Chapter Eleven
Another era
After silently extricating herself from the excited conversation continuing in the cavern, Chantel retraced her steps back up the winding corridor to the deck of the Kazaa. From the surface, the vessel looked deceptive in size. She looked down the side of the ship to see the water lapping at the hull below. The waves were more subdued today, as if experiencing a lull of temperament, in between bouts of fury. The Saharan remained tethered to the stern of the Kazaa, being dragged along behind like a petulant puppy on a leash. The oars that had given the Kazaa the appearance of a bird when Chantel had first seen the ship were circling lazily in the water, no longer powering along with the same energy they had exuded during the Kazaa’s advance to the Saharan. Peering down the length of the ship’s exterior Chantel could not have imagined that beneath the innocuous looking deck resided a cabin of ground breaking information technology. She wondered how many of the other crew people on the Kazaa were privy to the ship’s use as a hub of illicitly gained intellectual property, being traded through the waters right under their noses. She figured that most people on the ship must in some way have been partaking in the exercise. Condor did not seem to regard the CCC as much of a secret. Chantel looked across the waters and tried to speculate as to the number of other pirate ships that were out there, sailing the seas with similar resources of technology hidden within their hulls. She estimated that there must be hundreds of other similar vessels all in the same boat, so to speak, eking out their own existence in whatever unconventional manner suited them on the sea.
Chantel was convinced that the ocean was the last remnant of un-civilisation left in the world. The last time she looked at a map of the world, every space on land was already colour coded and categorised representing areas that had been explored and inhabited, already developed to their greatest capacity in the conquest for resource wealth. The oceans were the only blank spaces on the map, without any markings of population. She wouldn’t be surprised if a whole ulterior universe existed out on the ocean, different to everything she had ever known in her Pangaea world. From what she could tell, the children living on the Kazaa had vastly different upbringings to those experienced by children in the metropolis zones, or even Chantel’s own childhood growing up in the agricultural zone. There would be no implant initiations for the children on the ship for a start. Chantel had observed that few children on board the Kazaa had chip implants in their heads. Most of the adults were implanted with hard drive chips, although Chantel could not imagine that there would be much use for such devices out on the ship. She divined to think of what it must be like for a child being raised on a ship, sailing from destination to destination at the mercy of the ocean and never knowing what the next stop on land would behold. She remembered the inquisitive faces of the children that had been so interested in Chantel and Beren from their first night on the ship.
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Suddenly she was transported back to a time when she was a little girl, growing up in the agricultural zones north of Sydney metropolis. She could recollect that innocent thirst for adventure that she felt when she was younger and remembered how she loved to go searching for unexplored realms. Her parents had driven the family out to a neighbouring farm to look at produce and other equipment. She had a brother back then. This was before he fell ill. While her parents were discussing business with the proprietors of the other property, Chantel and Brad had run off to play in amongst the warehouses and other buildings on the farm. The farm owners were jovial folks and only too happy to let Chantel and Brad explore. They had run off excitedly together, thrilled by the prospect of being able to run around without adult supervision. Chantel had been nine on that day. Brad was seven, which was the age he would always be.
Chantel remembered how she and Brad had wandered onto the farming lands first of all. The farm they were on predominantly grew maize and they had spent a joyful time playing hide and seek in among the towering stalks of corn. Despite being two years younger than Chantel, Brad was already up to Chantel’s shoulders and could run just as fast as she could. They dashed around the rows of neatly planted crops in delight, giggling at the way the fronds of the plants stroked their skin as they brushed past. They tried to climb the maize stalks by hoisting each other up to grab at the bushels of corn that were just forming on the plants. The heat festering in the humidity of the air was absorbed by the pores of the maize plant, making the corn cobs warm to touch. Chantel and Brad tossed the vegetables at each other like they were hot potatoes, dodging in and out of the maize forest as they did so. They were both such high energy sprinters that they were quickly exhausted from such activity and meandered away in search for shade and a respite from the heat. They found a channel of water, similar to the canal they had on their own property that indicated the demarcation between this farmer’s property and the next. In an attempt to cool off, they both dove into the water.
It was not very deep, this manufactured rivulet of fresh water. It was the farm’s guaranteed water source in the event of drought and it formed a network all throughout the vicinity of farms, ensuring that each farm had access to a supply of water. They could both stand easily in the water and peer through the clear, trickling stream to the pebbles beneath. They laughed as they splashed each other mercilessly with the water. Chantel remembered now how refreshing the water had seemed that day, how Brad had beamed with delight as they both ended up saturated. He had always loved the water and even at a young age he was already adept at swimming in the dams and water holes around their farm. As opposed to Chantel, Brad had a spirit for outdoors adventure which gave their parents confidence that he would be responsible for the farm when they retired. Chantel had never shown much interest in agriculture and this was made only the more evident when she moved to the metropolis to enrol in university after high school.
As soon as they had cooled off in the water, Brad was off again; this time running towards some abandoned warehouses on the neighbouring property. Chantel gave chase and followed him inside a huge dilapidated building, inside which the heat was baking at an extreme temperature. It took her eyes sometime to adjust to the mottled light filtering through the crevices and holes in the walls of the building. When she was able to peer through the darkness and garner a sense of her surroundings, she could see that the interior of the building had been partitioned off into various storage areas that were empty now, containing just smatterings of the produce that must have been kept there previously. Brad had run off to one of the other levels underneath the ground and she could hear his footsteps echoing throughout the vast emptiness of the warehouse as he trumped down the stairs. She called him to come back, warning him that they shouldn’t stray too far away. There was no response.
She went in search for Brad. She remembered how each movement she made felt heavy in the musty air. The heat cooped up in the warehouse made the air difficult to breath and inhaling through her nose was an exhausting exercise in itself. Not only that, but there was a strange smell in the air. An acrid, unpleasant odour made her wrinkle her nose and gag. She breathed through her mouth instead, trying to filter the pungency out of the air by pursing her lips as she sucked the air in. Regardless, no matter what she did she could not get rid of the distaste in the air. She wished Brad had never entered the warehouse. She would not understand the direness of the situation he was in until later.
She proceeded to follow the direction of the sound of Brad’s footsteps. Each step she took made a crunching sound as her shoes pressed down lightly against the floor of the warehouse. The accumulated dust and grit on the ground rolled underneath her feet like she was stepping on gravel. With each step she took, her feet seemed to slide in the dirt, one step falling unsteadily in front of the next. Crunch, crunch, crunch. She followed Brad down one of the stair cases, stepping gingerly and trying not to touch the filthy bannister. She walked down one of the corridors lined with storage rooms, her footsteps echoing around her the enti
re way. Crunch, crunch, crunch. She saw something dart into the shadows in the corner of her eye. Frightened she let out a shriek and called Brad. She started running in his direction. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Her legs were almost tripping over each other now as she ran. The ground had turned even slipperier the further into the building she went, as more grit seemed to form on the ground. She could hear Brad calling. She ran quicker. Crunch, crunch, crunch. She saw more of them now, scurrying away at first when she approached. Then there were so many of them they were not even scared of her as she ran past. Her heart pounded. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Rats were piled everywhere in the bottom cavities of the warehouse. She saw them squirming over each other in their nests. She ran faster so they wouldn’t touch her. Crunch, crunch, crunch. She wanted to vomit with the sight of them. Plump, satisfied looking creatures, basking in the comfort of the abandoned warehouse. She was disgusted, but she had to find Brad. Crunch, crunch, crunch. She ran until she turned a corner and the horror of what she saw made her stop in her tracks. Crunch. Brad was squirming on the ground, trying desperately to beat away the rodents that were attacking his face, his hands and any bit of exposed skin they could nip at. Chantel screamed.
The next few moments seemed to happen in slow motion. She remembered running up to Brad. She remembered beating away at the dirty, infested rats as they snarled and hissed at her. She remembered dragging Brad up off the dirt as he cried and covered his face, rubbing even more dirt and rat droppings into himself. She remembered bumbling over the correct corridor to follow, the correct staircase to climb, the correct door to push as she struggled to find a way out of the warehouse. Before too long she was crying also as her and Brad both emerged from the empty warehouse covered in sweat and dirt and tears. Still hanging on tightly to Brad, she led him to the stream where they both plunged again into the cool, flowing water. She retched on the ground, finally, purging all the putridness from the warehouse. She would never forget how instantly their day of fun had turned to terror.
She brushed Brad off and calmed him down. He was still hysterical and swatting aimlessly at imaginary rats. Distraught, she held him close to her until he finally stopped sobbing. She didn’t know what to do. She had never been as terrified as when she saw Brad covered in rats. She was still traumatised by the thought of it. Eventually they headed back towards the farm house where their parents were still cheerfully negotiating the terms of their business. Their parents hadn’t noticed that anything was immediately the matter and so, to their peril, Chantel and Brad kept the incident with the rats silent. Brad made the excuse that he had been cut by the brittle leaves of the maize stalks as he was running through the crop field. Scared that they would be reprimanded for venturing onto a neighbour’s property, not a word was mentioned about the warehouse until several days later.
Sores soon started to appear on Brad’s body. He fell ill and had to be confined to his bed. All the while the sores became more swollen and started to change colour. By this time, although their parents knew what Brad was dealing with, it was too late for treatment. He was quarantined and given the best care the Wilds could provide. Even if medical treatment could be provided, all the facilities available for administering assistance were located in the metropolis zones and there was not enough time to apply for the relevant migration permits to travel to these areas. Eventually the sores became black with the unmistakeable mark of gangrene. Slowly, Brad’s youthful body withered and faded away.
With the plague affecting Brad for some time before his eventual demise, Chantel’s parents had sufficient time to let the reality sink in. As he lay wasting away in his room, the rest of the family cried all the tears they could summon until finally they could cry for him no more. At that point, they pushed his impending death to the outskirts of their mind and tried to get on with the daily tasks at hand, all the while burying their sorrow with work. Chantel never forgave herself for letting Brad run off as he had to the abandoned warehouse. She told her parents about what happened that day and they accepted the truth without any further questions, realising without doubt what the black sores were. They never mentioned the issue again to Chantel, but Chantel could not shake the feeling that in some way, they also held her responsible for what happened to Brad.
After the shock of the sickness had set in, each member of the family dealt with the inevitable in their own way. Chantel remembered lying in bed for hours at night listening to her parents quarrel about the most miniscule matters, all in an attempt to push Brad’s death from their minds. She remembered how withdrawn her mother became when the diagnosis was made and how her mother could not talk to anyone or even show her face to other friends or family for weeks at a time. On the other hand, Chantel’s father dealt with the loss of his son differently. He spent much more time out of doors; he tended the crops and fixed the machinery. Whatever needed fixing, no matter how long it had been neglected previously, he made it a mission to fix, with varying degrees of success. Her parents soon began to live separate lives.
With each person in the family living their own vortex of a life, the daily routine became just a matter of waiting. When Brad’s death finally came, there was a terrible silence that descended on the house. It permeated the roof and the walls so that even the floors were scared to creak. Chantel remembered how furtive her mother and father acted towards her during that time. If, by coincidence, their paths would cross, her parents would lower their eyes and walk briskly away, as if they were embarrassed that speaking would interrupt the impermeable atmosphere of solemnity enveloping the house after Brad’s death. There were instances when Chantel would not speak to another soul for days at a time. They continued for months like this, a family shattered by tragedy and fragmented in grief.
Over time Chantel and her parents regrouped, increment by increment, until a steady routine re-emerged. With time, Chantel and her parents eventually became a family again, minus Brad. Chantel had to get used to being an only child. Her parents had already reached their quota of two children per couple, and even with the loss of Brad, it was unlikely that they would be granted the right to reproduce further. They were past the child bearing age now. Chantel had the feeling as well, that her parents were too devastated to try for another child. They had invested so much love into Brad that once this was displaced, it seemed like they hadn’t the energy to do it all again. With the loss of such an irreplaceable life, some part of the family also disappeared, imploding like a burnt out star leaving a black hole with an imperceptible sense of nothingness behind.
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Chantel remembered all this now unwillingly as she set off to scour the rest of the unknown spaces on the Kazaa. That was the last time she remembered being in a similar situation, being in a place unknown, on her own and so far from civilisation. The vessel of the ship was a huge unexplored vicinity. She remembered the initial exhilaration she felt when she first entered the warehouse and the slight giddiness she experienced when realising that the place was not like any other she had ever known. This feeling was re-visiting her now, as she explored the Kazaa. However, remembering the horror she had encountered that day, it was with trepidation that she ventured her way into the unknown. She walked curiously through the usual living quarters expected to be found on a ship such as this. All the cabins were lined down a single corridor and furnished with two bunk beds each, exactly like the one her and Beren had slept in on their first night aboard. Strangely, Chantel could see that all the beds were occupied. The kitchen galley opened out into a larger dining area that also housed various lounge suites where the crew could relax and enjoy their entertainment. She noticed that this room featured several projector screens and control panels which she figured must all be connected to the hard drives in the CCC. No doubt this room would be a hub of activity for entertainment gatherings when new material was harvested from the various communication networks operating under the sea. Scattered on the couches, a few of the crew people were sleeping soundly away from the
heat of the mid-day sun. Chantel whisked quietly past them so as not to disturb and continued down a ramp to the lower floors of the vessel.
She proceeded down another dark corridor, similar to the one that led to the CCC, which she imagined would take her down to the depths of the ship. She could feel that she was advancing towards the less public areas of the ship now. There were no other people around. The corridor was illuminated with sensor lights that were activated as she walked past. With such low levels of light guiding her way, the corridor looked like a dark tunnel, which she could not see the end of. As the lighting flickered on and off around her, it cast fleeting shadows that would dart back and forth between the lights. The hairs on the back of Chantel’s neck stood on end. Her footsteps echoed around her as she stepped gingerly down the corridor, feeling again like she was nine years old exploring a new place by herself again. She walked alone down the corridor. Crunch, crunch, crunch.
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