She turned her attention back to the truck. A puff of smoke came out the exhaust pipe. The wheels moved as they straightened the vehicle up. An arm came out the window to wave her on.
She looked at the kangaroo as she drove past. Not an ounce of life in it. She looked to the edge of the road. Quite a drop. Maybe the sweet man was right, and she was lucky they came across the beast first.
<°)))><
Ava drove past an entrance to a residence and caught a glimpse of a vehicle parked there. She slowed down and saw the word ‘security’ on the side of the vehicle. Defence, police, or maybe a security firm. Probably the latter in this world of staff shortages. None of these entities bothered her. This was the place.
She wondered if there was still an aerial drone in the sky covering the area. She knew the focus of the main surveillance systems were the cities, not the country towns which were left to a few drones and satellites.
A side track appeared. She pulled the car over, picked up her phone, located the required app and tapped and waited for the screen to refresh. A map of the area appeared. Good. No drones currently monitoring this zone. No satellite passes scheduled. She wasn’t concerned about satellites images; it was only in movies and in cities where real-time imagery zoomed in on the baddies doing their stuff. No one was going to see this baddie do her stuff.
She placed her phone in a side pocket of her black sleeveless vest and opened the car door. She walked to the rear of the car and opened the boot. A folded rifle lay nested next to a collapsed yellow and black device, her ‘hovering bug’. She wouldn’t use it to check the property as the bug brought its own attention with its buzzing propellers and low trajectory.
The rifle she needed. It was handy working for a pharmaceutical company—they had come up with the perfect drug to knock people out and leave the recipient with no memory of the event, although she had no concerns about using the real stuff.
She kept herself concealed and made her way closer to the house. It looked like just the one person keeping the place secure. She sized the person up through her viewing glasses and selected the appropriate dart size. The dart was placed in the chamber of the rifle and a spare rested in her parka pocket just in case the first didn’t have the desired effect. She wasn’t overly concerned about an overdose.
The man got up from the chair. He yawned, then stretched. Obviously bored. He looked around and set his sights directly in the area where she was concealed. He squinted as if to adjust his sight. He took a step towards Perdu. She fired the dart. The man grabbed his neck just under his chin, pulled the dart out and threw it away. Too late. Ava knew that the majority of the dart’s content had been delivered into the man’s bloodstream. He staggered and reached for a verandah post nearby for support. Perdu watched and grabbed the other dart from her pocket. As she loaded it into the chamber, the man slowly slid down the post and lay sprawled out on the grass. Perdu ran over to him and checked a few life signs. He was out, and would be for thirty minutes or so.
Perdu entered Pop’s house.
<°)))><
James moved the bush aside and came out in a clearing. He wondered if the place was under guard. He needed to be quiet. The old wooden shed at the back of Pop’s house could be seen from the laundry window. It was a frosty type window with a number of cracks.
Was there a shadow figure at the laundry window? Or was his imagination, his mind playing tricks. That’s what he wanted to believe. He didn’t want any distractions.
<°)))><
Perdu watched through a crack in the laundry window as a man opened the shed’s timber door and entered. Who was this man? Perdu came out the back door and quietly headed towards the wooden shed. The door was open. Perdu stepped into the shack.
The man was on his knees lifting up a floor board, oblivious to her presence.
“Who may you be?” she asked.
The man turned suddenly and nearly lost his balance. He grabbed the top of a timber bench and raised himself up. There was dirt on his knees, which he brushed off.
“Uh . . . I’m a friend of the man who lives . . . lived . . . here.”
“Are you looking for a treasure chest?”
He looked to be regaining his composure. “To be honest with you . . .” He held up a brown paper bag. “This is dope. We used to share the stuff, and now he’s gone I thought I’d borrow some. He wouldn’t mind.”
“Your honesty could get you into trouble. You’re lucky I’m not a police officer. Are you sure the owner wouldn’t mind?”
“Of course not. We were mates. Anyway, who are you? Are you securing the house or something?”
The man’s conduct changed. He was ogling—looking her over.
“Nope . . . I’m family.”
The man raised his eyebrows. “Really? Then you must know his granddaughter, Lee-Ann,”
Was he trying to trick her or had he made an honest mistake? He looked an interesting man and she wasn’t quite sure what she should do with him, and he was still gawking.
“You mean Isabella, don’t you?”
He shook his head. ‘Yep, sorry that’s what I meant.”
His eyes started to dart around the shack. Ava hoped he wasn’t planning anything.
“I haven’t seen Isabella for ages.”
“Really. Well, this is your lucky day because she’s here.”
“Really?” Perdu sensed a heightening of her emotions. “And is her grandfather here?”
“No. You’re a bit late. They’ve taken him away.”
He must mean the Defence people, and she expected that. But the girl being there was a bonus, but what did Isabella know? Wakey, wakey, Ava. How do you think the girl got here? She’s got the transporting device.
35 – Lost and found
THE NOISE OF THE CROWS SEEMED TO BE FOLLOWING Isabella and Lucas as they made their way to find a strong signal. Crows were out of place in the country—they belonged more in the city, where they could scavenge. Her dad used to complain about crows pinching golf balls. She could picture her dad running down the fairway, swinging his golf club in the air. She now could also picture crows flying retaliating with sticks.
The track was just wide enough for one person. Flattened broken branches and leaves acted as a sponge carpet as they headed upwards. A large fallen branch blocked the path ahead. Isabella needed to remove the backpack to crawl under the branch. With her feet crunching the bush carpet she did not hear the item hit the ground. They walked on.
Ah-ah-ah-aaaah
