MY MIND BURSTS the surface of now. Reality shimmers around me. I’m sucking in hard, head dropped back, when I tip and stumble forwards. My hand grabs for the bedside table and somehow I stay upright.
A familiar room greets me: our bed sits neatly made beside me, two armchairs face a shimmering comscreen that looms over the room, a new window to the world. Photo pads of Mum and me have been hung in spaces on the rest of the wall, as well as a digital calendar: Mon 23 Nov 2095.
I smile. I’ve made it to a time I’ve never seen, no memories anymore of what the future might hold. Each of my tomorrows is again unknown, one more mystery waiting to be uncovered. But I’ll never escape what’s brought me here. And always, to my core, I’ll carry the truth of Alistair’s death.
I helped out with preparations before the jump. The conversation kept returning to discussions about water limits, ways to best store food, how to avoid being detected. But at least the location of the group jump was sorted. Straight after the firestorm, Amon and Echo’s folks built a fire-proof shelter in their side yard, fitted with an air purifier. It’s set up with provisions for food and water as well as various coms and a generator, a safe-haven during a fire. There’s even an escape hatch on the roof, in case the storm or fire or whatever causes the entrance to be blocked.
It’s also the perfect spot for a jump. It’s big enough for the whole group and designed to last. It won’t even collapse in an earthquake. Even if something happens to their house, the shelter will remain intact.
I decided not to jump from the fire shelter so I could drop in to see Mum as I went. It’s sort of been like coming home for the holidays, except without going anywhere in between. I needed to check that she was all right, but I never stayed more than a day or two. I’m anxious to catch up with the others, even overshooting the return date of a few visits – a result, I think, of travelling on my own, of not wanting to be left behind.
Mum was waiting here last time with a chickpea curry bubbling on the stove. Now the room seems empty, too tidy. Strange. I’m back early, this time, but only by a day. I don’t think she’d be expecting me. She must be out.
Judging from the sunlight against the window, it must be late morning. I pull on jeans and a top, then wander towards the kitchenette and find a note propped against a mug on the bench. It’s folded in half with ‘SCOUT’ scrawled in a corner. I unfold it.
Welcome home, sweetheart. Let me know when you arrive.
It’s Mum’s handwriting, sort of wobbly as if she scribbled it in a rush.
The woman’s chip is exactly where Mum agreed to leave it, hidden in a slip of paper behind my bedside table. The comscreen on the wall is new, sort of shimmery and see-through. Nice. I swipe it on and play around with the settings, resizing the whole thing and realising that it can be taken down from the wall and folded small to use as a compad.
I message Mum telling her that I’m here and send a different message to the other skippers. Even though it’s only a couple of weeks in my personal timeline since I last saw Mason, I’m itching to see him again. I flick refresh once or twice but find no replies. That’s okay. The group’s not due back until tomorrow, and there’s a good chance they’ll all land on time. That’s if our idea about synch jumping is right.
I’d be able to see for sure if I could get into the grid, but when I hack my way into the raw coding, it just looks like the loops and squiggles of an alien language. Annoying.
I’ll have to find a way around that, maybe connect with hackers on the dark web, but for now I check out the sparkpad pages.
I was half-expecting them to have been pulled down but it turns out to be the opposite: tens of thousands of read-throughs, and loads of users adding their own chapters to the story. Some don’t seem to get that it’s not a work of fiction but others do, posting their own tips and warnings, asking if other ‘readers’ would like to meet up in the real world. One’s even set up a get-together for all time skippers: location to be advised. Date: 1 March 2145.
Still no reply from Mum, so I catch up on news while I wait. It doesn’t take long to pick up a loop-repeat of themes, a swirling wind of unrest. Rations are still halved and the protesters are more organised: bringing parliament to a stop, blocking freight trains, even an attempt to storm the water-treatment plant. Jails are at full capacity and more illegals than ever have been forced out of the city, mostly ex-citizens charged with inciting unrest and anyone convicted of accessing more food than their rations, which means anyone on low-level rations who had no other way to survive.
I shut down the news feeds, standing away from the comscreen and gulping down 300 units of water. This is a world that I’ve never seen, but so much is familiar. Already my thoughts are shifting to the compost skips, whether it’s still possible to hack them during a blackout, and whether the illegal settlement is still upstream of the Maribyrnong Canal. I make a mental note to check that the underground spring hasn’t been discovered by the authorities.
A flash in the air makes me jump and gasp. It turns into a chuckle when I see it’s a reply from Mum. Maybe easier if you come to us. Rm 307, 145 Furlong Rd, St Albans.
I frown. What does she mean by ‘us’? I stash the chip deep in my hip pocket and head into 2095.
The building at 145 Furlong Road is a giant box made out of cream moulded polymer; a swish new flat for Mum perhaps? Maybe she finally spent those extra credits on it. I slip on a beanie and pull it low, reaching for the entrypad.
I pull back. Something’s not right about the message Mum sent but I’m not sure what’s going on. I’m tossing up whether to call Mum, to hear her voice for real, when the door slides up and a woman in slacks and a fitted black shirt squints into the sunlight. A red circlepad with the words ‘POLICE REQUEST’ sits on the wall just beside her. I guess the current state of things in the city means places like this are on permanent alert, ready to call the police at a moment’s notice.
‘Can I help?’ Her tone is stiff, more warning than offer.
Before I can stop it, one foot steps back. I plant my boots into the gravel, stand my ground. Her shirt has some sort of logo but it’s difficult to make out: Sun … shine Private. I think?
‘Miya Rochford … is she here?’ Don’t want to say more than I have to.
‘Oh, I didn’t realise …’ There’s a glint of recognition before her expression shifts again. ‘Yes, of course. Room 307.’ She points towards the lift, but even as I follow the line of her gesture I can see her watching me, trying to suss me out.
I’m not about to give away any answers. The hall is empty when I reach level three, all doors closed. No signs other than room numbers.
I find 307, take a breath and swipe.
Mum’s perched upright on a wide pillow in a narrow bed. Her hair is loose, her cheeks milky clear. ‘Sweetheart.’ She shuffles higher in the bed, extending a limp arm before letting it drop.
A man with curly dark hair is sitting against one wall, holding a shimmering compad open as if he was caught part way through reading aloud. His shape seems too big for his armchair.
I don’t move. The way she’s speaking, it’s thick, too slow. She’s so pale. Who’s that guy? None of this is right.
Again, Mum lifts an arm, a faint wiggle of one finger. ‘Coutlyn.’
Something pulls me towards her as a lump rises in my throat. She’s meant to be safe now. She’s meant to have all that she deserves and more. I press a cheek against her shoulder, tucked into her arms, aware the whole time we’re being watched.
‘Found us all … right?’ she asks. As if it’s just her and me, at home.
I pull away, swallow down the fear. ‘What’s going on?’
She manages to smile then, a slow shake of her head. ‘Of course. Yes. This is Jorge.’ Each word comes thick, slow. ‘He’s a specialist … nurse and … we’ve become close.’
Jorge dips his head as I try to summon some sort of reply other than a scowl.
My skin prickles as his eyes linger over me, trying to work me out. He’s wearing a woollen shirt and brown corduroy jeans, sort of retro but I don’t think he did it on purpose.
‘Doesn’t … she look … young, Jorge?’ Mum says with a lift in her voice.
I’m no older than the last time she saw me, but according to the chip I’m meant to be twenty-five. She’s putting this on for weird Jorge.
Jorge nods awkwardly. ‘I’ll leave you in peace.’ He stands and squeezes Mum’s hand before ambling out the door. ‘Nice to meet you,’ he says to me as he leaves.
The door drops with a pfft and I perch on the bed beside her. Alone, finally.
‘What’s going on?’ I want the real story this time. Nothing she’s said so far has been close to a real answer.
Mum’s staring at the closed door. Her eyes move to me, but nothing else. It’s as if she’s somehow afraid to talk. ‘I have motor neurone disease, sweetheart. It’s a condition that stops … my nerve signals working. My muscles are wasting. Speaking is diff … icult.’ She lets out a slow sigh. ‘I didn’t want you to worry. But … we’re past that now.’
Her hand is lying on top of the sheet near me and only now I realise her fingers are formed into a stiff claw. I lift it up, examine the shape and cradle it in my hands, pressing gently to straighten them, to fix her.
‘But you’re getting treatment.’ My voice comes out like a whine.
‘The best there is. For a while now, thanks to your extra credits. I have nanobots inside me, at the nerve endings. By imi … tating nerve signals, they’ve delayed onset by years. I’m alive today, Scout, because of that chip.’
Stiffly, she pulls her hand back from mine and glances again at the door as if she’s not used to having Jorge in another room. As if he’s her safety net.
That should be me, I want to say. I’m here now, I can help. It’s chased by the clash of thoughts that comes after a long jump, everything suddenly stretched out and warped. In Mum’s world, I haven’t lived with her for ten years, apart from the occasional visit. For me, it’s been a blink of an eye.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ I ask. This is the reason she was saving energy credits, I realise. Not because she wanted to move into a bigger room, but so she could pay the high costs of treatment.
‘I knew you’d worry … didn’t want you to change your life for me. It’s only in the last … year that I’ve needed palliative care. I moved … here a couple of months after your last visit. But Scout, I want you to know … I’m okay.’
She’s not okay, nothing about this is okay, but before I can speak she reaches out and brushes the back of my hand. ‘I mean it, Scout. I’m … all right. It was because of this disease I met Jorge. I know this is diff … icult for you to understand, but I’m … grateful for the time I’ve had with him.’
I can see the truth in her eyes, even as her words stumble and slur. She’s lying here in front of me, frail and twisted, but I’ve never seen her so at peace.
Mum keeps talking for a while, about transferring our room registration to my name, ways to manage the chip that will be mine again, sometime. She’s thought of everything, planning for a future she’ll never see.
‘So, what happens now?’ I ask.
‘We don’t really know … this treatment is cutting-edge. Some days are good, but others … Well, I have no way of knowing how much time I have left.’
No way of knowing … It’s the emptiness of the tunnel, an uncertain future all over again. But she’s doing it, facing the unknown the way she always has. Not with time skipping but by holding on to hope, trusting in each new day.
Her eyes lift to find mine, somehow hopeful and sad at the same time. ‘I want you to know … I’m proud of you, sweet … heart,’ Mum says gently. ‘Every step of the way. Never forget … how much I love you.’
‘I … Mum, I love you too.’ But my whole being pushes against the words. It’s like she’s saying goodbye …
The door pings and Jorge appears, pushing a food trolley. I slip off the bed and stand up in a daze; my whole world has been transformed.
‘Soup okay?’ Jorge holds out a bowl with a clip-on lid for me. ‘Curried lentil.’
Mum’s favourite. I take the bowl with a nod and turn to her as a table folds out over the bed. Jorge places a matching bowl on top for Mum.
He heads out the door again as I position my bowl on the bedtable. ‘Here, have both.’ I can find food some other way – we have a bunch of vac packs already stored in our room.
‘Come on.’ Mum gestures at the place on the bed where I was sitting. ‘Eat with me.’
The lid for her bowl is still clipped on; she’s not touching hers until I touch mine. Our old routine. You have it …
No, you.
This time, I decide not to fight. Whatever happens from here, I know I won’t be using the credits. They’re keeping Mum alive; it’s her chip for as long as she needs it. I unclip her lid and help position her straw, then we sit and share a small meal. Half-serve for her, half for me.
In broken sentences while we eat, she describes how it felt to have the nanobots injected. When I ask her about Jorge, her face lightens and her words flow easier. She sinks deep into the stories they’ve collected, their shared moments together. It’s as if she needs me to hear every one.
When Jorge comes back, I catch him sneaking glances at me again, still trying to work me out. I’m not sure how much Mum has told him about me, so I say goodbye for now, tell them I’ll be back the next day. Then I ride back to our room, stash the chip and collect water from the underground spring, still thankfully undiscovered. I’m ready for tomorrow.
I’m up early the next day, not used to sleeping on my own. For a split second I almost forget that it’s 2095, but soon my thoughts move to Mason and the others. Wish I could check the grid. I have a theory that returns from long jumps usually land sometime in the morning, perhaps matching the sort of time you might wake up.
Before I head out, I stash the woman’s chip safe behind the bedside table. I have a compad scrounged from the tip that will help me get around. There’s no way I’m about to risk losing the chip now that Mum needs the credits for treatment. No way I’m about to trace a live path to the fire shelter with it, either.
A mix of familiar and foreign greets me as I head out on my bike. More swish buildings, more people sprawled in rags on the footpath, but at least the bike path hasn’t changed. Plans bubble and pop in my mind as I ride. We’ll find a way to contact the new time skippers, perhaps even teach the illegal settlers how to skip in exchange for food.
Amon and Echo’s place is near the point where the Maribyrnong Canal hits the Yarra Pipeline, so on the way I roll past Yarraville Square. It’s early still, but already people are milling around, sipping coffee or talking on the phone. They’re protesters, I think, preparing for a rally. No police yet, from what I can see.
I turn down Amon and Echo’s street to find a woman in a grey bathrobe yawning beside a tiny dog squatting in the dirt. Just to be safe, I keep rolling past, barely glimpsing the concrete block of the fire shelter set against the back fence at Amon and Echo’s place before the bike carries me past. I’m not taking any chances.
A pile of dry branches towards the end of the street works as a place to hide the bike. I check a map on the compad to make sure the street isn’t a dead end so I won’t be trapped if anything happens. Then I sneak down a gravel driveway and track along the fence line at the back of the houses until I reach the rear of the fire shelter. The hard metal from the fence digs into the backs of my thighs as I balance on top, scanning the corners of the house and dark-grey panels of the fire shelter. No motion sensors from what I can see. No security cameras either.
I’m about to jump down when something on top of the shelter roof catches my eye. Five or six metal lumps, like the spine of a concrete dinosaur, glinting in the sun.
My eyes glide over the shapes as I reach for the roof, hook a leg up and scramble on top. On hands and knees, I creep forwards over the hot sheeting to the centre of the shelter.
As I reach the lid to the escape hatch, peering closer, all the blood drains from my face. They’re maglocks.
Someone bolted the hatch shut.