Skyquakers (31 page)

Captain sang old shanties to himself as he pissed in the
corner where he was chained. He then dabbed the puddle with his hands and
rubbed the clear fluid over his body, under his armpits, even on his face.

Ned was sitting against the opposing wall of the makeshift
cell, his ankle chained to the pipes in a similar fashion to Captain’s. His
face was bruised and dried blood covered his shirt. One of his wrists had lost
all feeling, suggesting it was fractured. His lower jaw ached to move and his
stomach had been in agony for too many days to count. There was a bowl of mushy
food in front of him, but he was never hungry anymore.

He asked the Quaker,
‘
What are
you doing?
’

‘Uh… relieving. Onto my body.
’

‘Why?
’

‘So
zhey
think I
a
m still
…
uh
—’

‘Crazy?
’

‘Lots of crazy.
’

Ned gave a brief smile. Captain continued singing to
himself, bathing in his own filth, rubbing urine into his grey whiskers and all
over his naked torso. Ned asked what he was singing. He told him it was an old
patriotic song, like a national anthem. He asked if Ned
’
s type had
an anthem and he nodded, but he was too tired to sing it.

Ned wrapped his arms around his stomach and doubled over.
‘
I
feel sick.
’
He fell to his side and curled up on the hard
floor.

Captain paused and took a moment to admire the native. They
had both been in this jail for a while now, prisoners aboard the floating
cloud. Barely fed. Often beaten. Captain did nothing as he watched the bossy
one harass the native for hours every day. Each time he would ask the same
questions, and each time Ned either refused to answer or claimed he didn
’
t
know. During moments when he was most in pain, being electrically prodded or
having his wrists twisted until they snapped, he gave his tormentor brief specks
of information, but nothing which painted the portrait Psycho wanted to hear:
there was a beach, a hospital, a pack of dogs, he said
; h
e hadn
’
t
seen the girl since the massacre at Zebra Rock. She went one way and he went
another. He didn’t know anything about her except her name. Psycho didn
’
t
believe him. He often accused Captain of playing a part in this game, keeping
the boy quiet over his lost child, but the old coot would merely start singing
or ranting on about something inconsistent, to the point where Psycho would
give up and leave for another day.

He admired the native’s courage and strength. If he was
lying about Lo, he was good at it. He made friends with the native, knowing he
was a friend of
Lo
’
s
. His silence was the
only thing keeping her alive.

It took them three or four days
,
marked by three or four beatings
,
for the two
prisoners to begin conversing. Captain
’
s English
was good enough, though his accent was deep and heavy, like that of a
chain-smoking Russian. Beneath the echoing pipes, the two spoke in brief bursts
back and forth, with lengthy time in between to recover both physically and
mentally from the conversation.

‘Who are you?
’
Ned asked.

‘I am
ze
captain.
’

‘But what
’
s your name?
’

Captain said a slur of words, none of which could be written
with the current alphabet. He returned to introducing himself as Captain.

Ned nodded. He gave a moan and rubbed his stomach.

Captain asked,
‘
Vhat
makes you sick?
’

‘What?
’

‘
Vhat
makes us sick must be
different to
vhat
makes you sick, yes? Are you sad?
’

‘Sad? I
’
m a lot of things right now,
but I don
’
t think
‘
sad
’
is the
right word.
’

‘Hmm.
’
Captain sat there with his
lanky legs outstretched. He arched his four toes, curled them,
then
relaxed again.
‘
You need
Vet
.
’

‘I
’
m
not
an animal,
’
Ned barked.

‘Zhen,
vhat
are you?
’

Ned couldn
’
t answer; the pain in his
stomach was too much.

They didn
’
t see Psycho for what Captain
suggested was about a week. They were visited routinely by guards in silver
chemical suits who threw them food, a little water, then left again rather
hastily to disinfect themselves. Ned asked about the Hazmat suits and the gas
masks, which had been his only interaction with
Skyquakers
until now. Captain said they were scared of microscopic bugs and diseases. The
first anatomical observations of natives found they were more bacteria than
flesh, and it terrified them. Other animals were even worse. Viruses,
parasites, things they couldn’t even classify: they had never seen such a
germ-infected ecosystem before. They were hypochondriacs, in other words, and
rightly too. As for the masks, they had to be worn continuously when exposed to
the Planet’s atmosphere or else his kind would begin to suffocate. Ned had
witnessed this before, and Captain confirmed his belief that the gases on Earth
were too disparate for them to breathe unaided. The proportion of one gas was
too high, and others too low. Ned asked which gas they needed more of. Captain
didn
’
t know the English word for it, but he drew the
chemical symbol for it in the dust on the floor, represented by six dots in two
vertical rows. Ned still couldn
’
t pick it, so they gave up on
that.

‘Why did you come to a planet if you knew you couldn
’
t
breathe on it?
’
he asked.

Captain shrugged.
‘
No other choices.
’

‘There are
no other
choices
in the whole universe?
’

‘No other
good
choices.
’

Ned watched him for a while.
‘
You came a
long way, didn
’
t you?
’

Captain nodded.

‘How did you get here?
’

He gestured to the floating machine around him.
‘
Ze
cloud.
’

Ned pointed up.
‘
We went to the Moon once.
’

Captain chuckled and slapped his knee, as though he had just
heard a brilliant joke. His neck frills made croaking sounds like a frog when
he laughed.

Ned asked what was going to happen next.

Next, Captain explained, Engineer would begin building colonies
on the Planet. At first, they would all have to be in securely air-locked
environments, like domes. Generation by generation, they could introduce more
of Earth
’
s gases, forcing them to acclimatise, until
eventually their species could survive outside in the New World independently.
The farms would continue breeding hybrids until gradually the genetic material
of Earth’s plants and animals were replaced entirely with the genetics of their
own, although it may all take centuries for the New World to represent
something similar to their former planet. Captain and his crew would certainly
not be around to see the final product of their endeavours.

Then, Ned said, the cloud would go back to get the rest of
the Quakers and bring them here, right?

No, said Captain, in a dark and stern tone. The cloud would
never make the trip there and back again. His species, stuck on a dying planet,
were all doomed. They didn
’
t know it, of course. The poor
and the starving were all told they would one day be rescued and taken to a new
paradise, but it was unfeasible, both financially and because of the limited
nuclear material available to fuel the cloud. If they knew they were being
abandoned
(
and
one day it would become known
),
riots would break out and globally there would be anarchy. His superior
officers upheld the lie in order to prolong the inevitable, so for now it was
only hope which kept them at peace. Captain dreaded the day the truth was
revealed.

Ned couldn
’
t help but to ask what they
were planning to do with the human population. To think that millions of people
were kept somewhere on this ship boggled his mind. Among them were his family,
his friends, the ranger and his daughter, and all the nice people whose houses
he had squatted in or ransacked for supplies from Wyndham to Zebra Rock. Seven
billion people, along with several hundred billion other mammals, birds,
reptiles and marsupials, were all floating a few kilometres over the planet
’
s
surface. What was going to happen to them?

Captain told two stories: his version, and Engineer
’
s
version. In his world, there would be sections of the Planet reserved for the
colonists and sections closed off for the natives
–
like sanctuaries, national parks, even along the
lines of zoos. He had watched his own planet
’
s ecosystem
collapse due to over-digging, over-polluting,
over
-logging:
he didn
’
t want to let that happen again. The less they
disturbed the natural environment of the Planet, the more it would reward them
in return. The humans would not like this, Ned said. He had read several books
and watched countless TV shows about Australians losing their land and being
separated from one another while under oppression, and it never ended well for
either side.

It was better than Engineer
’
s vision of
the Planet, he remarked. The new captain of the cloud was a day away from
exterminating the humans entirely, if it had not been for a combination of
Captain
’
s manic ventures and Vet
’
s loud
protests. He wanted to bulldoze the place and start anew. He wanted to reserve
the Planet entirely for them, eliminating all competition. He wouldn
’
t
stand for giving any land or liberties to a species on par with rodents. He
couldn
’
t see any use humans had to the ecosystem; they
were in fact the most harmful pollutant the Planet had ever encountered, and so
their extinction would be no great loss.

‘What about you?
’
Ned asked.
‘
Do
you think we
’
re animals? Rodents?
’

Captain held his stare. He licked his lips.
‘
I
came here not expecting to care,
’
he said.
‘
I
used to
vatch
little lights down
zhere
,
and think, ‘Oh look, just lights. Little, little, lights.
’’
He held out his hands, as though he was holding a large ball.
‘
And
zhen
I see Lo.
She
vas
this
big
.
’
Ned watched his eyes. He saw those black spheres
gloss over with nostalgia.
‘
I had no babies. Lo vas my
baby.
She
vas so
…’
He tapped
his head.
‘—
S
…
smart!’ He wrapped his arms
around his body.
‘
She
vould
hold me, like this.’

Ned watched him, this old man, this alien being. He could
see it in his eyes, the deep, unrelenting sadness he felt once he became alone.
It was intensely…
human
. It was
almost uncomfortable to watch.

After a few moments wrapped in memories of innocence, Captain
dropped his arms. He hung his head. ‘
Vould
you kill
an animal you loved? I vas dying of sadness until I saw her. You
—’
He pointed at Ned.
‘
You helped her. I like you.
’

He smiled.
‘
I
like you
too, I guess.
’

Ned
’
s eyes then rolled back into
his skull. His body collapsed limp onto the floor and began convulsing.

Captain leapt to his feet and shouted for help. He screamed
until his croaking throat ached. He banged against the pipes with his chains.
The guards outside heard, but had to hurry into their space suits before they
could enter.

The native twitched uncontrollably on the ground, arms stiff
by his side. Foam began to seep from his mouth. Captain lunged forward and
tried to reach him, but his ankle chain was too short. He called out to him. He
shouted for help again, louder, and finally they came storming in. The guards
halted when they saw the ill native. They didn
’
t know what
to do. Captain ordered them to get their thick heads together and find the only
one who could help: Vet. He roared at them until one finally got the hint of
urgency and ran off to locate the ship
’
s animal
expert.

Captain watched the native boy seize and convulse on the
floor. He desperately wanted to comfort him. Stretched out on his stomach, he
managed to touch a finger, just a little finger, and when he peeled it back, he
noticed the boy had a piece of paper clenched in his fist. He managed to get
the page by its crumpled corner and gently tear it from his hand.

Moments later, the heavy doors to the cell burst open.
Captain immediately retreated to his urine-drenched corner, the paper hidden
behind his back. Vet came in, dressed in white garments with a fabric scarf
wrapped around his mouth and nose. Vet immediately kneeled before the native
and took all his vital signs with swift, nimble movements of his hands and
instruments. He would not leave unless the specimen came with him to the
clinic; it may die if they did not allow it. The guards protested, but Vet
rebelliously took the animal in his arms
–
his bare arms
–
and carried him himself out the door.

One of the guards spun and pointed at Captain, accusing him
perhaps of doing this. The captain merely lounged in his urine and started
ranting that the world was a sad and horrible place full of death and misery,
so they ignored him and left with Vet.

Once alone, Captain pulled out the leaf of paper and read
the brief story inscribed on its crinkled surface. It took a lot of effort to
translate the foreign language, but he knew these symbols and he had learnt
many of these words. He had to speak the individual letters out loud, fractured
and broken up by confused pauses, much like a child learning for the first
time. Eventually, the words formed sentences, and those sentences held meanings
which carried important weight. His eyes widened with every translation, until
at last it ended with a shocking and brilliant conclusion.

He looked up and gasped, ‘Lo…’

After two gruelling hours, with six assistants at his side,
Vet managed to stabilise the native. They worked tirelessly to find the cause
of its sudden decline in health using every medical device at their disposal. A
sample of blood, lodged into the computers via a sterile glass tube, revealed
many answers, while other devices which measured its temperature, fluid
excretions, and organ activity revealed substantial internal failures. Vet, his
rubbery skin scrubbed raw after touching the contaminant, stood before a glass
wall looking into the intensive care unit of his veterinary clinic. Inside, the
animal lay on its back on a flatbed. Multiple tubes were attached to it,
draining fluid in and out. An array of machines monitored its every heartbeat
and every breath, each connected to the digital screen in Vet’s hands.

Vet wanted Psycho to see this. The boy in the silver suit
stood by him and watched through the glass. Vet wanted to tell him the news in
person.

‘He
’
s
…
dying?
’

Vet said nothing.

‘No,
’
Psycho spat.
‘
No,
he can
’
t! This isn’t fair!’

There was nothing they could do. It was dying and Vet didn
’
t
know what from. The native was infected, but it was a microbe he had not come
across before. It had spread rapidly throughout its body, present in its blood,
its brain, and multiple organs. Its systems were failing. Its blood was toxic.
The animal did not have long to live and it was sad to watch it suffer.

Vet wanted to know how the situation got this bad. He knew
what Psycho had been doing down in the pipes and he didn
’
t like it,
but he claimed the prisoner was perfectly fine when he last saw him, short of a
few superficial injuries. In Psycho’s eyes, his actions were necessary and justified:
Engineer wanted that contaminated specimen back, at whatever cost, and Psycho
was running out of ideas. For two weeks now he had been desperately searching
for Lo, but she disappeared suddenly before his eyes and the world was simply
too vast and too wild to seek out one soul. The boy lying in that bed was the
last person on this godforsaken planet who knew where she might be. For him to
die without giving her up was an injustice and Psycho would not stand for it.

‘He can
’
t die. Not yet. I
’
m
not done with him.
’

Vet said enough was enough. He planned to make the animal
comfortable until the end, but he was certainly not going to prolong its life
merely for Psycho
’
s needs.

After reading Lily
’
s letter, Captain knew now
what had to be done.

He was not sure if it was a change of heart, a need for
vengeance against that back-stabbing Engineer, or if it honestly was an act of
insanity. Whatever the cause, it became apparent that this had to
end
.
So when the sentries guarding the small cell beneath the ship returned later
that day, they were astounded to find their remaining prisoner had escaped. The
former captain
’
s chain was broken and a
ceiling vent somewhere high above the pipes had been pried open by incredible
strength. Neither could believe the old coot had the energy to carry out such a
stunt, and it only became apparent now that perhaps much of his illness had
been a fa
ç
ade.

They hit the alarm and used the cloud
’
s radio
bands to send a warning to Engineer; assumingly he was the Captain
’
s
first target. Secondly they issued a contamination warning to the rest of the
cloud, knowing he had been in the company of multiple wild specimens. The
lights began to blaze and sections of the ship began to seal off with heavy
doors in order to reduce the spread of contamination. Workers were infuriated
that this was the second time in mere weeks that a quarantine was being
enforced, caused twice by the same old fool. Many hurried to find themselves
gas masks and gloves, to protect themselves from germ exposure, while others
sealed themselves in their dorms and quarters to wait it out.

Engineer was on the ship’s bridge when he was informed by
radio of the threat. In fury, he ordered every crewman to arm themselves and
hunt him down. Shoot if they had to. Teams assembled. They reached for their
projectile weapons, some glass, some black and more deadly, and ran off into
the bowels of the ship to take care of this mess a second time.

Engineer remained in his commanding chair and listened to
the reports as they came through. Sightings of the captain were occurring all
over the ship. He was in the vents, swinging from pipes, and crawling through
manholes. There was gunfire, sounds of distress, things collapsing,
gas
exploding from busted pipes
…
Engineer
tried to make sense of what the crazy bastard was up to, but he was too
unpredictable. He was frail, he was ill, and yet he had disarmed and taken down
almost a dozen crewmen in mere minutes. Now he was armed, apparently, and
shooting wildly at everything and anyone. Some were hesitant to shoot back,
knowing he was an officer of prestigious rank whose mental faculties made him
an object of pity. Engineer suspected the melancholy was an act all along, but
to what end? What was the point of all this chaos?

One shouted over the radio that the captain was heading to
the animal warehouses. This made Engineer sit upright in panic. He had managed
to release one specimen; perhaps he was going back to release more. This cloud
could be overrun with wild animals in a matter of minutes if he pushed the
right buttons. Frantically, Engineer shouted for the warehouses to be sealed
off.
Do not let him inside
.

Too late.

Captain managed to outrun them all until almost the very
end. Tired, weak, and stained with the blood of his own crew, he was soon
surrounded by sixteen armed guards with black-coloured projectile weapons.
Glass pellets hurt, but black ones killed. His own glass weapon had run out of
bullets, so he threw it to the ground in defeat.

He managed to make it all the way to the warehouse, but not
the human house, as he had planned. Around him, the walls were packed high with
glass pods of millions of different mammal species, mostly four-legged
creatures of similar taxonomic orders. In the centre of the room, where the
animals were experimented on, a large feline creature, black and yellow
stripes, ivory horns and magnetic green eyes, was locked in a circular cage for
observations. The beast stalked impatiently up and down its enclosure, snarling
through the steel bars, sparking green bolts of electricity down its spine.

Captain was ordered to get down on his knees and surrender.
In the face of sixteen black barrels, he backed away gently, arms raised. But
before succumbing to their deadly fire, he slammed down a lever on the control
bench and suddenly the bars of the feline’s cage fell. The hybrid monstrosity,
now free, leapt directly onto two crewmen, crushing them beneath its enormous
claws and ripping their limbs with its teeth. Shouts, gunfire, and madness
ensued, allowing Captain to escape once again.

When the breach in the animal house was called over the PA
system, Vet responded immediately. Psycho overheard what was going on and
cursed,
‘
Christ, not again!
’

Vet ran off with his fellow medics. He gave out orders over
the radio to have the warehouses sealed off, not to keep Captain out, but to
keep the escaped creature
in
.

Psycho did not go with them. He remained in the clinic,
watching the dying boy through the glass window. They were alone now. He
observed his prisoner lying there on the table. He was in a critical state,
hooked up to machines as they surveyed what may be his last days, his last
hours.

Oh, how he
resented
him. Death was an easy way out. Far too easy.

He entered the white, sterile room. It was quiet, cut off
from the blazing lights and sounds of panic by thick glass doors and an
air-lock system designed to contain germs. It was a similar room as the one
Psycho woke up in when he was taken from Earth, lying under stunning white
lights, surrounded by the curious heads of giants in ponchos as thy poked him
and introduced him to his new life aboard the cloud.
Christ,
that
was a long time ago.

He came to the bed and looked down.

Ned managed to open his eyes. His body was lathered in
sweat. His stomach hurt. His head hurt. Every breath was difficult. He could
feel the fever destroying him from the inside, and he could tell by the
sorrowful looks on the white-scarfed Quakers tending to him that there was not
much they could do. There was a tube connecting a machine to his bellybutton,
and inside he could feel a long needle, feeding him fluids through his organs.
The fluid seeping into his guts was a soft pink in colour, ice-cold to touch,
and clearly had an analgesic effect; the white room looked fuzzy and his
movements were slow and laboured.

Ned saw Psycho standing over him, staring down with cold,
merciless eyes. He noticed his hand was clenched by his hip, concealing
something. Ned couldn
’
t help but to smile at the
bastard. He knew what he was getting away with. He could see Psycho was red
with anger, and it was a pleasure to know, despite all the cities he had burned
and all the massacres he had orchestrated, that this was his ultimate failure.

Psycho looked down at him and said,
‘
I can
’
t
save you, but you can save her.
’
His concealed fist tightened.

Ned snickered,
‘
You
’
re out of time,
aren’t you?
’

‘I
can make it worse. I can make it hurt.’

‘It
already hurts.’

He
asked very slowly, ‘Tell me where she is.’

Ned
told him to go to hell.

Psycho
snapped. There was no time to be delicate anymore; there was no point in
holding back his rage any longer. He lunged at Ned with a small steel scalpel,
hidden
in his tightened fist. He leapt forward to stab him in the gut, but Ned saw it
coming. In a burst of energy, he managed to hold him off. He seized Psycho’s
wrist mid-thrust and the two struggled back and forth. The scalpel came within
millimetres of slicing through Ned’s bare chest, but before his muscles caved,
he sharply twisted his wrist, and Psycho dropped the blade with a cry. He
lunged for it again as it clattered to the floor.

Ned threw himself off his bed, and with all his weight, he
took Psycho down. He wrapped the cord extending from his bellybutton around
Psycho’s neck and began pulling back –
hard
.
The two wrestled on the floor of the clinic, trying to pull away from each
other. Psycho, gasping for air, saw the discarded scalpel, but it was just
beyond the reach of his fingertips. He felt Ned on his back, pulling on his own
plastic tubes with the true determination to kill him. Psycho felt the pressure
in his skull begin to throb. He elbowed Ned in the gut before his vision went
too blurry. Ned made a choking noise and lost his grip. The two pulled away
from each other. Psycho coughed and wheezed; his face was as red as a tomato.