by V. L. Dreyer
"That's awful," I said softly, my stomach twisting into sympathetic knots. "If he was a Bollywood star, then his voice would have been his life and a huge part of his identity. No wonder he always looks miserable. I wish I could do something to make him feel more welcome."
"I don't think he feels unwelcome," Aaron replied. "He's not the sort to just sit there and sulk if he doesn't like something. He'll find some way to let you know, even if he has to write it out on a bit of paper, wrap it around a brick, and bash you over the head with it."
I laughed and nodded my understanding. "That's good. I don't want anyone feeling uncomfortable."
We continued in silence for a couple of minutes, each keeping our own council. Just as we were emerging from another building, I realised that something was out of place. I froze in my tracks and held up a hand to stop Aaron. He glanced at me quizzically; I lifted a finger to touch my earlobe, silently indicating that he should stop and listen. The part of town we were travelling through was densely overgrown, but the birds in the trees and bushes in front of us were no longer singing. Someone was hiding just out of our line of sight.
I sighed heavily and put my hands on my hips. "I know you're there, Bobby. Why don't you just come out so we can talk?"
Aaron took a nervous step up to my side, fingering the hilt of the long hunting knife on his belt. I lifted a hand to forestall any hasty actions and just waited. Sure enough, a few seconds later there was a rustling sound, and then the youth appeared out of the bushes. I was almost surprised to see him carrying a large wood axe. Almost, but not really.
I felt Aaron tense up at the sight of the weapon, but I wasn't concerned. While a wood axe could be a lethal weapon in trained hands, my previous encounter with the youth had led me to the understanding that whatever training he'd received from the Pukeatua bandits had been rudimentary at best.
"Were you planning to put that in my back?" I asked, keeping my tone conversational rather than accusative. I took a few steps forward, my arms relaxed at my sides, nowhere near any of my weapons. "You know that's not how justice works, right?"
"My dad said that justice meant an eye for an eye," Bobby replied. "You murdered him, so now I have to kill you."
"I didn't murder anyone," I replied, fighting the urge to react in a way that would exacerbate the situation. He was just a kid, after all. A dumb, stubborn kid. I'd been the same way at his age. Everything was black and white, with no room for shades of grey. "Look, Bobby. I know that you're angry, but would killing me actually solve anything? It won't bring your step-dad back. It won't bring back any of the other innocent people your step-dad killed, either."
"I have to do something," Bobby snapped angrily. He gritted his teeth and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, as though that would hide his tears from me. "He was my dad!"
"I know, Bobby," I said gently. I heaved another sigh, and watched my breath cloud in the frosty air. "It was a terrible situation. I wish it hadn't come to it. But the only other choice was to let him slaughter my husband and my foster-daughter. She's about your age, you know. She's a beautiful, sweet, kind girl with the soul of an angel and a smile that lights up the room. Your step-father wanted to kill her in cold blood, just because her skin is brown. She hadn't done anything to him. You have to see it wasn't right for him to kill someone just because their skin is brown. Do you think I should have just let him do it?"
Silence was my answer. Bobby shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot on the icy ground, his expression tormented and his grip on the axe increasingly awkward. Suddenly, he sniffed and wiped his eye again. "Shut up."
"We can fight if you really want to," I said gently, taking another step towards him. Rather than threaten him, I just slipped my hands into the pocket of my coat to keep them warm while I waited for him to make his choice. "You know that I'll probably still win, though. I've got ten years of experience on you, and I know how to fight. It doesn't have to be like this, though. I have no quarrel with you or your mother. I don't hurt anyone unless they try to hurt me or my family. That's my rule."
"Shut up!" he said sharply, taking a step back and shifting his axe up into an offensive position. I didn't move, didn't retreat, just looked him straight in the eye and smiled at him.
"I told your mum that I'm willing to go before a tribunal of justice, if you want me to," I explained evenly, my hands still resting comfortably in my pockets. "It was self-defence, Bobby. Everyone's allowed to defend themselves and their families from a threat. I mean, what would you do if someone attacked your mum? You'd want to protect her, right? I feel the same way about my daughter." I took another step towards him and shifted to a tone that was kind and gentle, but not condescending. "Like I said, it doesn't have to be this way. I don’t know what your dad taught you, but my dad taught me that forgiveness is a strength, not a weakness. We're going south soon. We're going to Lower Hutt, to build a new city where everyone is welcome. I'm willing to forget this ever happened and let you come with us – if you can find the strength to forgive me, too. You deserve a chance to be happy, and so does your mum. Everyone does."
Bobby's grip on the axe faltered in his trembling hands. He lowered it until the head rested on the ground and stared at me with tears flowing down his cheeks unrestrained. Then, suddenly, he dropped the axe and fled down the street away from me as fast as his legs could take him.
I watched until he was out of sight, then turned and looked at Aaron with my eyebrows raised. "I guess that's a no?"
"You handled that so well that if you weren't already married, I'd be down on one knee right now," Aaron said solemnly. It lasted for all of two seconds, then his friendly face cracked into a smile. I smiled back, though my heart wasn't really in it. I'd barely recovered from the last encounter with Bobby, and now I was left reliving the guilt and horror about what had happened in the forest near Pukeatua all over again. No matter how many times I told myself I had no other choice, I couldn't shake the niggling feeling that I should have found another solution, somehow.
Some days, I didn't think I would ever be able to forgive myself and move on. Other days, I thought that I didn't want to, that I had to remember so I never reached the point where I could do that kind of thing without feeling sickened by it. The last thing I wanted was to become the very monster I was fighting against.
I took a deep breath to calm my roiling stomach, then looked at Aaron. "Right, let's get back to work, shall we?”
***
It was late afternoon by the time we finished our final sweep of the town and returned to the spot we'd designated as our rendezvous. It was still raining and snowing intermittently, but we needed a way to burn the remains of the infected. The rendezvous was a large shed near the outskirts of town, which was big enough to house all those bodies but isolated enough that we could burn it down without setting the rest of the township on fire.
The volunteers handling what we'd come to refer to as 'slops duty' were the last to come back. They were wrapped from head to toe in disposable plastic suits that we'd found in a veterinarian clinic, with masks and goggles to protect their faces. For once in my life, I hadn't volunteered; my sense of smell was so sensitive that I probably wouldn't have made it through without losing my lunch. It had taken all of my willpower to hide my relief when other people had put their hands up for the gruesome task.
Charu was the last one to return, carrying two huge buckets filled with a horrible red-brown slime that I refused to believe had once been people. I took a deep breath and looked away; the sight alone was nearly enough to make me retch. Michael appeared out of nowhere and put his hands on my shoulders to reassure me. I leaned against him for a second to recover and absorb a little bit of his strength. When I looked back, Charu was emerging from the shed and stripping off his protective gear. It was too splattered with filth to try and save. Once he'd peeled it off, he tossed it into the shed and then silently walked away. I didn't need to ask to know that he was heading back to base to shower and scrub him
self raw. I itched just looking at him.
"Douse the bodies with petrol," I said, pasting my mask of strength back into place. "Good thing we've got some to spare now. We need to make sure it gets hot enough to burn them to ashes. We’ll bury the bones and anything left over once it cools down."
Michael gave me one last gentle squeeze, then stepped forward to do just that. He and a few of the others had spent most of the day gathering any spare firewood we weren't taking with us and stuffing it around the edge of the shed to make it burn as hot as possible. My rules were fairly simple: we could burn anything that wasn't of cultural significance. No books, artwork, musical or artistic instruments, or anything that still had value to us. Anything else was fair game.
Michael returned to my side once the work was done, leaving Hemi to do the honours. We retreated to a safe distance, where the rest of our little community had gathered to watch. The sun was setting, and it was hard to see exactly what Hemi was doing; I saw a tiny flicker of flame, then suddenly he was running towards us as fast as he could go.
"Why's he running so fast?" I wondered out loud. Before anyone could answer me, there was a small explosion, followed by a cascade of golden sparkles. My mouth fell open in surprise.
Beside me, Michael made a childlike sound that could only be described as a chortle. "Yes! Yes! It's working!"
"What's workin—" I started to ask, only to be interrupted again by another small explosion that turned into a cascade of blue sparkles. Before I could even catch my breath from the last one, a third and fourth explosion went off. Then the shed ignited with a whoosh of air, amid a dozen cascades of multi-coloured—
"Fireworks?" I gasped, my eyes wide. I wanted to turn and look at Michael, but I couldn't pry my eyes away from the impromptu display. "Where did you find those?"
"Oh, a few people had them in their garages," Michael answered breathlessly. "It was illegal to buy or sell fireworks any time except the week leading up to Guy Fawkes' Day, but lots of people used to buy extras and keep them in storage until New Year's Eve. Since the plague hit in December, they never had a chance to use them."
"No, I guess they didn't," I replied softly. I found myself clinging to him without even realising I was doing it "I didn't realise they lasted this long."
"Oh, yeah. Fireworks last forever, if you keep them clean and dry," he said. "Sophie and I used to do this every so often. We'd find some, have a little fun, get a little pyromaniacal, you know, the usual."
Just at that moment, the fire spreading up the walls of the shed reached the roof, and the first rocket shot up into the early evening sky. It exploded in a vibrant white powder-puff, and I gasped in delight. The fireworks on the ground began to fade away, but by that time we were focused on the sky instead, watching rocket after rocket shoot up above us and explode in sparkles, like the forgotten magic of a bygone era.
Which, in a way, it was.
Chapter Six
As soon as we finished washing away the grime of an unpleasant day spent doing the necessary, we headed to bed for an early night, just as we had every night since we'd arrived in Taihape. Even though we had plenty of fuel for the generators at the moment, we were painfully aware that such resources were finite and we had a long journey ahead of us. We had no intention of wasting any more than we had to.
I awoke in the washed-out grey light of dawn, curled up in the warm alcove between Michael's body and the radiator. I stretched languidly and rolled over on my side, enjoying the warmth while I could. There was nothing that urgently needed to be done until the flood waters receded, so there was no real reason for me to get up. I decided to let myself doze for a while. My eyes drifted closed, and I fell into that pleasant space between the world of dreams and reality.
When I opened them again, the sun had crept a few inches higher. The motel curtains weren't exactly the most solid things in the world, and let in just enough light for me to pinpoint the time as somewhere near mid-morning. I glanced at Michael and saw that he was still sound asleep, so I decided I probably wasn't the only one who’d realised we had a lazy morning ahead of us. My urge to doze had been sated and now I found myself awake and alert, so I decided it was time to get up.
I slipped out of bed without disturbing him, and gently pulled the blankets up to his chin to keep him warm. He sighed softly and snuggled into the space I'd left behind, but didn't wake. The sight of it made me smile and drew my thoughts to the child growing inside me. My little secret, for now.
I'd showered before bed and it was too cold to do so again just yet, so I just grabbed my clothing off the dresser and pulled it on. My basic essentials went into their pockets, but I left my weapons and coat behind for the time being. If I decided to go outside, then I could always come back and get them. For now, I just had to worry about my daily check-up with Doc, and it was easier to do that discreetly when Michael was still asleep.
I left the room and quietly closed the door behind me, then headed down the hallway to Doc's room. His door was slightly ajar; I knocked softly, then entered when he called permission. I found him sitting with Anahera, who was holding a notebook open to a page of tidy, hand-written notes. Maddy was sitting on the floor in the corner, playing with her favourite rag dolls.
"Good morning," I said. "I'm not interrupting, am I?"
"No, we were just working on that little project you gave us," Doc replied. "Come in and close the door."
I did as I was told, and plopped down in an old armchair that Doc had acquired for reasons known only to him; my guess was that he liked having somewhere for patients to sit aside from the beds, which made sense. Anahera leaned over and handed the notebook to me. I quickly glanced over the column of figures, then shot them both a curious look.
"This looks more like a census than a training chart," I said, intrigued.
"That's because it is," Anahera answered, her smile radiant as ever. "We know that you keep a list of everyone so that no one gets left behind, but with all these new faces we decided that it would be logical to expand things a bit. Look at the next page."
I turned the page, and skimmed over the contents. "Wait, is this…"
"Yes," Doc said, looking quite pleased with himself. "That's a list of everyone's names, dates of birth if they remember it, approximate ages, religious beliefs, occupations, and unique or useful skills. We've also plotted family trees as far back as we could, which I plan to keep updating as our little group expands."
"Family trees?" I asked, glancing back at him. "Why?"
"Numerous reasons," he replied. "Genealogy is an important part of human nature, and there is no Department of Births, Deaths, and Marriages to keep track of such things anymore. It will also help us keep track of genetic anomalies, so if there’s a risk of anyone developing a hereditary disease then we’ll have some advance warning."
"Oh, of course," I said, nodding. "There are quite a few people with relatives that are still alive since the immunity tends to run in families, so the likelihood of hereditary stuff reoccurring is a bit higher than normal."
"Only slightly, but yes," Doc said, nodding. "It probably won’t help a great deal for this generation, since so many of our citizens were too young to remember their family histories, but if we start the project now and gather as much information as we can from the people who are old enough to know and remember, then it will help in the future. As for the rest, I know that you like to respect people's choices as much as you can, so I figure that the religious data may come in handy at some stage. The career information is useful so we can keep track of who knows how to do what. "
"It is," I agreed. I skimmed the list quickly, then shot him a curious look. "Aaron's a nurse? That's interesting. He’s mentioned that he studied, but he never said what. Not that I’m complaining; two nurses are always better than one."
"Definitely agreed," Doc answered dryly, adjusting his spectacles. "My understanding is that Rebecca stopped practicing a few years before the plague, so her knowledge is a little rus
ty. I plan to bring her and Aaron in to assist me, and to retrain them both as much as possible. With this many people, I'm going to need as much help as I can get."
"How many women and kids are with the new arrivals?" I asked, glancing back and forth between them.
"Seven women of childbearing age," Anahera answered. "There's also one woman past menopause, and sixteen men over the age of eighteen. There are five kids, aged between three months and fourteen years. Three girls, two boys. They've got a few pets and some livestock with them, too."
I drew a deep breath, and let it out slowly. "Twenty-nine new faces. I don't know how I'm going to remember all of their names."
"We already thought of that," Doc replied. He grabbed another sheet of paper, peeled something off it, and slapped it on my chest. I blinked in surprise and glanced down at it.
"Really? A name tag? This is what we've been reduced to?" I commented, laughing. "That's actually kind of brilliant."
"It is, isn't it?" Anahera grinned at me. She picked her own name tag off the sheet and stuck it to her chest. "Your sister thought of it when she found a roll of these stickers in an old stationery shop in town."
"I like it. It's good," I agreed. "Start handing them out as soon as you can."
"We already have," Doc replied. "We've also started pairing apprentices with their teachers. Hemi is due to start training with me later this morning."
"And I'm officially opening classes for the children, too," Anahera added. "We went down and checked the flooding this morning. It looks like it's going to be at least another couple of days before we can get through there safely. In the meantime, we may as well get these kids learning something."