on. I just wanna have a quick word with him.’ Freel had been sending Ganya after her, hassling her to do another gig, and now that she was desperate enough she couldn’t get anywhere near him. ‘He’ll wanna speak to me. Just tell him Alida’s out here. I’ll wait.’
The front door beeped. The goon grabbed Alida by the arm and dragged her to the side.
‘Hey.’
‘Shut up a minute.’
Ganya and a couple of LeaderCorp goons stepped through the door first and then Freel emerged with another plastic-face, a Citizen with glossy, golden waves of hair that looked like your hands would slide right off if you tried to touch it. She was almost a head taller than Freel in tortuous-looking heels that reminded Alida how sore her own feet were. Freel and the Citizen were blinding each other with their super-white smiles. Alida wondered if that was how plastic-faces wrangled in the city, by shooting tooth-shine at each other until one of them passed out.
They all strode to the armoured bus and Freel and the Citizen shook hands before the visitors piled on. Ganya spied Alida and raised her eyebrows. Alida nodded.
The bus departed and Freel stood in the middle of the road until it disappeared. As he strutted back to the museum Alida wriggled out of the goon’s grip and moved into his path.
Freel smirked. ‘Alida. You look like shit.’
‘Well, things’ve been a bit tough with the hubs closed and everything.’
Freel rubbed his palms together. ‘That’ll all be changing very soon and I’ll be announcing some news to shut up all the doubters. Now, I’m sure you must be after some work.’
‘I’m considering it. Depends on what you’ve got.’ Alida suspected Freel saw through her tough act, but the alternative was to drop to her knees and beg.
‘I have something that would suit you. Tonight, actually.’ Freel tossed his shimmery hair off his shoulder and stood wide-legged like his balls needed more room than the average guy’s.
‘Tonight?’ Alida hadn’t expected something so soon. She thought maybe there’d be something later in the week and Freel would advance her the credits.
‘It’s tonight or nothing. Ganya will give you the details.’ Freel kept walking towards the museum entrance.
‘Hey. What about the dosh?’
Freel turned and came at her with his finger pointed and his voice raised. ‘No credits until you show up for the job. You’ve become a pain in my arse. Ganya tells me you hide whenever she comes looking for you. You’ll need to be more reliable and more professional if you’re going to work for me. This is your last chance.’
Freel stopped, his finger in front of Alida’s nose. She gulped and didn’t say anything. He was right. He turned and strode into the museum. Her legs buckled beneath her and she sat right there on the path.
Ganya put her hand on Alida’s shoulder. ‘How long since you’ve eaten?’
‘Yesterday morning.’
‘Eish! Wait out here. I’ll get you some rations and tell you about the job.’ Ganya helped her up.
Alida sat on the steps in the shade of the museum and rubbed her face while Ganya went inside. Her arms and legs trembled and cramps squeezed her insides like an augmented fist. She reckoned she might pass out on the trip back home.
Ganya came back out and handed her a bag filled with three water sachets, three Nutri-Shake sachets and three mixed insect nutrition bars. ‘Freel sent me the specifics of the job. We’ll meet at 10 p.m. Tunnels are blocked after all the explosions but we’ve got another truckie contact.’
‘Cheers. Um, Ganya?’ Alida ripped open a nutrition bar and took a bite.
‘Yeah?’
‘I have my monthlies.’ Alida grimaced. Mum had never told her what she did if she had a gig at that time of the month.
‘What do you use?’
‘A cup.’
‘That’s not ideal. I’ll get you some sponges.’ Ganya squatted down. ‘If you let us, we’ll take good care of you. Get you the contraceptive implant, give you ladies’ products and extra rations when we have them. There’s loads of perks working for Freel. He’s not as scaly as you think.’
Alida nodded. She didn’t want to be one of Freel’s girls. But they made it sound slicker than any other option she had. Maybe she could sort something else out when she wasn’t so hungry. She wanted Mum. Mostly because she missed her so much, and waking every morning to the memory that she was gone was a punch in the gut. But also because then Mum could’ve done this job instead. She was so bloody selfish. She brushed a tear from her cheek with her sleeve.
‘I might sit here for a stretch before I head back.’ Alida closed her eyes and chewed. She didn’t have the strength to move yet.
Ganya stood. ‘Come on. Get in the car and I’ll take you home so you can rest up before tonight.’
CHAPTER 16
Peony ushered Ferrassie over to a threadbare couch with stuffing erupting from tears in the fabric.
‘I think you’ll be exactly the thing for our new show.’ Peony waved her hands around. ‘Sorry about the state of this place. Did Ferdinand explain we’re starting renovations soon?’ She didn’t wait for Ferrassie’s answer. ‘Make yourself comfortable. I’ll bring you a drink.’
Ferrassie crushed a brittle piece of couch stuffing between her fingers. She supposed it made sense. Everything outside the cities was bound to be run-down after years of neglect. Peony seemed nice enough. It would all be fine.
Ferdinand and Peony were speaking in low voices in the adjoining kitchen. Something scuttled in a dark corner. Peony returned with a glass of cola. Fizzy drinks were so heavily taxed by LeaderCorp that Ferrassie had never had the chance to try one. The cola sparkled in the light. Tiny bubbles raced to the surface and popped. She took a sip. She’d never tasted anything so sweet. The bubbles burnt her throat and fizzed in her empty belly.
‘Now, Ferdinand and I will get the camera ready for your screen test. Finish your drink and then we’ll start. Nothing more than a formality, you understand? I can tell already you’re going to be ideal.’ Peony walked back to the kitchen.
‘Yeah. Awesome.’ Ferrassie took another sip. The sweetness and fizz were unpleasant and there was a slightly bitter aftertaste.
At least she hadn’t been missing out on anything all these years. She searched for somewhere to empty her glass. She didn’t want to offend the little-brains. Tattered c
urtains blew in and out of one of the windows. Ferrassie tiptoed over and poured the cola into the dirt.
The place was dodgy. She knew it in her gut. She’d been such a fool. A naive Neandertal. No wonder little-brains had superseded them all those years before. She’d been trying to be some sort of Neo champion and all she’d managed to do was live up to the daft Neo stereotype.
Ferrassie’s breathing calmed and her heart slowed. She yawned. Sugar furred her teeth. She ran her tongue around her mouth. Something was wrong. Her brain struggled to grasp it. Her eyelids drooped. She forced them open and shook her head. This wasn’t the time for a kip. If she moved around she would perk up, but her limbs were too heavy to lift. She closed her eyes for a moment, to give them a rest.
A copper with a scalpel chased her. He wanted to cut out her bones and put them in a museum. He caught her and sliced the back of her neck.
She swam through the murky depths of sleep and opened her eyes to peeling linoleum floor tiles. The back of her neck stung, right where her clone tattoo was. She screamed and scrambled to sit up.
‘She’s awake!’ Ferdinand yelled.
Ferrassie was lying on a table. She got to her knees and clapped a hand over the back of her neck. Through her blurred vision the room looked like a kitchen with a sink, a fridge and cupboards.
‘That’s impossible. I put two tabs in her drink. They never wake up if they’ve had two.’
Ferrassie blinked a few times and her vision sharpened. Ferdinand and Peony stood on opposite sides of the table, gawping. A scalpel dangled from Peony’s fingers.
‘Oh no, oh no, oh no. Please don’t hurt me. I won’t tell anyone. You can let me go.’
Ferdinand glanced at Peony. ‘We were only removing your tattoo. It’s a perk of working with us. You can’t be traced or detected.’
Peony nodded. ‘That’s right, and we didn’t want to cause you any distress, you understand? Why don’t I give you something for the pain and we can finish the procedure?’
The cupboard doors were peeling and hanging off their hinges. Cobweb stalactites fell from the roof. She’d been so daft.
Ferrassie shook her head and tears filled her eyes. ‘No, you’re lying. The Cavemen cast all have tattoos. What do you want with me?’
Peony and Ferdinand exchanged another glance.
‘Calm down and I’ll tell you the truth.’ Peony put the scalpel down.
The truth. Ferrassie wanted the truth to be that she was going to be a famous Neo entertainment star and that she hadn’t been drugged and lied to and she wasn’t about to have her organs harvested, or be raped and finished off, or whatever these freaks wanted to do with her.
‘We’re with a Neo rights group. We’re removing your tattoo so you can’t be traced. We’ll take you to a safe house with other Neos who’ve escaped LeaderCorp.’
Ferdinand nodded. ‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’
‘No … I don’t … I want to go home. Please let me go.’ Ferrassie hugged herself to contain her shaking. She couldn’t believe anything they said. Neo rights. That didn’t make any sense. All she’d wanted was to sing. And they wanted to hurt her. She needed to get away from them and get her mind straight.
‘Calm down and think about what we’re saying. This is a great opportunity for you,’ Ferdinand said.
‘Let me make you a cup of tea and we can talk about it.’ Peony held her hands towards Ferrassie.
‘I … I want to go.’
‘Understood.’ Ferdinand cringed. ‘We won’t force you to do anything you don’t want to do, but it’s a long way to the city and dangerous through the wilds and then the Demi-Settlements. Let me call a friend of mine who’s heading there tonight.’ Ferdinand did that blank thing that meant he was using IntelliEnhance.
Ferrassie slid off the table. ‘No. Don’t call anyone.’ The last thing she needed was more little-brains who wanted to cut her up. She ran towards the kitchen door.
Peony stood in her way and reached for her. ‘Please, Ferrassie –’
Ferrassie slammed Peony against the wall. She didn’t give a fuck if they reported her for bashing a little-brain – even being hauled into a Neo control van would be better than whatever this was.
‘Hey!’ Ferdinand seized Ferrassie’s shoulder.
An image from a Neo fight flashed into her brain. She clutched Ferdinand’s ears and headbutted him with her powerful brow ridge. Bones cracked and blood spurted from his nose. He collapsed onto the ground holding his mug. Peony shrieked and cowered on the floor.
Ferrassie burst through the front door. They’d better not follow her or she’d mess them up.
Adrenaline and moonlight guided Ferrassie down the dark track and away from the house. She peered over her shoulder every few metres. No one gave chase. At the main road she took cover from the passing trucks in the tangle of vegetation at the side of the road. The grass and weeds grabbed at her, hundreds of tiny fists trying to hold her back.
The cut on her neck throbbed.
She had no idea how she’d get to City 1 or how she’d pass through the wall when she did get there. She’d become a cautionary tale of Neo stupidity.
Further down the road, a sphere of light rallied against the dark: a fuelling station. Ferrassie lowered her eyes from the fluorescent lights and passed the fuel pumps and electric chargers. Two Neo
coppers manned the entrance to the store.
One of the guards stuck his arm out to bar her entry.
‘What’s up?’
He pointed at a sign on the glass sliding door.
‘I can’t read.’
‘It says Sapien Citizens only.’
‘Oh. I’m in a touchy situation and I gotta …’ What did she gotta do? Contact Neo Control? They’d send someone to take her straight to the medical research facility. Contact Amud? Even if he did come across a message from her on the Neo chat board, there was nothing he could do to help her. Contact her boss at the cricket factory? As if he’d care. She was replaceable. And technically she wasn’t even an employee there anymore.
Ferrassie turned from the door, walking slowly and hoping an idea would come to her. What if she went back to Ferdinand and Peony? They’d been scared of her strength. She could force them to take her back to the city. She shook her head. That was her daftest idea yet.
She was screwed.
Her stomach rumbled and a headache pounded behind her temples. The last thing she’d eaten was a Nutri-Shake for breakfast. There were plenty of eats inside the fuelling station and she had some currency on her tattoo. If only they’d let her through the door.
An armoured delivery truck lit her in its headlights. She hurried out of the way, towards the road. She had to keep moving. The boring, predictable everyday schlep of life between the cricket factory and the workers’ barracks didn’t seem so crook anymore. Neos weren’t supposed to have dreams of something better.
‘Hello there,’ a man’s voice called from behind her. She kept walking, assuming he was yakking to someone else.
‘Hello there, Neo-Neandertal woman.’
She turned.
The truck driver – a young Sapien bloke – came towards her, his hands in the air. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you. I’ve never seen a Neo alone out here. I thought you might need some assistance.’ He stood a couple of metres away. ‘Can I contact someone for you? I’m aware these places have a deplorable anti-Neo policy.’
Ferrassie, certain the bloke had been sent by Ferdinand and Peony to grab her, ran towards the darkness beyond the fuelling station. She was looking back over her shoulder at the truck when she collided with something. Arms went around her.
‘Oof.’ All the air in her chest rushed out through her mouth.
‘Where you running to, clone?’
A bear of a bloke held her. He didn’t have the smooth, neat features of a Citizen. He had coarse black hair all over his mug and his clothes were ragged and faded. He pushed her away from him, keeping a firm grip on one of
her wrists. She froze as two other blokes and a lady put down their water containers and pulled steel bars out of their backpacks.
Ferrassie looked from person to person. Not a single one of them seemed friendly. Behind them the night was pure black.
‘Where did you come from?’ the bloke holding her wrists asked.
‘I’m … I’m from City 1. I was tricked out here.’
‘Bullcrap. You’re from the free-Neo camp, aren’t ya?’
‘No. I got no idea what you’re yakking about.’
‘Tell us where it is.’ The four of them surrounded her.
‘Help!’ Ferrassie twisted towards the Neo guards at the fuelling station. They kept their focus forward.
‘Bring her with us. We’ll make her squeal,’ the lady said.
‘No, no, no. Let me go.’
A loud bang sounded over their heads. A screeching flock
of birds exploded from a nearby tree. Her captors recoiled and moved away. Ferrassie scrambled back. The birds’ cries faded into the distance.
‘I would advise you to leave the woman alone and go about your business.’ The driver of the armoured truck stood in the light of the fuelling station, holding a handgun.
‘Bloody Citizens think they’re in charge of everything, even out here,’ one of the blokes said.
‘Leave off. She’s not worth it. She doesn’t even know anything,’ the lady said.
The group trudged off into the darkness, torch beams marking their progress through the long grass.
‘You Citizens’ll get what’s coming to you soon. Very soon,’ one of the blokes yelled over his shoulder.
Ferrassie crouched on the ground, shaking.
The driver squatted in front of her. ‘Please let me help you. It’s dangerous for you out here. Where there’s a handful of Rewilders you’ll find hundreds more hiding in the shadows like cockroaches.’
‘Did they send you to get me?’
‘Who?’ The driver frowned.
‘Peony and Ferdinand.’
‘No. Who are they? Do you want me to call them for you?’
The Shining Wall Page 8