Matt Eaton - Blank

Gazing skywards, Luckman cast himself once more toward the heavens. There was one more place he needed to see. Pat had said it was no use looking for the Others. But there had to be one place that connected this world to theirs.

Take me to the source of that connection.

There was a rapid blur of movement as the scene around him dissolved and then reassembled like the world was changing channels. He found himself in the desert. A wall of air shimmered before him like heat haze. It was as wide as the dirt road on which it stood. The road looped back on itself in a large oval teardrop. The shimmer sat at the top of the loop. As he battled to comprehend he heard the approach of heavy vehicles. The same US Army trucks transporting the people of Alice Springs to God alone knew where. He watched as the trucks drove into the shimmer and then disappeared.

He tried to follow them through, but this only took him to the other side of the shimmer. Seeing the trucks drive at him head-on and disappear was like watching a magician’s vanishing act from backstage, except he still had no clue how the magicians were pulling it off.

He walked back along the loop to where the track met up with the incoming convoy of trucks. From here the domes of Pine Gap were visible, maybe four or five kilometres away.

Mel awoke late in the afternoon feeling like she’d been trampled by a herd of elephants. Her first thought was that she had come down with the flu, but she slowly began to recall the events of the previous night and how it had been the viewing chair that had drained the life out of her.

She rolled herself off the sagging motel mattress and dragged her pert but sorry arse upright. To her shock and alarm, she realised Paolo Favaloro was standing in the middle of the room watching her.

“I do not wish to alarm,” he assured her.

“Then why not knock on the door like a normal person?”

“It is not my way.”

She glared at him angrily. “Is it your way to give people heart attacks?”

He smiled disarmingly. “I find I am usually welcomed with open arms.”

“Dream on,” she snarled. Favaloro had the confident presence of a man used to getting what he wanted from the opposite sex. She sensed he was also more than capable of taking by force what was not offered freely.

All too late it dawned on her she was wearing nothing but a bra and a skimpy pair of panties. It was at that moment she realised with a certain degree of dismay Luckman wasn’t in the room with them. She began to hope like hell her relationship with Favaloro was not about to deteriorate into another Carter Pimford scenario.

But the Italian seemed to have other things on his mind. Furthermore, she recalled he had been no more than a ghost when last they met. She was, however, aware that her efforts in reading his thoughts were limited. She sensed feelings, perhaps a certain honesty in his intention, but nothing concrete. It was like he had the ability to mentally obfuscate.

She pulled on a shirt, defiantly refusing to give him the benefit of her embarrassment. She spotted Luckman’s note, scanned the words and realised it could be hours before he returned. She was on her own.

“You are trying to see into my thoughts, yes?” Favaloro asked her.

She nodded slowly. “You’re not an easy man to read.”

“But do you see I mean you neither harm nor disrespect? I have come to deliver a message – as you are the only one capable of heeding it.”

“You mean no-one else trusts you.”

“Put simply, yes. I am what some would call strange and exotic – and what others call alien. But like you I was born of this world and I feel its pain as you do.”

She raised an eyebrow. She hadn’t thought to rationalise his strangeness before now. It felt oddly disturbing to hear him suggest they were alike. She didn’t think of herself as alien.

“Pat Williams knows Father Paulson chose his counsel carefully,” Favaloro continued. “He also knows Clarence kept many secrets from me because of who I am. Much of the work of the Verus Foundation is therefore unfamiliar to me. In Pat’s eyes this renders me unworthy of trust. He also thinks I did nothing to prevent Clarence’s death.”

“Is that true?”

“Clarence and I shared secrets too. But when they returned his mind to him they distilled his intentions. I warned him against his course of action but in the end he rejected my counsel.”

“And what were his intentions?”

“He had become what you would call Blank. The Others restored his mind, but he became more than the sum of the parts. He became fearless. So much so he forgot that human beings are driven by fear, and this fear can help keep you alive.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“I have answered it as far as I dare, but I tell you this: While it was not my intention, I have misled Captain Luckman.”

“Everyone makes mistakes.”

“I am not often wrong. But we find ourselves in a new chapter of human history.”

“Some would say the final chapter.”

“I don’t believe that and neither should you. There is hope. The Others have expressed this to me most persuasively. They seek to help, yet the death of Father Clarence has proven an obstacle.”

“Pity that didn’t cross their minds beforehand.”

“There have been so many deaths; they were little troubled by the prospect of taking one more life. In this way they are no more evolved than the wisest minds on Earth. Perhaps less so, as they have remained separate and untouchable for so long. They are always of one mind. They did what they did because they believed they had no choice.”

“There’s always a choice.”

“Clarence died because he forgot some lines cannot be crossed without consequence. The Others viewed his refusal to bend to their will as a form of madness. Because it was they who had given him back his humanity, they deemed their cure imperfect. Thus they felt justified in taking his life away again.”

“That is brutal.”

“But there was nothing wrong with their cure. They simply do not tolerate dissent. They have no need for it.”

“What sort of totalitarian wonderland are they living in?”

“Clarence did not die in vain. You are here. You must give Captain Luckman a message. It is best not to reveal it came from me, but it is a message he must heed. Tell him the answer he seeks is highward firestone. Tell him soon.”

Favaloro took a step toward her and disappeared as if passing through an invisible doorway. The shock of it left her scalp tingling. She understood why it had freaked Luckman out.

The sun had gone down when Luckman and Pat emerged from the underground chamber but it was still as hot as hell inside the tin shed. Pat pulled the roller door open and allowed Luckman to reverse the car to the front of the house. He wound down the windows and gratefully breathed in the cool evening air.

Shorty joined them from the front verandah. “Where to?” he asked, taking the wheel as Luckman shuffled over to the passenger side.

Pat hopped in the back. “Drive round a bit then we’ll pick up some grog and head for da hills.”

“Grog?” Luckman whispered dubiously. “Sure that’s a good idea?”

“We just a buncha coons on the piss,” said Pat, his voice once more steeped in the vernacular. “No white fella take any notice of us, eh?”

Luckman had seen how people crossed the street to avoid blackfellas on the grog. They would be virtually invisible in plain sight. It was smart thinking, provided they didn’t actually get drunk. He stuck his head further out the window and lapped up the chill.

“Hey Lucky, you gonna bark like a dog?” asked Shorty, cackling like a teenager.