COMPOUND 65

BANG! Pffft! Arrrgh! Gem woke startled. She shivered, disorientated, and shaken by the strong visuals in a disturbing dream. She slithered gingerly out from under her blankets, pulling back the bedclothes centimetre by centimetre, excruciatingly slowly! She was all too aware that Hover-Module1 could detect even the most miniscule of sounds, and could simultaneously, set off all the alarms in her precinct. As the Compound was still silent, she assumed the previous sounds were part of her dream and she quickly dismissed them. The room was pitch- black and she could barely see a metre in front of her. She grasped feverishly around in the loose panel above her bed, for the little heart shaped locket she’d hidden there three weeks ago. The locket was her most cherished possession and was her only keepsake from her parents. They weren’t allowed jewellery in the compound, ‘jewellery led to vanity,’ and vanity, according to ‘the Administrant,’ could lead to other, even more grotesque, sins. The slightest tinkling sound emanated from the chain of the locket, and Gem froze. Hover-Module1 was already above her head. She feigned snoring and luckily it worked, Hover-Module1 left to investigate another sound down the hallway. ‘I’ll never get away with this’, Gem muttered quietly to herself.

‘Shhh,’ whispered Zed from the lower bunk, ‘I don’t want to spend all of next week in the Hothouse, just for you!’

Aptly named, ‘the Hothouse,’ it consisted of a room with no windows or furniture apart from a thin, stained, sweaty and smelly old mattress on the floor. Children who were considered to have ‘breached orders’, were left in ‘the Hothouse,’ isolated and fatigued. The strong lighting in the room tended to make it difficult to sleep, and if the authorities chose to be particularly cruel, they would leave the strobe lighting on in the hallway, so the light would shine on their faces at regular intervals. The heat, from the kitchen next door, climbed to unbearable levels, and children were only allocated one glass of water per day, barely enough, to quench their awesome thirst. It was often the case, that a child would be found delirious or unconscious on the floor, largely due to de-hydration. The year before, a girl who was younger than Gem, Zandra, was found in the room near to death. She was removed to Wakefield house, and nobody had seen her since. Food in ‘the Hothouse’ was the bare minimum, you were considered lucky if you received a half bowl of porridge and a small piece of crusty day-old bread for the entire day. If a child had ‘breached orders’ badly enough, they could even suffer ‘the ring of fire’, a metallic bracelet which wrapped around their forearm sending searing pain up their muscles towards their shoulder. This shooting pain occurred once every hour, until the child could write an ‘acceptable, apology essay.’

‘You won’t be in any trouble’, Gem hissed back at Zed, ‘Just say you were asleep, and you don’t know anything!’

‘But what are you doing?’ Zed whispered, as quietly as she could.

‘I’m getting out of here! Don’t you tell!’

‘But where will you go?’ Zed asked, exasperated, but also concerned. ‘I’m going North to Arcadia, I heard they give asylum to runaways.’

‘Take me with you?’ asked Zed urgently, ‘Please! …I won’t get in the way, I promise!’

Just then Hover-Module1 appeared overhead scanning both children. They kept silent but it wouldn’t move off, and instead it stayed, hanging ominously in the air, dipping every now and then to scan them. Both children froze. Then, like a miracle, Hover-Module1 flew off down the hall to investigate the loud crashing sounds coming from the kitchen. All the alarms were set off, and the noise was exacerbated by the sound of arguing between the kitchenhands and other staff about who had caused, ‘the accident.’

‘If you are coming, come now!’ Gem whispered hoarsely. ‘Ok’ I’m right behind you’.

During the ensuing hubbub of sirens, flashing spotlights, children shouting and crying, and authorities rushing, Gem and Zed stepped down onto the floor.

‘This way’, Gem whispered. She wasn’t at all certain about Zed coming along. Zed had a tendency to panic, and Gem had recently discovered her curled up into a tight bundle on the floor, clutching onto her pillow. When she inquired what the problem was, Zed had told her it was a direct result of a tense situation between two other girls. Gem thought that she might prove to be a liability. She pictured Zed panicking, just at the wrong moment, and of them being sent to ‘the Hothouse’ for an extended period. However, she also knew that this might be her only chance to get away, and besides, she didn’t want Zed blabbing to First Principal about what she intended to do. The First Principal was a woman, staunch in stature, and staunch in attitude, and she would surely chase Gem down if she possibly could. After all, it wouldn’t do her reputation any good, if she had been outsmarted by runaways.

They crept down the back hallway in the dark, sliding their hands across the smooth walls for a guide, to the door that led to the outside. Holding her breath Gem opened the door half expecting to see a guard on the other side, but there was no guard. They apparently weren’t the only children who’d decided to escape. A large group of children had rushed towards the gates and were attempting to push their way through as a mob. The guards, trying to thwart the swarming children, were standing across the entrance, arms linked, in formation, striving to stem the flow.

‘This way’, Gem whispered. Gem and Zed ran to the truck scrambling up the large and wide inflated tyres, across the small cargo bed section, and into the back of the truck.

‘But Gem’, Zed exclaimed, ‘They always check the trucks!’

‘I know, but they don’t check the freezers.’

‘Your joking! Gem, we could die in there!’

‘No, I’m not joking, and you will be ok! We will only be in them for a minute or two, they don’t lock them, so you will be alright!’

‘I hope that’s true!’

Gem had been observing the delivery men every day for weeks, but still, she wasn’t one hundred percent certain, that the freezers were completely safe. She knew however, it was her one, and only, chance to escape. She longed for the time she could hug her mother again. If Gem had been upset, or lonely, her mother would gently sway her whilst singing a folk song. Her lilting tunes were calming and gentle, and they always cheered up Gem. Her mother had a trained, mellow sounding voice, and she was often asked to perform for family or social gatherings. Gem missed combing her mother’s soft silver hair, missed looking into her gentle smile and shining blue eyes. She also missed snuggling in her father’s strong arms! Gem held fierce resentment and flaming anger towards the people who had removed her from her parents, by the group they still referred to as; ‘Child Services.’ When she was still at home she had listened, through her bedroom wall, to her parents talking long into the night. They had been concerned about how the locals were coerced into precarious, dangerous, and lowly paid work in the mines, the threat of their children’s removal looming large, if they didn’t comply with any demands of their supervising instructors.

Gem remembered when the trucks came to take them away. She remembered the condescending smiles of ‘the workers’, the distressed look in her mother’s face, the look of complete rage from her father. She remembered the crying, sobbing, and screaming of the other children, as they were bundled into the trucks in cages. Several children had fled, running off into the bush, and the officers had chased and beaten them into submission. She remembered how one little girl had run behind her for protection, and how the guard had grabbed her by the hair, and had wacked her so hard with his truncheon, that her legs gave way and she had fallen screaming to the ground. Gem shuddered, the memories of that day, were still vivid, and they haunted her!

‘Get in this freezer Zed, but don’t close the door until you hear the door of the truck opening. Here, put this around you.’ She handed her a large coat, belonging to one of the Truckies,’ and some plastic to wrap around her. ‘Count to 60, two times, and then open the door. See this red latch here? It will open it. Get in and try it out!’ Zed climbed in and tried to open the door, success, the door swung open. ‘Right’, said Gem, ‘now be completely quiet until you hear someone at the door of the truck’.

Zed and Gem waited, the passage of time seemed to slow, as frightened, their breathing became quicker. ‘Oh, another thing, slow your breathing down in there!’ Zed nodded, her fear rising.

In the background they could hear the screeching of the guards yelling instructions, the screams of rampaging children running through the compound, and finally some gunshots and then complete silence. Gem and Zed’s imagination ran riot, almost in sync with the rioting children. Did they actually shoot someone?

Finally, there was the rattle of the lock, and the workmen opened the door of the truck. In a split second, Gem and Zed closed the lids of the freezers and started counting. Gem had failed to mention that she suffers from claustrophobia, and now the terror was welling up in her, to the extreme. The walls of the freezer appeared to sway, her palms were sweaty, the sweat quickly turned to ice, she couldn’t slow her breathing, and her heart was racing. Gem uttered to herself, ‘I won’t make the two minutes.’ Then she remembered the heart shaped locket and felt around for it in her pocket. Whilst running her fingers over the heart shape, she remembered her mother’s smile. She also remembered her father’s laughter at some silly joke, and this gave her some comfort, and her breathing slowed.

They finally heard the words; ‘Ok Phil, she’s right to go!’ and the door of the truck slammed shut. Like jack-in- a-boxes, the two girls threw open the doors of the freezers. Cold, wet, and shivering, they quickly took off their clothes and raided the spare uniforms of the truckdrivers’ hanging in the back.

Even with the truckdrivers’ clothes, they were still cold, and hungry. Their stomachs growled for food, and, because of her low blood sugar, Gem felt like she might faint. They began rubbing their extremities to keep warm. Gem could feel the beginnings of frost bite in her toes, and it took over an hour to warm them even a little. Hour after hour the two girls clung to each other for warmth as the truck bumped and grinded along the highway. Gem was in disbelief that they’d even made it that far! She had a sneaking suspicion that the truck may pull over anytime, and Child Services would drag them back and put them in the Hothouse for weeks.

‘If this truck is the one, I think it is, it will take us straight to Arcadia!’ Gem tried to cheer up, the now gloomy looking, Zed.

The truck suddenly stopped. ‘Quick get behind that crate’, whispered Gem. The truck door opened and a big burley looking truck driver, with an anxious expression on his face, peered in. He looked almost directly at them, and then back at the ensuing scene outside. Whilst being careful not to reveal herself, Gem gazed out past him, to her worst nightmare! It was Child services! Children were running, screaming, being chased by guards, and bundled into cages, mothers were calling to their children and begging authorities not to take them, fathers were looking angry, and red faced just like her dad. Gem, horrified, caught a glimpse of a child with bloody clothes and hair.

‘It’s child services!’, whispered Gem, and then she realised she shouldn’t have said anything. Zed was still behind the crate, but now she was curled up in a ball. She was rocking herself and mouthing, ‘I’m alright, it will be alright.’ Gem thought it wouldn’t be long before zed made a noise to give them away. Gem made the ‘shhhh,’ sign to zed by holding her finger to her mouth.

One of the guards walked briskly, and with purpose, over to the truck driver. The guard’s eyes wide open, he quickly surveyed all he could see whilst standing behind the tailgate. Gem’s heart almost stopped!

‘You haven’t got any children holed up in there?

‘Children? Umm…No! The driver answered, but with the slightest hint of uncertainty in his voice. Then, appearing to recover, he said, ‘I just arrived’, ‘looks like you have your hands full!

‘Yes, there’s a lot of runaways around these parts.’ With that he walked away, but then he whispered something to his partner, pointing over to the truck. Then both men marched quickly back to the truckdriver.

The other man, a skinny hard looking guard, with a pock marked face asked; ‘So you’ve just got in mate?’

‘Yeah, I’ve been driving all day.’

‘Has your truck been checked?’

‘Yeah, it was fully inspected when we left.’

‘Where did you come from?’ asked the skinny man, peering again into the truck.

‘Compound 65.’

Zed suddenly stood up behind the crate, still hidden, but in the process, she kicked the crate making a small noise.

‘Do you mind if we have a look ourselves?

This was it; Gem knew in a couple of minutes it would all be over! She’d be bundled into a truck with the other children. She could feel her cheeks burning and her body shook with fear, turning her skin into a blotted mass of white, red, and purple. The hairs on her arms stood to attention. Her heart pounded so strongly that she could feel the blood rushing through her ears. Tears began to well up in her eyes and her eyes were now stinging. She was furious! She’d fight this man, she thought, if it came down to it!

The thin man placed his hands on the tray of the truck and was about to get into the back. Zed gasped, barely audibly, but the thin man looked up. Gem grimaced, thinking the thin man had probably heard it. She held her hands up with clenched fists, preparing for the onslaught. Her face was now burning with anger so badly, that it felt like sunburn. Her fists were held so tightly that her nails were digging into her palms. Her thoughts were racing! What if I catch this man off guard and just take a swing at him? The thin man had one leg up on the tray of the truck. He was about to swing his other leg onto the tray, when whoosh, an escaping boy, ran too close to the truck, almost bowling him over. Both guards went chasing after him, the thin man screeching, ‘stop that boy!’ Gem nearly collapsed from the tension, but then she steadied herself and was relieved that the guards had run off.

‘I know you are there!’ said the burly truck driver.

Then he closed the doors and started the vehicle. The truck groaned and they were moving again.

‘What did he say?’ asked Gem, startled. ‘I don’t know, “You are there”, or something?’ replied Zed.

Gem’s face was red hot, her heart felt like it was doing backflips, and she could feel sweat streaming down her body. ‘I’ve heard that some people get rewards for runaways!’ she gulped.

‘And sometimes they get sold off into slavery!’ replied Zed, and in a breathy, scared, high pitched voice, ‘What are we going to do?’

‘Quick,’ Gem said, ‘look for a way out, a panel, or a door, we could maybe climb up on the roof, and jump off the truck when he stops.’

Panicked, the two girls scrambled around in the truck, looking for a way out. They ran their hands over the wall of the truck looking for loose panels, there were none. Then Gem spotted a panel on the roof. She asked Zed to climb up onto her shoulders to reach it. Gem held Zed’s arms, as Zed placed her foot on Gem’s bended leg. She swung her legs out over Gem’s shoulder, coming to rest straddled around Gem’s head. Just then the truck hit a bump in the road and the two girls toppled hitting the floor of the truck hard. Zed fell directly onto a box and had injured her arm and leg.

‘Are you alright Zed?’

‘I’m ok, I think.’ But she wasn’t really, she had a large gash on her leg that was now bleeding profusely, and the dark liquid was flooding her trousers. Gem scurried around for something to bandage Zed’s leg with. This can’t be the end! Gem thought. We can’t have come all this way for nothing! She found a shirt, that appeared to be clean, and tore it up into strips wrapping them around Zed’s leg. Luckily, the bleeding stopped, for now. The two girls, attempted to reach the panel on the roof again. Zed was balanced insecurely on the shoulders of Gem, and at first the panel wouldn’t budge, but finally the panel gave way.

Zed pulled herself up through the hole and was now perched on the roof. Whilst clinging precariously onto the lip of the panel, she whispered back to Gem; ‘But how can you get up here?’ ‘It’s ok’, said Gem, ‘we can make a rope out of the uniforms.’

‘Gem, I’m scared! I don’t like this!’

‘Hang on Zed, I’ll be up there very soon!’ Gem looked around for as many pieces of clothing as she could find, and hastily tied them together. She wasn’t really sure how well the whole thing would hold.

‘Gem!’ Zed shuddered, ‘It’s too high! I’m scared! I want to come down!’

‘Have a look at the length of this.’ She showed Zed the improvised rope, ‘Concentrate! Will it reach the ground?’

‘No!’

‘Are you certain?’

‘Yes, I’m certain! I want to come down!’

‘Gem, it won’t work!’ cried a scared Zed, clinging onto the lip of the panel. ‘Can you please, get me down from here!’

Gem helped her back down, allowing Zed to stand on her shoulders, and slide down her body.

‘What can we do?’ Zed asked terrified.

‘I don’t know, fight him?’

‘He’s too strong!’

The truck stopped, sending Gem and Zed fleeing back behind the crates. Both girls were out of breath and panting with fear.

‘Well, come on out then! Come on… come on, I know you’re there!’ Boomed the Truck driver.

The two girls cautiously revealed themselves, coming out from behind the crates, the colour drained from their faces from terror.

‘Please, please don’t turn us in! We meant you no harm’, pleaded Gem, in a croaky, shaken voice, tears streaming down her face.

‘Now, now enough of that, tell me, where are you headed?’

‘Arcadia, we heard that they accept, um, runaways.’ Gem didn’t see the point of lying to this man, and honesty just might get them less time in the Hothouse.

‘Arcadia? But that is where we just came from! The authorities have rounded up every kid in town as a punishment for harbouring, well, kids like you!’

Gem’s heart sank, this was their only opportunity, the tears welled up in her eyes once more.

‘Are you two from compound 65?’

‘Yes’, said a downhearted Gem, dutifully telling the truth, hoping for less severe punishment.

‘I was there too, for five long, terrifying years!’ said the burly truck driver. ‘An evil place that! I visited the Hothouse there, on many occasions! No… no, I won’t be taking you back!’

Gem saw his face softening and she began to like this burly truck driver.

‘I’ll tell you what though, you’ll be safer in the cab with me. If anybody stops us, you’re my kids alright? And I will call you Holly, and you Jessica, after my great grandma’s. Where are you from? I mean prior to Compound 65?

‘Blackbutt’, replied Gem,’ and Zed followed, ‘I’m from Jackandary,’

‘Well, they are a long way from here but in five weeks I will be in Blackbutt and the week after in Logan, which is just 3 kilometres from Jackandary, I guess I could make a stop.’

At this news, the girls smiled, a brilliant smile, a smile neither had worn on their faces for a long time. Gem, exhausted, eventually fell asleep and dreamed of the time she would run to her mother and snuggle in her father’s arms again.

It was a warm day; the sun was shining, and the sky was blue, when Gem arrived at Blackbutt. Her house was just as she remembered. The passionfruit vines, her mother had planted, had grown into large plants consuming the fence. The vines were now parading an abundance of luscious looking Passionfruits. The rose bushes were in full bloom, including the purple one that her mother had worked so hard to cultivate. She pushed through the gate, passing the letterbox, that her father had carved into the shape of an owl. The house itself was a modest dwelling, but painted in warm, welcoming colours which now appeared to be greeting her home. Gem walked to her front-door and her little sister came running to greet her.

‘Where are mum and dad?’, Gem asked her little sister. ‘Taken away’, said her sister.’

‘Taken where?’ Gem asked sullenly.

‘Taken away and locked up in compound 65’.

Gem sank to the ground on her knees, the tears streaming down her face. But then her sister smiled, ‘But Nanna’s here!’ adding in a tiny voice, ‘and I am here!’, and she gave her big sister the longest hug.

‘Look what I have here,’ said Gem, softly smiling through her tears. She carefully took out the heart shaped locket and delicately opened it. The picture was the sweetest image of her sister in a powder-blue dress, with white lace, and a pink bow, a reminder of happier times. She said to her little sister; ‘this picture helped me through, and this locket here, it helped me, to come home to you!’

©BrendaKellaway,7th, July.2021