State of Grace

by Hilary Badger

  Lainie smiles at the surprise on my face. She waves her hand again and now I see where everyone is. Images flash up of Jasper, Luna, Sage, Fern, Gil, Brook and everyone else, sprawled out on beds in blue rooms, exactly like the one I’ve been in.

  I gasp.

  Lainie laughs. ‘They’re only asleep.’ She pauses. ‘Or comatose, if you like. The trial implants were designed to last a year. Our medical team have placed the volunteers in medically induced comas while their brains process the sudden shift in reality. After that, the participants will be released back to their old lives.’

  Their old lives? For the first time I understand that every one of Dot’s creations has mothers, history and memories. Like me.

  ‘Phase 1 of the trial is over, you see. Completion night’s been and gone.’

  She laughs again. ‘You must be wondering why no-one’s been chosen.’

  I start to shake my head, but it doesn’t stop Lainie.

  ‘I have chosen, though. Can you guess who? It’s you! You and Luke. Your unique physiologies mean you can help us test a new, stronger version of Grace. You see? You’ve been chosen to do Dot’s work.’

  So it’s me after all. Of all one hundred of us, I’m one of the chosen. This might sound prenormal – strange – but a little thrill passes through me, even with everything I now know. I can’t help it and I don’t understand it.

  All I can say is, it’s hard reshaping everything you believe. Even when you think you’ve done it, your old ideas have this habit of popping up to make you doubt yourself.

  Lainie scans my face. ‘You’re not convinced.’

  Can she see the billion things I’m thinking of inside my head?

  Blaze, who might disappear in a haze of light if I don’t go after him.

  Dennis, so small and scared, the coconut knife in his hand. Dennis, who has to be somewhere. Dennis, who I need to find and protect.

  ‘No,’ I don’t even know I’m going to say it before I do. And the word might be very soft but it’s also clear. ‘I don’t want to.’

  ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of. Shepherd’s research chemists are excellent. The very best. They’ve already formulated a brand new version of Grace for you for Phase 2. We could use your help with the babies. Can you imagine all those empty huts full of children?’

  ‘I don’t want it. Unchoose me. I want to go –’

  Where, exactly?Who with?

  ‘There’s an implant for Luke too. By tomorrow morning, your belief in Dot will be completely restored.’

  ‘Luke? Where is he? Let me see him.’

  Lainie reaches down and rolls up the sleeve of the floppy blue sungarb I’m wearing. She traces the outline of my dotmarks with her fingertip, then settles back on the arm of my chair.

  ‘I assume you haven’t recovered any memory about how you got these. Julius? The fire?’

  I blink my answer. No.

  ‘I understand a boy named Hunter Keogh was involved, if that helps jog your memory.’

  32

  I WAKE UP coughing. I’m lying on the grass beside this big blue shape. It’s just like the lagoon, except the edges are straight and the bottom is completely flat.

  Swimming pool.

  There are rings floating on the surface as well as animals, these squat blue and yellow things that kind of look like legless horses. It’s hard to see exactly because everything’s completely wreathed in smoke.

  There’s a body crashed out beside me on the grass. The gorgeous guy whose name, I guess, is Hunter. Next to him, a pile of sungarb – clothes – is all tangled together. A dry wind’s blowing and flakes of ash twist and float in the air.

  Everything’s lit up orange and there’s a solid heat coming from the big white hut thing on the lawn.

  House.

  Instead of shutters, the windows have shiny squares of glass in rows, one on top of the other. In the upper row, way off the ground, the windows are glowing from the inside.

  I see myself, the version of me who calls herself Viva, standing there looking up at those windows.

  Suddenly I’m shaking Hunter awake and shouting at him.

  ‘There’s a fire! My house is on fire!’ Like that fact isn’t totally, completely, immediately obvious.

  Then Hunter’s on his feet and he’s groping for his clothes. At the same time, he’s tapping the device around his wrist.

  ‘The whole upstairs,’ he says into it. ‘Yeah, the roof.’

  I shriek, ‘Tell them Julius is inside!’

  But whoever Hunter’s talking to, he’s already giving them that information.

  ‘Yeah, her brother. Like, six, I think?’

  There’s a bang followed by a shattering sound. Where there used to be glass in one of the windows, now there’s just this big, jagged hole. Hunter is sweating. His face is streaked with ash, his hair plastered to his head.

  He thinks we should go, that’s obvious.

  I ignore him. I cross the lawn towards the house and I’m all bent over, coughing, but I keep on moving. I see myself putting my hand on the door then yanking it back because I guess it’s hot or something. So I bump my hip and shoulder into the door and open it that way.

  This shimmering, hazy whoosh of air blasts out and I stagger backwards. Outside, the night’s starting to fill with a whining sound. It’s getting louder, ridiculously loud, and Hunter’s yelling at me to get out because the fire truck is on its way.

  Obviously I’m not listening. I just get back up and go inside the big white hut. The house where I – Viva – used to live.

  Inside, everything’s black. But it doesn’t matter because I have to close my eyes against the smoke anyway. I’m kind of feeling my way along, through this big open room with sinks and cupboards then out into a corridor with a staircase in it.

  My feet are on the bottom step. The fire roars like some kind of big cat in the night, and there are all these shattering noises as the lights on the roof explode, raining shards of glass down on my head, sprinkling them in my hair. The entire time, the only noise I can really concentrate on is this little voice calling my name.

  ‘I’m coming to get you,’ I yell back. ‘Julius, can you hear me?’ He doesn’t answer, so now I’m not sure whether or not he knows I’m in the house, or whether it’s even Julius’s voice I can hear. On the wall above my shoulder there are pictures of me and Julius. The glass has shattered and the pictures themselves are curling and buckling and blistering in the heat.

  The two of us are disappearing.

  ‘Viva! Veeeeev-va …’ calls the little voice, which may or may not even be real. ‘Help!’

  ‘I’m coming,’ I say.

  I try putting my feet on the second step but I can’t do it. There’s heat and smoke and flames pouring down the stairs, building a solid wall in front of me. All the way up the stairs, the lights and the pictures go on exploding and from the way I’m choking it’s like all the air has been sucked out and there’s nothing left to breathe.

  And I guess it’s around then a spark ignites my sungarb, the sleeves of this flimsy little button-up thing I’m wearing.

  Watching myself on those stairs, I try to figure out when I decide I can’t keep going. I mean, when exactly is it that I realise I’m too precalm – too weak, too frightened, too pathetic – to go up those stairs and save my brother?

  At what point do I just let him … I search for the word.

  At what point do I let him die?

  Next thing I know, I’m slapping at my burning sungarb and wheezing and kind of choking on words like, ‘I can’t’ and ‘I’m sorry’.

  Then there are voices from the door behind me and someone strides in dressed in shocking yellow sungarb. And just like that I let myself be swept back out the door and onto the lawn. Hunter has gone and in his place are a whole lot of strangers who seem to think they definitely need to be there.

  ‘You’re the sister?’ someone says. ‘You’re Viva?’

  Then there are hands all over me, dr
agging me away from the fire. The weird thing, and the thing I remember the most, is how, the further away I get, the louder I hear Julius’s voice.

  ‘My brother’s in there!’

  That’s the only thing I can say. I find myself lying down as all around me voices are agreeing that everyone is trying to help Julius, trying their absolute best to get him out.

  Cool blades cut through my charred sungarb.

  ‘Have they made contact with the mother?’ asks a voice.

  I hear myself demanding no-one rings her at work, not until they get Julius out.

  ‘You don’t understand,’ I sob, ‘She left me in charge. I’m responsible.’

  Something cool goes on my hot, red skin. Am I screaming? I guess I am. The next thing I know, we’re rushing along the road, sirens blaring. There are people crouched beside me, telling me to hang on because I’m doing great, I’m doing so well.

  Except there’s also a voice saying, ‘Upstairs bedroom. Probably a cigarette.’

  And that’s how I know for sure it’s completely and utterly my fault that my brother is dead.

  33

  I‘M IN THE chair hugging my knees to my chest when a supermiley woman comes into the blue room. She explains she’s a counsellor.

  ‘My role is helping you transition.’

  Without asking, she sits down on the edge of the bed.

  ‘Would you like to discuss the news you’ve had today? It will help, you know, to explore your feelings.’

  ‘Sounds kind of pointless.’

  I’m facing away from her. My left cheek is resting on my knee and I don’t even bother to lift it.

  ‘After I get the new implant, I won’t even know it happened.’

  ‘What did happen,Viva?’ she asks.

  ‘It’s Wren.’

  ‘Wren. Sure, if that’s what you prefer. Can you tell me in your own words what happened to your brother?’

  The story comes out of me in this kind of dull trickle.

  The entire time, I’m talking to the wall. When I’m finished, the counsellor says, ‘The death of a sibling is profoundly traumatic. In your circumstances it’s even more troubling. I’d think there was something wrong if you weren’t feeling angry.’

  I can hear from her voice she’s still smiling, like talking about Julius is the thing in all creation she loves to do the most.

  Never once does she use a word from the Books of Dot though. She says death instead of going beyond.Which makes sense, because without Dot there’s no way to pretty up dying. Unless you believe in Dot, death is a one-way trip without anyone to meet you on the other side.

  The end.

  Bam.

  Over.

  And that’s what happened to Julius, all because of me.

  ‘You’ve made peace with your decision to go ahead with the second procedure?’

  I nod. I start thinking about being back in Dot’s garden. How just a few days ago I was all fired up about saving Fern and the others as well. Now I don’t have to bother about that.

  But even if the others were still in the garden, I don’t think I’d want to save them anyway. I mean, freedom and truth and knowledge are all great and wonderful until you find out why you gave up those things in the first place.

  Obviously, there are flaws to the whole idea of Dot. In Gil’s case, major ones.

  But the way I figure it, being without Dot is a whole lot worse.

  ‘I’d have the procedure right now,’ I say to the counsellor. ‘I’ll do it myself if you want.’

  ‘What about any others your decision might affect?’

  I think of Mum, waving on the beach. Dennis and his rasping, wheezy breath.

  Right now neither seem enough to make it worthwhile living without Dot.

  And then I think of Blaze. I picture him a thousand different ways. Kicking his long legs in the glowing pond, curled up beside me in bed …

  Tomorrow, he’ll be a believer with a brand new implant, just like me. At least, that’s how I hope it’s going to go.

  ‘I’ve decided,’ I tell her. ‘I’m ready.’

  The counsellor seems satisfied. When she leaves, she closes the door especially softly behind her, like hearing the door shutting might push me over the edge or something.

  I start crying straight after she goes. I’m not sure why, but I do know it has nothing to do with the door.

  The next time the door bleeps, I’m still in the chair with my face all streaked and the end of my nose bright red. The person who comes in is dressed in blue sungarb with that crook pattern all over it. He even has a cord around his neck with the little white rectangle dangling from it.

  Only the person standing in front of me isn’t Alexander Reynolds like it says on the rectangle.

  This time my visitor is Blaze.

  For the first few seconds after I realise who it is, I go all oozy. I feel like jumping up, going over there and squeezing Blaze super hard. And then I remember Julius and I know it doesn’t matter how I feel about Blaze because he’s never going to feel the same way back. Not once he knows what I did.

  And I can tell without asking that he doesn’t know. It’s so obvious by the way he sits down on the arm of the chair and puts his hand on my leg. Something he’d never do if he knew I’d killed my own brother.

  ‘How come you’re dressed like Alex?’ I ask, and it comes out all choked.

  Blaze stays quiet. He lets me fill in the blanks for myself.

  ‘You’re leaving?’

  ‘And you’re coming.’

  He gives me this look that’s so tender and sweet it makes me feel prehealthy to see it.

  Scratch that. I find it physically painful.

  He even offers me his hand, to help me up from the chair I guess, but I don’t take it.

  His words come faster now, all urgent and practical and everything. I guess he realises for the moment this thing between us has stalled.

  ‘It has to be now. They’re going to notice his pass is missing pretty soon.’

  I shake my head.

  ‘It isn’t optional, you know. Being chosen.’

  ‘You said no to the new implant?’

  ‘I tried. They didn’t like that idea much.’

  I want to explain to him how leaving seemed like the best thing to me too, until I found out about Julius. Now nothing seems like a good idea. All I want to do is forget. Forget what I did, and believe someone loves me unconditionally.

  ‘They’re going to launch this drug soon, you know. Even after what it did to Gil,’ Blaze says.

  I lower my eyes. ‘Gil’s just one example. It worked fine for pretty much everyone else.’

  ‘They’re testing it on kids next.’

  ‘Heaps of people decide what their kids should believe,’ I mumble at the floor. ‘Ever heard of a christening?’

  Blake’s hand is kneading my knee. Hard. Like he’s trying to wake me up from one of those deep, numbing sleeps.

  ‘What about Dennis then? Don’t you want to find him and make sure he’s –’

  ‘I can’t help Dennis. I wouldn’t trust myself.’

  ‘Why not?’

  I have to tell him now. I have to close off the way I feel and just let the whole story about Julius unfold.

  So I do. I try to imagine Blaze is someone I’ve only just met, someone I don’t have any kind of history with. When I get to the part about Hunter Keogh I go on talking like the information’s irrelevant to Blaze. I figure it’s going to be soon enough anyway. After tomorrow I’m not going to remember anything about Hunter and his cigarette and the capsules that I guess made me forget to put the cigarette out properly.

  I get to the part where I’m on the stairs and there’s that little voice and the pictures curling on the wall. Blaze tries to touch me then.

  He says, ‘Viva, I’m really –’ but I shake him off and tell him that my name is Wren.

  ‘I’m not calling you that.’

  ‘Why not? That’s my name. At least, afte
r tomorrow it will be again.’

  ‘Viva’s more you.’

  How would Blaze have any idea what’s me and what isn’t?

  ‘It’s okay for you. You didn’t find out what I found out.’

  ‘No,’ he says. ‘Not exactly that.’

  ‘What, something even bigger?’

  I mean, as if.

  There couldn’t be anything bigger than Julius. That’s about the biggest thing anyone could ever need to forget.

  ‘Alex told me how they recruited the trial participants. Rich kids from fancy mental hospitals whose parents agreed because they were basically willing to try anything.’

  He stops. He won’t look at me. In the blue room, lights buzz and equipment beep. Every sound is made by machines instead of people or animals or Dot herself.

  Between me and Blaze though, there’s a heavy, thick silence.

  ‘Except with me, it was different.’

  Blaze takes a folded piece of paper from the pocket of his blue-printed sungarb and hands it to me.

  Teen Found Guilty of Chilling Murder

  Local student Luke Beaufort was today sentenced to a 25-year minimum jail term for the vicious killing of a priest, Father Michael Repton.

  ‘Father Mike’ Repton was a long-serving staff member at St Joseph’s College, where he both befriended and mentored disadvantaged boys. The unconventional priest was a passionate surfer who organised regular surfing trips and an annual beach camp for his charges.

  The court heard Beaufort entered the school on a scholarship and quickly became one of Repton’s protégés.

  The prosecution maintained Beaufort went to Repton’s residence out of school hours and killed him in a jealous rage when he discovered Repton had a younger boy visiting. Throughout the trial, the defence admitted Beaufort beat Repton several times with a shovel, fatally wounding him.

  By his own account, the youth ‘snapped and went mental’ when he discovered Repton sexually abusing the younger boy, who cannot be named.

  Beaufort’s defence rested on the claim that Repton had also forced him to perform oral sex on a number of occasions during 2010 and 2011 while the priest recorded the alleged acts.