The Cut Out

by Jack Heath

  The classroom ceiling was somehow spotted with chewing gum. A giant map of the world was painted on the rear wall. The scale had been distorted so that each country’s size was determined by how close it was to Kamau. Facts were printed under each nation’s name: The first country to have a female prime minister was Sri Lanka. The oldest human-made structures are the 40,000-year-old fish traps in Australia. Gunpowder was invented in China.

  Kamau itself was big enough that facts were written on individual provinces. Towzhik is the site of Parliament House. Kharsum, the second tallest mountain in Europe, is in East Kamau. A deadly coronavirus outbreak was contained at Melzen.

  Besmar was a blank splotch, except for a dot that represented the capital city, Tus.

  A few students looked up at Fero and then turned back to their books. If anyone had seen him on the news, they gave no sign. Irla was sitting near the back of the room. As he approached he noticed that her uniform was neater than usual. Every button was done up, her skirt reached her knees and her socks matched. Her head was lowered as if in prayer but her eyes were up, watching the room. He was relieved to see her, although she looked as wary and sad as a dog next to a broken vase.

  Fero sat down next to her. ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered.

  Irla didn’t look at him.

  ‘I thought if I distracted that cop you’d be able to get away.’ Fero leaned in. ‘Irla?’

  ‘We shouldn’t sit together.’ As Irla spoke, Fero saw a bruise on the back of her neck.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Leave me alone, okay?’ She got up, moved to a different chair and sat down.

  Fero didn’t follow her. She had sounded scared rather than angry. Maybe the police had threatened her. Told her not to talk about the protest.

  ‘Come on, take your seats,’ Ms Tilya bellowed as the other students shuffled into the classroom. ‘Quiet please, we have a lot to get through. You may have heard that the Kamauan embassy in Moscow was attacked on the weekend. Eight civilians are dead. Who can tell me why?’

  ‘That’s not history,’ Omas said. ‘That’s news.’

  Omas was a smug-looking boy who always spoke up first. Fero tended to agree with him, but wished he wouldn’t try to dominate every lesson.

  ‘History is just news with the unimportant stuff stripped out,’ Ms Tilya said. She wrote Kamauan embassy attacked on the whiteboard. ‘And believe me, this is important. Why was the embassy attacked?’

  ‘Because the Besmari government hates us.’

  ‘The government?’ someone else asked – an athletic girl named Gliyana. She was the only student who could seriously compete with Fero in the distance-running championships. He liked her, although they had never spoken. ‘Wasn’t the embassy attacked by terrorists?’

  ‘Officially,’ Omas said. ‘But it’s obvious who was really behind it.’

  Ms Tilya tilted her head from side to side. ‘You don’t see a lot of hate in international politics,’ she said. ‘Selfishness, yes. Pride, sure. But not hate. Can anyone else make a guess?’

  ‘Because of Devin Kunin,’ another student said as she drew tessellating shapes on her notepad. She spoke with the bored tone of someone who had known the answer all along, but had hoped somebody else would save her the trouble of voicing it. ‘We accepted his application for asylum.’

  ‘Thanks, Cerah,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘I’m glad to see someone did the reading.’

  Whenever Fero tried to talk to Cerah she always seemed keen to get rid of him. But she was friendly with Irla. Maybe he could ask Cerah to make sure Irla was okay.

  ‘Our government is protecting Kunin,’ Ms Tilya continued, ‘even though he’s wanted for a series of bombings that killed dozens of Besmari civilians in Tus last year. This was cited as the primary reason for the embassy attack.’

  She wrote Bombs in Tus on the whiteboard.

  ‘But there’s no evidence that Kunin was responsible for those explosions,’ Omas said.

  ‘That’s what our government says,’ Ms Tilya replied. ‘But the Besmaris say he should be sent back to face the charges.’

  ‘There’s no way he’d get a fair trial over there.’

  ‘Let’s pretend he’s guilty. Who can tell me why he did it?’

  ‘That’s ridiculous. If you—’

  ‘Omas,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘Give someone else a chance to speak.’

  ‘The bombings happened right after our deputy foreign minister got killed,’ Gliyana said. ‘Right?’

  Ms Tilya wrote, Deputy foreign minister murdered. ‘Very good. The assassination was carried out by former members of the Besmari army. Our government says they were operating under orders, their government says they weren’t. What reason did the former soldiers give for the killing?’

  Silence.

  ‘Fero,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘How about you?’

  Everyone turned to look at him.

  Fero had been thinking about the events of the previous night. It was hard to focus on the lesson. But he could see what was written on the whiteboard, and he’d heard a few key words.

  ‘Uh, because President Grigieva refused to shut down our nuclear weapons program,’ he said.

  ‘Correct.’ Ms Tilya added Nuclear weapons development to her time line.

  ‘We can’t get rid of our nukes.’ Omas sounded increasingly cross. ‘They’d invade us. You’re making it sound like it’s all our fault.’

  ‘How long are we going to do this?’ Cerah groaned.

  Ms Tilya’s eyes glittered. She always seemed happiest when she was making someone angry. ‘Do what?’

  ‘Go backwards. We did this, because they did that, because we did this, and so on.’

  ‘You’re asking exactly the right question. As a nation, how long are we going to do this?’

  The students looked uncertainly at one another.

  ‘This conflict will claim many lives over the next few years,’ Ms Tilya continued. ‘How long are we going to keep attacking them, ensuring that they keep attacking us?’

  There was silence.

  ‘Let me put it another way,’ she said. ‘Imagine you were President Grigieva. How would you achieve peace?’

  Omas stuck up his hand. ‘Nukes,’ he said.

  Gliyana laughed nervously.

  ‘As a deterrent?’ Ms Tilya asked. ‘Or are you talking about wiping Besmar off the map?’

  ‘First one, then the other,’ Omas said.

  ‘Then I think we can be glad you’re not our president,’ Ms Tilya said.

  The class chuckled.

  ‘Nuking Besmar would kill many millions of people,’ she continued, ‘and if they got the chance to strike back – which they would, if we gave them time to prepare by bragging about our nukes as a deterrent beforehand – then both countries could wind up as radioactive wastelands. Who else has an idea?’

  There was a pause.

  ‘Surrender,’ Cerah said.

  Everyone looked at her. Fero wondered if he’d misheard.

  ‘I mean it,’ Cerah continued. ‘Don’t fight back. Then they’ll have nothing to retaliate to.’

  ‘What about when they invade?’ Omas asked.

  ‘Why would they?’

  ‘Because they know we won’t fight back.’

  ‘But what’s in it for them? Isn’t invading a country expensive?’

  ‘Invasion isn’t our main concern,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘Who can tell me what Kamau’s primary export is?’

  ‘Metal,’ Gliyana said.

  ‘Which metal?’

  ‘Nickel?’

  ‘Well done. We export limonite ore, which is rich in nickel and iron. Who’s buying our nickel?’

  The students looked at each other.

  ‘Irla,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘Care to make a guess?’

  Irla’s voice was small. ‘China? Or maybe India?’

  ‘Both. Good work. They use our limonite ore to make stainless steel. But if Kamau becomes too volatile – too many terror attacks, too much civil unre
st – who will they buy from instead?’

  Silence.

  ‘Does anyone know what the primary export of Besmar is?’ Ms Tilya asked.

  ‘Limonite ore,’ Omas said. He said it with confidence, but Fero thought it was probably a guess.

  ‘Bingo. The point is that the Besmari government has financial incentives to destabilise us. Even if we surrendered, the attacks might keep coming.’

  ‘So, if we can’t keep fighting, but we can’t stop fighting, what is the answer?’ Cerah demanded.

  ‘There may not be one,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘If there is, I certainly don’t know it. But let me ask you something: who started this conflict?’

  ‘They did,’ Omas said.

  ‘How?’

  No one spoke.

  ‘Okay,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘When?’

  ‘A really long time ago?’ Gliyana guessed.

  ‘Correct. In your parents’ parents’ parents’ day, back when Besmar was part of the Soviet Union. Should you be held responsible for things that happened before your birth?’

  ‘Obviously not,’ Cerah said.

  ‘Now think about the kids in Besmar. Kids your age. Should they be held responsible?’

  Silence.

  ‘Nations are made up of people,’ Ms Tilya said. ‘Don’t ever forget that.’

  Someone cleared his throat. Fero looked over to the door.

  Two uniformed police officers stood in the doorway.

  Ms Tilya’s eyebrows shot up. Her hands curled into fists. For the first time Fero wondered if the rumours about prison were true.

  As alarmed as the teacher looked, it was nothing compared to the terror on Irla’s face. Her skin had gone white. Her lip was trembling. She gripped the edge of her desk as though planning to crawl beneath it.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ one of the cops said, and suddenly Fero recognised him. It was Sergeant Hilliev, one of his interrogators from last night.

  ‘We need to talk to Fero Dremovich,’ Hilliev said.

  Fero’s heart kicked in his chest. What did they want with him now?

  ‘He’s not in trouble,’ Hilliev told Ms Tilya. ‘He’s just assisting us with our enquiries.’

  ‘Fero,’ Ms Tilya said, one eyebrow raised. ‘You’re dismissed.’

  Fero slipped his textbook back into his bag and rose to his feet. As he walked towards the doorway he shot a glance back at Irla, who was still trembling with fear.

  Don’t worry, he mouthed at her.

  But he didn’t have time to see her response before Hilliev put a hand on his back and guided him out the door.

  ‘I thought you never wanted to see me again,’ Fero said.

  Sergeant Hilliev didn’t smile. ‘It’s not me who wants to see you.’

  ‘Then why was it you who picked me up?’

  ‘Some people prefer not to show their faces.’

  The corridors of the school were silent now that everyone was in class. Hilliev’s polished shoes clacked against the linoleum. Fero had read that wearing hard, leather-soled shoes strengthened the shinbones if the wearer was young, but put them at risk of snapping if the wearer was middle-aged. He wondered how old Hilliev was.

  They walked past a string of plaques, a noticeboard and a sculpture of a desk made by an ex-student. When they reached the foyer, Fero spotted a polished black sedan parked in front of the school. A tall, sad-eyed man in an ash-grey suit leaned against it.

  ‘Who’s he?’ Fero asked.

  Hilliev didn’t respond. As they trotted down the steps, he called out, ‘He’s all yours.’

  The man in the suit opened the car’s rear door. Noelein was sitting on the leather seat.

  ‘Get in,’ she said.

  Fero looked back at Hilliev.

  ‘Unless you want to ride with the cuffs on,’ Hilliev said, ‘I’d do as she says.’

  Fero clambered into the car. The suited man shut the door.

  The car smelled like it had just been washed. There was no dirt on the charcoal carpet, no dust on the seats. The rear doors locked themselves with a clack.

  The suited man climbed into the driver’s seat and started the car. Looking out the tinted window, Fero saw that Hilliev was already walking away towards the school car park.

  ‘Uh, hello again,’ he told Noelein.

  ‘Put your seatbelt on.’

  Fero did. It didn’t give him the sensation of safety. He felt trapped.

  The car pulled out into traffic. Fero watched the school slide away into the distance.

  ‘Do you have more questions?’ he asked. ‘About last night?’

  ‘No,’ Noelein said. There was something about her face that Fero didn’t like, although he couldn’t quite figure out what. Perhaps a crookedness of the lips, an asymmetry in the eyes. Fero told himself his unease was just the echoes of his nightmare. But Noelein’s gaze left him feeling like he was inside an MRI machine. He suddenly had the feeling she knew he had been dreaming about her.

  ‘Everything I’m about to tell you is tier-one classified,’ she said. ‘If you share it with anyone—’

  ‘I’ll find myself in Velechnya State Prison,’ Fero finished. ‘You said that last night.’

  ‘I’m glad you remember,’ she said. ‘Three days ago, our Cataloguers intercepted some chatter about a Besmari terrorist plot. The codename was “Three Bags Full”. We were trying to get more information when five Besmari soldiers crossed the Dead Zone.’

  ‘What’s the Dead Zone?’

  ‘That’s the minefield between our fence and their fence. If our border guards see anyone out there, they shoot to kill. But these five Besmaris got through somehow and escaped onto Kamauan soil.’

  The thought made Fero uneasy. ‘I didn’t hear about that.’

  ‘What part of “classified” don’t you understand?’

  ‘Oh. Right.’ But if it was so secret, why was she telling Fero? What did he have to do with any of this?

  ‘Twenty hours later,’ Noelein said, ‘three backpacks full of hexogen were stolen from a munitions supply station. The same substance killed more than sixty people in the 2008 Jaipur bombings – it’s twice as powerful as TNT. With the amount they took, they could flatten a city block.’

  ‘Three bags full.’ Fero felt like he’d drunk sour milk.

  The driver changed lanes. A car honked at them. Neither the driver nor Noelein seemed to notice.

  ‘At seven this morning we got a message from the terrorists. If we don’t meet their demands within forty-eight hours, they’ll blow up the hospital.’ Noelein checked her phone and put it back in her pocket. ‘I authorised a nine-person team to take them out.’

  ‘Out of the hospital?’

  ‘Out of life.’ Noelein held Fero’s gaze. ‘It’s important that you understand how serious this is. Thousands of Kamauan citizens are at risk.’

  ‘Isn’t Melzen Hospital abandoned?’

  ‘Yes. It’s fenced off, at the top of a hill with only one entrance and no cover leading up to it. The facility goes deep, deep underground, so it’s protected from air attacks. Also, the subway tunnels have been walled up.’ She adjusted her seatbelt. ‘I lost contact with my team only seconds after they got inside. I have to assume they failed.’

  All that had happened this morning? ‘That’s terrible,’ Fero said.

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  ‘Why would anyone want to blow up an abandoned hospital?’

  ‘How much do you know about what happened there nine years ago?’

  Ms Tilya had covered it. ‘A fire broke out as the patients were being treated,’ Fero said. ‘The fire department couldn’t go in because of the virus and the burning chemicals. Most of the patients and doctors died.’

  ‘All of them died,’ Noelein said. ‘And then the area was quarantined. Not just because of the toxic gases, or the chance of infection – the X-ray machines were leaking radiation.’

  The car rumbled to a halt. Looking out the window, Fero saw the Towzhik Public Library.
r />   ‘We’re here,’ Noelein said.

  THE LIBRARY

  The driver remained in the car while Fero and Noelein climbed out. ‘Follow me,’ she said.

  ‘If the hospital is quarantined—’ Fero began.

  She shushed him. ‘We can’t talk out here.’

  Fero followed her up the steps. The Towzhik Public Library was a broad, flat building with huge panes of polished glass. The inauguration speech of Kamau’s first democratically elected president was inscribed on the walls in Cyrillic. These days, the Kamauan language was usually written in the Latin alphabet. Fero could only read Cyrillic because Zuri had taught him.

  Noelein led him inside. They crossed the gleaming marble foyer and entered the silence of the carpeted area. A group of university students sat on squishy chairs, poring through textbooks. Small children prodded the illustrations in picture books.

  Fero followed Noelein past the bookshelves, the display cases, the couches, the barcode scanners.

  ‘You work in an actual library?’ he whispered.

  ‘We collect information.’ Noelein gestured at the shelves. ‘What better place than this?’

  He followed her to the curved sliding doors beneath a sign that read RARE BOOKS | AUTHORISED ACCESS ONLY. He had visited the rare books section on a school excursion. He remembered it as a dry, cold room where ancient books were pressed under plastic barriers. There wasn’t much space – he wondered how many Librarians there were.

  Noelein punched in a key code and the airlock opened. She led Fero inside, and the brushed steel door whooshed closed, trapping them in the enclosed space. A single bulb burned overhead.

  A second keypad was bolted to the wall inside the airlock. The last time he was here, Fero had wondered why it was there. Surely anyone who had the code to get into the airlock would also have permission to get into the rare books section? He was about to ask, when Noelein entered a second code and the floor lurched beneath him.

  It’s a lift, he realised.