“Let’s just go over this last hill,” begged River, filled with unquenchable childlike curiosity.
“Okay, but we’ll have to hurry back, so Cedar and Jake don’t worry about us,” I acquiesced, sounding way more responsible that I had ever imagined I could. We were almost at the top of the hill anyway, so I couldn’t see the harm.
I could tell that the girls saw something amazing when they reached the crest, as they both stood stock still, bodies frozen in either amazement or horror. I couldn’t be sure which. I picked up my pace and elongated my strides and was beside them in seconds.
Before us, stretched a sheltered valley, only partially open to the ocean side, but that wasn’t the amazing thing. The gentle slopes that led down to the basin were covered in the greyish-green lichen, specially designed to convert our crappy atmosphere in to oxygen. The plants were thick along the ground until they reached a small patch of brilliant yellow green blades that undulated in the soft breeze. It was nothing that the girls had ever seen before and I’d only seen the desiccated remnants of grass up in the northern tundra once when I was maybe five years old or so. I had to rub my eyes and take a second look before trusting what I saw.
River took a few steps towards the slope, but I grabbed her arm and held her fast.
“But,” she looked at me with frustration, “but, what is it?”
“It looks like grass to me, but you can’t go down there,” I tried to explain. Her bottom lip popped out like an ejected SIM card and I thought she might cry. “Here’s the thing, we don’t know how sensitive those plants are, what if we disrupt something and it kills them? How would you feel then?” I watched her expression change as she considered the possibilities.
“Is that what happened,” she looked for a word that would encompass what she was trying to say, but failing, only added “before?”
“That’s exactly what happened,” I confirmed, sweeping my arm across the vista. “All of this used to be covered in trees that gave homes to all sorts of animals and bugs and other plants. It was pretty amazing, but now it’s all gone, except for maybe this one little spot.” I watched her eyes grow round and she looked back at the patch of grass with a new found reverence, her eyes full of tears. She tried to swallow them, but one escaped and trickled down her round cheek. Blossom put a comforting arm around her shoulder.
“Don’t cry River. Those things down there, do you know what they are?” she asked. The girl shook her head. “They’re hope,” smiled Blossom. “The world is trying to fix itself and that is totally awesome!”
I noticed our shadows stretching out towards the valley and realized that we’d been longer than I’d intended.
“Come on; let’s go tell Cedar and Jake!” The feeling that I’d had when Grandmother had touched my chest returned, triple-fold as I processed the implications of our find. The girls didn’t need anymore encouragement and turned back, running madly down the incline back towards the car. I noted that as I trotted behind, keeping their pace, that I wasn’t as winded and that all the time spent out in the Bee Zee had whipped me into better shape. It felt good, and I was pretty sure that it would come in handy for whatever happened next.
Jake and Cedar were waiting for us, faces creased with concern, but the sun hadn’t sunk completely below the hill, so they were only mildly concerned. They’d sent Pipkin out to search for us, but we hadn’t seen him. It wasn’t long before he returned but we were already part way through our story about the little valley we’d come across.
“Oh my God, we saw some of that stuff, too, but it was too far away to get a good look at. I thought it was maybe old plastic or something,” said Jake excitedly. “We did find a way to get down to the beach, it’s not too far from here, but the path is pretty narrow.”
“Yea, I’m not sure if the car will fit through or not, maybe Pip can do some calculations?” added Cedar.
“We’ll check it out tomorrow,” I suggested, watching the sun dip below the horizon, “and then, once we’re down, we can head towards the ocean and maybe that damned code thing will start working.”
I wasn’t sure how far out we’d have to go to try and find the next step of our journey. The bridge that we saw was definitely the one in Reg’s clip. I could make out large tracts of it stretched out across the sea bed, tonnes of cement fragments resting where they had fallen and the thought of the power which had smashed it made me shiver a little. We were safe from monstrous waves, but once we were out on the beach, there was no shelter from smog or sand storms if they blew up. We’d also be easy targets for drones, if they flew out this far, so it was sufficiently dangerous to make me reconsider our options. I could tell that Cedar was thinking the same thing, as she settled River in for the night.
I did my own rounds, checking in with everybody to see how they were. Jake and Blossom were still talking excitedly about the plants they’d seen and what it might mean for the world as a whole and what they might see if they found the fabled farmer.
I was glad to see that Blossom had let go of some of her doubt. Had it only been a few weeks ago, that I’d met a world savvy street rat that would have sold her own mother if it had benefited her? Maybe that was too harsh, but I knew in my heart of hearts she’d debated turning us, or at least me in to the authorities before we’d fled in to the burn zone. I probably would have done it if I were her, but I was glad she’d had enough faith in Jake not to.
It took me a long time to fall asleep. The regeneration of plant life had mind boggling implications and I wondered how the plants survived with a dearth of water. There were obviously some sort of nutrients in the soil, or perhaps they were like those air plants that sucked food out of the atmosphere. I wasn’t a botanist, or even a biologist, but the lack of information had me pondering late in to the night.
It didn’t feel like I’d been asleep for long when something woke me. I reached up and touched my forehead, where a remnant of sensation tingled. Something had hit me and there was a drop of moisture where I gently prodded with my finger tip. Had it been something sharp? Was I bleeding? I put the tip of my finger to my tongue, expecting the metallic taste of blood, but I couldn’t taste much of anything other than a hint of salt. I turned on my side and pulled my blanket around my ears; maybe I’d just imagined it or it was a last drop of perspiration from the heat of the day. I closed my eyes trying to get back to sleep when something hit me on the nose. This time I was awake and knew my imagination wasn’t that well developed. Touching the spot, sure enough I found another droplet of moisture. For the next hour, it was like torture, I’d just starting to doze off and I’d get smacked with a droplet. It only seemed to be bothering me, but I could hear the sounds of droplets hitting the plastic blankets and other hard surfaces. I could feel sleep calling me, when a thought popped in to my brain like an electric shock; rain!
By the time I’d scrambled to my feet and found a light stick, the drops had stopped, but I could see a few scattered beads of moisture on our blankets. The rest of my companions had the blankets pulled up over their heads to ward off the morning sun, or so I assumed, which explained why none of them woke up. I ran a hand over the car and gathered up a few more droplets; certainly not enough to be useful to us, but maybe just enough to feed the tender grass shoots we had seen. I scanned the horizon and noticed a shrinking black line blotting out the stars. I supposed that it was possible that some of the rain clouds that apparently gathered over the ocean might send the odd sprinkle all the way to the shore. When everyone woke up, they were never going to believe me.
Chapter 28 – Faith or Folly
Dawn had just broken across the great void of the ocean bed, as we loaded up the car and tried to decide what to do next. It was Pipkin that suggested we should turn on the Ham radio and search for transmissions. I scrolled slowly over the available channels as Cedar tried the decoder again. It was doing something, but we had no idea what, as no numbers were generated. Jake suggested that it was scanning for a connection and thought we ne
eded to be down on the ocean plain to get a good signal. This was said as he and Blossom watched Reg’s clip for what must have been the thousandth time. River hovered over their shoulders, curious about the images that flashed across the little screen. She tapped a finger against her thigh as she watched the images pass, as if impatient for it to finish. The three watched it a couple more times through and as Jake packed up the tablet and solar panel, River’s face went through a series of indescribable expressions. I was just starting think that she might be having a mental breakdown, when she stopped her facial contortions and ended with a huge smile.
“What are you so happy about, kid?” asked Jake, equally fascinated by her actions.
“Oh, I was just ‘membering that thing you showed me,” she replied with a shrug, like it was normal to attempt such a thing.
“No way,” said Blossom doubtfully, giving River a joking shove against the shoulder. The girl looked at her confused.
“You don’t do that?” River questioned, obviously thinking that they were teasing her.
“Couldn’t if I wanted to,” said Jake, “but you can?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, so prove it.” It was said kindly, but with a bit arch teenaged superiority. All of us stood stunned as River described the clip like it was playing before her eyes. “Whoa,” said Jake with a whistle through his teeth, “cool.”
“There’s twenty-eight pictures, nine movie things, seven sounds and one was them words,” River added, basking in the attention.
“Really?” Cedar ruffled the girl’s hair and sat down next to her. She looked at me and raised her eyebrow. We’d never thought to count the different media types. “Why did you think to count them?” River looked at her like she was joking.
“The first clip is someone saying ‘count the number of times’, so I figured that’s what I was s’pposed to do.” It was said so innocently. Cedar and I exchanged another look.
“It could be a code,” said Jake with a shrug.
“Or it could be a frequency, but in what order?” I spun the dial on the Ham radio, testing combinations. “What were those numbers, again, River?”
“Uhm,” she squinted as she double checked her memory. “Twenty-eight, nine, seven and one.”
“Okay, you said the first bit was a sound file, so maybe we should try that number first, what came next?” Jake wasn’t completely ready to rely on the girl’s memory and he set up the solar panel and tablet, ready to run the clip again.
“Next were some pictures, then another sound thingy, a movie and the last thing was the saying.”
“What if that’s supposed to count as an image?” questioned Jake. River shook her head, after thinking it over for a second.
“No, it was different, even though it did have a picture, the most obvious thing were the words, not the man.”
“My God, I just remembered,” interrupted Cedar, “my grandmother had an eidetic memory when she was a child; that must be where you got it from.”
“What’s ei-de-tic?” asked River, carefully sounding out the syllables.
“It just means you can remember images and things really well. I think the ability lessens with age; you’re pretty old to still have it, I think.”
“With all the genetic messing around, who knows what’s normal and what isn’t anymore,” added Jake. “Neat trick, Kid.”
As all the conversation floated around me, I was still trying to figure out how to translate the clues into a frequency or channel that would get us in contact with whoever we were looking for. I checked the megahertz band and slowly cranked it to 7289.1 and held my breathe. I heard a crackle, which didn’t sound all that much different from the usual static, until I heard a faint tone over the headphone I had pressed to my ear, I wasn’t sure if it had been audible through the external speaker as well.
“Did you hear that?” I yelled over the voices, but already knew the answer. How could they have when they were all yammering about River’s abilities?
“If I might make a suggestion, Owner Dax?” I nodded at the bot and made an impatient hand gesture. “Perhaps you should make a QSO.”
“Make a what?” I thought maybe his hard drive had been damaged in the rain.
“Make a call, Owner Dax,” His ear twitched down, and I felt that I might be straining his patience with my ignorance. “Perhaps you should start the conversation.”
“Right, good call.” I put the headphones on properly, adjusting the length so the ear pieces rested comfortably on either side of my head. I swallowed inconspicuously as I picked the microphone. I’d surveyed the equipment as I diddled around with the dials and figured that I had to press the red button to make the mike active. I pressed it down and the static in my ears went dead. I panicked and let go of the button and the static was back. Had I done something wrong? To cover my doubt I turned back to the bot. “So, how do I know if there’s someone I want to talk to on the other side, what if it’s the Sand Walkers?” Before he could answer another tone sounded on the frequency and it was a lot louder with the headset on properly.
“I read that faith is an important aspect of humanity, Owner Dax. Would this not be the right time and place to exercise the idea?” With that he buzzed over to Cedar who was packing up Betsy and then gathered up the others as well. He apparently felt obliged to tell them I was about to use the radio. I swallowed my concerns and depressed the red button again.
“Hi, is anyone out there?” It wasn’t the boldest statement and my voice waivered a little bit in the middle, but I let go of the button and listened intently. All I received in response was another tone. I pulled the headphones off. “No one’s answering. Let’s get out of here, we can try again later.”
“Well, at least try again, before you give up,” chided Cedar. “It’s not like anyone’s going to be sitting right by their radio, at least I wouldn’t think so. Give it another go and if there’s no answer we’ll head up the coast to the spot we found yesterday.” I decided to humour her and slid the headphones on again and called out, this time a bit more forcefully. It seemed to me that the beeps were increasing in frequency, but weren’t close enough together for me to be sure. I shrugged and we packed up the radio and got in to the car.
The ride to the beach access point wasn’t terribly long and we headed down the slope cautiously. The going was steep and the reddish sand was fine and slippery, but we finally found ourselves on a stretch of beach that faced the ruined bridge. Even shattered, the pillars of the bridge were impressive; looming over our heads almost majestically. I tried to imagine the force required to topple such an immense structure, but my imagination failed me.
None of us could resist exploring, so after parking under an arch that might have originally held up the driving deck, we piled out of the car and walked around the foundations of the columns and paced out some of the large pillars that lay across the sand. I quickly tired of the sport and stood looking out towards the east. There didn’t seem to be anything out past the ruins and I wondered why we were bothering. What could possibly be out there?
I caught a glimpse of myself in the review mirror and was surprised at the scruffy grey beard that had sprouted over my face. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d really taken the time to look at my reflection, outside the blurry image I’d see in the pod’s mirror as I sleepily shaved every morning before school. There was white scattered through my hair as well and I could see smile lines creasing my face. When had I gotten old? I admitted that I’d drifted lazily through the last ten years of my life, but is that what had changed me so drastically? Or was it all the madness of the last few weeks? It was a moot point. I looked the way I looked and we were doing what we were doing and there was really no way to go except forward. The radio squawked from the back compartment and the sound made me jump. I scrambled to the back of the car, throwing open the back hatch to grab the headset. Whatever had made the sound didn’t make any more, but I tried to make contact.
“Hello? Is a
nyone out there? Can you hear me? This is Dax, are you there?” I don’t know why I thought giving my name would be helpful in any way, but as I waited for a response I noticed that the beeps had definitely picked up speed, but it seemed that there was no one on the other end of the line. Maybe the types and number of media on the clip didn’t have anything to do with the frequency. It certainly hadn’t done anything on the key code, which lay on Cedar’s seat, the lights slowly spinning over the digital displays.
The kids soon tired of the ruins as well and settled themselves back in the car as Cedar wiped away traces of our foot steps. She took her time getting in to the passenger seat. I’ve come to believe that her timing was the act of a greater power.
Before I could start up the vehicle, a little blip from Pipkin warned us that something was close by and as I strained to look out beyond the fallen bridge column that was our hiding spot, I made out the high pitched whine of a drone, flying low over the beach. We watched its shadow sweep over the wide expanses of sand and morph into crooked shapes as it just cleared some of the columns that still stood upright. It was one of the flat black drones and its colour and sound felt repressively ominous. We froze, not daring to move. We hoped the car’s camouflage had kicked in and we were invisible from the cameras. The UAV hovered close to our hiding spot and we knew it was sending out scans. Somehow it knew we were here. I heard the whir of Pipkin’s lasers warming up, but was afraid to warn the bot to be still, lest the microphones pick up the sound. I did my best to gesture to him, but I only received an ear twitch in answer.
Cedar didn’t agree with my silent assessment and slowly lowered her window, allowing the RAB-bot to exit. As he cleared the window, the UAV turned towards us and I knew that the bot had given away our position. Pip rushed towards the drone, laser set on the main engine, but I could see it was going to be too late. The red dot of the drone’s laser fell on the dash. I blinked and in that moment, waited for the sound of the laser, but instead there was a loud sizzling and a crash. It took my mind a few seconds to realize that my eyes were open and that the burning wreck of the drone lay on the sand, not very far from us.
Last Farmer: Last Farmer Series - Book 1 Page 25