The Afterlife of Alice Watkins 2

by Matilda Scotney

  “My people believed the spirits of our ancestors walk with us, give us courage and guidance,” Jane said.

  “What a lovely tradition.”

  “Well, it was a lovely tradition, lost with all the others now, we weren’t so lucky in preserving our culture as others. Mary will help you with this Alice, it’s between you and her.”

  Jane kissed her on the forehead and went back to her bedroom.

  Alice sighed and put the still sleeping Pecky on her hat. Returning to her own room, she flicked onto Noah’s signature. The panel remained blank and quiet, but that simple act made her feel close to him and reminded her of the last time they were together, when she lay under his arm, close to his heart, the night their child was conceived.

  Chapter 35

  The next morning, Mary sat with Alice in front of the registry. Jane had told her about Alice’s thoughts from the night before.

  “Where do you want to start?” she asked, bringing the registry to life.

  “I’d like to see how we’re related.”

  “Well, we would need to give the registry a time frame. A lot of records were lost, and few were kept during the plague cycles so it might be sketchy. They’re not terribly reliable until you get into modern times.”

  “OK. Let’s try the twentieth century.”

  “Decade?” she asked Alice.

  “1940s.”

  “Registry, common ancestor, Alexis Langley and Mary Greer, 20th century, 4th decade,” Mary commanded the responder, but the registry couldn’t comply. It believed the Alexis Langley mentioned was dead, due to her birth being several hundred years before.

  “We’ll have to get your status updated at the Principality House, Alice. You can’t go around being dead.”

  Alice agreed.

  “Common ancestor, Alexis Langley deceased, Mary Greer, living.”

  A whole list of people flashed up, but the registry homed in on one line. To Alice’s amazement, an image appeared.

  “Albert and Mary Hallett,” Mary read.

  Alice stared in amazement. Two elderly people in a bar, seated with glasses of stout and cigarettes in their hands. Her grandparents—her mother’s father and mother.

  “They’re my grandparents.”

  “Your grandparents?”

  “Well, Alice Watkins knew these people.”

  “They’re possibly your grandparents many times removed. And mine. Let’s see if we can trace any posterity or establish a link.”

  “Here we are. Issue: Joyce Hallett, born, 12 December 1934 and David Hallet born 11 May 1936—dates are recorded using old style calendar, but I can read it, you can help if I get stuck.”

  Alice nodded. She looked at her mother’s name but stayed silent. Joyce Hallet. Seeing it now, Alice felt removed from her.

  “One or other of these might give us a clue,” Mary said, then commanded, “Joyce Hallett.”

  The registry moved with eerie slowness, almost like the glass pointer on a Ouija board as it highlighted Joyce’s name and brought up her details; it reminded Alice of the day she saw her sarcophagus on the registry, but this time, she had no urge to run.

  “Well,” Mary read the entry, “Joyce Hallett, date of death is 18th May 1975. She had issue, Alice Hallett born on 4th November 1951. So, Joyce was only 16 when she had a baby, and unmarried.”

  Alice’s father was unknown. So Alice was probably the result of the triggered hormones her mother had so often warned her about. He wasn’t dead. Her mother had lied.

  “Are there any images, Mary?”

  “No, it seems not. What about Alice Hallett? We might both be descended from her.”

  Alice nodded, but she already knew what happened to Alice Hallett.

  “Here we are,” Mary pointed to the name. “Alice, this is interesting! Alice Hallett, born 4th November 1951 married Edward Watkins. Alice Hallett became Alice Watkins!” she looked up at Alice. “That’s extraordinary. Let’s see when they married. 25th October 1967.” Mary continued to study the information for a moment until she saw Alice was sitting utterly still. She sat back.

  “This is the Alice Watkins, isn’t it?”

  Alice didn’t answer at first, just stared at her name on the registry.

  “Check the date of death please, Auntie Mary.”

  Mary had already seen the entry.

  “Date of death not recorded.”

  “Why would that be?” Alice searched the entry herself for a clue. Mary wasn’t an expert in genealogy and could only hazard a guess.

  “Well, the plague started around 2026; she may have died then. We can’t be sure. If she did, few records survive because of the scale and suddenness of fatalities and the ensuing chaos. It says here Alice and Edward had two children, Michelle and Steven,” but Alice’s gaze drifted somewhere beyond the registry, to a time long gone.

  “Shall I tell you their birthdates?” Mary spoke quietly, not understanding where Alice had gone, but sensing Alice already knew the answer. And when it came, it sent a chill through her body.

  “There’s no need. I know.”

  A feeling of disquiet crept into Mary’s heart, as if she’d suddenly become part of something far larger than she ever imagined. Alice’s response to the entries suggested prior knowledge, and her memory of dates, uncanny. She must have undertaken very serious research, enough to feel a kinship to these people, but when Alice briefly spoke of them before, Mary dismissed her memories as fantasy.

  “I accept Alice,” Mary said after a moment, “that somehow, you know all this already. I can only assume you researched this branch of your family at some point and connected to these people in some way. I don’t want you to be upset.”

  Alice turned her head slowly, still with distance in her eyes.

  “I’m not upset, Mary. Are you happy to continue?” Then she smiled, back in the present and Mary let out a mighty sigh of relief.

  “Yes, I’m happy, but stop me if you find it’s too much. You seemed quite lost there for a moment.”

  “Sorry, Mary. Nothing we’ve seen so far is strange to me. You must be right, I’ve researched it and retained accurate memories.”

  Mary allowed herself to be reassured, but her sense of disquiet lingered. She pulled herself together, she’d consider it later.

  “It seems Michelle went on to have a family,” she continued, “but Steven seems to have dropped off the face of the earth like his mother—like Alice Watkins. Michelle—no death date, had six children but going by this, not all of them had children. This one,” Mary displayed a poor-quality image of a child, “Eliza, didn’t marry but her death date is recorded as 2nd December 2203. She lived for 103 years.”

  Eliza. Her darling granddaughter. Alice didn’t flinch.

  “Only two of the other five have marriages and death dates recorded, they all die out before the end of the 23rd century. Alice, we aren’t descended from Alice Hallett, so I’m not sure why you identify with Alice Watkins. I think we should try David Hallett.”

  Alice had come to believe her memories were stray, random pieces of information she’d picked up, even though it was evident Alice and Alexis were related in some way. But seeing it on the registry and knowing all the details even before the dates were revealed unnerved and confused her. Perhaps a further examination of the records would bring clarity. Mary turned her attention to Uncle David.

  “Here, David Hallett married Glenys Simpson 3rd September 1960, died, 22nd September 1990. Issue: Peter born 10th February 1961 and Imogen born, 15th August 1963. (SB).”

  “What’s SB?”

  “Stillborn.”

  Alice never knew that about Uncle David. How awful for him.

  “So, Peter it is then. Peter Hallett married Ellen Norris on 10th August 1982.”

  Alice thought about Ellen Norris, with tattoos and bad language, a girl from a rough family. Her mother would not have approved, but despite her roughness, the girl had always been kind to Alice. She said nothing of this to Mary.
r />   “There’s an image,” Mary smiled, delighted. “My goodness, they look old in this.”

  The image was of a much older Peter and Ellen and marked December 2030. They looked happy. Mary followed their line with optimism, hoping it would reveal the connection between her and Alice.

  “Their issue, Lily, born on 14th May 1984, Stuart born 14th November 1985 and Elaine born on 22nd November 1987. No death dates for either Peter or Ellen. We should try the children.”

  For Mary, these people were mere ghosts, but to Alice, she believed she’d once known them. Elaine died in 2007 in a car crash, Alice attended her funeral, it was terribly sad. Stuart never married, preferring the company of males, and so it only left Lily, who Alice remembered as being blonde and pretty. She pointed to Lily.

  “Let’s try the oldest, Lily,” she said.

  “Might as well. Here, married young.”

  Yes, Alice thought, she was young and had a beautiful wedding; she looked like a little doll. Michelle was her matron of honour.

  “Married Michael Bell,” Mary was saying. “There’s an image of him, he looks pleasant.”

  Alice didn’t recognise the man, he was far too short to be Michael Bell, but she didn’t say so.

  “And their issue, Thomas Michael born 2nd December 2003, Siena born 2nd November 2005 and no death dates recorded for either Michael or Lily.”

  “Is this the only source of records”? Alice asked, frustrated at the slowness of the process. She would have preferred to view a proper family tree. “It’s quite incomplete”.

  “Yes, pulled from every source ever available, remember, many records were lost in the panic and confusion after the second wave of plague. So, will we try Thomas or Siena?”

  Alice knew both of Lily’s children. Siena wanted to travel the world. Thomas was a homebody and liked school.

  “Let’s try Thomas,” Mary didn’t wait for Alice to choose. “Here we are, married, firstly, Sharon Smith 10th October 2023, then married again—Abigail Pink 29th January 2030. Can’t find any children, though. Date of death for him was 2nd December 2060.”

  “His birthday.”

  “So, it was. Perhaps we try Siena.”

  “Sen-sen,” Alice started to drift again, remembering aloud Siena’s pet name. A sweet child. Mary looked up.

  “Sen-sen,” Alice repeated, “it’s her nickname.”

  “Perhaps this isn’t a good idea, Alice,” Mary turned off the registry, but Alice just smiled, gave a gentle nod to the screen and urged her to continue.

  It felt odd to Alice, seeing her nieces and nephews’ deaths on record as if she was eavesdropping on future events, even though these events were now in the distant past.

  Mary returned to the registry with some trepidation. She took a deep breath, hoping against hope this wasn’t a mistake.

  “Registry. Siena Anne Bell born 2nd November 2005. There’s no marriage date, Alice, but she had a child, no, wait, two children—but the birth dates aren’t recorded. Samuel and Isadora. Isadora? What sort of name is that? Anyway, the line seems to end there. There’s an image of Siena though, it’s poor quality.”

  Alice peered for a moment at the image, but it certainly looked like Siena. Probably around 40 years old, maybe less, and wearing a Red Cross uniform, holding a small, dark-skinned baby.

  “I wonder what she’s doing?” Alice said. “That uniform was worn by aid workers.”

  “I’ll check. It only mentions her last recorded whereabouts as Central Africa around 2042. The information was taken from a photograph, but it doesn’t say why she was there.”

  “Does her line end?”

  “Well, we may pick it up if we try the twenty-first century. It might list some of those we’ve already seen and linked them elsewhere.”

  “I don’t understand why we can’t just follow the leads, how did Principal Katya find out we’re related?”

  “It’s a different process, Alice. Principal Katya wouldn’t look at our family history because there’s no need, she only needed to know we had a genetic connection. How we got to that wouldn’t have been of interest.”

  “I’m not clear why so many historical records have been lost.”

  “The devastation of the plague left many historical and other records unattended and in disarray. Who knows what happened? And names change, while a line may end in one place, it can appear in others. These records are not comprehensive and could be inaccurate. Let’s try: common ancestor, Mary Greer living, Alexis Langley deceased, twenty-first century, sixth-decade overlap.”

  Several records appeared. Mary directed the registry to one area.

  “There’s an Isadora Daniels in Sydney in 2059, born 1st January 2020. If that’s the same Isadora, then Siena had her at 15, my goodness! Isadora’s husband was Dominic Daniels. Their children were Elise Siena born on 22nd May 2044, Simon Dominic born on 24th September 2045 and Stuart Anthony born on 3rd July 2050. Isadora Daniels, Dominic Daniels, Elise Daniels deceased 2068—plague resurgence.”

  “Oh, they all died of plague.” Alice sad for them, almost an entire family lost.

  “Yes, and usually, if it’s recorded, that’s all the information you’re given. It leaves Simon and Stuart to follow. Which one?”

  “Can the registry give a pedigree chart? We can see in one glance then. We should have tried that before.”

  “It wouldn’t have worked, Alice. Only if the links can be confirmed. But we can try if you like.”

  “Pedigree; Simon Dominic Daniels born 24th September 2045.”

  The registry searched and came up with similar names but no exact matches. A Simon Dominic Daniels worked for NASA in 2076, but no pedigree was available.

  Mary tried the brother. “Pedigree; Stuart Anthony Daniels born 3rd July 2050.”

  And this time, a few lines emerged with the two brothers listed. Mary couldn’t explain why it hadn’t shown up before, but the page gave useful information.

  “See,” Mary displayed the chart. “It shows his mother as Isadora Daniels, born Isadora Bell. So, we’re on the right track. We can follow this line, and it might lead us to where we want to go.”

  “It’s a long way to here,” Alice said, pointing to them both, and glum about the gaps in the information.

  “Yes, but we have a name now. Progeny previous subject,” Mary commanded.

  Stuart’s progeny appeared, some even had images, and Alice believed she saw a family resemblance. But harder to believe—all these people had university degrees and high positions in government and commerce. And all descended from her dear Uncle David, who couldn’t even spell.

  Mary displayed new records, picking out the ones she believed connected them. “As we go down the list, it’s clear none of them were prolific breeders; in fact, they appeared to be academics for the most part. It looks like some fell victim to the plague between 2103 and 2109, but for others, no death date is recorded. We know now the plague came in three surges, but at the time, they didn’t know that. It took the A’khet to tell them.”

  “Did people know about the A’khet then?”

  “Not until the 22nd century. No-one even knew how long they’d been here, hidden away.”

  Alice returned to the pedigree; a line merged. A recent addition. She showed Mary who grinned broadly.

  “This is where the line meets with the Greer family. Only a hundred or so years ago.”

  “But I still don’t know how I got to be here. I remember Alice Watkins and all her details but not Alexis Langley. You came down through David Hallett’s line, but whose line did I come down through? And why would I have researched his sister, Joyce Hallett?”

  “I can’t explain it, Alice. I was told in the beginning your memories were muddled. It’s possible when you researched your family history, you found a link to Joyce Hallett. Shall we try again?”

  “Yes please.”

  “Ancestry, 20th century, Alexis Langley, prior entry.”

  The picture of Gran and Grandpa Hallett c
ame up with the information they had seen earlier.

  “The registry can’t link a direct line here, Alice, there must be gaps. So we have to do it generation by generation.”

  “Try one of Alice Watkins’s children. Michelle,” Alice suggested.

  “Of course, Michelle Watkins married Peter Campbell on 13th July 1998, then it lists the children and their dates of birth. We know Eliza didn’t have children. This one, Marianne, one child, no date of marriage. Her child was called Alice-Ann and has only a date of birth. Let’s search Alice-Ann Campbell. No, nothing. Oh wait, date of death—this is sad. Marianne Campbell died, 20th April 2033 and Alice-Ann Campbell the same day, mother and daughter,” Mary turned to Alice.

  Marianne. Outspoken and opinionated, even for a thirteen-year-old. Dead at 30. Michelle must have been devastated. Alice wasn’t sure how she felt, or even if she should feel. Was this tragic event something she would witness if she was still Alice Watkins? Marianne was a lovely girl. This should hurt, but Alice felt strangely disconnected. And Marianne had called her little girl, ‘Alice’.

  “Does it say how they died?” Alice asked quietly, scanning the display.

  “It often doesn’t. Like I said, records from the 20th and 21st century are often incomplete. We’re lucky to find the information we have so far. When we get to the 23rd century and chips get their biomechanical subroutines, records are more accurate because of the DNA.”

  Alice nodded. “Shall we try these, the twins?”

  “This symbol,” Mary pointed to a diamond shape, “is an acknowledgement of having lived, gleaned from some long-forgotten government record or another source, but no other records.”

  “Does it mean they died young?”

  “Not at all. It just means their records were lost. We can try to pick them up in a search later in the century when we have more clues.”

  “What about Toby?”

  Toby had told her about her chin hairs. Instinctively, her hand went to her chin.

  “Toby Campbell, here, a date of birth.”

  But Alice remembered it. 15th March 2009.