[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…
In this short episode (5.1) Letitia comes to terms with her mission, but learns that time is of the essence…]
The Department Should Pay
Letitia tottered down to the Sandy Bay shore. Dark. Only the streetlights to guide her steps. She needed time and space to process her part in the mission her father, daughter and the IGSF had planned for her.
‘At least it’s a warm night; warmer than Antarctica,’ she muttered. ‘I’ll try and get some sleep, then work out what to do in the morning.’ She chuckled while clutching her stomach. ‘Perhaps, I can get the Education Department to pay for my fare to Adelaide. Me? A teacher? What next?’ She sighed and kicked the sand. ‘How long can I keep up the “Teacher-act”, I wonder?’ She flung her arms about in grand gestures, rehearsing her role. ‘Good morning class, I am your new English teacher, the wonderful, the magnificent invisible Miss Fahrer, or would that be Driver? Am I going to be persecuted for having a German name? Nah, it’s Adelaide, I’ll be right. I wonder where I’ll be? If it’s the Barossa, I’ll definitely be alright. Okay, not sure how I’ll manage the critters. But you know, if they start throwing paper at me, I can always disappear.’
Letitia twirled and tripped on a stone. Over-balanced. Falling…
Great! Not again!
Strong arms cradled her and lifted her upright.
Balanced, Letitia blinked, allowing her eyes to adjust to the dull tones of night.
Wilhelm’s bleached blonde hair and ghost-like complexion glowed against the blackness. ‘Whoopsy-daisy, you nearly took a tumble.’
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to…you know…impose…I just…’ Letitia stammered.
‘It’s okay.’ Wilhelm released her arm but remained facing her. ‘I’m so sorry that they have dumped this mission on you. If there’s anything I can do to help.’
‘Teaching is the one profession, I never wanted to do.’ Letitia wiped a stray tear that had decided to roll down her cheek. ‘Actually, you know, if I have to be a teacher, which I should remind you most emphatically, that I am not. But if I have to be, well, it’s only fair if they get the Education Department to pay for my fare back to Adelaide. Don’t you think? After all, how else am I going to get there? I have no money. And it would be for a good cause. You see, Tails and Maggie, those two scoundrels…they have stolen your, your’s and Frieda’s grandchildren…’
Wilhelm’s eyes widened. ‘Grandchildren?’
‘In my future. I think,’ Letitia said almost in a whisper, ‘I think, or this world is like a parallel world to mine, but out of time, sort of. I guess there must be…’
Wilhelm breathed out with a whistle. ‘Phew! And there I thought you were the embodiment of the crazy woman inside my head. Parallel worlds, well, that sounds novel—Man In the High Castle stuff.’
‘What? No, I’m serious, I thought, you being part of the IGSF and fight against Boris, I thought you must have some understanding that parallel universes are a thing.’
‘I do, I do,’ Wilhelm caught her arm. ‘But we can’t tell Frieda that. She’s still trying to get her head around time-travel. Which, even I can’t believe is possible. But hey, I get your drift. As I said, with some of the strange things that have happened to me. And to be honest…’ He turned Letitia around and guided her up the steps to the house. ‘Look, we need to drive to my boat tonight. We need to move on this plan. The Admiral called and said that time is of the essence.’
‘Won’t your wife get upset?’
‘She’s used to it.’ Wilhelm sighed. ‘It’s all part of working for the Intergalactic Star Fleet. Oh, and pretending to be a psychiatric doctor.’
He opened the basement garage with his remote and led her to his Aston Martin Coupe.
Within minutes they were gliding across the Tasman Bridge, over the brooding Derwent River, to Bellerive Marina.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…
In this episode (4.2) After enjoying the wild Weber char-grilled salmon Letitia faces the prospect of another mission; one which she may not relish…]
‘Oh, no! How awful!’ Frieda sympathetically patted her shoulder.
Wilhelm leaned back on the bench seat and cynically remarked, ‘You fool! No one leaves their belongings on the beach. What were you thinking?’
‘But, but, this is Tasmania. 1967! I thought my stuff would be safe on a near deserted beach.’
‘Well, now you know. Not even Coles Bay is safe from thieves.’ Wilhelm shook his head in disgust. ‘After all, someone stole our illegal alien this morning from The Royal Hobart Hospital, no less.’
‘Or the alien escaped and stole the cleaner’s clothes…’ Frieda nodded slowly at Letitia.
‘I guess the thief got her just desserts,’ Letitia mumbled while raising her glass, studied the final quarter of wine in the bottom of the flute.
‘What do you mean?’ Frieda leaned forward to catch her errant friend’s every utterance.
‘She means that Miss Thief who stole her identity and everything, ended up crashing in the plane,’ Will said.
‘Oh! So that’s why you are here,’ Frieda said; the Riesling had gone straight to Frieda’s head addling her brain cells.
‘Yes!’ Wilhelm and Letitia replied in unison. Letitia congratulated herself for a story well executed and believed.
‘Oh, well, then, I guess your family are relieved,’ Frieda concluded. ‘We’ve been in contact with them and heard you may turn up here.’
‘Yes, Fritz sent a message with the flight from Mawson Station that you’d been found and were being transported to Hobart.’
‘Fritz did?’ Letitia picked at her nails and glanced at Wilhelm.
‘He did,’ Wilhelm replied. ‘I was to make sure you stayed safe and undetected in the hospital. But you decided to take matters into your own hands and escape.’
‘Silly girl.’ Frieda patted Letitia’s hand. ‘And I had to go in search of you, before anyone else, undesirable found you.’
‘Like Boris,’ Wilhelm said.
The smug expression that Letitia had been inwardly harbouring drained from her face. She had not covered that little scenario. ‘Oh, beetle juice! You got me. I woke up in that hospital. I don’t know what I was thinking.’
‘Oh, you poor thing! Lettie!’ Frieda grinned before dashing into the house, and returning, armed with a solid black phone attached to the longest cord Letitia had ever seen in her life. She shoved it under her nose. ‘Here, you must ring them. They would be so worried. But, here’s the thing. You haven’t been sent here to enjoy the views and life of luxury. Your father has a mission for you. He wants you to help rescue a couple of children who have been abducted and something rather peculiar, take them back to their own time.’
‘First task,’ Wilhelm cleared his throat, ‘is to be some lady called Maggie. They say you knew of her on this Mirror World you have been going on about.’
Trembling, Letitia shook her head. ‘Me? Maggie? I look nothing like her.’
‘Of course, you’re not.’ Frieda chuckled. ‘But you only have to call their home and put on a voice like you are her.’
Heat flushed through Letitia from her scalp and cascaded down her neck, shoulders, body. Beads of sweat accumulated on her temples and coursed down her cheeks. ‘I’m not ready for this. I’m still fuzzy headed from the coma. I don’t want to stuff it up.’
Wilhelm leaned back on the table and sniffed. ‘You’ll be fine. You’ll make a great Maggie. Whoever she is.’
‘You reckon?’ Letitia twisted the cord in her hand. ‘What if Tails, that’s her husband and partner in crime, answers?’
‘Intelligence from Nathan is that Maggie’s husband has just driven down from Alice Springs.’ Wilhelm smiled. ‘Your dear friend Nathan has been tracking him. Tails has the boys, and Maggie according to our sources, is somewhere here on the island.’
Frieda nodded. ‘So, here’s your chance. Call Tails, put on your best Maggie voice and give him the good news.’
Letitia examined the contraption of a telephone with an inward sense of horror. Then in an even voice said, ‘Right!’ Staring at the angular black lines of the phone, calm flowed over her. Was this part of the plan? From above? Or at least the IGSF of the future? Was Fritz in on it? Was this plan Jemima’s doing? She was skilled at invisibility, but putting on voices? Impersonating Boris operatives?
Letitia took a deep breath. She decided to go with the proverbial flow and join Wilhelm and Frieda in their world’s script.
So, mustering up as much sincerity as possible with the view of taking on the role of Maggie, while at the same time figuring out how to sound like Maggie, she said, ‘There was this lady with red hair on the plane, she gave me a sick-bag.’ Then gushed, ‘But, there is one problem. What if they think – well actually, by this time they must believe I’m dead. I mean, Boris, he was there with his bomb. He blew up the plane over Mirror Antarctica…and – and what if Tails and the boys are on their way to Hobart? I should try by… what else can we use to communicate? Telegramme?’ She looked at the couple, both wide-eyed. Then, before they could answer, continued, ‘But I – don’t know the number.’ She had to think of some feeble excuse she can’t call the dreaded family.
‘You ring the exchange, dear. They’ll know.’ Frieda sighed. ‘Go on! At least try.’
‘But they might be using different names—aliases. Tails likes doing that. No one really knows what his real name is.’
‘All under control. Seems they go under the name Taylor. Nick and Maggie Taylor, as far as the IGSF intelligence can ascertain,’ Will said.
‘Okay.’ Letitia conceded and plucked the phone from Frieda. She did not want to admit that she had forgotten how to manage telephone exchanges in the 1960’s. The two hovered over her like hawks. ‘What do I dial for Adelaide?’
‘Here, let me.’ Frieda lifted the phone out of her hands, twirled the dial, and with efficiency, handled the exchange with the words, ‘Connect to Taylor, Nick Taylor of Somerton Park, please.’
Then, handed the receiver back to Letitia.
This will be interesting! Letitia thought while listening to the dial tone of antiquity.
A click sounded on the other side of the phone as a boy with a timid voice answered, ‘Hello, this is Liam. Who’s this that is calling?’
Letitia gaped, stunned by the randomness of her luck. Then, grounding herself that such coincidental events are rarely coincidental, she spoke in the voice she remembered of the women with red hair from the plane. ‘It’s your mother, here, Liam. I, er, survived the crash.’ She paused, unsure if her voice sounded convincing. The mosquitos hovered over her bare shoulders too, waiting to catch her unawares and sting her.
‘Mother? You don’t sound like her. Who are you?’ the boy said. ‘Are you a playing a joke on us?’
‘No, I’m – your…’ she was about to say “rescuer”, but realised that such a concept may sound ridiculous to the boy. ‘I’m alive, I didn’t go down with the plane. I wasn’t on…People sound different so far away in Tasmania,’ she rambled.
‘Your three minutes has expired, would you like to reconnect?’ an officious sounding voice cut in.
Letitia hesitated.
With a clunk, the other end of the phone went silent.
She glanced from Frieda to Wilhelm, then waved the phone receiver in the air. ‘It cut out on me.’
Frieda snatched the handset. ‘They only give you three minutes for interstate calls. Don’t you know that?’
‘On Mirror, there’s no time limit on calls,’ Letitia replied wistfully.
Will sighed, ‘Mirror? What sort of world is that?’
‘Told you, the future.’ Letitia handed the rest of the phone and the tangled cord to Frieda. ‘That’s where I’ve been. That’s why you couldn’t find me. Till now.’
‘Oh,’ Wilhelm said.
‘Time travel?’ Frieda bundled the phone and cord in her arms. ‘How’s that possible?’
With a shrug, Letitia stared out over the river, the glimmering lights bouncing off the inky water. Night had finally fallen. ‘Liam, the younger boy answered. So what’s the plan? Any more intel on what happens next?’
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…
In this episode (4.1) Letitia enjoys wild Weber char-grilled salmon and must explain her inexplicable reappearance having been MiA for several years …]
The late evening light spread endlessly over the listless blue water. A warm breeze wafted periodically, ever so gently rustling the jasmine creeping up the balustrade. Salmon sizzled in the large black bowl stranded on three legs. After little Johnny with golden curls had peddled his energy out with red tricycle around the lawn area, Frieda, bathed him and put him to bed. Then she decorated the outdoor table, with left-over festive mats and coasters. Letitia now recognised the table as made of Huon pine. A spotlight beamed on their pending dinner and a lonely Tupperware bowl full of chips. Frieda then retreated to the open kitchen window that presided over the deck, where she tossed green salad that would eventually accompany the salmon and chips.
‘Help yourself to chips. They are warm. I was keeping them warm in the oven.’ Frieda offered from the open window. ‘Sorry about the fish we bought earlier. While you were in the shower, the dog got to the rest of them. Lucky, we had some salmon in the freezer. Will caught it on one of his boating exploits down the south-west coast, Macquarie Harbour. Wild salmon, it’s the best.’
‘Where’s the dog?’ Letitia asked.
Frieda rolled her eyes and snorted, ‘In the Dog House; locked up behind the shed; no chances taken. Don’t want him getting the salmon too.’
Letitia stared doubtfully at the pink plastic bowl laden with crisp wedges of fried fat and potato. She visualised Sister Salome, Gunter’s sister, egging her on. She may have been starving, but oil dipped fried chips spelt dangerous levels of cholesterol, thickening of the arteries and the waistline.
‘Come on, Lets! Have a few! You look like you need a bit of fattening up. Remember when we were kids. You would eat almost anything and everything and you never put on weight,’ Frieda urged.
‘At least you are honest. I remember my mother would just shove the bowl under my nose, strategically, and then be offended if I did not lick the bowl clean.’ The crisp golden slices of potato were enticing, and her empty stomach grumbled in yearning for them. Meanwhile Wilhelm, lean and fit, resisted temptation by casually reading The Canberra Times. He had a conference to attend in Australia’s national capital and was keen to be in the know about what was going on there.
‘Your mother! I remember her!’ Frieda snorted, ‘Why did I bother getting chips?’ She shovelled a few sticks of fried potato into her mouth. ‘Gawd! Am I going to be the only one who eats them?’ Her words muffled by the mouthful of mash.
Letitia selected a strip of carrot from the salad bowl that Frieda had brought out with her and chomped on it. The headlines on the front page of the newspaper, concerned her. “Late News Over Hanging” was plastered over the front page. The issue relating to capital punishment sent chills down her spine and she trembled.
Wilhelm peeked over the paper. ‘What’s the matter, Letitia? You’ve gone all pale.’
‘Huh? It’s that thing about capital punishment.’ Letitia shivered. ‘It’s like someone’s walked over my grave. I don’t know, I can’t explain.’
‘Hmm, there’s a push against it.’ Wilhelm flipped the paper closed and looked directly at her. ‘In my opinion, there are some people who deserve it.’
‘But what if they get the conviction wrong? And sentence an innocent person…?’
‘I think the salmon is ready.’ Frieda chirped. ‘I can smell that it is cooked.’
Wilhelm rose, laid down the paper on the table, and retreated to the Weber. With a moment’s reprieve, Letitia adjusted her position on the sassafras timber bench and leaned over to gain a view of the material that Wilhelm had been reading. However, Frieda barged in claiming the newspaper for herself. ‘Look at this! Pilots escape a plane crash! Landed on its fuselage.’
Letitia sank back into the dimness of twilight, knowing her minutes of being simply lost-now-found Letitia were numbered. Unsure of how the situation and her place in it, stood in this out-of-date world, she cleared her throat ready to recite her hastily constructed story for the ensuing discussion and IGSF debriefing while eating salmon.
‘That name sounds familiar,’ Frieda pointed at the paper.
Letitia’s heart sank with the acid of nervousness. She opened her mouth ready to defend her presence in this time which was her survival. However, Wilhelm, bearing the oven tray of Weber-grilled salmon, interjected. ‘That reminds me. Did we have a queer case today!’ He snatched the paper from Frieda and served the fish.
Without complaining or further comment for the moment, Frieda proceeded to serve the meal of fish and chips with salad. Wilhelm briskly and with finesse poured the white wine into crystal flutes. With Wilhelm’s pronouncement of “enjoy”, they silently dug into their late-evening meal.
Letitia savoured a mouthful of succulent salmon hoping in vain that her mysterious re-entry into this world at this particular time would slide into acceptance and then into obscurity. Unfortunately, that dream was not to be.
Wilhelm calmly and deliberately placed his fork and knife on his half-eaten plate of fish and continued sharing his day. ‘We had this illegal immigrant escape. Pity, the case sounded interesting. Apparently, they found her in Antarctica.’ He took a sip of chardonnay and chuckled to himself. ‘That matron, Sister Cross, you know, the one I’ve told you about, Frieda? Well, the immigrant apparently disappeared on her watch. Imagine that! Hawk-eye, herself! Tell you what, the boss wasn’t too pleased. If it wasn’t for the fact that the patient was meant to be in a coma, I guess Cross would have been suspended.’
Frieda sang some eerie “Doo-doo-do-do” tune and remarked, ‘Sounds like something from Deadly Earnest.’
Although vaguely unfamiliar with the supernatural implications, Letitia kept her head down and steadily shovelled in the salmon and salad and tried her best to remain inconspicuous. She was fortunate that her fingers were not frost-bitten and that apart from the initial lime green cleaner’s uniform, she had appeared sane and incontrovertibly Australian to Frieda.
‘Say, how has your day been, Letitia? What brings you to the clement climes of Tasmania?’ Wilhelm piped up attempting to make pleasant conversation.
As Letitia’s mind had become more unfrozen and nimbler, she knew that she had to factor in an aborted journey to Antarctica, as well as head off their suspicions as to her presence in this Apple Isle. She took a deep breath and made the tale fly by the seat of its breeches. ‘Well may you ask.’ She took a sip of Barossa wine and savoured its dry wooded vintage. ‘I had travelled to Tasmania to visit my relatives…’ She paused knowing that she had fudged the finer details of flight or sea, but sure that Jemima might be somewhere on the Island, ‘and – and was planning to fly over Antarctica – lifelong dream, and all of that.’
‘I didn’t know you had relatives here,’ Frieda interjected. ‘Last time I checked, your dad and mum were in Adelaide. The rest of them, cousins, I mean, are in Germany, aren’t they?’
Almost immediately Wilhelm flicked a hand in front of her wine glass, ‘Well what am I, dear?’ He royally waved a hand and with a knowing smirk, bid, ‘Continue.’
Letitia looked up and at Frieda’s husband. Him? Related? How? But said, ‘I meant, I mean, my mother’s family were Australian. Been in Australia for a hundred years.’ Then softly, ‘Don’t you remember how my father met my mother, Gertrude?’
‘Gertrude?’ Wilhelm laughed. ‘How many times have we heard that story?’
Letitia recalled the recent conversation with Jemima on the fated plane and decided to incorporate that piece of information. ‘Um, well, actually, yes, of course. But you see I was meeting my mum here in Tassie to go on the flight to Antarctica. It was her life-long ambition too.’ She paused, remembering that both Frieda and Wilhelm had expressed surprise at her reappearance after several years of being MiA (missing in action). She dismissed the calm demeanour they displayed when finding her as one of shock or not wanting to seem foolish for not keeping up with IGSF news. So, she added, ‘And a celebration, of course, for escaping Boris’ clutches on Mirror World and returning to Earth.’
The couple glanced at each other and then Letitia.
‘Fair enough,’ Wilhelm said. ‘But I don’t understand. There’s no tourist flights to Antarctica.’
Letitia lowered her voice. ‘Well, not officially, Mr. Thumm.’ She locked eyes with Frieda. ‘No parties at the LaGrange Point, either. Officially.’
Wilhelm crossed his legs. Frieda looked away.
‘You know nothing will stop my mother from doing what she wants to do, don’t we?’
‘No, I mean yes,’ Wilhelm muttered. ‘Strong-willed that woman.’
Frieda pursed her trembling lips. ‘So, typical! Treks all the way down to Tasmania. Hobart to boot. And doesn’t even give us the time of day.’
Letitia smiled. ‘That’s my mum.’
Wilhelm tapped pouting Frieda on her arm. ‘Say, I heard there was a plane crash in Antarctica. Unofficially.’
Frieda pounced on the newspaper and after a brief tug of war with Wilhelm, scrutinized it. Letitia braced herself. Frieda’s index finger paused, and her eyes raised up to her full of pity. ‘Oh, my God, I am so sorry!’
For a few furtive moments Wilhelm’s brow remained furrowed as he searched the paper. ‘Where is it? Where is it? I don’t see it. You’re joking.’ As he did this, Letitia steeled her muscles for the next instalment for her survival. She sensed an oddness about Wilhelm Thumm that made her uncomfortable and yet curious about him.
Once the mission to find this fake news had been accomplished, and not found, Wilhelm sternly and accusingly pointed a finger at her. ‘Well, Letitia, what are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be dead? From the plane crash?’
‘You see, that’s the interesting thing.’ She nodded. ‘I was in Coles Bay.’ She didn’t know why she chose Coles Bay. She recalled that there was a beach there. ‘I was in Coles Bay, on the beach having a swim.’ She checked Frieda’s and Wilhelm’s responses, so far so good, so continued her “slight” diversion from the truth. They didn’t look like the sort of people that could handle time travel or parallel universes at this stage. After all, she figured that Frieda may have imagined Mirror World to be a planet, like the Pilgrim Planet. Will perhaps, he had hinted at it. But not Frieda. Definitely, not Frieda. Then again, with her limited knowledge about physics, Letitia didn’t know if she understood inexplicable intricacies of time-travel. ‘Anyway, I had a nice cool, actually, the water was freezing cold, swim, and I came out of the surf to find everything – my bag, my towel, my clothes, money, tickets, everything gone.’
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…
In this episode (3.2) Letitia delves into her friend’s past and makes some intriguing discoveries…]
Frieda led Letitia into her room and rifled through a room-sized walk-in robe packed-full of clothing. From what Letitia could discern from the king-sized bed which faced a wall-sized window view of the Derwent, there were at least three decades worth of fashions represented. 1940’s to mid- ‘60’s, she surmised. A bold red and green floral print dress flew through the air and gracefully landed on the bed next to her. As she picked up the polyester-cotton dress, she remarked casually, ‘Blood and bone? Isn’t that something you do to roses in springtime?’
Frieda’s voice floated out from the depths of the clothes cupboard along with a pair of knickers still in the original plastic wrapping. ‘Yeah, don’t remind me! You know Will. He’s always gunna do, but then he’s on call, then there’s a golf tournament, and then Christmas, and then the bothersome yacht race! And in the end the job never gets done. Then before you know it, the damn dog’s got into it. Poor roses!’ More rustling could be heard from the vacuous hole of the cupboard, punctuated by Frieda’s verbal explosions, that spanned several European languages. ‘Now where are those dumkopf shoes? Merde! Can’t find anything in this hole!’
Standing by the bed like a dummy awaiting further instructions, Letitia chuckled, ‘You’d fit well into Mirror World.’
‘What? What the blazes is Mirror World?’
Realising that this Frieda may have never experienced such a world, Letitia shrugged. ‘Never mind.’
After a few more crashes and angry expletives, Frieda popped her head through the door. ‘Oh, er, Letitia, you can use the en suite shower and get changed. Just throw the dirty clothes outside the door. I’ll get them and put them in the wash. They won’t take long to dry in this weather.’ Then, almost as an after-thought, ‘Oh, er, Johnny’s coming home with his nanny soon.’
Letitia raised an eyebrow. ‘Johnny? Is that…?’
But Frieda had already flown out of hearing-range.
Letitia spied the adjoining door to the closet and assumed that this led to the en suite. It did. After peeling off the offensive manure laden garb, and depositing it just out the door, she turned on the shower revelling in the warm water flowing over her parched and soiled body.
For a couple of minutes, she enjoyed the refreshing and steamy streams run over her tired skin and aching muscles. Her mind wandered over postcards of lush fertile temperate forests of the West Coast of Tasmania (Mirror, of course, and East Coast there). She had not been there yet but remembered the pristine photographs from Geographic calendars and books that Jemima had sent in years gone by (or in future years as the case seemed to be in this out-of-time world). At Christmas, a tradition was established: she would send Switzerland, and Jemima would send the Tasmanian wilderness.
Hot spicy drops of water seared Letitia’s skin, jarring her out of her Tasmanian wilderness daydreams. She leapt to the far corner of the bevelled glass shower cubicle to escape the stings of boiling hot water. Through the steam, she noticed a knob marked with a blue ‘C’. She had forgotten that even showers were not computer-adjusted in 1967. With a sigh and with careful manoeuvring, she twisted the cold tap handle until the water simmered down to a more ambient temperature. How the soft water lathered the speck of shampoo to froth into a huge volume, she marvelled. Adelaide’s desalinated water of 2018 on Mirror World, never did that. It was a good day if you managed to conjure up a few stray bubbles from that water from drought-stricken Adelaide of the 2010’s on Mirror. Since global warming had taken a firm hold, the mainland of Mirror-Australia had been in perpetual general drought for more than twenty years.
Conscious of impending future water restrictions that might even extend to Hobart, even on this world, she terminated her shower after a few minutes of bliss, and dried with a towel compliments of Frieda. Actually, the white fluffy Dickies towel had “Frieda” embossed in dark pink across one corner. She did not feel comfortable using the one marked “Wilhelm”. Carefully, she dried her long dark locks and donned the blue patterned loose-fitting dress, and underclothes Frieda had provided.
‘A bit of a tent,’ Letitia said admiring her slim figure in the mirror, ‘but cool all the same. The white floral design I like.’
Finally, she began to thaw from the freezer of the South Pole.
Her limbs felt like rubber after the warmth of the shower and for once she could move them freely without the stiffness of cold, threatening frostbite and muscle-cramp. She wandered out into the bedroom of Wilhelm and Frieda. Was that the same Wilhelm Frieda had begun dating back before the Boris disaster of the Lagrange Point? she pondered. The Derwent was bathed in the first flushes of sunset, reflecting pleasant pinks and glowing orange on the hills beyond, the flickering lights of the city shimmering against the warm dark grey blue of river and evening. She read the analogue clock that sat in its own foldable leather case on the cluttered bedside table.
‘Nine o’clock!’ she muttered. ‘I was only in the shower for a few brief minutes. Who’s been messing with my time? I was sure it was only two or three in the afternoon, surely…’
She noticed a family history book that was stacked on top of a pile of neglected receipts and used airline tickets. ‘I wonder if I’m in this family history in this particular world and time?’ She flipped distractedly through the stiff A4 sized pages. Caught a glimpse of Frieda’s brother. Their mother remained a mystery. ‘I wonder who she was? What happened to her?’ She flicked back in search of the page and elusive image. She found John, Minna’s brother. Born 1963. ‘You didn’t waste any time, Frieda,’ she muttered. Then she gulped in momentary, reflection, ‘Neither did I, I mean, we. Wow, Jemima and John are the same age, technically…’ Distracted, Letitia turned page after page, hoping to uncover her or her counterpart’s existence.
‘Wise guy! Jolly joker! Who may I ask are you?’ A man’s voice echoed through the room while a golf club nudged Letitia in the back.
With a shriek, Letitia tossed the genealogical document into the air causing it to splat inelegantly onto the homemade patchwork quilt.
‘Who are you in my bedroom, wearing my wife’s clothes, and reading my family history?’ the man accused half in jest.
Letitia replied, ‘Just seeing if…I hope you don’t mind.’
The man she assumed was Wilhelm Thumm interrupted her. ‘Well, of course! Go ahead. Have a look. You helped Frieda with the research. Letitia! How good to see you, after, after…’ He paused thoughtfully, ‘after all these months! Or is it years?’ And gave her an obligatory hug. ‘Frieda informed me of your auspicious discovery. So, this is where you escaped to! What a surprise! You know, to be honest, we all thought you were, you know,’ he cleared his throat, ‘um, gone…dead. Although, we never did find a body, so, of course certain members of the IGSF, you know the likely characters, never gave up. After all, with what happened to me…’ Wilhelm’s voice trailed off into the realm of uncertainty.
What a bonus! Letitia mused. She recalled a few discussions with Frieda as they sun-baked on the sands at Bondi but didn’t think she had done that much to help write the family history. ‘I ended up in another dimension, Mirror World, and was busy helping the IGSF there. Anyway,’ she smiled, ‘It’s good to see you too, Will. You don’t mind if I have a look through the book, you know check for, check for typos, inconsistencies and, and there’s these distant relatives from Switzerland that I want to check up on, see if they were put in here,’ she rambled. Figuring that she had to get her facts straight if she was going to appear convincing in this time frame and realm.
‘Sure!’ Wilhelm nodded. ‘Come on down to the deck. We are having a nice glass of Riesling from the Barossa, and Frieda’s grilling up some salmon on the Weber. The latest thing from America, you know. Tasmanian salmon, it’s the best!’ he sucked in the twilight air between his gritted teeth and lead the way out to the deck.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…
In this episode (3.1) Letitia meets an old friend…]
The Point of Batteries
Part 1
‘You must come to my place. You must!’the blonde said.
Letitia glanced around the almost empty street. The crowds had dwindled to nothing in the golden light of the late afternoon sun. Her suggestion was not a bad one under the circumstances.
‘You must come for tea.’ The lady grabbed Letitia’s arm and dragged her along the road lined by warehouses. ‘We’ll grab takeaway on the way home. There’s a lovely little fish’n chip shop just up the road near our place. Remember when we were kids and we used to ride our bikes up to The Rocks and get a three-pence bag of chips? They were the best chips, weren’t they?’ The blonde ferried her up some steep steps.
‘Hmm!’ Letitia tried to remain polite and in the know. Rocks? Riding bikes? Fish and chips? Three-pence? All familiar images that hinted at the nameless friend’s identity. Her fuzzing mind tried to stretch her still frozen memory to capture who this woman was. The harder she tried, the more futile her efforts at name retrieval became. ‘How embarrassing! I apparently knew this lady from childhood,’ she muttered.
The blonde gave a tiny snort of laughter. ‘Gunter loved those chips. Remember? He said they were the best chips in Australia.’ She paused and for a moment gazed over the cove which spread beneath the hilltop vantage point. ‘Poor Gunter!’ she remarked, ‘Boris got him, ya know.’
The sun had crept behind Mount Wellington casting muted shadows over the historic houses, the pebble-strewn beach and the calm waters in hues of purple and blue. ‘Hmm! Poor Gunter!’ Letitia parroted. She paused in thought. Gunter, my half-brother?
Bright, colourful sails of boats dotted the river. The vivid reds, yellows, and whites pitted against the deep blue of the waters almost succeeded in converting Letitia to cheerfulness. However, the reality that she may have left her old world permanently behind, lurked in the shadows of her subconscious and troubled her. Letitia tried to agree to sound as if she knew what the blonde was talking about. She tried in vain to match Gunter with this lady’s elusive name. Perhaps it’s a case of mistaken identity.
How did anyone from the past recognise her? Mirror World and nanobot repair from the burns in her first accident had darkened her skin. Letitia checked her hand. Still the colour of cedar.
‘Poor Gunter, we haven’t been able to find him. He left after the disaster, you know, the bombing of our ship. He blamed himself for your disappearance.’ The lady guided her, striding towards the banks of the river. ‘But…it was my fault; I should’ve never…’ She stopped at a corner and announced, ‘Here we are! The Fish’n Chip shop!’
She led the way through the open white-framed doorway to the full-bodied aroma of sizzling oil, batter and chips, tessellated tiles and stainless-steel benches. A few bored customers reclined on a wooden bench seat that lined the shopfront, reading Readers Digests from the 1950’s.
Letitia peered at the magazine of a disinterested patron to the left of her. “Behind the Iron Curtain” the cover advertised. Letitia leaned back to check what that article was all about. The man narrowed his eyes and glared at her. Then, he stood up, marched to the counter, and spoke to the manageress in muffled tones, furtive glances and fingers pointed in her direction.
Letitia’s chest tightened. They’re going to ask me to leave, she thought.
‘Do you want whiting, Letitia?’ her blonde friend, also standing at the counter, called back over her shoulder.
‘Yeah, okay,’ while waiting for the inevitable directive to move outside. After all, it was the 1960’s and Letitia was the wrong colour.
Letitia noticed the blonde make an emphasised gesture in her direction, and say, ‘My friend will have one piece of whiting and I’ll have one piece of garfish with minimum chips.’
The manageress, a woman with bottled auburn waves, and olive-toned skin, looked at Letitia, and opened her mouth to speak.
The blonde cut off her unspoken words and in her best German accent, said, ‘Listen lady, she’s my friend, got it? We’re better than that, aren’t we? That’s why we come to Australia. We are all different, but we are all human beings. Besides, I don’t know why she’s so tanned, but she is as white as me; I know her parents, they come from Europe, migrants from Germany, just as you are a migrant from Greece, am I right? So, just make those fish and chips, okay?’
Something clicked. A key turned in her mind. Letitia studied the blonde lady handing over the cash to the Greek vendor. Frieda. Only Frieda Muller would have the courage to stand up for her rights; human rights. Frieda who tolerated no nonsense. Frieda, who once confided that she’d defied Hitler, and somehow survived. Something to do with being Lebensborn, she remembered. Admittedly the last time she met Frieda, she had become Frieda Thumm and was well into her fifties (give or take a decade or two with the distortion of light-speed travel). Letitia wondered how she could have struggled to recognise her. She who defended her in the fish and chip shop and now stood before her with a newspaper parcel of battered fish and chips was Frieda. But which Frieda? Letitia assumed this world’s Frieda.
Letitia perched on the bench.
The man adjusted his black-rimmed glasses, and with head bowed, walked back to the space next to Letitia. He mumbled an apology which Letitia acknowledged with a slight nod.
Letitia rubbed her hands together and smiled at Frieda. She had retrieved the name. She had found her friend’s identity. At least that was one good outcome from an otherwise less than ordinary day. At least she had one friend in a world and time when she calculated to have few friends. There was Fritz. But where was Fritz?
Frieda strode up to her and she leapt up to follow her friend. ‘Come,’ she commanded, ‘Let’s get to my house before the chips get cold.’
In the lingering late afternoon sun, the sun that refused to go away, the sun that refused to set, the friends wended through the narrow streets of this aged and historic part of town. The roads were steep as they were narrow. Parked cars on both sides, blocked some roadways which had not caught up to the 20th Century. Letitia marvelled at the vintage nature of the vehicles. She had not seen a FJ Holden in decades. The place was cluttered with them. And brand-new Holden Premiers, the luxury version, a collector’s dream on Mirror World. And there, she mused, was a Ford Falcon, more angular than its Holden counterpart; commonly a hoon car on Mirror World (in the eastern states of Australia, mostly). In Mirror Baudin State (South Australia), only Renaults and Peugeots would do. Letitia had to hide the smirk on her face as she contemplated the ugly future of these carbon spewing air-polluting machines.
‘So, Frieda, what may I ask are you doing in this part of the world?’ Letitia ventured to enquire.
Frieda frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean…um…’ Letitia hesitated hoping to guess correctly, and whispered, ‘um, um, Hobart?’
‘Hobart? But Letitia, we’ve been here for ages,’ Frieda replied. ‘Thing is, how did you end up here?’ She made a sharp turn at a white rendered wall of a two-story bungalow overlooking the bay.
‘Long story,’ Letitia exhaled briefly, relieved that she had guessed correctly, about Hobart. ‘I mean, are you working?’
Frieda returned a pan-faced expression which read as “are you stupid?” Then she pressed the small hand-held device and magically the gate in the wall opened. ‘Nup, I don’t need to work. I’m a lady of leisure. I’ve achieved “effluence”.’ Frieda’s tongue remained firmly in her cheek.
‘You mean, affluence? Lucky you!’ Letitia remarked admiring the fine leadlight birds that framed the light-coloured pine door. She absorbed the unique brisk scent of pine and commented almost involuntarily, ‘Wow! What’s that smell?’
‘You mean the door? It’s Huon Pine. Solid…’ Frieda began to explain before another, fouler odour accompanied by a large darker four-legged creature, assaulted Letitia.
Frieda’s train of thought and keys were lost in her black Labrador’s excitement to greet the unfortunate visitor, namely Letitia. In between the fever of yelps and her face covered in fermented slobber, she could hear Frieda yell, ‘Jack! Off Jack! Down! Down! Sit Jack! Naughty boy! Get off Jack!’ But her commands were in vain. Jack, the dog kept on jumping all over Letitia, and slathering to his heart’s content.
As the torture by dog continued, Frieda’s tone changed from playful to serious and Letitia nostrils were disturbed by a particularly pungent smell that lingered on her clothes. It had that thin weedy, off-meaty, faecal, with a touch of compost aroma about it. She brushed her uniform defensively and shrieked, ‘Ugh! What’s that smell?’ Bits of pitch-black dirt the consistency of sludge clung to her fingertips.
The Labrador gave a final yelp and flung itself after a flying fried fish.
‘Quick, while he’s distracted.’ Frieda pushed her friend through the door and slammed it shut. Once inside in a darkened entrance hall, she exclaimed with disgust, ‘Pooh! What’s that smell? It’s revolting!’
Smeared over Letitia’s lime green pants and top were the tell-tale marks of a dog’s misadventure. ‘Ugh! What is this stuff?’ She choked on the strong stench of sewerage. ‘It’s worse than Boris! When you said that you was “effluent”, I didn’t think you meant literally.’ She pinched her nose with added effect.
‘Oh, gore! The bleeding dog’s got into the blood ‘n bone. Sheisse!’ Frieda’s language was becoming increasingly colourful, and Letitia had no doubt that she was indeed Frieda. She grabbed a hold of Letitia’s arm and escorted her up the stairs. ‘Come on, you better get out of these rags – have a shower – I’ll get a change of clothes – and put these…’ she covered her nose with her sleeve and breathed out a nasal cry, ‘Phew! These into the wash must go!’
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