Boy Versus Rat Dog

by Justin D'Ath

  Colt had been to Death Farm. He’d seen the big grey buildings that had been purpose-built for killing animals (just like the old Abattoir slaughterhouse). He’d seen the big, blackened chimneys where the dead animals had gone up in smoke. He’d seen the scorched fragments of bone and half-melted horse shoes that were the only things left. ‘We’ve got to rescue her, Mum!’

  Kristin returned the fat-bellied cub to its blanket-lined box and lifted out another one. The circus’s female sun bear had rejected both her twins. ‘I’m sure Lucy’s all right, Colt. Someone will find her tomorrow, you’ll see.’

  ‘Have you listened to a single word I’ve said?’ he asked.

  ‘Of course I listened.’ Kristin sat down and began to feed the second tiny cub. ‘But I really don’t think Officer Katt would go to such lengths just to get even with you.’

  ‘She’s crazy, Mum! She hates me! You saw that stuff she said in the VN.’

  Colt’s mother looked up. Her face told him all he needed to know. She thought he was the crazy one, not Officer Katt. ‘If it makes you feel any better,’ she said, ‘I’ll give DoRFE a call first thing tomorrow morning.’

  Colt forced a smile, as if she really had made him feel better. But tomorrow would be too late. If he was right – if Officer Katt had taken Lucy to Death Farm – elephants would be extinct by tomorrow morning.

  Even if he no longer had superpowers, Colt wasn’t going to let that happen.

  Before leaving the nursery trailer, he bent and gently stroked the feeding cub with the tip of one finger. There were four Asian sun bears remaining on the planet – they still had a chance.

  ‘See you back at the caravan, Mum,’ Colt said.

  But he didn’t say when.

  Neither bicycle had lights. Colt had a little SmartTorch, but it was impossible to hold it and ride at the same time. Luckily, the moon was nearly full. It cast a pale wash of light over the road. As long as they stayed away from the edge, where unseen potholes or squashy ridges of gravel could bring a bike rider unstuck, he and Birdy were safe enough.

  Except from other road-users.

  Whenever headlights approached, they’d quickly wheel their bikes off the road and hide. Any vehicle coming from the direction of town could be someone looking for them – Kristin, Birdy’s parents, or even the police.

  The bike didn’t belong to Colt. His had been sold in the garage sale when he and his mother joined the circus. He’d borrowed Mrs Flynn’s. She didn’t know it was gone. She didn’t know her daughter’s bike was gone, either. Or her daughter, for that matter.

  Birdy’s parents thought she was over at Colt’s caravan, watching a holovid. And Colt had left his mother a note saying he was watching a holovid at Birdy’s.

  Sometimes you had to cover your tracks when you were a secret superhero.

  But am I still a superhero? Colt wondered.

  When Birdy had suggested they wear their clown suits, Colt had talked her out of it. It was nighttime, he’d said. Nobody would see them.

  He hadn’t wanted to tell her the real reason why he didn’t want to dress up as Superclown, but when Birdy kept arguing about it he’d finally told the truth.

  ‘I’ve lost my superpowers.’

  ‘No way!’

  ‘It’s true,’ he’d said, feeling like he’d let her down. As if he’d lost his superpowers on purpose. And perhaps he had – hadn’t he wanted to be normal?

  After Colt told Birdy what had happened when the Big Top collapsed, she said, ‘It mightn’t last. You might get your powers back.’

  Colt wasn’t sure he really wanted them back. But he’d dumped a supply of Power Bars and a bottle of sugary soft drink into his bag, just in case.

  Also in the backpack was his mother’s hand-held GPS. She called it Kermit because it sounded like a talking frog on an old TV show she used to watch as a kid. Every few minutes, Kermit’s muffled voice could be heard from inside Colt’s backpack: ‘Continue along Cattlegrid Road for six point five kilometres.’

  ‘How far did he say?’ asked Birdy, puffing along behind him.

  ‘Six and a half kilometres.’

  ‘Rat poo! I thought it was closer.’

  Colt didn’t have the heart to tell her that the six-and-a-half kilometres would only take them to the next crossroads. From there, they still had another fifteen kilometres to go.

  He had been surprised when he’d looked up DoRFE Quarantine Centre on Kermit and the map had showed how close it was. The circus moved so often that half the time Colt didn’t know where they were, apart from the name of the town. According to Kermit, you could get from Abattoir to their destination in 18 minutes. That was in a car. On bicycles (without lights) it took them just under three hours.

  ‘Destination on the left,’ announced Kermit.

  ‘Finally!’ Birdy gasped.

  They stopped in the middle of the road. There was just a black wall of trees on their left. Colt pulled out his SmartTorch and clicked it on.

  ‘Shashlik!’

  A ghost rat came scuttling onto the road towards him. It stopped when Autobeam focused on it, and stood up on its hindquarters like a Lost World meerkat. Autobeam must have blinded it, yet the twin silver disks of its eyes seemed to stare straight at Colt. As if the rat could see him despite the glare from his SmartTorch – see right into his eyes. His scalp prickled. Colt kicked some gravel at it, and the big white rat turned and scurried away.

  ‘Car coming!’ Birdy warned.

  The headlights were still a long way off. They were coming from the direction of Abattoir. Colt cancelled Autobeam and stuffed the little torch into his pocket. He followed Birdy off the road into some long grass. They lay flat on the ground next to their bikes as the vehicle drew near.

  ‘It’s slowing down,’ Birdy whispered.

  ‘Do you reckon?’ said Colt. He was still thinking about the rat. If only one rat in a thousand was a ghost rat, how was it that he had seen two ghost rats in less than a week? He certainly hadn’t seen 2000 normal rats. He hadn’t seen any!

  Birdy was right. The car was slowing down. Colt heard the driver change gears. Heard the tyre noise soften.

  Shashlik! he thought. It’s going to stop right here!

  Gravel popped and crackled under its tyres as the vehicle came slowly along the edge of the road towards them. It passed within two metres of their hiding place – so close that Colt could hear golden oldies music playing on its radio. Close enough for the driver to see them if she looked out her side window. Luckily, she didn’t look. The vehicle continued past them, its bright tail-lights turning the grass tips red.

  ‘Phew! That was close,’ whispered Birdy.

  Colt cautiously raised his head. When he’d first heard the golden oldies music, he had immediately thought of his mother. How had she found them? But the vehicle driving slowly off down the road wasn’t his mother’s Ford Appaloosa, it was a large, pale-coloured van. Colt had seen vans just like it before.

  He knew that in daylight the van would have been orange. There’d be a DoRFE logo on its door. And rat cops inside.

  About 50 metres past Colt and Birdy’s hiding place, the van’s brake lights flared. It made a slow right turn across the road and disappeared into the trees.

  ‘Bingo!’ said Colt. Kermit had got their destination wrong, but only by 50 metres.

  He and Birdy picked up their bikes and rode cautiously along the road’s edge to the place where the van had turned off. A gravel driveway led to a tall fence and a gate. The gate was open. There was a big sign attached to the fence. Colt could just make out the DoRFE logo in the moonlight. And two words: KEEP OUT.

  ‘Welcome to Death Farm,’ he whispered.

  ‘It seems different,’ whispered Birdy.

  Colt thought so, too. They were both familiar with Death Farm. They’d been there before. But it hadn’t looked like this.

  ‘There must be more than one entrance,’ he said.

  Hiding their bikes and helmets in some bushes, h
e and Birdy crept in through the open gate. A narrow gap carved through the forest like a fire trail. Tall trees shut out the moonlight. There was a ribbon of starry sky overhead, but down at ground level it was totally dark. Small, invisible things with lots of legs (or no legs at all) scurried and slithered through the leaf litter. Mosquitoes whined around their ears. A giant tree spider clicked its fangs right above them. Birdy’s fingers found Colt’s (or his found hers) in the darkness. Holding hands, they felt their way forward with their feet. Colt didn’t dare switch on his SmartTorch in case the rat cops saw it. He hoped they wouldn’t stand on anything nasty.

  It was a relief to see lights ahead. But scary, too. Death Farm was a creepy place – more creepy than the million invisible night creatures that scurried, slithered and clicked all around them.

  Leaving the safety of the fire trail, Colt and Birdy pushed their way through the last of the trees to the forest’s edge. They crouched behind some ferns. Before them stood a collection of floodlit buildings, surrounded by a three-metre-high fence with razor wire coiled evilly along the top. It was some sort of compound. There was razor wire on the gate, too. But like the gate back at the road, it had been unlocked and left wide open.

  The orange van was parked next to a station wagon (also orange) in front of what looked like a row of offices. Ribbons of light escaped through vertical blinds in the office windows.

  ‘Colt,’ Birdy whispered. ‘This isn’t Death Farm.’

  Colt slipped off his backpack and dug out the GPS. He touched the screen and Kermit’s map lit up. In the destination box it said: DoRFE Research Centre.

  ‘What a doofus!’ he groaned. ‘I must have hit the wrong one in the search menu. Research Centre was right under Quarantine Centre.’

  ‘You mean we came all this way for nothing?’ Birdy asked.

  ‘Sorry,’ Colt whispered. But he was more sorry for Lucy. How were they going to rescue her now? ‘Hang on a minute,’ he said.

  He touched DoRFE Quarantine Centre on the menu and waited while Kermit made the calculations. Shashlik! The Quarantine Centre (aka Death Farm) was 758 kilometres away! How long would that take them on their bicycles? A week? A fortnight?

  ‘Poor Lucy!’ Colt whimpered. He dropped Kermit into the backpack and buried his face in his hands. ‘We’re never going to save her now.’

  If only he still had his superpowers! Superclown could pedal 758 kilometres in a matter of hours – even on Mrs Flynn’s clapped-out old bicycle.

  Birdy tugged his sleeve. ‘Don’t give up yet, Colt. Look over there.’

  Right down the far end of the fenced compound, where there weren’t so many lights, a big, box-shaped truck was parked half hidden beneath some trees. It looked big enough to carry an elephant.

  ‘Do you reckon she’s in there?’ Colt asked excitedly.

  ‘I guess she could be.’

  He hoisted his backpack. ‘Let’s go and –’

  ‘Wait!’ Birdy warned.

  Two figures had come out of the office building. One looked like Officer Owen, the ear-studded rat cop who’d been so upset when Zoltan died. The other man wore a white lab coat – he must have been a DoRFE scientist. They stopped on the far side of the van, where Colt and Birdy couldn’t see them. A moment later, the office door opened again and a second rat cop emerged.

  It was Officer Katt.

  ‘We have lift-off!’ Colt whispered.

  Officer Katt joined the two men behind the van. Colt could hear their voices, but not what they were saying. It looked like one of them was about to leave. Or all of them, he hoped. But if they did, they’d be sure to lock the gate behind them. Colt studied the gleaming razor wire that coiled along the fence and across the top of the gate. If he and Birdy were going to get into the compound, they had to act now – while the gate was still open. He rose to his feet.

  ‘Follow me.’

  Before Birdy could ask what he was doing, Colt had left the safety of the forest’s edge and was running flat out towards the open gate. It was a huge risk. To reach the gate he had to run towards the rat cops, too, but he was counting on the van blocking their line of sight. As long as they didn’t move, they wouldn’t spot him.

  His gamble paid off. They didn’t move. Swerving in through the gate, Colt ducked behind some big, dark-coloured drums stacked on pallets just inside the fence and threw himself flat on the ground.

  Phew! Made it!

  ‘HEY!’ yelled Officer Katt.

  Colt nearly blew it. He nearly jumped out from behind the drums and made a break for it. It was lucky he didn’t. He would have collided with Officer Katt and Officer Owen as they came charging past his hiding place with their stun guns drawn. Colt froze and held his breath as their heavy boots went pounding off towards the forest. They hadn’t been yelling at him.

  It was Birdy they were after.

  Birdy had hesitated before she followed him, giving Colt a 15-metre head start. He’d reached the drums a split second before Officer Katt poked her head around the side of the van. She didn’t see him but she spotted Birdy, halfway between the forest and the open gate.

  ‘HEY!’

  Now Birdy was racing back the other way, with the two rat cops in hot pursuit.

  ‘STOP OR I’LL SHOOT!’ yelled Officer Katt.

  She was wasting her breath. Birdy was out of stun-gun range. She was just a small black shadow racing away from them. Colt watched her reach the trees well ahead of her pursuers and melt into the pitch-black forest.

  ‘GRAB MY TORCH FROM THE VAN!’ Officer Katt yelled over her shoulder to the scientist, who hadn’t joined the chase.

  Had she looked back, rather than just yelled, Officer Katt might have spotted Colt this time. Crouched in the narrow space between the drums and the perimeter fence, he was in full view of anyone looking back from outside the brightly lit compound. Quickly, he crawled around the other side of the drums, where the two rat cops couldn’t see him.

  But now he was in full view of the scientist!

  Luckily, the man in the white coat wasn’t looking in Colt’s direction – he was rummaging in the back of the orange van for Officer Katt’s torch. Finding it, he raced over to the station wagon and jumped in. Its engine roared, its tyres spun, and two blinding headlights came sweeping towards the gate. Towards Colt! He flattened himself against the ground and covered his head. The vehicle roared past, spraying him with flying gravel.

  Phew! Once again, he’d avoided detection.

  Colt knew they wouldn’t find Birdy. She was too smart to be caught – too quick and agile to give Officer Katt a clear shot at her in the thick forest. Even on its lowest setting, the electric charge from a stun gun could knock a person out.

  Set on maximum, it could kill an elephant.

  Colt hoped with all his heart that Lucy was still alive. She was more than just an animal, he thought. More than a pet. She was his friend – she even understood him when he talked to her!

  He’d be devastated if she was dead.

  With everyone off looking for Birdy, Colt had a chance to find her.

  Blinking dust from his eyes, he cautiously rose to his knees and peered over the top of the drums. The station wagon had stopped at the edge of the forest. Its bright headlights lit up the trees. Colt watched the scientist pass the torch out through the open window to Officer Katt. Behind her, Officer Owen stood staring into the forest with his stun gun held at the ready. Officer Katt talked urgently to the scientist. He nodded a couple of times, then drove off along the fire trail towards the road.

  Head down, keeping the drums between himself and the forest’s edge, Colt went in the other direction. He sprinted across the compound to the nearest building. Set a little apart from the row of offices, it reminded him of a small holiday cottage. But who would take their holidays here? Colt ducked around the back and – Shashlik! – nearly ran into a clothesline with washing hanging from it. There was a small vegetable garden, a barbecue, and an outdoor setting with a folded sun umbrella r
ising out of the table. The glow of a holovision set flickered behind partially closed curtains. People must live here. Probably more scientists, Colt thought, since it was a research facility.

  He wondered what kind of research they did here.

  Colt hurried across to the next building. Identical to the first cottage, this one was in darkness. He passed another clothesline (more washing) and darted across a stretch of open ground to the back of the long, low office building Officer Katt and the others had emerged from. Lights shone in some of the windows, but those at the end were dark. Colt sneaked through the shadows, keeping close to the wall and ducking low each time he came to a window – even the unlit ones. He felt like an actor in a spy movie.

  But this was real, he reminded himself. He wasn’t an actor. If anyone saw him, they wouldn’t be actors, either. And if they had stun guns, those would be real, too.

  He reached the end of the office building. The truck was parked under some trees about 35 metres away. Floodlights along the perimeter fence bathed the area in pale yellow light. Colt looked over his shoulder – back in the direction of the cottages – and saw no sign of life. He took a deep breath and flexed his muscles, hoping against hope to feel the familiar tingle of his superpowers returning, but nothing happened. Too bad, he thought. And went charging across to the truck.

  It was big, about the size of a furniture removal van. Large enough to carry an elephant. Colt ducked around behind it. There were two doors, held closed by a system of rods and levers. He pulled one of the levers, half expecting it to be locked, but the mechanism turned easily. The door creaked open. Colt poked his SmartTorch through the gap and clicked it on.

  The back of the truck was empty.

  When Colt had superpowers, one of his special abilities had been an enhanced sense of smell. Did he still have it? He stuck his head into the rear of the empty truck and sniffed the stale air. Bingo! There was a faint animal odour – it wasn’t fresh, but Colt’s super-sensitive nose told him that an animal of some kind had been in there recently.

  Lucy?