Other Worlds Were Possible, page 28
He exhaled with relief, almost giggled, almost laughed, and smiled in a hysterical fashion. Then he recoiled in terror and shock. His heart pounded so hard, he thought it must have ascended into his throat. His throat had bulged, but that was because he had gulped down too much air. It felt as though all his blood had rushed towards the small zone between his shoulders. That region felt dense. But he could not feel anything below his ribs.
There was a reason why he had reacted in such a manner…
By his feet, curled up in a foetal position, was the person he and Hope had met the previous time they were here. The man who had stormed into this store, stopped, laughed at Sunny, told him he was holding the axe the wrong way around, and suggested they depart, because “Once they’ve got you, there’s really no escaping.”
Sunny had pondered that meeting on several occasions: Who was this man? Was he defending him from the Wogies? Or was he defending the Wogies’ cargo? Sunny could not tell if this fellow had been mocking, threatening or protecting him. He could have been doing all these things. It was impossible to say.
Right now, Sunny could not even be sure if this man was actually asleep. Sunny had been relatively quiet, but he had still made a little noise. His actions had produced a deluge of glass, which had hurtled towards the man. That person appeared to be asleep. He was whistling into the darkness, and biting off chunks of air. But he might have been faking. He might have been waiting for the perfect moment to pounce.
Sunny thought better than to wait and see. He climbed back through the window, crouched down out of sight, spied on the man, and only returned once the clock had chimed again. If this man could sleep through such a noise, Sunny supposed he could sleep through the sound of a breaking window. Perhaps he had grown accustomed to the cacophonous melodies of this town. Perhaps he had always been a deep sleeper.
Sunny returned through the window, tiptoed through the back room, gathered all the cured meat he could carry, retraced his steps, and passed that food through the window. He repeated this process a second time. On the third, he returned with a sack which contained some yellow kernels, and a second sack, which contained something that Songbird had called “Rice”.
He clambered through the window, picked up three slabs of meat, and hurried back to meet Butterfly and Buffalo.
***
Sunny completed two missions. He reunited with his companions and handed them the meat he had gathered, before returning to fetch some more.
If anything, they were more relieved to see him, than the food he had foraged. They had grown increasingly worried, the longer he remained away; fretting over his safety, and the safety of their clan. They only inspected their food after they had hugged Sunny, checked that he was real, hugged him a second time, rubbed his nose, nuzzled his cheeks, hugged him a third time, and then a fourth.
Sunny thought that Butterfly might have been concerned about the weight of the food he had asked her to carry. But he could be entirely sure. She had not emitted a sound.
Buffalo was not nearly so aloof.
“It’s enough,” he insisted. “We can carry this between us. It’ll last us for almost an entire lunar-cycle, if we pad it out with leaves.”
But Sunny, high on adrenaline, was in no mood for a compromise:
“We don’t need to ‘Pad it out’. I’ve gathered some grains. It won’t take long to fetch them. And then we’ll be able to survive for several lunar-cycles.”
Sunny was compelled as much by stubbornness as by reason. He had overcome so many emotions, he felt it would have been foolish not to maximise the returns, now that the worst of it was over. He just had to make one final trip, and the rewards would be substantial.
“Go ahead… No, sister, brother: I insist. The others will be worried… If everything goes to plan, I’ll catch you up on the way. If not, I’ll meet you at the camp… That’s correct. Don’t worry about me. I’m telling you: Go! Be gone!”
Sunny shot them a glare which was so red, so piercing, it inspired his friends to pat their sides, to check if they had been burnt.
They did not say a word. Buffalo was too meek to argue, and Butterfly was too shy. They had a mission to complete. Sunny could do whatever he liked.
***
Sunny was in a mood which verged on the cavalier; breezy, carefree and proud. He had even caught himself whistling, as he passed by Songbird’s home. He had muted his lips, the moment he became aware of his bluster. But he could not stop himself from smiling at the brazenness he had displayed.
He skipped down lanes, and cantered around corners. His feet skimmed the surface, caressing the wisps of mud; guiding his body, as it slunk through the darkest patches of air. He was no longer thinking of the sleeping man. He had forgotten about that eerie flame.
He crossed the square, slid sideways through the gap, located the remaining food, crouched down, gripped the sacks, and eased himself up.
He was surprised to discover that he had not, as he had supposed, returned to a standing position. He was still squatting. The sacks were still on the ground.
It was strange. But it was not insurmountable.
He clenched his cheeks and began again, with much the same result. He supposed the sacks were too heavy to lift. But this did not adhere to reason. He had carried them here before.
He tried a third time, and a fourth, before jumping, but remaining in the same position. He had been startled by a voice that was so unforeseen, it felt ten times more vicious than it sounded. But he was unable to rise, because he was being held in place by an insurmountable force: Two hands were grasping his shoulders.
“Blah, blah blah, blah-di-blah, blah blah…”
Sunny could not understand a word. At first, he was relieved. The mission had been thwarted. But it had been thwarted by a child or a fool; a person who was incapable of coherent speech. He gulped down three lumps of air. And only then did he recall where he was, and what sort of people had occupied this place. He had not been accosted by a child, nor by a fool, but by a Woggy; the most fearsome creatures their tribes-folk had ever encountered.
In a single sudden movement, he twisted his torso, and launched himself to the side; producing a horizontal thrust, which he hoped would propel him beyond the reach of his assailant.
He landed face-first in the dust.
A foot had been hooked around his ankle, just above his scar; holding his foot in position, as his body flew into the void. Now his face was kissing the ground. Dirt was filling the gaps between his teeth, a knee was pressing his spine, and two hands were pinching his shoulders.
“Didn’t you hear? We said you’d be given a fair trial. Justice will prevail. Stay calm. Inhale. Justice will prevail.”
Sunny frowned, even though he knew that no-one would see.
“Oh… You said all that?”
“Ah, yes. I thought as much… You don’t understand the Civilised Language.”
Sunny tried to shrug, failed, and reluctantly said “No”.
“That’ll explain it… We were just saying that you’re going to come with us. We’ll put you in a cell overnight, and you’ll stand trial tomorrow.”
“What’s a ‘Cell’?”
“A prison… Err… A hut from which it’s impossible to escape.”
“Oh... So you’re kidnapping me?”
“‘Kidnapping’? Hah hah! Hee hee! No, my cousin. We’re arresting you.”
“Oh… This ‘Arrest’?... Is this the Woggy word for kidnap?”
The speaker paused to think of a suitable response, giving a second person the time he needed to light a torch. For some reason, beyond the bounds of logic, Sunny had supposed that he had only been assaulted by a single individual. He had not considered that the two different voices might have come from two different mouths; even though one was high-pitched, the other low; even though the first had spoken Woggy, and the second had spoken in a dialect which was similar to Sunny’s. Nor had he realised that the force used to restrain him had been so great, because it had been applied by two different pairs of hands.
The lull in conversation allowed his reason to catch up with his mind, which had been careening out of control; fuelled by a heady cocktail of shock, fear, adrenaline and bile. It seemed obvious to him now: The man with the torch was the nightwatchman; the man he had been trying to avoid. The second man was the store’s attendant. He must have woken from his slumber, spotted the broken glass, gone to find help, returned with the guard, and hidden with him in the shadows, whilst waiting for Sunny to return.
Now he was speaking again:
“No, no… ‘Kidnap’ is when you seize a person for no good reason. ‘Arrest’ is when you… When the state kidnaps… When they capture a person because they’ve committed a wrong.”
Sunny was puzzled:
“But I’ve not ‘Committed a wrong’. You’re the ones who assaulted me; shunting me to the ground. You’re the ones who are hoarding all our food. I’m telling you: You should be ‘Arresting’ yourselves.”
The nightwatchman gave a long reply, which the attendant attempted to translate; abbreviating his partner’s speech by such a large degree, that Sunny paused before he offered a response, because he was almost certain there was more to it than this:
“My friend says you’re wrong about what you called an ‘Assault’. Such things aren’t assaults when they’re committed by the state. The state has a monopoly on violence.”
Pause.
“A ‘Monopoly’?”
“The state’s representatives are permitted to attack… to restrain and punish the people. But the people do not have permission to attack the state.”
“Oh… That doesn’t sound fair.”
“Now, he says you’ve committed what’s called a ‘Theft’. You took something that didn’t belong to you, without the owner’s permission.”
“Oh… But I only shared some food. And food belongs to the hungry… And I was hungry. So it did belong to me. I had a right to gather it up.”
Sunny could not see how his assailant had responded. His forehead was pressed into the dirt. Yet he was fairly certain that the attendant was smiling. He could hear the sound of a smile, which reverberated through that person’s speech; accentuating the last syllable of every word, and heightening his pitch each time he launched a sentence:
“Ah! What savage logic! ‘From each according to their ability, to each according to their need’. Hah hah! Hee Hee!… My cousin: Civilised people don’t think in such a way.”
“Okay… But if these ‘Civilised people’ had needed this food, they’d have eaten it already. And yet they haven’t. They’ve left it here to rot… Why shouldn’t we eat it? Food is meant to be eaten.”
“No, no. Starving people can’t just take unwanted food. That’s theft.”
“But it’s our food. It grew on our land… We only want to share it.”
“My cousin: You can tell that to the judge on the morrow. You can plead your case to him.”
AN OLD FRIEND
“Brother-o: Do you know what I’m holding in my hand?”
Sunny attempted to look. But he was blinded by the light, which was gushing through the door, saturating this jail; a subterranean tunnel, with cells cut out of the rock on either side.
He tried to shake his head and say “No”. But he could not be sure of the effect. His head barely moved, and his “No” was little more than a whisper.
“Ah! Brother, it’s a fact: This is a ‘Key’. The key-o that can conquer this lock.”
Sunny’s brain did not respond in the normal fashion. It deconstructed his thoughts; detaching the adjectives from their nouns, and preventing the pronouns from agreeing with their verbs:
“Key-o, he bringing, warrior… Strange, he sound, man familiar… Face, he look looking, mine.”
He shook his head with nauseous rapidity, in an attempt to unjumble his thoughts.
He recognised the man’s accent. It was both strange and familiar; as warm as could be expected from a member of the Eagle Clan, with the elongated “O” sound which only they used. Yet his tone was a little too crisp. This man sounded more like Father Ralph than Sunny’s kinfolk.
Sunny tilted his head, to see what sort of person could possess such a voice. Was this a friend or a foe? A member of their tribe, or citizen of this town?
The light pierced his eyes. It shone through that man, transforming his body into specks of glitz and dust.
Sunny scrunched his eyes, squinted and blinked. Nothing changed. Then the man’s body began to reform, particle by particle; absorbing the sun’s rays and beams. First, he was a shuddery outline. Then he was a silhouette. He developed a tone and a third dimension.
This man’s facial hair was similar to Sunny’s. It stretched down from his sideburns, and reached around his mouth, without filling the spaces between. His shoulders were the same width as Sunny’s. They had the same roundness. They connected with his arms at all the same points. His body was remarkably familiar. But he wore it in the manner of a Woggy. He stood a little taller, a little brasher; making a concerted effort to lift his shoulders. He wore the same type of cloths that the Wogies always wore.
“Brother-o! Oh brother! So many seasons without the sunshine of your face. And now our stars collide. Old Hunter, with this key. And young Sunny, behind these grisly bars.”
It was Hunter! Sunny had been a fool not to realise it before.
Hunter’s statement had been true. Sunny was behind bars. He had been in this dungeon for what felt like half a day. Although he was unable to say for sure. There were no windows. One could not follow the path of the setting sun or rising moon. The light which entered, when Hunter had opened the door, suggested it was early afternoon. It was probably the first afternoon since Sunny had been arrested. But it could have been the second or third.
Sunny was, he had to admit, a little discombobulated. Hunger was almost certainly a factor. And inexperience was a factor too. He had never been underground. He had never encountered a set of bars.
“Will they murder me?”
“Probably not. Why waste a big wise man like Sunny?”
“Sorry… ‘Waste’?”
“They don’t waste resources in the New World. Not without a reason. These are the facts: The Sons of Empire might execute a man, to set an example to his clan. They might kill him, if they consider him a threat. But you? Brother: You don’t seem like much of a threat.”
“Oh.”
“No, they wouldn’t want to waste a fine resource like Sunny.”
“A ‘Resource’?”
“A labourer.”
“A… You mean… You wish to enslave me?”
“Me? Heavens, no! The traders might want to enslave you. There’s good money to be made from shipping off a strong lad like Sunny.”
“‘Shipping’?”
“Putting you inside a giant canoe. Paddling you across the seas. Taking you to a distant plantation.”
“Oh… I think I’d rather be… Umm… What did you call it?... ‘Executed’?”
“That can be arranged. But I can do better. For my very own little brother? Why, I wouldn’t want you to be enslaved or killed.”
“Oh.”
“Oh, Sunny-o, oh! Why do you think I brought this key?”
“To mock me?”
“Brother!”
“To move me?”
“Come! You’re breaking my heart.”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? Sunny! Wow! Haven’t you learnt a thing? After everything I’ve done?
“I warned you. I told you, ‘The Sons of Empire are coming. They will see and they will conquer.’ I told you to flee, to ‘Make a new life for yourselves, in the deepest depths of the bush.’ I offered you medicine and blankets. I even gave you a gun; the sort of gift that no other clan has ever been offered before.
“Brother: You’re my very own flesh and blood. Family-o. And one doesn’t kill or enslave one’s family. How could you think such a thing? Factually! It pains me inside.
“You might not agree with my lifestyle, or with every little thing I’ve ever done. But you shouldn’t doubt my intentions… Sunny: These matters aren’t so wet and dry. I tried to save you before, and I’m here to save you again. These are the bones of the matter.”
Sunny repressed a frown. The Hunter he remembered was no saviour. He was an exiled Uncle Crow; someone who had imposed a debt, and then used that debt to blackmail him; threatening to expose Sunny, for sharing a gun, if he did not support his motions.
“You’re here to… To ‘Save’ me?”
“This is an indisputable fact! I came as soon as I heard the news. A young man had stolen enough food to feed an army. Wow! Just wow!... I asked myself: ‘Who could that possibly be?’ And I could only think of a single person: Brother Sunny. Sunny the impetuous. Sunny-o… Factually: I had to stop what I was doing and come here right away.”
“Oh.”
“‘Oh’ indeed! I thought to myself: ‘I cannot allow a brother to rot in jail. I cannot stand by whilst he’s enslaved. What sort of man would I be?’“
“Oh.”
“I thought: ‘I must save this big wise man. I must come to his rescue, before it’s too late.’”
“Oh.”
“And so here I am!”
“To save me?”
“To save you-o!”
“Oh.”
“Well? Do you wish to be saved?”
“I suppose.”
“You suppose?”
“I mean, yes. Of course.”
“Ah! Of course, brother Sunny, of course. Let’s make like lightning and bolt.”
Hunter inserted the key, turned it through ninety degrees, allowed the door to swing open, waited for Sunny to emerge, followed him up the steps, and led him into the light.
***
His peers were struggling to believe the news: Sunny had been kidnapped. And then he had been freed. And it was Hunter who had freed him.
