DAY
Siding Spring Observatory
Gamilaraay Country
I lower myself into the water. The rockpool is egg-shaped, washed smooth. The stream eddies around me before rushing away, down the mountain, clear and cold. My skin goosebumps and then calms. The immersion is a reset, opening my pores, heightening my awareness.
I shift my eyes towards the rustling in the fern fronds without moving my head. The tell-tale flashes of red, white spots on black: diamond firetails. They come to bathe at the spring. The water comes from deep underground, from the mountain’s volcanic past, nourishing species still clinging to life. The firetails flit and whistle along the branch above my body, thin and tea-coloured beneath the surface. My fingers twitch, mimicking their movements.
‘Hey,’ I say.
They land at the pool’s edge, exposing scarlet rumps as they dip and sip with matching beaks. The close encounter with another being sets a charge moving over my skin.
The close encounter with another being sets a charge moving over my skin.
The shift comes before I register human noise, movement. The firetails dart off, into the undergrowth, taking the last of my body heat with them. When I look up, a strange face is peering down from the track above. The sort of face I haven’t seen before. Shit.
I splash out onto the rock shelf and pull on underwear, socks and pants over damp skin, slip on my boots, wrestle my arms into my thermal, then my fleece, pull the hood over my head—and run.
My breath is loud in my ears. I head away from the spring, away from the path above, branches and leaves slapping against my cheeks and hands. I’m making way too much noise, leaving a trail, but I have to warn the others. When the undergrowth becomes too thick to push through, I climb the steep slope. So steep I have to dig in the toes of my boots and grip strappy lomandra to pull myself up.
At the top, I skirt around the cluster of white domes nestled in the bush. Where the trees thin, the undergrowth is easier to move through, but it’s easier to be seen, too. I keep low and move fast, avoiding puddles and soft soil, leaping from tussock to tussock. Once the path firms and steepens, I run hard. My heart is pounding, the calming chill of the creek gone. I’ve messed everything up, for everyone.
My heart is pounding, the calming chill of the creek gone. I’ve messed everything up, for everyone.
When I reach the shoulder of the mountain, still in shadow, I drop down between two cypress pines to look back. Their sharp scent and furrowed trunks steady me. Three white vehicles, doors open. I’m too far away to read the numberplates or decals: MuX? Government? Military?
I turn my back on the scene, imprinting it to memory. I scramble over the mountain’s shoulder and plunge down the other side. It’s so steep, I have to zigzag to control my descent, slipping and sliding. With my vision blurred, smell takes over: callitris resin, damp soil, scat, wet fur. A rock wallaby startles, bounding away.
Deep in the gully, I leap from rock to rock to cross the creek and find the trailhead on the other side. The switchback climbs between cypress pines and ironbarks, into grasstrees and mossy boulders, leading me to the level clearing that holds our cabin. The two rooms, kitchenette and outdoor shower isn’t much, but it has been home for these last months. I sprint the final distance, although I’m already spent.
Dianella is waiting in the doorway, boots on, body tense, her camera gear already packed. ‘Heard you coming a mile off,’ she says. ‘What happened? Did I hear vehicles?’
‘Three. Outside the lodge, near the main telescope. Four-wheel drives,’ I say.
Dianella’s forehead creases beneath her battered hat. ‘Parks?’ I shake my head.
‘You’re sure?’
‘I’m sure.’ The flat affect, the pronounced eyes, had been unmistakeable. ‘There’s an Incomplete with them. Maybe twelve or fourteen years old.’
She’s reading my face. ‘A family then. What else?’ I drop my head. ‘The Incomplete. They saw me.’
‘How?’
It’s a fair question. They say that Incompletes are short-sighted and ill-equipped for the outdoors. And I’m pretty much the opposite.
‘I was swimming.’
Not one muscle in Dianella’s face moves but her gaze harpens to laser. ‘Where?’
‘At the spring.’
She tips her head in that pained way. ‘How often have I told you not to go down there? And now, of all times …’
‘I know,’ I say. ‘But there are firetails.’
I worry that if I stop paying attention, they’ll go. And the water is my conduit to the heart of the mountain range, though I wouldn’t say so out loud, even to my own mother.
Her face softens. ‘How many?’
‘Three. A breeding pair and a female from last season.’
‘Oh.’ She closes her eyes for a moment. ‘That’s wonderful. But you know we have to go now,’ she says. ‘Your bag’s ready?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’ll signal the others and meet you there. Don’t forget the food. Two minutes.’ She holds up two fingers, as if by making one mistake I’ve somehow lost the capacity to understand numbers.
We’ve done this drill a dozen times. In case someone came looking or one of us was spotted. I hoped it would never happen, and didn’t even consider that it would be me. I take my spare outfit from the drawer and add it to my backpack, then the drybag containing the food, pull the drawstring tight, clip the buckles and sling the pack over my shoulders. Dianella carries the camera gear; I carry the food. That’s the distribution of weight and responsibility.
I throw my collection of seedpods, leaves and feathers out the window, and watch them scatter on the breeze. The room is clean and bare, as if I was never there. I take one last look at the trunks and branches outside, the forest that has held me, and pull the timber shutters closed.
This is an extract from The Thinning by Inga Simpson (Hachette Australia), available now at your local independent bookseller.
