Collecting People

"Luke gets to collect his family. I get to watch from the fire and pretend the voice offering me the same thing isn't poison."

The journey back to camp was its own kind of purgatory.

Every swing of the crutches sent fresh protests through my shoulders and arms. The rubber tips sank into sand that seemed to have grown deeper and looser in the hours since I'd crossed it, each step requiring twice the effort it should have. Sweat soaked through my shirt, plastered my hair to my forehead, stung my eyes with salt I couldn't wipe away without losing my balance.

I stopped to rest more times than I could count.

The landscape stretched around me in its monotonous palette of ochre and rust, offering no landmarks, no shade, no relief from the sun that hammered down with the persistence of a grudge. My leg throbbed beneath its bandages — not the sharp agony of fresh injury, but the deep ache of tissue that was healing and resented being made to move.

Somewhere behind me, a mountain of fencing supplies waited to be transported. That job would fall to others — to Nial with his experience, to Paul with his determination, to anyone whose body still functioned the way bodies were supposed to function. Not to me. Not to the cripple hobbling across the desert on borrowed aluminium.

Try not to get eaten by anything else in the meantime.

Luke's note surfaced in my memory, and I laughed — a short, harsh sound that startled me with its bitterness. The crutches were a gift and a reminder, a kindness wrapped in an acknowledgment of everything I'd lost.

The camp appeared on the horizon eventually, its collection of caravans and tents resolving from heat-shimmer into solid shapes. Smoke rose from somewhere near the centre — someone cooking, maybe, or just maintaining the fire that had become our focal point. The shadow panther's head still stood at the entrance, that grotesque sentinel with its dead eyes fixed on nothing.

I pushed through the final stretch, arms screaming, shoulders burning, my entire upper body staging a revolt against the demands I kept placing on it. The perimeter welcomed me with nothing but dust and exhaustion.

Chris was crossing the camp as I entered, carrying something I couldn't identify from this distance. Our eyes met briefly — a flicker of acknowledgment, nothing more — before he veered away, adjusting his path to avoid coming within conversation range.

Good. One less thing to navigate.

My caravan waited where I'd left it, small and cramped and utterly welcome. Henri greeted me at the door with the enthusiasm of a creature who'd spent the day wondering where his human had gone. Someone had fed him — the bowl was empty, licked clean — and left fresh water that he'd apparently ignored in favour of sleeping on my pillow.

"Missed you too, mate," I said, lowering myself onto the mattress with a groan that came from somewhere deep in my bones.

The crutches clattered to the floor. I didn't bother picking them up.

For a while, I just lay there, staring at the ceiling while Henri settled against my good leg. My arms ached. My shoulders burned. My leg throbbed with the particular complaint of tissue pushed past its limits. But more than any of that, my mind churned with everything I'd learned today.

Luke's theft scheme. The truck driver on Earth who'd take the blame. Grant and Sarah, still believing they were going home in two weeks. Adrian, too stoned to understand what had happened to him.

And Clive. Always Clive, lurking at the edges of my consciousness, waiting for the next moment of weakness to exploit.

Surely, it is worth the price.

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to silence the whisper that wasn't quite a whisper.

Sleep found me before I could decide whether I wanted it to.

The knock came as dusk was settling over the camp.

I jerked awake, disoriented, uncertain how long I'd been out. The caravan's windows showed the last orange traces of sunset bleeding into purple, and the sounds filtering through the thin walls had shifted into the quieter rhythms of evening.

"Kain?" Karen's voice, muffled through the door. “We've got the campfire going. Thought you might want to eat something."

Food. When had I last eaten? The chilli from the night before, maybe. Time had become a blur of pain and movement and the endless cycle of problems that demanded solving.

"Coming," I called back, pushing myself upright and reaching for the crutches.

Henri was already at the door, tail wagging, apparently recovered from whatever mood had possessed him earlier. I gathered him into my arms and made my way outside.

The first thing I noticed was the fence.

It hadn't been there when I'd returned. I was certain of that. But now a chain-link barrier encircled the settlement, its metallic surface catching the fading light and throwing it back in dull glints. The posts stood straight and purposeful, the wire mesh stretched taut between them, and a gate had been installed at the main entrance with a latch that actually looked functional.

Nial's work. It had to be. While I'd been unconscious in my caravan, he and the others had transported the supplies from the Drop Zone and assembled them into something approaching protection. Hours of labour I'd slept through, contribution I'd failed to make.

The temporary fencing wouldn't stop a determined shadow panther — I wasn't naive enough to believe that. But it was a boundary. A statement. A line that said this space is ours.

For the first time since I'd arrived in this dimension, the camp looked less like a collection of desperate refugees and more like the beginning of something that might survive.

I made my way toward the campfire, the crutches finding easier purchase on the packed earth near the centre of camp. The flames had drawn the usual crowd. Paul stood near the fire, his face cast in flickering orange light that deepened the lines of exhaustion around his eyes. Luke and Beatrix were there too, their postures carrying the particular energy of people who'd just arrived from somewhere else.

Chris and Karen sat on the far side of the fire, close enough to share warmth but far enough that I could avoid direct eye contact without it seeming deliberate. I positioned myself on an empty crate at the fire's edge, settling Henri beside me and propping my crutches against my good leg.

The conversation was already underway.

"—feels a bit like a zoo here now," Luke was saying, his tone carrying an attempt at levity that didn't quite land.

Paul's sigh was audible even over the fire's crackle. "Except this time, I think we are the animals locked in the cage."

"I'm not so sure that the goat and chickens you've locked in the car and left out there would agree with you," Beatrix cut in, her voice dry.

I'd missed something, clearly. Goats and chickens? But the conversation was already moving on, Luke making promises about supplies and motorhomes, Beatrix nodding along, the rhythm of planning and logistics that had become the soundtrack of our existence.

"—you've got some skilled people here now," Luke was saying. "You'll have a little village built and buzzing with enthusiasm in no time."

I thought about Grant and Sarah, still believing they were on a two-week assessment trip. Thought about Adrian, too stoned to understand what had happened to him. Thought about all the "skilled people" Luke kept collecting, most of whom hadn't chosen to be here.

Buzzing with enthusiasm seemed like a stretch.

"Speaking of motorhomes and supplies," Paul said, and there was something in his voice that made me pay attention, "Luke can give you my house keys."

Luke nodded. "Yeah, I've got them all in a safe space."

"If Claire and the kids really have gone to Queensland, I doubt they'll return anytime soon." Paul's words carried a weight that went beyond their surface meaning. His family had left. Had chosen to leave, or been forced to leave, and now his house sat empty on Earth while he carved out a life in a dimension that shouldn't exist.

"You may as well bring anything from the house that looks useful," he continued, directing the statement at Beatrix.

I saw my opening.

"Include furniture with that," I interjected, hobbling forward with the crutches and inserting myself into their circle. The movement startled all of them — they'd been so absorbed in their conversation they hadn't noticed me approach. "I could really do with a good couch to rest my leg."

Luke's attention shifted to me, his brow furrowing as he took in the crutches, the careful way I was holding my weight. "Has it still not healed fully yet?"

The question shouldn't have stung as much as it did. He was just asking. Just curious. But something in his tone — the surprise, maybe, or the implicit assumption that supernatural healing should have sorted everything by now — scraped against wounds that went deeper than the ones on my calf.

"No." The word came out sharper than I'd intended, edged with a bitterness I couldn't quite suppress. "I don't seem to be as privileged as Joel."

Joel, who'd been resurrected at the lagoon. Joel, who'd walked out of that water whole and perfect and alive while I'd been left with a leg that might never work properly again. The comparison was unfair — Joel had died, actually died, which was rather worse than getting your calf torn open — but fairness had stopped mattering to me somewhere between the shadow panther attack and the assault I'd committed to earn my half-measure of healing.

Luke pressed on, apparently oblivious to the edge in my voice. "Any news on that front?"

I shook my head, the concern that had been gnawing at me since Uncle Jamie disappeared resurfacing with fresh intensity. Two days now. Two days since they'd gone hunting the Portal Pirate, and not a word, not a sign, not even a whisper of information about what had happened to them.

"We've not seen anything of Joel, Jamie, or Glenda," Paul added, his contribution doing nothing to ease the tension that was building in my chest.

"Give them a couple more days." Luke's response wavered, the uncertainty in his voice doing nothing to inspire confidence. He was trying to reassure us, but even he didn't seem to believe the words coming out of his mouth.

"And then what?" Beatrix's impatience cut through the platitudes. She stood with her arms crossed, her gaze fixed on Luke with an intensity that demanded answers he couldn't provide.

Luke shrugged, the gesture infuriatingly helpless.

Paul let out another of his heavy sighs, and I felt something inside me snap.

"You've really got no idea what you're doing, do you, Luke?" The words burst out before I could stop them, all the frustration and fear and exhaustion of the past days condensing into a single accusation. "You brought us here. Trapped us in this place. And now you can't even tell us what happens when our people don't come back?"

"It's not that easy," Beatrix snapped, stepping forward, her eyes blazing with a fierce protectiveness as she positioned herself between Luke and my anger.

"You don't have to tell me that," I retorted, shifting my weight on the crutches and nearly losing my balance in the process. The pain in my leg flared, a physical reminder of everything this place had already cost me. "I'm the one who nearly got eaten. I'm the one who—"

I stopped myself before I could say more. Before I could mention the lagoon, or Chris, or the things I'd done that no one else knew about.

"Enough!" Paul's voice cut through the growing animosity, loud enough to echo across the camp. The command in his tone demanded compliance, and despite myself, I felt my anger deflate slightly.

He was right. Fighting among ourselves accomplished nothing. Whatever problems I had with Luke's methods, whatever doubts I harboured about his competence, we were stuck together now. United by circumstance if not by choice.

I took a breath, forcing the tension out of my shoulders. The frustration hadn't gone anywhere — it was still there, coiled in my chest like something waiting to strike — but I pushed it down. Buried it with all the other things I couldn't afford to feel right now.

"And while I think of it," Paul continued, redirecting the conversation with the practiced ease of someone accustomed to managing difficult personalities, "my car is still parked at the Adelaide airport car park. Can you collect it for me and bring it here?"

The question was directed at Beatrix, a transparent attempt to steer us toward practical matters and away from the emotional minefield we'd been dancing through.

She gave me a final one-eyed glare — a warning, maybe, or just acknowledgment of the tension between us — before turning her attention back to Paul. "Sure." The word was clipped, reluctant, but at least she was cooperating.

Luke's face suddenly brightened, his eyes widening with that particular excitement that seemed to possess him whenever a new idea struck. "I am flying from Hobart to Adelaide first thing in the morning. I won't have time to collect Paul's car, but I can register a Portal location to make it easier for you, Beatrix."

"Thanks, but there's no need to fly, I've already registered several locations in Adelaide," Beatrix replied, her confidence a marked contrast to the uncertainty that had coloured the earlier conversation.

"Oh." Luke's enthusiasm deflated into thoughtful concentration, and I could practically see him recalculating whatever plans he'd been forming.

After a moment, his head rose, determination reasserting itself. "I've already got my flight booked. I may as well use it. Besides, I might find something useful at the airport. In any event, it'll give you a much closer point of entry for collecting Paul's car."

"All right," Beatrix agreed, apparently deciding the argument wasn't worth pursuing.

"What are you actually going to Adelaide for, Luke?" Paul's question carried a hint of suspicion, the protective concern of an older brother who'd learned to be wary of his sibling's schemes.

Luke hesitated, his eyes darting between Paul and Beatrix as if weighing the consequences of his answer. When he finally spoke, there was a confidence in his voice that hadn't been there before.

"I'm thinking I might bring our parents and siblings to Clivilius."

Beatrix gasped audibly. "Is that a good idea?"

But Paul — Paul surprised me. Instead of the objection I expected, his voice was steady, filled with a quiet conviction. "It'll be a lot more mouths to feed, but I think you're right. I think they could really help us here."

I watched the exchange with a growing sense of disconnect. Luke and Paul were planning to bring their entire family into this dimension. Parents, siblings, whoever else might be waiting in Adelaide. They were going to tear them away from their lives on Earth and deposit them here, in this place of shadow panthers and ancient entities and water that demanded impossible prices.

And they were doing it willingly.

"How many?" Beatrix asked, her eyes narrowing as she tried to calculate the logistics.

Paul turned to Luke. "Only Adelaide?"

"I think so, for now. Eli is still visiting Lisa in the United States."

The names meant nothing to me, but the implications were staggering. Luke had family scattered across the world, and he was already planning how to collect them. How to add them to his settlement. How to build something that looked increasingly like a kingdom with himself at its centre.

"Girlfriend?" Beatrix ventured.

"Sister," Luke and Paul responded in unison.

"Oh, you've got a big family," Beatrix remarked.

"Yep," they agreed together, and despite everything, I felt a pang of something that might have been envy.

A big family. Parents and siblings who could be collected and protected and brought together in one place. Luke had all of that waiting for him, and he was making plans to ensure they'd all survive whatever was coming.

What did I have?

Brianne. Our unborn daughter. Both of them trapped on the other side of a portal I couldn't cross, living lives that were continuing without me while I rotted here in the dust.

"Are you going to bring them to Bixbus tomorrow?" Paul asked.

Luke shrugged. "I'm not sure yet. I still haven't worked out the best way to approach them. Any ideas?"

Paul considered for a moment. "I suspect that all you need to do is find a way to convince Dad, and the rest will easily follow."

"Hmm," Luke mused, rubbing his chin. "I think you're onto something there."

The conversation continued, but my mind had begun to drift. I found myself staring into the flames, watching them dance and flicker, casting shadows that seemed to reach toward me with grasping fingers.

Jeffries Manor. The place I'd called home for most of my life. Eight of us crammed into that sprawling house, constantly underfoot, constantly bickering, constantly together in ways that had felt suffocating at the time and now felt like something I'd give anything to have back.

Mum. Dad. My brothers and sisters. All of them going about their lives on Earth, probably wondering what had happened to me. Probably worried sick, or maybe they'd already given up. Maybe they thought I was dead.

Maybe I was, in all the ways that mattered.

"Come on, Beatrix," Luke's voice broke through my reverie. "Let's get you these keys."

I watched them depart, their figures receding, and felt the weight of their departure settle over me like a physical burden. Luke was going to Adelaide. Going to collect his family, bring them here, give them a chance to survive whatever was coming.

And I would stay here. Trapped. Alone.

The contrast was almost too much to bear.

I thought of Brianne's smile. The way her freckles caught the light. The swell of her belly where our daughter was growing, getting bigger every day, approaching a birth I might never witness.

If I brought her here — if I somehow found a way to bring them both through the Portal — we could be together. Could face whatever came as a family, united against the darkness instead of separated by it.

Surely, it is worth the price.

The voice slithered into my consciousness without warning, familiar and unwelcome. Clive. The entity that lived in the water and the whispers, that had orchestrated my assault on Chris, that had shown me visions of paradise while demanding pieces of my soul in payment.

Light the fire. Share the light.

The words hung in my thoughts, dripping with something that might have been hope or might have been poison. I couldn't tell anymore. The line between Clive's manipulations and my own desperate longings had blurred until I wasn't sure which thoughts were mine and which had been planted there like seeds waiting to grow.

My gaze left the flames and swept across the settlers gathered around the campfire. These were my people now, whether I'd chosen them or not. Karen and Chris, sitting close but not touching, carrying secrets between them that I'd helped create. Nial, exhausted from a day of building walls that might or might not protect us. Paul, bearing the weight of leadership that had been thrust upon him without his consent.

My unchosen family.

Could we find solace in each other's arms? Could we build something here that was worth protecting, worth fighting for, worth the terrible prices this place demanded?

Or were we just pawns in Clive's game, destined to suffer the consequences of choices we didn't fully understand?

The mirage surfaced again — that vision of a thriving settlement where Brianne and our daughter were safe and happy. A sanctuary in the desert. A future that felt simultaneously possible and forever out of reach.

Light the fire. Share the light.

The words resonated with something deep inside me, something that wanted to believe they meant something good. That there was a path forward that didn't require betraying everything I valued. That hope wasn't just another trap waiting to snap shut.

With a hesitant resolve, I whispered the words aloud: "Let's do this."

The sound of my own voice startled me. The settlers around the fire continued their quiet conversations, oblivious to the internal battle I was fighting. Only Paul glanced in my direction, his expression questioning.

I met his gaze, feeling the fire's warmth against my face, feeling the crutches pressing into my palms, feeling the weight of every choice I'd made and every choice still waiting to be made.

Paul's brow furrowed, confusion and concern warring for dominance. He didn't understand what I was saying. Couldn't understand, because he didn't have Clive's voice whispering in his head, didn't carry the weight of bargains made and violations committed in the pursuit of survival.

But something in my expression must have communicated enough, because after a moment, he simply nodded.

The fire continued to burn, casting its light against the encroaching darkness.

And somewhere in the depths of my mind, Clive's presence stirred — satisfied, perhaps, or simply waiting.

The path ahead remained shrouded in uncertainty. The shadows within me mirrored the shadows that surrounded us. But for the first time since I'd arrived in this place, I felt something that might have been purpose.

Whether it was my own or Clive's, I couldn't say.

Maybe it didn't matter anymore.