I don’t say nothing for a second.
“Promise me,” Ben says again, demanding it this time.
“Promise!” Manchee barks and there’s fear even in that.
“I promise,” I say.
Ben reaches behind his back and unclasps something. He wriggles it for a second or two before it comes unlatched completely. He hands it to me. It’s his hunting knife, the big ratchety one with the bone handle and the serrated edge that cuts practically everything in the world, the knife I was hoping to get for the birthday when I became a man. It’s still in its belt, so I can wear it myself.
“Take it,” he says. “Take it with you to the swamp. You may need it.”
“I never fought a Spackle before, Ben.”
He still holds out the knife and so I take it.
There’s another BANG from the farm. Ben looks back towards it, then back to me. “Go. Follow the river down to the swamp and out. Run as fast as you can and you’d better damn well not turn back, Todd Hewitt.” He takes my arm and grips it hard. “If I can find you, I’ll find you, I swear it,” he says. “But you keep going, Todd. You keep yer promise.”
This is it. This is goodbye. A goodbye I wasn’t even looking for.
“Ben–”
“Go!” he shouts and takes off, looking back once as he runs and then racing off back to the farm, back to whatever’s happening at the end of the world.
“C’mon, Manchee,” I say, turning to run, tho every bit of me wants to follow Ben as he’s running across the fields a different way, just like he said, to confuse anyone out looking for Noise.
I stop for a second when I hear a bunch of smaller bangs from the direkshun of the house which gotta be rifle shots and I think of the rifle that Cillian took from Mr Prentiss Jr and all the rifles that Mayor Prentiss and his men have locked away in the town and how all those guns against Cillian’s stolen rifle and the few others we got in the house ain’t gonna be much of a fight for very long and it gets me to wondering what the bigger bangs were and I realize they were probably Cillian blowing up the generators to confuse the men and make everyone’s Noise so loud they can’t hear even the whisper of mine way out here.
All this for me to get away.
“C’mon, Manchee,” I say again and we run the last few metres to the river. Then we take a right and start following the river downhill, keeping away from the rushes at the water’s edge.
The rushes where the crocs live.
I take the knife from its sheath and I keep it in my hand as we move along fast.
“What’s on, Todd?” Manchee keeps barking, which is his version of “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know, Manchee. Shut up so I can think.”
The rucksack’s banging into my back as we run but we keep going as best we can, kicking thru river shrubs and jumping over fallen logs.
I’ll come back. That’s what I’ll do. I’ll come back. They said I’d know what to do and now I do know. I’ll go to the swamp and kill the Spackle if I can and then I’ll come back and help Cillian and Ben and then we can all get away to this somewhere else Ben was talking about.
Yeah, that’s what I’ll do.
“Promised, Todd,” Manchee says, sounding worried as the ridge we’re going along is getting closer and closer to the rushes.
“Shut up,” I say. “I promised to keep on going but maybe keep on going means coming back first.”
“Todd?” Manchee says and I don’t believe it either.
We’ve gotten outta hearing distance from the farm and the river veers away east a little before it enters the top of the swamp so it’s taking us away from the town, too, and after a minute there ain’t nothing following us as we run ’cept my Noise and Manchee’s Noise and the sound of the running river which is just loud enough to cover the Noise of a hunting croc. Ben says that’s “evolushun” but he says not to think about it too much around Aaron.
I’m breathing heavy and Manchee’s panting like he’s about to keel over but we don’t stop. The sun is starting to set, but it’s still light as you please, light that don’t feel like it’s going to hide you. The ground is flattening out and we’re getting down closer to river level as it all starts turning to marsh. Everything’s getting muddier and it’s making us slow down. There’s more rushes, too, can’t be helped.
“Listen for crocs,” I say to Manchee. “Keep yer ears open.”
Cuz the water from the river is slowing and if you can keep yer own Noise quiet enough you can start to hear them out there. The ground’s got even wetter. We’re barely making walking pace now, sloshing thru mud. I grip the knife harder and hold it out in front of me.
“Todd?” Manchee says.
“Do you hear them?” I whisper, trying to watch my step and watch the rushes and watch out for Manchee all at the same time.
“Crocs, Todd,” Manchee says, pretty much as quiet as he can bark.
I stop and I listen hard.
And out there in the rushes, out there in more than one place, I can hear ’em. Flesh, they’re saying.
Flesh and feast and tooth.
“Crap,” I say.
“Crocs,” Manchee says again.
“C’mon,” I say and we start splashing along, cuz we’re in muck now. My shoes start sinking with each step and water’s coming up over the top of ’em and there’s no way to go ’cept thru the rushes. I start swinging the knife as we go, trying to cut any rush that’s in front of me.
I look ahead and I can see where we’re going, up and to the right. We’ve made it past the town and it’s the bit where the wild fields come down by the school and meet up with the swamp and if we get thru this marshy bit here we’ll be on safe ground and can get onto the paths that head into the dark of the swamp.
Was it really only this morning I was here last?
“Hurry up, Manchee,” I say. “Almost there.”
Flesh and feast and tooth and I swear it’s getting closer.
“C’mon!”
Flesh.
“Todd?”
I’m cutting my way thru rushes and pulling my feet outta mud and flesh and feast and TOOTH.
And then I hear Whirler dog–
And I know we’re done for.
“Run!” I yell.
And we run and Manchee lets out a frightened yelp and leaps past me but I see a croc rear up outta the rushes in front of him and it jumps for him but Manchee’s so scared he jumps even higher, higher than he really knows how, and the croc’s teeth snap on empty air and it lands with a splash next to me looking mighty pissed off and I hear its Noise hiss Whirler boy and I’m running and it jumps for me and I’m not even thinking and I’m turning and I’m pushing my hand up and the croc comes crashing down on top of me and its mouth is open and its claws are out and I think I’m about to be dead and I’m thrashing my way back outta the muck up onto the dry bit and it’s on its hind legs coming after me outta the rushes and it takes a minute of me yelling and of Manchee barking his head off before I realize that it’s not actually coming after me no more, that the croc’s dead, that my new knife is right thru its head, still stuck in the croc and the only reason the croc’s still thrashing is cuz I’m still thrashing and I shake the croc off the knife and the croc falls to the ground and I sort of just fall over too in celebrayshun of not being dead.
And it’s when I’m gasping for air from the rush of my blood and Manchee’s barking and barking and we’re both laughing from relief that I realize that we’ve been too loud ourselves to hear something important.
“Going somewhere, young Todd?”
Aaron. Standing right over me.
Before I can do nothing he punches me in the face.
I fall backwards onto the ground, the rucksack digging into my back and making me look like an upturned turtle. My cheek and my eye are just singing with pain and I haven’t even moved properly before Aaron’s grabbing me by my shirt front and the skin beneath and lifting me to my feet. I yell out from how much i
t hurts.
Manchee barks an angry “Aaron!” and goes for Aaron’s legs, but Aaron doesn’t even look before kicking him outta the way hard.
Aaron’s holding me up to look him in the face. I can only keep the one non-painful eye open to meet his.
“Just what in the name of God’s bounteous, glorified Eden are you doing down here in the swamp, Todd Hewitt?” he says, his breath smelling like meat and his Noise the scariest kinda crazy you never wanna hear. “Yer sposed to be at yer farm right now, boy.”
With his free hand, he punches me in the stomach. I try to bend over with the pain of it but he’s still holding on to my shirt front and the skin below.
“You gotta go back,” he says. “There’s things you need to see.”
I’m gasping for breath but the way he says it catches my ear and some of the flickers I’m catching in his Noise make it so I can see a little bit of the truth.
“You sent them,” I say. “It wasn’t me they heard. It was you.”
“Smart boys make useless men,” he says, twisting his gripping hand.
I cry out but I ruddy well keep talking, too. “They didn’t hear the quiet in my Noise. They heard it in yer Noise and you sent them to me to keep them from coming after you.”
“Oh, no, Todd,” he says, “they heard it in yer Noise. I just made sure they did. I made sure they knew who was responsible for bringing danger to our town.” He grits his teeth into a wild smile beneath his beard. “And who should be rewarded for his efforts.”
“Yer crazy,” I say and boy is it ever true and boy do I wish it wasn’t.
His smile falls and his teeth clench. “It’s mine, Todd,” he says. “Mine.”
I don’t know what this means but I don’t stop to think about it cuz I realize instead that both Aaron and I have forgotten one important thing.
I never let go of the knife.
A whole buncha things happen at once.
Aaron hears knife in my Noise and realizes his mistake. He pulls back his free fist to make another punch.
I pull back my knife hand and I wonder if I can actually stab him.
There’s a breaking sound from the rushes and Manchee barks, “Croc!”
And all at the same time, we hear Whirler man.
Before Aaron can even turn, the croc is on him, clamping its teeth onto his shoulder and grabbing him with its claws and pulling him back towards the rushes. Aaron lets go of me and I fall to the ground again, clutching at all the bruises he’s left on my chest. I look up and I see Aaron thrashing in the muck now, fighting with the croc and the sails on the backs of other crocs heading his way, too.
“Outta here!” Manchee’s barking, almost shrieking.
“Too effing right,” I say and I stumble to my feet, the rucksack knocking me a little off balance and my hurt eye trying to peel open but we don’t stop and we run and we run and we run.
We get out of the marshes and run along the bottom of the fields to the start of the swamp path and we run into the swamp along it and when we get to the log that Manchee always needs help over he just sails right over it without even stopping and I’m right behind him and we’re running our way to the Spackle buildings just like we were this morning.
And the knife is still in my hand and my Noise is thudding so loud and I’m so frightened and hurt and mad that I know beyond any shadow of a thought that I am going to find the Spackle hiding in his Noise hole and I am going to kill him dead dead dead for everything that’s happened today.
“Where is it?” I ask Manchee. “Where’s the quiet?”
Manchee’s sniffing away like mad, running from building to building, and I’m doing my best to calm my Noise but there don’t seem any chance of that.
“Hurry!” I say. “Before it runs–”
And it’s barely outta my mouth before I hear it. The rip in the Noise, as big and horrible as life itself, I can hear it a little bit away, behind the Spackle buildings, behind some bushes.
It ain’t getting away this time.
“Quiet!” Manchee barks, all keyed up, and he runs past the buildings and into the bushes.
And the quiet moves, too, and tho I can feel the pressure in my chest again and the terrible mournful things coming into my eyes, this time I don’t stop, this time I run after my dog and I don’t stop and I take in my breath and I swallow away the pressure and I wipe the water from my eyes and I grip the knife and I can hear Manchee barking and I can hear the silence and it’s just around this tree just around this tree just around this tree and I’m yelling and I’m going round the tree and I’m running at the silence and my teeth are bared and I’m screaming and Manchee’s barking and–
And I stop.
I stop right there in my tracks.
I don’t, I do absolutely not put down the knife.
There it is, looking back at us, breathing heavy, crouched at the base of a tree, cowering from Manchee, its eyes practically dying from fright but still trying to offer up a pitiful threat with its arms.
And I just stop.
I hold my knife.
“Spackle!” Manchee barks, tho he’s too chicken to attack now that I’ve held back. “Spackle! Spackle! Spackle!”
“Shut up, Manchee,” I say.
“Spackle!”
“I said shut up!” I shout, which stops him.
“Spackle?” Manchee says, unsure of things now.
I swallow, trying to get rid of the pressure in my throat, the unbelievable sadness that comes and comes as I look at it looking back at me. Knowledge is dangerous and men lie and the world keeps changing, whether I want it to or not.
Cuz it ain’t a Spackle.
“It’s a girl,” I say.
It’s a girl.
“It’s a girl,” I say again. I’m still catching my breath, still feeling the pressure on my chest, definitely still holding the knife way out in front of me.
A girl.
It’s looking back at us like we’re gonna kill it. It’s hunched down in a little ball, trying to make itself as small as possible, only taking its eyes off Manchee to snatch quick glances of me.
Of me and my knife.
Manchee’s huffing and puffing, his back fur all ridged, hopping around like the ground is hot, looking as charged up and confused as I am, tho completely hopeless about keeping in any way cool.
“What’s girl?” he barks. “What’s girl?”
By which he means, “What’s a girl?”
“What’s girl?” Manchee barks again and when the girl looks like it might be about to make a leap back over the large root where it’s huddling, Manchee’s bark turns into a fierce growl, “Stay, stay, stay, stay, stay . . .”
“Good dog,” I say, tho I don’t know why it’s good what he’s doing but what else can you say? This makes no sense, no sense at all, and everything feels like it’s starting to slip, like the world is a table tilted on its side and everything on it is tipping over.
I am Todd Hewitt, I think to myself but who knows if that’s even true any more?
“Who are you?” I finally say, if it can even hear me over all my raging Noise and Manchee’s nervous breakdown. “Who are you?” I say, louder and clearer. “What are you doing here? Where did you come from?”
It looks at me, finally, for more than just a second, taking its eyes off Manchee. It looks at my knife, then it looks at my face above my knife.
She looks at me.
She does.
She.
I know what a girl is. Course I do. I seen ’em in the Noise of their fathers in town, mourned like their wives but not nearly so often. I seen ’em in vids, too. Girls are small and polite and smiley. They wear dresses and their hair is long and it’s pulled into shapes behind their heads or on either side. They do all the inside-the-house chores, while boys do all the outside. They reach womanhood when they turn thirteen, just like boys reach manhood, and then they’re women and they become wives.
That’s how New World works, or at least tha
t’s how Prentisstown works. Worked. Was meant to, anyhow, but there ain’t no girls. They’re all dead. They died with their mothers and their grandmothers and their sisters and their aunties. They died in the months after I was born. All of them, every single one.
But here one is.
And its hair ain’t long. Her hair. Her hair ain’t long. And she ain’t wearing no dress, she’s wearing clothes that look like way newer versions of mine, so new they’re almost like a uniform, even tho they’re torn and muddy, and she ain’t that small, she’s my size, just, by the looks of her, and she’s sure as all that’s unholy not smiley.
No, not smiley at all.
“Spackle?” Manchee barks quietly.
“Would you effing well shut up?” I say.
So how do I know? How do I know it’s a girl?
Well, for one, she ain’t no Spackle. Spackle looked like men with everything a bit swelled up, everything a bit longer and weirder than on a man, their mouths a bit higher than they should be and their ears and eyes way, way different. And spacks grew their clothes right on their bodies, like lichens you could trim away to whatever shape you needed. Product of swamp-dwelling, according to another Ben-best-guess and she don’t look like that and her clothes are normal and so there ain’t no way she’s a Spackle.
And for two, I just know. I just do. I can’t tell you but I look and I see and I just know. She don’t look like the girls I seen in vids or in Noise and I never seen no girl in the flesh but there she is, she’s a girl and that’s that. Don’t ask me. Something about her shape, something about her smell, something I don’t know but it’s there and she’s a girl.
If there was a girl, that’s what she’d be.
And she ain’t another boy. She just ain’t. She ain’t me. She ain’t nothing like me at all. She’s something completely other else altogether and I don’t know how I know it but I know who I am, I am Todd Hewitt, and I know what I am not and I am not her.
She’s looking at me. She’s looking at my face, in my eyes. Looking and looking.
And I’m not hearing nothing.
Oh, man. My chest. It’s like falling.