Andrea Höst - And All the Stars

"Hot property?" Min offered Madeleine a sympathetic grimace. "I’d ask how it feels to be a penthouse on The Peak, but your impersonation of a Green says it all."

"There is no guarantee containment will block the trackers, and we would need to reach a suitable place which isn’t occupied by Moths," Fisher continued. "I have a possibility in mind outside the area they’ve been using – that new hotel which was due to open at Barangaroo on the fifteenth. Like Circular Quay, it’s accessible from the waterfront."

"Well, we’re not going anywhere while it’s daylight, so we don’t have to decide right away," Noi said, rubbing her forehead. "Driving off the Wharf would be a huge risk, so we’ll strongly consider the boat option first. Pack what you can easily carry and stash anything we can’t take with us into the study. Nash, can you take the binoculars and search for movement while it’s still light, particularly any sign of those navy ships? And also look over our boating prospects?"

When Nash nodded, she went on: "Fisher, if you, Millie and Min can scare up any images on the public webcams of any of the directions we might head, that will help with our choices. Pan, when it hits early dusk, not dark, go out and see if you can finger-punch the lights over the north end of the marina."

"Mindless vandalism is my forte," Pan said, his spirits recovering with the prospect of action. "Guess we’d better wait till after midnight for the great escape? Let the Greens get sleepy?"

"After three," Fisher said. He glanced at Madeleine. "After the moon has set."

Would they ever have another moment in the moonlight? "I’ll help with the cooking," Madeleine said, scarcely feeling real.

"First check the apartments for gloves, hats, anything which looks useful for a boating trip in this weather. Right. Let’s get started."

Fisher rose with the rest, but only to sit on the coffee table in front of Madeleine, brows drawn together in concentration. Madeleine, half out of her seat, dropped back down, and looked at him uncertainly.

"I wish I could make you promises," Fisher said. "But I don’t want to downplay the danger we’re in. I’d like you to make a promise to me, however."

"What is it?"

"Fight. Always fight. No matter how impossible the odds, no matter who you’ve lost, how you’ve been hurt. If there doesn’t seem to be a way out, look for one. If you seem to have come to an end, start afresh. Never, ever give up."

She stared at him, startled by the anger, the complex swell of emotion in his voice.

"You don’t think your plan has a chance?"

Fisher looked away. "The Cores will almost certainly participate. Those of the higher ranked clans are sure to be stronger than the Moths we’ve previously encountered. And tomorrow is just one day of two years. It’s what comes after which frightens me most of all."

He still wouldn’t look at her, was watching Noi heading upstairs.

"It makes it easier for me," he added, voice muted, "to know that you won’t falter. Can you promise to try?"

Madeleine promised.

"What are you writing?"

"Thank you note for the owners of the house," Noi said, frowning as she read it over. "Miss Manners totally needs to add a chapter on squatting during an apocalypse. I wish we didn’t have to leave your painting behind, Maddie."

"I’ll come back for it."

"That’s the spirit. A big improvement over yesterday afternoon."

"I’m trying to keep focused on how glad I was to survive St James," Madeleine said. "I was convinced the dust would kill me, and I concentrated everything I had on getting out, and painting the picture I’d been waiting months to start. I got to do that, by going on step by step, not giving up. And then I met you, and we got through Bondi, and the seven of us have really…"

She gazed out the patio doors, to the moon being swallowed by the sea.

"I’ve spent years thinking I was so self-sufficient, that I had all I needed. My art is always going to be the most important thing for me, but this place has been…good for me. I’m really proud of the portrait of Tyler, and I think the one of you and Emily might be the best thing I’ve ever done. They have something my usual work lacks. And–" She smiled. "And I want to paint Fisher. When that Spire’s no longer in Sydney, and I can do something so indulgent as hit the nearest art supplies store, I will paint him."

"Preferably nude."

"Maybe." Madeleine refused to be embarrassed. "We better get downstairs. Two years of this still seems a near-impossibility, so I’m focusing on the current step."

Noi nodded, folded her note in half, and stuck it in the middle of the children’s drawings on the fridge. "I’ll miss this place," she said, then tugged a scavenged beanie over her riot of curls, and picked up her backpack.

They turned out the last of the lights, and rode the elevator down to the garage, stepping into chill, pitchy dark. The open service door was a grey square of illumination, and cubes of windshield glass crunched underfoot as they edged their way toward the three shadows which interrupted the thin light.

"Won’t be long," Pan murmured. "They’re aiming for the slip closest to the near entrance."

"I’ll head down to check," Min said. "If I don’t come back, they’re ready. Or I’ve fallen in."

"We’ll listen for the splash, Minnow." As soon as the younger boy had gone, Pan took and let out several long breaths. "I’m so wired. Makes me want to shriek, and jump about."

"Tempting." Noi shifted the spare bag of food she was carrying. "When all this is over, I think some full-throated yelling while running down the middle of the nearest street will be in order."

"Works for me."

"You’ll join in, won’t you Millie? Maddie?"

"Through Hyde Park," Emily said, firmly, and after a moment they agreed to that, then Noi led Emily out and down the Wharf to the northern gate of the marina.

"I can’t believe, with all the millions of dollars of high-powered luxury boating stretched before us, this is the plan we’ve come up with," Pan said. "There’s something inherently deflating about the words utility dinghy ."

"Rowing four kilometres in the dark," Madeleine said. "Racing dawn. Smuggling ourselves right beneath the noses of the Moths."

"Stop trying to make it sound awesome. Utility Dinghy. Utility Dinghy."

"Let’s go." Lifting her allotted share of the food, Madeleine stepped out of the garage, and waited while Pan pulled the service door gently shut behind them. They crossed to the corner of the main building and peered down the Wharf, all shadows and moonlit edges, and then the soft glow of lampposts beyond the area where Pan had punched out the lights. No sign of movement. They slid around the corner, keeping close to the high patio fences which hid the view into the lower apartments, and moved as quietly as they could, straining their eyes to spot the gate to the marina.

"I think it’s here," Pan said, barely audible.

Finger Wharf didn’t have safety railings, the edge a shin-high wooden board punctuated by the occasional pylon. The marina gate was transparent, opening onto a ramp leading down to the floating dock, which had no rim at all. Even though they’d given their eyes plenty of time to adjust, Madeleine still didn’t dare do more than inch forward, searching with her free hand. They’d timed their departure to use the last of the moonlight to get around the dock without torches, and she was able to make out shapes, but couldn’t force herself to move any faster.

"It’s here."

The words were accompanied by the faintest metallic noise, as Pan turned the key left by their advance boat-seekers, then pulled it free. The ramp at least had railings, and Madeleine followed it down until there was nothing left to guide her, and she stood clutching the end, trying to adjust to the faint bob of the dock.