But Little Fearless and her friends didn’t feel sorry for her right then, as she charged down the alley towards them, her shadow a great dark stain spread by her advancing bulk. Little Fearless was concentrating on bringing Stargazer back to her senses by patting her on her cheeks, shaking her gently and whispering in her ear. The other girls, even Tattle, were struck dumb as if they were stranded in the path of a charging rhino.
“Stand up!” bellowed Stench. She seemed to have only two volume levels, loud and very loud, and this was in the second category. Immediately the three Y girls rose to their feet. Little Fearless was still trying to rouse Stargazer.
“You deaf?” yelled Stench, fixing her gaze on Little Fearless, who had Stargazer’s head cradled in her arms.
Little Fearless looked up at her, unintimidated. When she spoke, she spoke mildly and politely, without a trace of nervousness.
“We’re sorry. But Z242 here is not well. She’s very weak and sensitive, and was so overcome by the beautiful smell from the rubbish that she fainted.”
Soapdish, Tattle and Beauty all glared at Little Fearless. She was mad to provoke Stench further by making fun of her kingdom of rubbish.
But Stench blinked twice and looked puzzled. “What are you talking about?” she snapped. “Are you making fun of me?”
“Not at all,” replied Little Fearless quietly. “Why do you think we were here in the first place? We came because Z242 told us about the scent, and we wanted to smell it too.”
Although Stench was stupid, she wasn’t stupid enough to believe that any of the other girls in the Institute felt the same as she did about the rubbish dumps. Although it was true that she had come to love the aroma of rotting food, she knew everyone else found it repulsive.
“Get up on your feet! You’re talking nonsense. You think it stinks here, like everyone else. You’re making fun of me, and I’m going to make sure that you regret it.”
Stargazer was beginning to come round. Little Fearless gently massaged her temples.
“You don’t understand. It’s not the garbage we’ve come to smell. No, Stargazer told us there’s a secret hidden underneath all the smell of decay and rottenness, and that it’s beautiful, and she brought us here because she wanted us to smell it too.”
Tattle, Soapdish and Beauty didn’t have a clue what Little Fearless was talking about, but, sensing Stench’s gaze on them, they nodded hesitantly as if in agreement.
“She has special powers. She can see what others don’t see, and sense what others don’t sense. She claims that here, right at the heart of all the rubbish, there is something precious, and that she can actually smell it, and it has a scent that is both wild and rich.”
To the surprise of Tattle, Soapdish and Beauty, Stench nodded, and when she spoke again her voice was softer, less angry.
“Is she the one they call Stargazer?” she asked, at almost a normal volume.
“She is,” said Little Fearless. “Could we have some of your water to help her come to her senses?”
To the amazement of the others, Stench reached for her belt where she kept her water bottle and passed it to Little Fearless, who splashed some onto Stargazer’s face. Stargazer shook her head and her eyes flickered open.
“She’s right,” said Stench, helping Stargazer to her feet. “There is something precious here. I’ve been searching for it all these years I’ve been looking after the tips, and I can also smell it sometimes. It’s as if I have a sixth sense, like her.”
Tattle nervously choked back a laugh. Immediately Stench turned on her, grabbing her arm roughly so that she could see her steel identification bracelet.
“Y558. I’ve heard about you. You talk too much, everybody says. Think you’re a hard case but you’re as soft as muck. You need shutting up. You can talk all you want in the Discipline Block, only there’s no one to listen. Except for the rats, of course.”
Just then, Stargazer let out a low moan. “The shadow,” she said, staring ahead of her but not seeming to see anything. “It’s you.”
“What is she talking about?” asked Stench nervously.
Hearing her voice, Stargazer turned to Stench. Immediately her face softened, and to everyone’s amazement she reached out and touched Stench softly on the arm.
“Thank you. Thank you, Lila. You are good. You are good.”
Stench looked like she’d been slapped. “What did you call me?” she gasped, taking a step backwards.
“Lila,” said Stargazer in a quiet, firm voice. “You are Lila.”
Stench looked around her, bewildered. She jerked her arm away from Stargazer’s touch and chewed at the air as if she could find no words. Then she withdrew a step.
“Get back to your hall in the Living Block. All of you. And don’t let me catch you here again, otherwise I’ll report you. The Controller won’t stand for it. You’ll go to the Discipline Block. Get away. Get away from here before I change my mind.”
Stargazer rose unsteadily to her feet, helped by Little Fearless, and the five girls started to walk as briskly as they could away from Stench. The X girl stayed rooted to the spot and did not speak again.
Stench
Anyone attempting to escape the
protection of the school shall suffer
the severest punishment under
City penal law, as shall anyone
(a) aiding that person; (b) withholding
knowledge of any escape attempt.
Furthermore, all the residents of the
school shall be punished in the event
of any such attempt being made.
Rule 1, Book of Regulations, City
Community Faith School for Retraining,
Opportunity and Hope
It was a few days after the incident in the alley that Little Fearless realized she had to escape.
She had to be loyal to her dead mother; she had to be brave and true to herself – and that meant getting out of the Institute somehow, to tell the world the terrible secret of what was happening in there.
No one had ever escaped from the Institute before, but, inspired by Stargazer’s vision of the future, she had gnawed at the idea like a terrier. However elusive the solution seemed at first, she would not let it go. She wrestled with the image of Stench and Stargazer’s meeting time and time again, as if sensing it might hold some kind of key to getting out of the place. Then, at last, she had woken up in the night with the outline of a plan, all laid out in her dreams.
She debated with herself whether she should tell any of her friends. If they didn’t know anything, they couldn’t tell anyone. Tattle in particular had a loose tongue and loved to gossip. Soapdish would hate the idea because it involved breaking one of the most serious rules in the Institute. But she had to tell someone or she would burst, and she couldn’t tell one of her friends and not the others. It would be hurtful and unfair.
So, one night, after work in the laundry had finished, Little Fearless met Tattle, Beauty, Soapdish and Stargazer in their dormitory to tell them her intention of escaping.
“There are only two ways out of this place,” she announced. “There’s the laundry vans, which come and go twice a day. On the way out, of course, they are inspected very carefully. I’d never make it out in one of those.”
“What’s the other way?” asked Tattle.
“The rubbish lorry.”
“You’re going to sneak out in the rubbish lorry?” said Beauty.
“That’s right. It’s obvious.”
The other girls were disappointed. No one had escaped in the rubbish lorry before. Stench watched the bins like a hawk. It couldn’t be that easy. Perhaps, although Little Fearless was brave, she wasn’t really all that clever, they thought dejectedly.
“But what if they catch you? You’ll be taken away. We’ll never see you again,” worried Stargazer.
“They won’t catch me because there won’t be any inspection.”
“How do you know? Stench is very proud of her jo
b. Fanatical about it, in fact. No one could ever sneak out under her nose.”
“I know. If she inspects the rubbish properly, as she always does, I dare say she’s sure to find me.”
“Well then,” said Beauty. “I don’t see how—”
But Little Fearless held up her hand and winked. “The thing is, if she inspects the rubbish. The if is the thing. The if is the plan.”
Soapdish looked puzzled and irritated at the same time. “Of course she’ll inspect the rubbish,” she snapped. “Stench is devoted to her rubbish, and no one can get anywhere near the bins, let alone the rubbish lorry, without her knowing. She’ll turn you over to the Controller without a second thought, and probably thrash you with her leather strap for good measure.”
Now Beauty chimed in. “I agree with Soapdish. Have you been inhaling cleaning fluid, LF? I admit that what you are suggesting is very brave. But I just can’t see how it would work. Even if you could get out of the Institute, there’s a bed check every night at midnight, and if you weren’t there the alarm would be raised. You wouldn’t even have time to do anything useful before they found out you were missing.”
“And what would you do anyway?” asked Tattle. “I mean, we all agree you’ve got a lot of guts. But what’s your plan – to run around the City shouting ‘Come and save us, come and save us’? They’d think you were a lunatic. They’d be right, too.”
Little Fearless had expected something like this. She raised herself to her full height. Her face, as usual, was dirty and her clothes were ragged. All Y and Z girls wore clothes donated by charity shops in the City, and they were tattered and ill-fitting.
“Your families are still out there somewhere,” she said in a plain, matter-of-fact voice. “When I get to the City I’m going to find them. And you have to trust me. I will escape. My plan is just too good to fail.” She adjusted her old purple beret so it was arranged in a jaunty angle on her head.
“I’ll tell them what is going on in the Institute. Then they’ll tell others and they’ll start a riot and come and raze this place to the ground. Then you’ll be able to take back your real names, and become real girls again.”
Tattle and Beauty looked sceptical.
“Or not,” said Tattle. “Perhaps they won’t believe you.”
“Or worse,” added Beauty bitterly. “Perhaps they won’t even care.”
Little Fearless was taken aback. She expected to hear that kind of sourness from the Controller, but not from her friends.
But Soapdish, surprisingly, since she hated breaches of the rules more than anyone, seemed suddenly excited. “If you really could get out…” she said breathlessly, staring at Little Fearless with glittering eyes. “I don’t know what stories they’ve told our parents about us, but I do know that as soon as they recognize them as lies, they’ll come and get us.”
“I believe that too,” replied Little Fearless. “But first we have to decide whose parents I go to. I’ll only manage to make it to one home. One of you needs to tell me where your parents live.”
She turned to Beauty and spoke earnestly to her. “Beauty. Your family is rich. You told me once that your father was high up in one of the Ten Corporations. If I could find your parents, they’d be powerful enough to help us.”
Beauty avoided Little Fearless’s gaze and raised her chin slightly. “My parents couldn’t care less. They put me in here in the first place. Said I brought shame on the family. So they got rid of me.”
“But even so…”
“What’s more, I don’t care about them. They mean nothing to me,” she said bitterly. “They wouldn’t help you anyway. They’d kick you down the stairs and call the police.”
“Beauty, I’m sure that’s not true. All parents love their children.”
“I hate my parents, and I don’t want anything to do with them, and I don’t want you to have anything to do with them either, because they’ll just make trouble for us all.” She crossed her arms and turned away.
It was Tattle who spoke up then. “Little Fearless, go to my father first. You can tell him everything. And he’ll be able to do something.”
“How will he be able to do something?” asked Beauty wearily.
“He’s a policeman.”
“A policeman?” echoed Beauty and Soapdish together, incredulously.
Tattle flushed. She had always made the most of her reputation as a juvie, and she clearly believed that having a policeman for a father – instead of a villain or some kind of rebel – was faintly embarrassing.
“Yes, a policeman,” she admitted meekly. “And I’m sure the only reason he’s done nothing to come and get me is because he believes in the City Boss and the Ten Corporations. He thinks that as long as he does what he’s told, the City authorities will run things for the common good of everyone. He really believes having me in here is for the best, and if they say I am being well schooled and looked after, then he’s bound to believe it’s true.
“But once he sees you and you tell him the real story, he’ll see how he’s been lied to. Then he’ll be able to go to the chief policeman, who will have the power to tear this place down and lock the Controller up for good.”
With Little Fearless, Stargazer, Soapdish and Tattle all now eager to put the plan into effect, Beauty began to become infected with their enthusiasm.
“Maybe you’re right,” said Beauty. “Maybe, since he’s a policeman, he really could do something. If only you could escape. Surely no one would stand for it once they knew what was happening here, least of all a policeman.”
“But why should he believe you?” said Tattle, a sudden doubt creeping into her voice. “All he’ll see is a ragamuffin little girl, covered in filth, who could be anyone. He might arrest you, or throw you out. My father was always very, very strict. He believes law and order and respect are the most important things of all.”
“I’ve thought about that,” said Little Fearless. “Give me a lock of your hair. I’ll show it to him, and he’ll know who I am and that I’m telling the truth. Any father will know his daughter’s own hair.”
Without pausing to reply, Tattle reached for a rusty pair of scissors that she kept beside her bed. She hacked off a clump of her honey-coloured hair and thrust it into Little Fearless’s hands.
“Look after it, Little Fearless. When my father sees it he’ll know for sure that it is mine and that I’m trying to send a message to him.”
“One more thing,” said Little Fearless softly. “You need to tell me your real name.”
The girls were silent. It was taboo.
Nevertheless, Tattle leaned over to Little Fearless and whispered in her ear. Little Fearless nodded and kissed Tattle delicately on the cheek. “It’s settled then,” she said firmly, wrapping the lock of hair carefully in a piece of old newspaper. “The next time the rubbish lorry comes, I will make my escape. And I promise you something else – I’ll be back in my bed by midnight so that you won’t all be punished; they’ll never know I was gone in the first place.”
“But how will you manage that?” asked Beauty, screwing up her face in puzzlement.
“And how are you going to deal with Stench?” chimed in Soapdish. “She’s stupid, but she’s tough and hard-working too.”
“Don’t worry,” said Little Fearless quietly, rubbing her temples with her thumbs as if to stimulate brilliant ideas. The thumbs left black marks, making her face grubbier than ever. “I’ve got it all worked out. Because Stench isn’t only stupid. She’s greedy too. And that’s the key.”
It was surprising how much rubbish a thousand girls could generate, even when they possessed very little to throw away. By the time the rubbish collection came round, the tips would resemble a small range of foul-smelling hills and valleys.
All Little Fearless did for the first part of her plan was to go and stand by these rubbish tips with a smile on her face. She wore a tattered suit of old brown tweed, the trousers far too wide and long, tied at the waist with a piece of string, a
nd a blouse with a pastel flower pattern that looked like it belonged to an old lady from another time in history. As ever, she wore her battered beret on her head, tendrils of red hair snaking out from under the rim.
It’s not easy to keep a smile on your face when it smells so badly you want to throw up, but for Little Fearless’s plan to work it had to be done. She stood there smiling and skipping, and generally looking delighted to be part of one of the foulest landscapes imaginable.
Stench, having spotted her, stopped searching among the rubbish for precious things and marched right up to where Little Fearless was standing. The X girl smelled so badly that it was hard for Little Fearless to keep on smiling. But she managed a grin, although it was rigid and would not have convinced anyone who wasn’t as insensitive as Stench.
“What are you doing here? What are you so happy about? You should be in your dormitory,” she snapped.
“Oh, please,” said Little Fearless in the sweetest voice she could manage, “I hope you don’t mind. But I just thought it was so … I don’t know. Special.”
Stench’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “What’s your number? You look familiar. There are so many girls in this place, I can’t keep track. Can’t remember faces. Never could. But I’ve seen you recently, I’m sure of it. Weren’t you here with that weird one – Moonwatcher, or whatever she’s called?”
“Yes, that was me,” said Little Fearless. “Her name’s Stargazer.”
“I remember,” said Stench. “She knew about the precious things. And she knew my name.”
She fell silent, as if trying to remember something Little Fearless had said. “Special. What’s special?” she said finally.
“The rubbish tips,” said Little Fearless.
“Huh,” said Stench, scanning the pile of rubbish and scraps in front of her. But she made no move to march Little Fearless back to the Living Block.
“You don’t mind me looking, do you, X12?” asked Little Fearless.