Herdenmord - ONC2021

Run

The spicy smell of eucalypts filled my nostrils. We stood, listening to the bush. I could hear the buzz and whirr of insects around us, but there was no bird song.

We opened the back of the station wagon and chose our weapons. Jamie already had her baseball bat, but she slipped the sheath of my father's favourite fishing knife onto her belt. Quan took the other knife and tucked it into his boot before selecting the shovel from the pile. Dimi chose a heavy golf club and a hammer and Aaden had already laid claim to the axe. I picked up the tire iron and the second hammer, tucking it into a pocket in my backpack. I wanted to feel reassured but the weapons didn't help at all. I'd never killed anything. I didn't even know if I could.

I heaved my backpack out, ready to carry it, but Quan put his hand on my wrist. "I'll take it."

I looked at him. It was hard not to grin. The bandage covered his injured eye, but his carefully styled fringe hung like a curtain in front of his good eye. I could see a gleam somewhere under that thick hair, but that was it.

"Can you see anything?" I asked, allowing a tiny smile to curve my lips.

"Not really." He pulled the knife from his boot and grabbed a handful of fringe. Before I could do more than gasp, he'd sawed straight through it. He dropped the hank on the ground. It shone blackly in the sudden silence.

We all gaped at Quan's over-exposed face. "What?" he growled, a half-snarl on his lips. "It's not like anyone gives a shit about hair anymore."

Somehow, that was worse. Because he was right. We were living in a completely different world. A world in which Quan could cut himself a short, ragged fringe and it was the best idea of the entire morning. Nothing else could've underlined how much things had changed, or how permanently.

In this new world, stuff like hair, or the latest tech or fashions didn't matter. We had bigger problems. Like surviving.

"Will there be medicine at Blue Tree Hill?" I asked, thinking of Dimi.

"Who cares?" Jamie said roughly.

I gaped at her, suddenly realising she was going to be affected worse than any of us. She saw my expression and scowled blackly.

"Come on," she snapped. "We need to go."

Aaden grabbed the first aid kit from the car and shoved it into the top of my backpack, strapping it shut. "Seeing as you're happy to carry extra," he said, slapping Quan's back. He hefted his own backpack, heavy with water.

A strange growling emanated from Dimi. "I'm hungry," she said. None of us had managed to eat a bite, but Dimi had lost anything she'd had in her stomach.

"We'll eat when we're safe." Jamie started down the trail ahead of us.

"Remember to look up," I hissed. I didn't want any of us to fall victim to the mythical but now horribly possible drop bear.

We walked in single file along the river path. On this side of the Yarra, the path was no more than a packed dirt trail through shrubs and trees. Small birds flitted from branch to branch around us, their whistled warnings preceding us.

The sun was high in the sky. High enough to keep possums and other nocturnal animals in their nests. But there had been lots of roos in this park, along with rabbits and feral cats.

We walked as silently as we could, though I sounded loud in my own ears. I could hear myself breathing and the thud of my heart beat. Each footfall sounded like a drumbeat. There was no way the animals around us didn't know we were here.

I heard Jamie suck in breath up ahead. She stopped and we piled up around her.

There was something on the track. A boy. He was facing the sky but he saw nothing. The crows had found his eyes.