Red Fox

by Fanning, Lara

  Mopoke. Mopoke. Mopoke.

  8.

  At some point I must have fallen asleep because when dawn comes I wake up: curled on the ground, feeling groggy in the head and sore everywhere else. Touching the golf ball sized bump on my forehead, I squint at the trees above me for a long time, wondering where on earth I am, before I remember everything that has happened over the last couple of days. I turn my head and see Whil is still sleeping a few metres away from me. He managed to find a dry patch of earth beneath a cluster of bushes. I, however, am cold and my back is damp.

  Shivering as I sit up, every inch of my body feels like it creaks to life. I groan. My body isn’t used to sleeping on the hard-packed dirt. Rubbing absent-mindedly at the itchy lacerations on my wrist, I stand up and look onto the flat. There is a wispy mist lingering around the ground and the sun hasn’t yet peeked on the horizon, so the world is still a hazy dim. I spot the herd of horses but they are moving towards the other end of the flat to spend the rest of their day in the cover of the trees. The stallion leads them away and they vanish into the snowgums like ghosts, as if they were never there in the first place. The bitter cold has seeped into my flesh so I start jogging on the spot and blowing into my freezing cold hands, which are turning an alarming shade of pale blue. My breath comes in white puffs of mist. It takes a few minutes of movement for warm blood to start circulating through my veins again. My fingers start to turn pink and I feel warmth flood into my cheeks. My clothes are still damp, but if Whil and I can keep moving, we will at least stay warm.

  I look down at Whil, who is still fast asleep. What a hopeless companion I’ve been burdened with! Last night I’d felt somewhat relieved that he’d wanted us to continue travelling together. Now, it’s obvious that I will be much more helpful to him than he will be to me. Someone could attack us and he’d still be dead to the world.

  “Whil,” I hiss, kicking snow against his jacket. “Wake up. The horses are leaving.”

  He rouses and opens one eye to look at me. I purse my lips, forcing back the bubble of laughter on my lips. He looks funny half-asleep: sort of disgruntled while at the same time plain stupid as he squints into the rising sun and stretches out like a dog. “What does that mean?”

  “They’ll be going to water,” I say. “I’m thirsty.”

  “Me too,” he yawns. He gets to his feet and rubs his eyes.

  We start towards the other side of the flat and find the horse’s path in the trees. Knowing too much noise will make them flee, though they are far ahead, we move quietly and slowly. Eventually, the narrow path turns down a steep, rocky hill that Whil and I carefully navigate down. It gets so steep I start searching for branches to grab hold of or clumps of grass to grip. Pebbles slide away beneath my boots and the ice makes everything, even the bare dirt, slick and dangerous. The bottom half of my jeans are a disgusting mess of mud, snow and even flecks of blood: probably some of Seiger’s, some of Clara’s and some of my own.

  “How big do you think this place is?” Whil says breathlessly. “Where is the fence Seiger told us about?”

  “I wouldn’t have a clue,” I say, carefully placing my foot on a rock that looks like it might tumble away beneath my weight. The stone slips out of place and I grab the first thing my hand touches to balance myself before I topple down the steep hill. Unfortunately, my hand grasps a clump of razor grass and the sharp edges of the blades slit my palm open. I get my footing again, and cursing, I wipe the blood on my jeans, adding some more to my stock. “I suppose they have to give us a fighting chance of survival and give us a big area with food and water in it.”

  “Is there anything we can eat in this place?” he asks, slippery-dipping two metres down the slope. He rakes his hands into the dirt and brings himself to a stop.

  “Probably, but I don’t know what is edible. You could have been a hunter instead of a dairy farmer, Whil,” I say. Before he gets upset, I flash him a grin over my shoulder and jump down the final metre of the hill and into the shallow stream at the bottom of it.

  The creek isn’t large but the water is clear and flowing steadily. It is nestled between the hill we just walked down and another steep ascent on the other side. The brook is full of smooth, round rocks that are different shades of brown from light copper to raw umber. Seeing the water and feeling it soak through my already drenched shoes, I suddenly realise how thirsty I am. I cup up handfuls of it and drink it down, filling my stomach until I’m fit to burst. It tastes brilliant. Nothing like the chlorinated water that we used to have in town or the earthy dam water my family has been boiling to drink for the past year. This water is fresh and cold. It hits the bottom of my stomach and chills me, while also sending a new surge of warm energy through my limbs.

  Whil drinks it down eagerly as well and then we slump back on the bank to rest briefly. I glance around, looking for some sign of where we are. This creek looks vaguely familiar. I’m sure I’ve crossed it on horseback once or twice before. The brumby trail continues on the other side of the watercourse, through thickets of bracken and dormant, grey tangles of blackberry bushes. I wish the blackberry bushes were bearing fruit. A handful of the tiny tasty fruit wouldn’t go astray right now. Though the water makes me feel better, my stomach still feels hollow and my store of energy is slowly trickling away.

  I wonder if the track leading up the opposite hill is the one that leads to Native Dog Flat or was there another path at Native Cat that I didn’t see? A small sign on a tree catches my attention. It is made from a piece of bark and has two letters painted on it in black paint: ‘ND’. There is an arrow pointing up the other hill.

  Yep, this is definitely the right path.

  I look up the steep hill, which is just as precarious as the one we just climbed down, and groan.

  “We have to climb it, don’t we?” Whil asks but it isn’t a question. He’s smart. He knows what the sign means.

  I nod. “Come on. The sooner we get out of the fence the better. If we get out today, we have a couple of weeks head start to get as far away as possible.”

  “Alright.”

  We tackle the hill one brambly step at a time. The blackberry bushes, although leaf-bare, still have horrible thorns that catch on both my clothing and my skin. I yank away from them painfully, becoming more flustered by the second. Hiding beneath the scratchy bracken ferns are sharp stones and wombat holes that Whil and I trip over. There are rocks all the way up and hidden crevices between them that catch our feet, a dangerous hazard for two exhausted wanderers. Five minutes later, we are only half way up the impossible slope and we are sweating like turkeys on Thanks Giving. Under different circumstances, the sweat dripping from my brow and the loud panting animal noises I make while trying to breathe might embarrass me—but not now. There is no time for embarrassment and no need for it. Whil is struggling just as much as me and by the time we reach the top, both of us double over, hands on our knees, gasping for air.

  He looks at me and glance back. Soggy blonde hair hangs in my eyes. His face is as red as a tomato and he is shining with sweat. I feel just as hideous as he looks and my head pounds as if someone is tapping it with a hammer. I have half a mind to continue on before Whil realises how revolting I look but after a moment, his face breaks into a smile and instead, we both start laughing. For some reason, our disgusting bodily states seem outrageously hilarious and both of us cackle like hyenas for a good two minutes, half choking on our already laboured breath.

  As ridiculous as the situation is, I can’t help but feel grateful for Whil’s company. Alone I could probably move faster, but I would be haunted by dark memories and crippled by grief and sorrow—and so, I decide being with Whil is best and I warm to him in that instant. With tears in our eyes, we finally stop laughing and I take the lead again on the flat ground.

  But we don’t get far.

  Once upon a time, this track would have gone straight to Native Dog Flat but not anymore. An eight-foot high fence with a cement base and razor wire coils glaring f
rom the precipice brings our track to an abrupt halt.

  My heart sinks. Some optimistic part of me was hoping that Seiger was lying about the ring. I had expected to just keep walking to Native Dog flat without any sort of obstructions. Knowing that we are indeed trapped inside an arena makes my skin prickle, and despair settles over me like a shrouding mist.

  The wild horses must have followed the creek or veered off somewhere else because they are nowhere to be seen. However, at the base of the fence, where the track vanishes beneath it and continues on the other side, there is the carcass of a recently dead horse. I’m glad Whil doesn’t balk at the sight of the dead animal. He’s proven himself fit and capable and hasn’t muttered a single word of complaint, but the last thing I need is a person who can’t stand the sight of a carcass. We’ll have to be eating these sort of things soon enough.

  We approach the body of the bay horse slowly and gaze down at it. Its legs are stiff and held above the snowy ground. The eyes, although now pecked out by crows, were open when it died. It looks like it simply fell over while standing and never got to its feet again. Flies swarm around it but luckily the bloated body is too frozen to stink. I look between the fence and the horse before my ears pick up a gentle humming noise. I look back at the horse, splayed out on the ground with stiff limbs like it has just been hit by lightning. There are several swollen blisters on its body and the hair on its muzzle has been singed away. Quietly, I curse.

  “It’s been electrified,” I say quietly.

  I had expected a fence and assumed it would be made out of razor or barbed wire to deter us. What I hadn’t expected was that it would be electrified—given electricity is forbidden. And whoever made this enclosure didn’t stop at that. A large strip of land five metres wide is cleared on both sides of the fence. The remains of the shrubbery that once grew near the fence is now a mangled jumble of logs and branches jutting from the bulldozed earth. The earth is churned as far as I can see up the fence line in both directions. I know in my heart that the bulldozed area will stretch the entire length of the arena and that no scalable trees will stand close to it. I stare for a long time, turning my head back and forth. It looks like a huge scar on the landscape, one that will remain for years to come—a bitter reminder that the government trapped us here like zoo animals. I worry for the animals that actually do need to move around the bush for new pasture or water when drought hits. What of the Native Cat horses that will eventually need new grass? I glance at the dead horse and don’t need to wonder what happens when they get too hungry.

  “Typical,” I spit. “They turn off our electricity for the good of the earth but don’t mind keeping their own running. Just like with the guns, tranquilizers, and car. Those things shouldn’t even exist anymore. They went through a lot of effort—illegal effort—to keep us in, didn’t they?”

  Too much effort, I think. Why do they want us so bad? Surely they wouldn’t give us a chance to survive if they planned on killing us later.

  But Whil isn’t listening to me. He is now walking up the fence, looking between the fence and the line of trees five metres away from it. I don’t know what he’s searching for. There is nothing I can see that will help us escape. We could climb one of the larger gum trees distanced from the fence, pray for our lives and jump, but more than likely we’d land on the fence and be electrocuted or just fall to our deaths on the other side.

  Desperate to find a way out, I fall to my knees at the concrete base of the fence and start digging in the slushy soil with frantic movements. The melted snow is cold but I keep hacking away at it until my fingers turn red and shards of ice cut my skin. My body is going to be covered in scars by the end of this ordeal. Dirt forces its way deep underneath my fingernails. I scoop half a foot of moist, cold earth away but the concrete base sinks deep into the ground. It could take days to dig a hole under it and it would be dangerous to try shuffling through an unsupported tunnel anyway. Rocking back on my heels, I give a snarl of anger and pound the cement base of the fence with my palm.

  Whil is still pacing the fence line when I look up, my hands now plastered with mud and once more freezing cold and turning blue. I stuff them into my jacket pockets for warmth.

  “What are you thinking?” I ask, slightly annoyed that he’s spent so long standing around doing nothing while I’ve been digging. I stand and go towards him.

  “We can cut one of the larger trees and push it over the fence. And just walk across.”

  “Cut it with what, Whil? We don’t have an axe lying around, do we?” I say acidly. My voice is fierce and offensive, but Whil takes no notice.

  He continues pacing up and down the fence line while I just stare at the enormous, deadly barricade in bleak surrender. We can’t get out of this enclosure. We are trapped like fish in a barrel and free for the taking when Seiger returns.

  I glare at the fence and try to work out its secret, try to figure out what its weakness is. We must have come in through a gate at some point but walking the perimeter of the fence will take hours, maybe even days. Given how well this part of the fence is built, I know the gate will be doubly secure because it’s only natural we would target that area to escape. A gate might even be guarded.

  There must be a generator or transformer powering the fence, but the creator’s of the arena wouldn’t be dumb enough to keep such an important piece nearby for fear of us destroying it. I cock my head and listen intently, but hear no whir of machinery.

  The creek we crossed would also run under the fence at some point but we would run into the same problem. It will be just as secure and perhaps even guarded. How do we conquer this? I begin to wonder if it’s even possible when I see a streak of movement in the corner of my eye.

  I turn my head just in time to see Whil, running at a break neck speed towards the charged fence. His legs stretch out far, his face is contorted into a grimace of concentration, and as I gape at him, silently screaming, he bends his knees and lunges for the fence in one massive leap. For one instant, I watch him soaring in slow motion, reaching for the fence, and then he hits the wire with a ringing chink. The whole thing seems to shudder under his weight and to stop the panicky shout that threatens to erupt, I slap my hands across my mouth. Whil’s fingers wrap around the mesh and he jabs the toe of his boots into the wire holes with desperate actions until he is steady. I hear no static noise that might indicate Whil is frying alive, but for long moments he doesn’t move.

  “Whil!” I shout. “Are you alright?”

  Turning his head, he meets me eyes. He isn’t smiling and the look on his face is strained. I can hear the ragged saw of breath in his throat.

  “Shirt. Jumper. Pants,” he huffs.

  “What!”

  “Take them off. Give them to me.”

  I don’t have time to ask questions. The longer Whil hangs onto the fence the more tired he will become and the more chance he has of falling and being electrocuted. Then I realize why he hasn’t sizzled to death by electrocution — not yet anyway. The electricity doesn’t have anywhere to ground itself and so there is no circuit for the voltage to run through. Like a bird sitting on a power line, Whil is safe. I tear off my heavy jacket and throw it to him. He catches it and begins climbing higher on the fence. Struggling to remove my boots, I watch him ascend, teetering on one leg as I try to pry the shoe from my foot. Finally, the boots are off and I pull my jeans down and throw them to him as well. He catches them and also snags my shirt when I toss it.

  “Don’t sniff them!” I shout stupidly, my mind throwing me random thoughts to say in its hysteria. “They stink like B-O.”

  Though Whil is struggling to stay aloft, I cheek lift in an uncontrollable smile and he gives a laugh of raspy exhale. The scene is so utterly ridiculous I could laugh myself, but I don’t. Standing in my plain black bra and underpants, I feel no embarrassment, for Whil doesn’t have the opportunity to look at me. Besides that, vanity and self-consciousness is not something I, or anyone else, has time for anymore. I w
rap my arms around my shoulders for the cold is bitter.

  Every nerve in me shivers with fear for Whil’s safety while my brain spins in anxious anticipation that he may have found a way out of the ring. If Whil’s plan works, and, geez, I hope it does, we will be out within the hour and on our way to safety and freedom. We won’t have to think of some elaborate, time-consuming plan to cut a tree down with the bones of the dead horse or dig a tunnel system beneath the cement footings—all ideas that were already flittering through my brain moments ago.

  I watch, open-mouthed with my heart thundering in my chest. Every inch Whil moves up the fence, I wait for him to topple, hit the ground—with a leg, foot or finger even still pressed against the chain link—and shudder violently while the electricity charges his body. But he doesn’t fall. He reaches the top of the fence with my clothes tucked under his arm.

  As he unhooks one hand from the fence and begins gathering up my jacket, his other arm, bearing the weight of his body as he hangs, shakes dangerously. Every muscle in the arm is tightened and tense, and the veins in the nook of his elbow are taut and showing clear under the skin. I don’t know if I could hang there like that. It looks like his veins might burst from the effort. Frozen with fright for my new companion, I urge him on quietly, while jumping from foot to foot, depending on which one was last submerged in the freezing cold snow at my feet.

  Carefully, Whil lays my brown jacket over the razor wire. Then he does the same with my jeans and shirt until all of my clothing is draped over the razor wire like some sort of twisted, prison clothesline.

  “Rock,” Whil says. His voice is low and muffled.

  I know what he is planning to do, and the thought terrifies me. One wrong move will send Whil toppling to the ground, either cut to pieces or electrocuted. Hardly able to tear myself away for fear Whil will be dead next time I look, I search for a rock and quickly find a large stone that I will be able to throw and he will be able to catch without too much danger of it weighing him down.