We leave the city in the early morning, taking the highway to the northwest, going up the country to the places where the aliens used to live. At one point during the journey it becomes apparent that the trip is not what I understood it to be, a holiday jaunt into the countryside to visit the deserted alien houses. She reveals that she is meeting a friend of hers, a woman, an alien who still lives here on Earth, deep in the countryside, isolated from human civilization. This has been slipped in, folded into our lives, pushed in between the bits and pieces of what appeared to be a casual conversation. Our relationship changes after that. I believe this alien woman is an ex-lover that she once spoke of. I grow bewildered, confused, jealous, angry, and useless. And she becomes all thrusty glances that at first warn, then accuse, glances which say: You never understand, then later, You fool, then later still, You are trying to interfere in my life. A silence intervenes, the journey continues. The world has been very quiet of late, since most of the aliens left. It is a terrifying, insecure quietness, a dread.
Arrival is at an old stone house in the country. Nearby is an old stone church. It has some beautiful stained glass windows which seem to depict the death of the Christian revival. A motorbike leans up against the wall of the church. She inspects it, checking it over like an animal, reassuring it and herself that everything is as it should be, that it will get her further up-country. I sulk from a distance, watching, then she nods, everything is okay—the alien woman has arranged this—but now communication is poor. There is nothing we can say to each other.
Inside the house are some other people, strangers unknown and irrelevant and unconcerned about our arrival. They are here to do other things. We are of no interest, they none to us. The interior of the house is self-functioning, built according to the alien Crypto-System. A set of Y-shaped escalators moves between floors. The levels are confusing, known yet still strange, as always in alien houses. Upstairs, the house’s treasure, its heart, the Virago Machine, is still intact, still useable. It has escaped ransacking. At first appearance it looks like a typewriter and a cupboard. The typewriter, quite large, sits on a desk and backs against the cupboard, but this is only an interpretation. It is really a complete unit, a communication system capable of transporting messages across the lost years of space. It is arguable whether it carries them across the lost years of time as well. I have opened the doors of the cupboard and gazed at the rolls of yellow paper, all printed with fading, gray type. There are messages here, much to be deciphered, but later, later….
Later another woman arrives. I know her by name. She and I are friends sometimes, both putting up with the whims of her. She is not the ex-lover. The ex-lover, the alien, is still far away, up-country, another two weeks’ trip there and back. I suspect my chances of accompanying her now are slim….
Several hours of arguments, more accusations, more references, obscure, to my ignorance, my lack of understanding of anything outside myself. The other woman who has arrived feels sorry for me, but she will say nothing. So it becomes, as it always becomes: it is I who have done this to myself, and unless I ask forgiveness, lose the anger, stop the sulking, then there will be no forgiveness, no reconciliation, and the trip up-country will proceed without me. And at some point it does not matter anymore, for it would seem that she only meant for me to come this far, to this alien house in this silent country.
Sometime later they are gone. I do not see, nor hear, them go. I was inside and such are the mysteries of the Crypto-System that the outside world is blocked out, destroyed: the house has its own reason, its own rhythm.
I ride the Y-shaped escalators, careful to switch sides at the ascent, so as to be not carried downstairs again—a tricky business, but like so many tricky things there is a knack to it, and once learned it is simple. The other people in the house are drinking wine. They too are ignorant—so she said—but they do not mind. I sense that they have come here to enjoy that ignorance, a convenient caravanserai on a long journey. I stand before the Virago Machine, my fingers resting on the keys, but I type nothing. I do not open the doors again, even though I sense that important communications or fragments of them are here. Perhaps there are messages from her ex-lover, perhaps there are communications which explain the quiet dread that has invaded our lives, but I am too scared to find out just yet.
During the days that follow I drink wine and display my ignorance with the other travellers. I fancy that I am beginning to enjoy myself, but it is the enjoyment of ignorance, the pretense that there is nothing else going on, and that this current pastime is the be-all and end-all of life. Sometimes, during drunken euphoric stupors, I mount the escalators, my feet infected by the cheap wine, slipping on its steps, but each time the knack remains and the ascent to the upper storey is successful. There I search through the paper memories of the Virago, looking for the communications of one woman to another, but I find little. I suspect that the Virago is in bad need of repair: only fragments appear in its rolls and rolls of paper, bits and pieces that it has grabbed from the localised slipstream of the Crypto-System. Here and there among the faded type-print, among the yellow rolls of paper, women’s names appear, sometimes complete sentences, scraps of messages they once sent to each other, some messages from this house to another further up-country, others that were returned. Occasional flashes of deeper import appear, mortality statistics and references to war atrocities, but there is nothing among these remnants to confirm and complete my half-held images of her infatuation with the alien woman. The communications remain incomprehensible to me, and I suspect that I have missed something important.
My days continue, and then they are back. So, two weeks have gone—inside the house barely five days have passed—such is the nature of the alien system. It is difficult to readjust. Here she is now. I am pleased, but some anger burns within me still. Why did she have to go? What need did she have? But she will not speak to me, or glance in my direction. A coldness sits between us like a long-lost friend. I ask many questions, jealous questions, finally drawing accusing glances upon myself. At least now she will look at me, but she does nothing to alleviate the pain, and displays her determination of being right, absolutely right, because she has chosen to do this. No other reason is required by her. As usual I feel more alone now. I am drawn towards her and away from the wine-drinking travellers, but I become lost somewhere in between, a territory so familiar to me that I begin to feel secure in my isolation.
Preparations for the journey down-country begin. I make one more visit to the Virago. Perhaps a last communication has passed between them and the nature of this journey, the nature of their relationship will be revealed on the yellow pages in the cupboard. But the Virago gives me nothing, only more communications with the intent of glances. It forces me away in the end and like a child I kick its cupboard, a further injury which will add to its demise. I ride the escalators downstairs one last time and salvage some joy from this by deftly changing tracks mid-flight, descending, rising, descending, until I tire of the game, my new trick, and allow myself to be carried to the lower storey.
We return to the city, a loathsome silent journey. If I ask questions there will be no answers. I do not ask. I like answers too much. Somewhere we stop to eat. The woman behind the counter looks familiar. I will talk to her, a chance for small revenge, but when I draw close I know this woman is a stranger. I do not know her, there is nothing I can say. At the counter, her friend—my friend I think—whispers to me. There is a communication in her bag, you should read it, do not let her see you. Perhaps you will be ashamed of your actions.
At home we still do not speak. She leaves her bag in the lounge and goes to the bathroom. I find the brown envelope, break it open, and feel the yellow Virago paper between my fingertips. In faded print like that of a cheap portable typewriter with a poor ribbon the message of the alien woman, her work, her art, her mission, is written. The communication consists of names, places, figures, some of which are vaguely familiar, others which I feel I should know but do not. I can only decipher some of it: Vietnam, some statistics, some figures; Ethiopia, more statistics, more figures; this obscure country, that obscure country, printed number after printed number, child mortality throughout this war and that, the usual cryptic use of the English language. No statement of reasons, no conclusions, just fact after fact, figure after figure, numbers hammering at you until the conclusion becomes self-evident. I look at the communication again and realise something important is happening. This is the way they think. This is the way the Crypto-System works: a whole bunch of data forming a question. And this one became simple, in the end deciphering it was easy. The message rendered into humble human English: why do they kill children?
And her friend, my friend, had been right. I felt petty and ashamed. Simple jealousy had dominated me, and yet something more important had been happening. They, the alien women, had come here, studied us, and here the final communication, perhaps from the last alien on Earth, shakes in my hand. I mumble to myself, did this sum us up in their eyes, was this their final cryptic conclusion? Why had they left? Confused and distraught, the human lounge-room becomes a foreboding place. Had they studied us, tried us, and convicted us? Was that what it was all about? I imagined a fleet of alien ships channelling towards Earth to pronounce the final verdict and sentence. She was in the bathroom. Why had she been gone so long? A question on yellow paper. So, there was a question, there could be an answer. The bathroom door is locked. I knock hard, there is no answer. The door lock breaks, swings open. She is blue on the floor. No breath. The lips are already cold. Peach blossom and bitter almond hang in the air. There is a scrap of yellow paper in her hand. It unfolds in the warmth of my touch.
There is no answer, it reads.
There is a Virago Machine in an abandoned house down the road—they always leave their machines. The house is boarded up. I climb in through broken windows. Glass cuts my body. I begin to bleed. No escalators this time, the Machine sits in the kitchen next to the stove. I rest my fingers against the keyboard. She is gone now. She knew there could be no answer. I don’t feel anything. My fingers rest against the keyboard. I cannot answer the question. I imagine fleets of alien warships laying waste to the world. Punishment, no redemption. I see a scrap of yellow paper grasped between her fingers, unfolding in my hand. My fingers type, fumble and type. The cupboard splutters and whirrs, coming to life. Across the lost years of space, the communication, my answer, appears in faded type on yellow rolls of paper: I didn’t kill any children.
Selfish to the last, I wait. There is no rolling thunder, no sound of an alien fleet breaking through the sky. Just a long steady silence that screams in the ears.
My days begin again, not much stranger than before. No redemption, beyond punishment. I move from abandoned house to abandoned house searching for further remnants of the Crypto-System, thinking yet that there might be an answer, hidden away among the yellow rolls of paper, now crumbling to dust. The world has grown quieter still, more deserted. Lingering, as if it turns ever more slowly upon its axis. In the end I return to the house in the country. No travellers this time, no cheap wine. The Crypto-System remains, the escalators still work. Some hope is salvaged as I ride them upstairs, prepare to switch tracks at the ascent, but I have lost the knack. I lose my footing, stumble, slip, then slide to the bottom. When I look up I see the escalators stop. Caught in an unfinished movement, everything is utterly, utterly still. My heart is between beats. Quietus.