The Newcomers: a novel of global invasion , human resilience, and the wild places of the planet

by Pamela Jekel

  “Ah. Well, then you’ll share ours. Of course, wresting it from my son, Baako, is a bit of a chore. He’s mad for his games.”

  Chase grinned for the first time, and Jomo felt his heart wrench for the boy. “I like Zbox. Wonder if we play the same ones.”

  “Shouldn’t doubt it. Baako’s fourteen. You’re thirteen?”

  He nodded, “Just turned.” His eyes roamed the room.

  “Ah. Then you’re one year older than Desta.”

  “So you have a son, Baako, one year older, and a daughter, Desta, one year younger than me, and that’s it?”

  “That is, as you say in America, all she wrote,” Jomo said.

  “And what’s your house like?”

  “Nice enough, I daresay. Plenty of room, and we may take on a few more, should the need arise.”

  “There were hundreds of kids waiting for places in the Collection Station I was at,” he said, subdued again. “And hundreds of stations all over the country, I think.”

  “Well, then, we shall have to see what we can do about all that, eh? Why not pop to the loo and wash up,” Jomo nodded towards the door with his chin, “your Tommy burger’s bound to be here shortly.”

  He watched the boy make his way through the tables to the toilet, noticed how eyes followed him, some openly hostile, others merely frankly curious. This was going to be more difficult than he had imagined. He wished the boy was older. More mature. Well, that was going to happen quick enough, no matter. Wish it or not.

  The waitress brought the plates over. “Where’s your kijani, then?” she asked. Your young man.

  “Excused himself,” Jomo said.

  “A Yank, is he?”

  Jomo looked up at her flared nostrils and stiff smile. “Quite. I gather the poor waifs are starving to death over there.”

  She rudely snorted and flounced off.

  Jomo sighed. More difficult, indeed.

  Chase pronounced the Tommy burger “awesome”, and then they made their way back to the station, wheeling the little valise behind them. The boy seemed excited about the prospect of a rail journey. Baako had already learned to be cynical; this lad had not yet perfected that pose, and it was amusing to see his youthful excitement at this new adventure. When they got to the station, he looked around in confusion.

  “Where are the Escorts?”

  “Sorry?”

  “The soldiers. For the train.”

  Jomo realized the importance of his question. “You’ve been escorted by soldiers throughout, then?”

  “From the Collection Station to the camp—“

  “The camp?”

  “The Collection Camp. They ran the camp. And then from there to the train, they took us. And then on the ship, too.”

  “But didn’t your government arrange for your care and transport?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Dad says there’s hardly any government left. It’s just the Army now. And the Marines. We had Marines at my camp.”

  “I see. Well, there’s no soldiers here, lad. Just you chaps going to your new homes.”

  “Have you got soldiers in this country?”

  “Well, of course we do. Mind your step now, hand that porter your bag.”

  Chase waved eagerly at children he recognized, as though they’d not just seen each other two hours before.

  “We get to have an overnight on it?” he grinned.

  “Yes, it will rock you to sleep,” Jomo said. “You may take the top cot; I’ll be down here,” he said, as the porter ushered them to their compartment. It was nearing twilight as the train readied for departure.

  “So, it’ll be too dark to see any animals,” Chase said.

  “Are you an early riser?”

  “Not hardly.”

  “Well, t’would be foolish to sleep in tomorrow, because dawn is when the game’s out. You’ll see plenty before we reach Nairobi.”

  “Giraffes? Elephants? Maybe a lion?” He all but bounced on the cushion.

  “I daresay,” Jomo said. The train made its initial departure noises, a few jolts, a long whistle, and they began their journey. “Would you like a bit of exploring?”

  “Right-o!”

  Jomo chuckled, wondering what old Brit film had inspired him. Once in the corridor, they quickly found packs of kids and their new foster fathers, and Chase asked, “There’s no moms on this train?”

  “Oh no, lad, most mums are at home, waiting for you chaps to arrive.”

  “Are they allowed on the train?”

  “Well of course, they’re allowed, but they’ve their own responsibilities, eh? Ours are to fetch the children.”

  Chase pondered that. “No way my mom wouldn’t be here, if kids were involved. ‘Specially if one of them was going to come home with us. No way. Can I go see my friends?”

  “Surely. Do you have any money with you at all?”

  Chase dug some Euros out of his pocket. “We changed these before we sailed.”

  Jomo added a handful of Kenyan shillings to his hand. “Knock yourself out,” he added with a wry smile.

  “Thanks,” Chase grinned, hurrying out of the compartment.

  Jomo found a group of fathers, and they compared notes again. Most were putting a brave face on their choices, even if they had secret fears. “They seem fairly well-adjusted, considering,” he said to one man who was watching as two little girls fell in with the gaggle of kids crowding the lounge bar with Euros in their hands.

  “More’n I’d be, that’s a fact,” the man replied. “Staggers the mind, eh? Ten years ago, I recall when kids from America came to Embu to show the farmers some organic farming, how to use briquettes and the like. Rains had been scant; crops were poor. They dug and planted and weeded and harvested, worked hard, they did. Seven hours a day, five days a week, all volunteers, lived in a rented house, no electric, no baths. Paid three-hundred pounds each for the privilege, at that! And now, we’re taking them in, just to keep them alive. The world’s gone mad.”

  “And very forgetful,” Jomo said. “In Mombasa! Remember that troop of kids that came over from Boston and worked with the Magongo Santana friends of environment youth group? Had you heard of that? They collected rubbish! Went from house to house, trying to show them simple waste management, planted trees, did I-don’t-know-what-all, and now they frown at this lot as though they’re here to steal their last bottles of Tusker. We best be prepared for some cheeky remarks with them in tow.”

  The man shook his head in mournful agreement.

  “Are yours orphans?” Jomo asked, dropping his voice.

  “Don’t have the slightest. Can’t bring myself to ask.”

  “If they aren’t yet, they soon will be,” another man said. “Odds their parents survive the work camps are slim to nil.”

  “What have you heard about them?” Jomo asked.

  “Dreadful places. Run by the military, so naturally the food is bad, and they’re over-crowded. Be lucky if they don’t have diseases running rampant. These,” he nodded to the children, “they’re the fortunate ones.”

  “I daresay.” Jomo watched as Chase laughed with two chums, jostling and teasing, seemingly without a care. He wondered what the boy dreamed of, those long nights on the sea.

  That night as they readied for bed, he ventured a question. “Did you ever see the aliens, Chase? They show themselves at all?”

  “Just some pictures in a magazine, supposed to be what they look like. I don’t know anybody who ever saw one.”

  “I saw those photos,” Jomo said. “Tall and thin, eyes like preying mantis, eh? I should have thought they’d have shown themselves at least once.”

  Chase shrugged. “They never had to. They sent the messages, and we went where they said.”

  “What did your father say about that?”

  Chase looked at him, his eyes suddenly cold. “My father said shit. He did what he was told.”

  Jomo was shocked to silence. He felt he should reprimand the boy for his disrespect and his lang
uage, but he could only shake his head sorrowfully. “Well, we’ll speak of this another time perhaps,” he said.

  When first light entered the compartment, Jomo rose up on one elbow and saw that Chase was already awake, on his stomach, watching the African landscape roll by.

  “I saw giraffes,” he said.

  “Did you, now. This is the perfect time to see elephants moving to the river as well. They like to take long drinks, after their sleep.”

  “Do they sleep lying down?”

  “Oh, yes. And they snore.”

  “No way.”

  “Way, dude.”

  Chase chuckled.

  “When we get to the farm, we’ll ride out, you and Baako and I, and we’ll take the dogs. See if we can scare up a lion or two.”

  “With guns?”

  “Of course.”

  “Cool.”

  “Quite.” He rang for the porter, ordered tea, toast, and jam, and settled back in his dressing gown to watch the morning unfold. He never tired of it, the length and breadth of Africa, the long vistas that dimmed to nothing but more Africa. What must it be like to live in a place corralled by buildings and houses and factories? Must it be hard to breathe?

  “You said ‘farm’,” the boy asked. “Like with chickens and cows and stuff?”

  “Right. But mostly pyrethrum fields. ‘Py,’ for short. White flowers used for natural insecticides. Big market in Kenya. We’re the number one producer in the world.”

  “So you grow flowers? Are most of the people poor where you live?”

  An impertinent question. But logical enough, Jomo supposed. “I should hope not. Nyeri is the capital of the Central Province. They told you nothing about it before you came?”

  “Some. They said we were colonists. On a mission to colonize those places that still can be saved. To the wilderness areas, like Africa, and teach ecology.”

  Jomo chuckled. “Colonists? Did they, now. Well, we’ve been colonized before, lad, just as you were, but we’ve been a free nation longer than I’ve been alive. And while I’m certain you might make some suggestions to a few farmers in Nyeri, we’re not frightfully backwards on the subject. Nor are we exactly wilderness,” he added wryly. Jomo suddenly felt the boy needed to be put in his place. “You call yourselves ‘colonists’. We feel you’re more like, well, refugees.”

  Chase was silent at that. “So we’re not on a mission?”

  “Not to save Africa. Perhaps to save yourselves.” Since they were on sensitive ground, Jomo decided to press on. “Tell me, Chase. Why did your parents decide not to send your little sister?”

  He looked away, clearly uncomfortable. “It was mostly my mom. All my grandparents died. Then Moses died. He was my little brother. He wasn’t even three. The Legionnaires. She just wasn’t the same after that.”

  “Oh, my dear boy. I am so sorry.”

  His face turned stoic again. “Yeah. Well, after that, Mom couldn’t stand to send Miranda away. She could stand to send me away alright, but not her precious baby.”

  “I am certain that your mother felt you were just as precious to her.”

  “Not so precious she couldn’t send me off quick enough. And my dad didn’t do a thing to stop her.”

  “Chase, it’s a hard duty that parents have, to do what they think best for the family. You’ll never know the heartache their decisions cost them.”

  “Yeah, well nobody asked me what was best.”

  “And why would they do that? You’re a boy. They’re the adults. It’s their place to make decisions for the lot of you. They clearly felt that Miranda would not fare well away from them, but that you were old enough and strong enough to forge on.”

  Chase turned a skeptical gaze to him.

  “Have you heard from them?”

  “I got two letters in camp.”

  “Ah, yes. Where you were in training to be colonists. Right. And have you answered their letters?”

  He shook his head.

  “Well, they must be frightfully worried about you, then. When we get home, you’ll write to them directly. And I’ll add a line or two, so they know you’re in good hands. Now here comes tea,” he said as the porter knocked. “There’s a good lad, make room for the tray. Do you take yours white or black?”

  “What?”

  “With milk or without. Never mind, you’re too young for black. You’ll like it best with milk and sugar, I should think. Just like Desta.” Jomo pointedly ignored Chase’s bewildered frown and handed him his tea and toast, prepared as he felt the boy should enjoy them. Good a time as any for him to learn his place in the pecking order, after all. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put aside childish things. And a child he is, for all his stiff-upper lip. If I don’t break him a bit, Baako will, and that will be a certain row.

  The train pulled into Nairobi through the city national park, and Chase was agog at zebra, wildebeest, giraffe, warthog, elephant, and wild dogs, roaming free and all within sight of the tallest buildings. They left the station and found the car.

  “Escalade,” Chase said. “Sweet. Electric?”

  “Hybrid,” Jomo said. “Petrol’s too dear for cars these days, mostly we save it for the lorries and the farm equipment. Now let’s get you what you’ll need for school, a proper kit, I should think.”

  “Kit for what?”

  “Uniform, Chase. And all the paraphernalia that goes with it.”

  “What kind of school?”

  “Same’s Baako and Desta, of course. Catholic secondary. You’ve taken Latin?”

  He shook his head, clearly overwhelmed.

  “I shouldn’t worry about it; you’ll pick it up straight away.”

  As they drove into the shopping area of Nairobi, Chase gasped. “Has the sickness been here, too?”

  Shops were boarded up; the streets were largely empty. Jomo was used to the change. He realized too late he might have warned the lad. “No, no. Not this new disease, at any rate. Nairobi was hit with the hanta fever ten years back, killed hundreds of thousands. Many more fled to the villages. Didn’t you hear about it in America?” It was quite odd. America sneezed, and the world knew of it by morning. Kenya was devastated, yet this boy knew nothing of it. Easy enough to resent that. “But no Legionnaires. Our water is perfectly safe, most particularly our well water at the farm.”

  They found a shop, bought Chase the clothes and supplies he’d need for a few weeks, and as the shopkeeper was wrapping the parcels, Jomo took the opportunity to step outside and make a call to Asha. Cell reception would be impossible once they left Nairobi.

  “Good morning, love,” he said when she answered.

  “Good morning! I take it you’ve arrived back safely, then? And how are the children?”

  “Well, one of them is fit and fine, the other one’s gone missing, I’m afraid. Their parents decided not to send her. Our one chap made the trip alone.”

  “Oh, I am sorry,” Asha said. “Desta was so keen for a girl. And so was I, of course.”

  “Just what I told him. But he’s a bit prickly on the subject. Might want to leave off the questions for a bit, just until he settles in.”

  “Certainly, certainly. But the boy’s….normal otherwise?”

  “Quite.”

  “Well, I’m glad you called, love, and thanks for the warning. See you in a few hours, then?”

  “All’s well there?”

  “We miss you.”

  “Well, we’ll have the remedy for that soon enough.”

  He went back into the shop, collected Chase and the parcels, and they headed for Nyeri.

  * * *

  Osa came awake gradually from her nap. Surrounded as she was in the deep bush by a dozen of her sisters, cousins, aunts, and her mother, she felt safe and relaxed.

  Her daughter slept with the other older calves, close to the weanlings. She had seen ten summers now, had not suckled for two of those, and her role within t
he herd was becoming well-defined. Nannies to the youngest, the older daughters were responsible for their share of calf-care. Osa’s daughter took her duties seriously, staying close to three young calves so that she could fuss over them, touching them often with trunk-strokes and pats, feeling their rumps for any foul waste, placing her trunk into their mouths to see what they ate. She would make a good mother in her time.

  Osa moved gradually to the kneeling position and then rolled upright, rumbling low in her stomach as she did so. The smell of the red dust and the heat in the upper branches, the scent of the cooler, crushed grasses, and the familiar heavy odors of her own body reassured her. The other members of the herd were coming awake as well, and the snoring of the sleeping elephants changed to new sounds as the bush was soon alive with the gurgles and low burbles they used to make themselves known to each other, even when the cover hid their bodies. Like all elephants, Osa had thick pads of gristle just below her foot bones that let her move very quietly through cover when she desired. Or she could rampage through brush, exploding it with an angry roar, for effect. Like many large mammals, she relished quiet.

  Their leader, an aged cow of more than fifty summers, began to assemble them, leading them around the thorn brush towards the nearby river to drink and bathe. Old One had been their leader since before Osa had reached her maturity, and she could scarcely recall any leader before her. She had seen much, and Osa knew that Old One was surprised by nothing. Or if she was, she hid it well.

  Through thirty summers, Osa had learned her rightful place in this, the largest herd which roamed the land of the three rivers. Increasingly, she had seen other herds, as the dry season deepened, coming to share their water. At times, Old One had to signal the herd to simultaneously flap their ears and trumpet displeasure, shouldering strangers aside so that the calves could find their spaces at the crowded riverbank. The humans had pushed their maize fields farther into the bush, into places the Old One had known to be without man most of her life, and with man came struggle for what water was left after they carried it away on their heads. There was little to be done about the humans, but Osa felt that more frequent thefts of the maize was likely a fair exchange.