Other Worlds Were Possible, page 18
“Here. You could wear this in your ear. Or you could slot it through your nose… It’d look pretty…”
Hope slapped the object away.
“I’m already pretty!”
Unperturbed, Sunny tried a third time; returning with a fragment of something translucent. It had an irregular shape, which suggested it had been a part of something else.
Sunny cut himself on its edge:
“Ouch! Mother Nature, the ancestors, and all the unborn descendants!”
Hope raised her eyebrows.
But Sunny remained defiant:
“We could use this as a blade…”
“Oh behave! Can’t you see that it’s nothing but junk? The Wogies dumped it here because it's worthless… And you treat it like it’s treasure! Even dung beetles have more self-respect.”
Sunny supposed she had a point.
As if to prove that point, an elderly woman appeared on the other side of the mound, where she dumped some peel and bones.
“See? Rubbish! Absolute garbage. What sort of nincompoop would wish to swim in a cesspit like this? Eh? Mister Sunny, ‘Uncle Crow of the Dump’. Mister Digger Of Unrotted Manure.”
But Sunny had noticed something else:
“You’re looking at the wrong thing.”
“I know what I saw.”
“Okay. What did you see?”
“I saw a woman pour rubbish on top of your precious ‘Treasure’.”
“And then what did she do?”
“She… Mister Milky Eyes: You saw what she did. She spun around and retreated into this err… This camp thingy… Or whatever this monstrosity is supposed to be.”
“Who made her spin around?”
“Eh?”
“Who made her return?”
“No-one.”
“Oh, so you’re saying she was a Woggy? A Daughter of Empire? A coloniser, free to do as she wished?”
Hope did not reply.
“She looked just like us! And she walked here without being whipped. Without being chained. You know… Just like we weren’t whipped or chained by Uncle Survey, the Desert Wogies or Father Ralph.”
Hope scowled.
“Can’t you hear that screaming? What is it you think they’re doing to the people who ‘Look just like us’?”
But Sunny was sure of his convictions:
“There’s only one way to find out… And, you know… I think we’ll be fine. If that woman can come and go, then we can too. Let’s move! Let’s fly like a bird with a worm.”
***
Sunny had been correct. Following in the lady’s footsteps, they walked past a couple of Wogies, without inspiring a second glance.
Things might not have gone so smoothly…
When they first stepped into the open, they had proceeded in the most tentative of fashions; taking a couple of baby steps, stalling, skipping, and coming to a premature halt. They would have continued in this jilted manner, had Sunny not placed his hand on Hope’s shoulder; caressing her forwards, whilst whispering: “Walk as if you belong here, or these people will stop and stare.”
Sunny sensed that Hope was not particularly enamoured by this command. But she did as she was asked, which was all he could have expected.
A few moments later, they arrived outside the first building; a hut which was positioned away from the rest of the camp. It was far longer than the other buildings, but a similar width.
Peering through the doors, Hope and Sunny noted the peculiar setup. There were up to a hundred people inside. The natives were spread out across the floor. The Wogies were lying atop their own individual platforms, beyond a wooden divide. Most were stoic. A few were writhing in pain.
“These must have been the people we heard screaming.”
Hope nodded.
Much to her relief, they were not screaming because they were being attacked. If anything, they were being healed. But why? What had happened to them? How could so many people be ill at the very same time?
A healthy Woggy was dashing back and forth, attempting to do far more things than any sane person would ever attempt to do at once, and demanding far too much from his assistant; a native, who began to obey each order, before stopping short to obey the next.
Those two attendants were mainly caring for the Wogies; ignoring the natives, until their screams became too much to bear.
Sunny could not make much sense of their conversation. But he began to recognise a few of the words which were repeated more than the others. There was one which sounded something like “Tuberculosis”, and another which sounded like “Influenza”. At first, he thought they might be talking about “Chicken pox”. Then he became convinced that they were saying “Smallpox”. One of the words was probably “Typhoid”. But it might have been “Typhus”, or “Measles”, or “Whooping cough”.
The way these words were spoken, after so much deliberation, made Sunny suppose they were a kind of diagnosis. Yet this seemed too far-fetched to believe. He had heard tales of new diseases, which had appeared overnight. Their clan had a story about this very thing: The Fable of Great Uncle Death. But he had never heard of so many diseases, arriving together, at the very same point in time.
Hope had reached a similar conclusion:
“I guess this explains why Hunter offered us so much medicine.”
“He was trying to help.”
“Perhaps… I don’t know… Anyway, let’s move on. This place is giving me the worms.”
***
Hope and Sunny proceeded along a muddy lane, flanked by two rows of huts, before emerging into an opening. This square-shaped space was surrounded by a hotchpotch of half-finished buildings. A couple were two stories high. One was cross-shaped. A few were filled with supplies. Several were filled with people.
One of the huts was producing far more noise than all the others. It was packed to the brim with Wogies, who were spilling out onto the veranda; swigging a frothy drink, and engaging in a type of conversation which was unlike anything Hope or Sunny had ever encountered. These people did not appear to be talking to each other, giving their companions the time they needed to speak. They were talking at each other. Their words were jumbled up. Sentences were waging war on rival sentences. It was almost impossible to discern individual streams of speech, just the chuggedy-chuggedy din of indecipherable voices.
They backed away, retreating to a grassy spot on the opposite side of the square. They made themselves comfortable. And they observed the people nearby.
One man was asleep, in the middle of the afternoon, for no apparent reason. A second man was skipping, then walking, then skipping; whistling an offbeat tune. A third man was feeding intestines to a dog, without using them to wash his hands.
They recoiled, almost in unison; turning to face a hut which had a roof but no walls.
Sunny’s eyes were immediately drawn towards a rather stumpy animal, which reminded him of a cloud. There were thirty similar creatures in a pen at the rear of that hut. But it was this first animal who grabbed his attention. A native was holding it between his legs. “Baah”, it screamed. “Baah!”
Sunny gripped his own legs, awaiting the animal’s slaughter. He had killed several animals himself, but he usually did so from a distance. That seemed fair. The target had a chance to get away. It would escape if it was quick, or nimble, or cunning. But this? The native had already captured these animals. He was making them wait their turn, and appeared to be cuddling them as they were killed. It was far too intimate. It was outright unnatural.
The native brought the sharp object down upon the cloud-like beast. But that animal did not bleed. Nor did it collapse.
Sunny had to perform a double-take, before he was prepared to accept the reality of this situation. The native was not killing the animal. He was removing its fur!
“But… The animal will be bald. Naked! Bald and naked. Naked and bald… How on earth and the ancestral realm will it regulate its temperature?”
Hope shrugged.
She was more interested in the pile of fur by the man’s feet. Another man was gathering it up; placing it in a large wooden box, which was supported by four vertical circles. When the box was full, that man climbed on top and whipped a horse, who trotted away; pulling the box towards another hut.
Hope had seen horses before. Both Hunter and Father Ralph had ridden atop those animals. But she had never witnessed a spectacle which was quite as bizarre as this.
Now it was her turn to ask an unanswerable question:
“How did he get that animal… that horse… To pull that thingy-whatsit?”
Sunny opened his mouth to answer, but failed to produce a sound. His gaze was still fixed upon the first man, who was removing furs with metronomic regularity. His talents were breathtaking. But something was amiss:
“The… The joy… Where’s his joy?”
Hope had already worked this out:
“Can’t you see? He isn’t a Mister Happy, doing this out of choice; because he loves the task, or because it’s necessary. Why would anyone need so many balls of fur? No. He’s a Mister Slave In Invisible Chains. He’s being made to do this… Of course, there’s no joy. He’s stuck in a trap.”
Sunny could not see a trap. The man was not tied or bound. No-one was holding a weapon above his head, forcing him to do this laborious task.
“I don’t like it… It… It doesn’t seem… Umm… Right? Natural? Sane?”
“Let’s get out of here.”
“Okay. But let’s explore one of those huts before we go.”
Hope sighed. This place was giving her the spiders. But she did not feel threatened. Other natives were walking around without being harassed. She supposed that she and Sunny would also be left alone.
They walked at a leisurely pace, reached one of the larger huts, and edged inside; coming to a stop after a few more steps.
That place was filled with two types of crops.
“Rubber and cotton,” Hope explained.
“Cotton?... Oh… Does it taste nice?”
“I’ve never tried it.”
“It looks a bit… Coarse… I mean… How are you supposed to cook it?”
“I don’t think you do.”
“Oh… You eat it raw?”
“I don’t think you eat it at all.”
“No?”
“I think you smoke the rubber.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah.”
Hope shuffled back through the entrance, walking on the balls of her feet.
“Let’s go.”
“Soon. Let’s just explore one last hut-store-place… The last one, I promise.”
Hope followed Sunny’s lead, without a word or gesture, but with a look which positively screamed: “Oh, do hurry up! What else could you possibly want to see?”
Sunny wanted to see what was inside this modest hut, which he entered without the kind of delay which had stalled their progress before.
This place was different to the previous building. A variety of things were on display. Legs of meat hung from the rafters, and some sacks were arranged in a row. Their tops were open, exhibiting a variety of grains. But there was one particular object which piqued Sunny’s interest: That strange item the Wogies wore on their feet.
He grabbed one, realised it was too big, put it back on a shelf, and selected a pair which he supposed might fit. He squatted down, shoved the first one onto his foot, jumped up and grinned:
“Look at me! I’m a big Woggy fellow, with a loincloth on my foot!”
“Humph! Loincloths are for your loins. That’s a foot-cloth.”
“Huh? Okay then… I’m a big Woggy fellow, with a foot-cloth on my foot.”
Hope smiled, although Sunny could not be sure if she was smiling with him or at him. He did look mildly ridiculous. His toes, which were splayed, pointed out at the most awkward of angles. His feet overflowed the sandal’s base.
Hope did not stop to stare for long. She was enjoying herself; playing with a wooden contraption, with a row of spikes on one side. She had seen a Woggy use something similar; running it through his hair, untangling the knots and straightening the strands. But when Hope attempted to do the same thing, the object got stuck. She had to yank it free, applying so much force, she detached a clump of hair.
Sunny could not help but chuckle:
Aha! Aah… Aah…
He silenced himself just as soon as he realised how loud he had been. It was reckless; an act which could have drawn unwanted attention.
As if on cue, a stranger stomped in through the gates. His eyelids were drawn so wide, his eyeballs extended beyond their sockets. His eyebrows had a turquoise hue. It was petrifying. But Sunny was not only petrified. He was also relieved. This man was a native. His face was covered in tattoos, which bore a passing resemblance to his own.
The man scowled, formed a fist, restrained himself, and guffawed:
“Hah hah!… You think?... Hee hee!.. You think that’s how you hold an axe?”
Sunny had forgotten he was holding anything at all, let alone an object which was called an “Axe”.
“You hold it by the other end… By the handle… There… That’s the handle, there.”
Sunny nodded, earnestly, as he turned the “Axe” around.
“I’m inclined to believe you’re not a citizen of this town.”
Sunny frowned. He had understood most of the comment, which was spoken in a familiar language. But had never heard of a “Citizen” or a “Town”.
“Yes, I thought as much… Now, you can stay here if you so choose. The decision is entirely yours. But if you have somewhere else to go, or if you still have a clan to call your own, then I’d suggest you flee before you’re spotted. Once they’ve got you, there’s really no escaping.”
Sunny paused to consider these words.
But Hope was in no mood to dally. Before Sunny knew what had happened, she had grabbed his wrist, pulled him out of the store, and dragged him across the square.
***
They would have sped through the camp, and out the other side, had Sunny not spotted someone familiar; a woman who was standing in front of one of the smaller huts…
At first, he thought he had seen a ghost. The very sight of that person sent a shiver down his spine; pinning him to the spot, and causing his jaw to hang loose.
Hope did not stop. She charged ahead; yanking Sunny’s arm, almost removing it from its socket, rebounding back, crashing into his body, and knocking him to the ground.
“Soh… Soh… Songbird?... Is that you?”
Songbird was so large, it would have been impossible to miss her. Yet she seemed smaller than before. It was a strange thing. Her thighs were about as large as Sunny remembered. They were still as spherical as any thighs he had ever seen. Her upper body was also the same size. Every part of her body was as large as it had always been, if not a little larger. Yet Songbird seemed smaller. Perhaps it was her attire. She was covered in cloths. Perhaps Sunny had grown. Or perhaps the world had grown up around her. Her new hut was four or five times larger than the tent she had lived in before. This “Town” was several times the size of her clan’s old camp. Songbird was still a giant. But she was no longer a force of nature. She no longer possessed the gravitational field that had once attracted Sunny. She was just as enigmatic. But she was far less magnetic.
Sunny was just pleased to find someone he could trust. He jumped to his feet and followed Songbird inside.
Hope’s anger was plain to see. She had placed a forefinger beside each of her temples, such that they looked like a pair of horns. But Sunny could not be sure why she was angry. Was it because she was impatient to leave? Or because she was jealous of this older lady?
Hope held her ground; waiting for Sunny to protest, turn around and leave. She only followed him inside, once it became clear he was determined to stay. And even then, she remained in a bitter mood; slumping against a wall, falling to the floor, twiddling her fingers and chewing her lip.
“Auntie Songbird, meet Hope.
“Hope… Our dearest Auntie Songbird.”
Songbird smiled at Hope, who avoided eye-contact, scoffed and turned away.
“Ah, yes… So, Auntie… I guess this explains why you weren’t at the Big Camp.”
Sunny looked around the hut, and was surprised to see the sort of things which were normally kept in a communal store: Pots, containers, a beaker, some leafy vegetables and a stack of edible roots. It also contained a platform, like the ones they had seen in the infirmary.
Songbird patted that contraption.
“Come. Sit on this ‘Bed’.”
She patted it a second time.
“Come, come... I won’t bite, unless you want me to…”
Sunny edged forwards. He looked to Hope for moral support, gave up, and finally took a seat. It was not nearly as bad as he had feared.
“Hmm…” Songbird continued. “That wasn’t exactly our choice… So, no-one from our clan made it to the Big Camp. Most didn’t make it at...”
Songbird did not finish the sentence, but Sunny was reluctant to push for more. Songbird was clearly hurt. Her hands were trembling. She was not crying, but her eyes had moistened. They were reflecting the few slithers of light which had managed to creep in through the gaps in the walls.
“They took… They took my sons… They… Hmm… They tied them up, and marched them away. Someone said they were being sent to a distant ‘Plantation’. But no-one told us what a ‘Plantation’ was… They said I should come to this town, or my daughter would be next.”
Sunny stroked Songbird’s thigh, granting her the time she needed to continue.
“I… Hmm… So, I think I should start at the beginning.”
Sunny nodded.
“So, there was this man. He… Hmm… He looked like us. He spoke our language. But he wasn’t of our mind. He…”
Sunny filled the silence:
“Hunter?”
“Yes!... No… So, I’ve met that Hunter chap. He… Hmm… But I’m speaking of someone different. Someone similar, but different.
“So, this other chap, he offered us what we called ‘Cargo’. Impressive things. Enchanting, beguiling things. Things we’d never seen before. Things we could’ve never made ourselves.
