Illustrated by Lee Kuruganti © 2008
The Hole
© Mark Dalligan
Tribe Mother constantly warned them to stay away from the Hole. Hunter ignored her. He loved the coolness that lay around it; a good place to catch lizards.
School stretched into the late afternoon. Hunter was bored with the Elders conflicting memories. ‘Oral History’ they called it, though often they argued over what was real and what imagined. The saving grace for Hunter was the illustrated encyclopaedia. It was kept on a lectern and a page turned each day. The boy could read well enough and the magic of the book absorbed him.
At home his father and mother were arguing again so he took his supper down to the Hole. The raised ceramic lip made a comfortable bench.
He dropped pebbles into the dark, smiling when one made a pleasant ‘ching’.
"Yo!" Herb Gatherer, approached. "What’s up?"
He ignored her.
"Any food left?"
He passed the last of the bread and she gave him some sweet roots to chew.
"So what’s down there?" she asked.
Hunter shrugged.
"Want to find out?"
The boy beamed agreement.
"Wait here, I’ll be back."
Though the minutes passed slowly it gave time to supplement his meal with a few locusts.
Herb Gatherer returned, a braided cord looped over her shoulder. She carried the tribe’s Light.
"Now what?" he asked, feeling things were running ahead of him. The girl’s scent of wild oregano distracting him.
"Now we tie the Light to the end and lower it. We see what makes them afraid."
They played it out slowly, illuminating a smooth rock wall, catching the silver gleam of metal.
Hunter leaned across, lowering the Light further and, when the end of the line was reached, stretching down until his shoulders ached. It was only Herb Gatherer’s quick reactions that stopped him toppling over, but he came up with empty hands.
For a few moments they had a good view of a pointed metal tube, saw the bold black letters 'USAF' and the painted slogan across its wide blunt head: "Here’s one for Freedom!" Then the darkness returned.
Shamed at losing the Light, they walked back to the settlement, heads down. They did not hear the low electronic hum the passing magnets of the wind-up torch had strated in the ancient mechanism, nor know that the Hole's occupant had started to communicate with others scattered across the land.
