Luxury Coop

“In Clivilius, you learn fast: if it has a roof and doors, it’s shelter. Even if it used to be a BMW.”

The sudden arrival of Paul shattered the quiet rhythm of the late afternoon, his energy practically crackling as he burst into camp. I was seated by the bonfire, the flames licking lazily at the dry air. The heat from it was comforting, almost meditative—an anchor in a world that still refused to feel entirely real.

“Karen!”

His voice cut clean through the haze, sharp with urgency. I sat up straighter without thinking, the muscles in my back tightening reflexively, every sense sharpening like a lens clicking into focus.

“I need a favour.”

“Sure, Paul. What’s up?” I replied, my curiosity immediately piqued. There was something in his tone—an odd mixture of excitement and restraint—that made me think of children just barely containing the thrill of a secret.

“We’ve got some new residents,” he said, and I caught the briefest twitch at the corners of his mouth. It wasn’t quite a smile—something stranger, more layered. “A goat named Vincent and a bunch of hens from Yunta.”

The words hung there, absurd and weighty all at once.

For a moment, my brain hesitated. It was like feeding the wrong variables into a field algorithm—nothing resolved properly. A goat? Hens? Here? The image refused to settle into anything coherent.

“You’re kidding!” My voice lifted with the same bewildered amusement I might’ve used had he told me he’d found a camel in the mess tent.

Paul’s expression answered for him: a slow, wry smile that reached his eyes and curled there, half in mischief, half in resignation. “I wish I was. Beatrix just brought them in. We need to get them settled somewhere,” he added, exhaling like a man caught in the absurd orbit of someone else’s grand plan.

A soft chuckle escaped me as I leaned forward and placed my mug carefully on the table beside me. The ceramic made a gentle clink against the sun-bleached timber, oddly grounding amidst the surrealism of our conversation. The idea of integrating a goat and hens into the stark geometry of our camp was, unexpectedly, comforting. There was something deeply human in it—an echo of farms and fencelines and warm breath in cold morning air.

For a moment, I glanced back at the drink I’d set down, half wondering if any tiny opportunists might claim it in my absence. The image of ants lining the rim or a fly drifting lazy circles above the surface came unbidden—scenes so familiar they lived in muscle memory.

But here, there was nothing. No drones of wings, no scuttling lines across the ground. No flies. No ants. Just silence and the slow hiss of wind dragging dust across the dry skin of Clivilius.

It struck me again, as it so often did, how unnaturally still this world remained. Like a stage set moments before the actors take their places—complete in form, but void in essence.

And now, somehow, we had livestock.

Energised by the absurd but oddly welcome task ahead, I pushed myself up from the seat by the fire. My muscles groaned in protest, stiff from crouching too long and cooled slightly by the approaching lateness of the day. I rubbed the small of my back out of habit, already picturing what awaited us.

“Alright, let's do this,” I said, brushing off my trousers. A flicker of anticipation stirred in my chest, tempered by a flicker of logistical doubt. “But where do we put them? We don’t exactly have any secure enclosures.”

Paul’s eyes lit up almost immediately, catching the firelight like flint. That look—half spark, half dare—was becoming familiar. He had a knack for strange, almost reckless improvisation, and more often than not, it worked.

“How about Glenda’s BMW?” he said, unable to suppress the grin breaking across his face. “It’s secure, and it’s not like she’s using it right now.”

I stared at him. For a heartbeat, I thought he might be joking. But no—he was entirely serious, delight flickering in his expression like a boy who’d just thought of building a rocket out of garden furniture.

Under any other circumstances, the thought of housing livestock in a luxury vehicle would’ve been laughable—sacrilege, even. The sort of thing that might earn you a formal letter from the Council and a scathing editorial in The Tasmanian Observer. But here in Clivilius, where logic bent like light through warped glass, it almost seemed sensible.

I barked out a laugh, a real one—unexpected and unfiltered. “A BMW coop? Why not!” I said, still grinning. “It’s the safest place for them tonight, especially with no fences up yet.”

There was no trace of irony in our decision. Just the quiet, matter-of-fact resolve that necessity demands.

We walked side by side towards the vehicle, our boots crunching softly against the sunbaked dirt.

As we slipped into the front seats, the engine turned over with surprising ease, purring beneath us like a machine far too refined for its new purpose. Paul navigated slowly, carefully, easing the car across uneven terrain with a driver’s instinct and a showman’s flair.

I turned slightly towards him. “So, how did we end up with a goat and chickens?”

His answer came in a flurry of animated gestures and breathless retellings—Beatrix’s impromptu rescue operation, stealthily kidnapping them from the back of an old man’s ute. Apparently the goat Vincent was facing an imminent execution.

As he spoke, I pictured the scene in vivid fragments: Beatrix, determined and dirt-smudged, coaxing reluctant hens into the boot of a car; Vincent the goat bleating his objection with theatrical flair.

I shook my head, half-smiling, half-incredulous. The image of it all was as vivid as a fever dream.

If Beatrix is going to rescue every animal she comes across, I mused silently, watching the sunlight glint across the bonnet, we’re going to need more than just the help of Grant and Sarah.

A sardonic thought flickered across my mind. We’ll be needing an entire wildlife team before long.

And yet, strange as it was, it felt good—this peculiar blend of chaos and care. A goat named Vincent. Chickens in a BMW. Life, finding its way, even here.

---

Arriving at the Drop Zone, the scene that met us was so surreal I had to blink twice to be sure I wasn’t hallucinating. Vincent the goat, utterly unfazed, ambled about as if he owned the place, each casual step kicking up small clouds of ochre dust that hung lazily in the still air. His expression—if goats could be said to have one—was one of contented indifference, tail flicking idly as he nosed at a cracked crate with philosophical curiosity.

The hens were another matter entirely. Scattered across the dusty clearing, they pecked industriously at the barren ground, scratching and strutting like entitled explorers mapping a blank continent. Feathers fluffed in the dry breeze, their tiny movements gave a flickering illusion of life reawakening in a place that had long forgotten the meaning of it.

Then came the moment of improvisation.

Paul swung open the backdoor of Glenda’s BMW with the flourish of a man unveiling a masterpiece. The sleek, charcoal-grey interior gleamed under the enduring sunlight, leather seats pristine and laughably inappropriate for what was about to occur. The contrast was too much. I stood there for a moment, absorbing it—the intersection of luxury engineering and rustic necessity—and the image landed like a punchline.

It was like watching someone ladle soup into a champagne flute.

I folded my arms, already suppressing a grin as the hens turned their collective attention to our approach. And then, as if on cue, the performance began.

The chickens, now fully aware that relocation was imminent, adopted the air of rebellious schoolchildren refusing to board the bus. Every attempt to corner one dissolved into clouds of dust and frustrated flailing. Their movements were sharp, calculated, almost smug—like they'd rehearsed this exact evasion drill.

“Got any experience with chicken catching, Paul?” I asked, my voice dry with amusement as I watched him stumble after a wiry brown hen that darted just beyond reach, tail feathers fluttering like bunting in the breeze.

“Not exactly part of my skillset,” he huffed, trying to wipe the sweat from his brow with the back of a dusty forearm. “But how hard can it be?”

Apparently, the chickens took offence.

They scattered like pinballs, zipping between booted feet, flapping indignantly at any attempted grasp. One particularly spry hen seemed determined to make an example of Paul. With a series of deft manoeuvres that would’ve impressed any football coach, it zipped between his legs, doubled back, and somehow leapt with surprising grace onto his shoulders.

For one ridiculous moment, she perched triumphantly atop his head, wings outstretched like a feathered crown. Paul spun on the spot, arms flailing, trying to dislodge her as she clucked indignantly—more theatre than threat.

He looked, briefly, like a man trying to exorcise a very angry hat.

The laugh built in my throat faster than I could swallow it. I bit my lip hard, shoulders shaking as I fought for composure. Tears threatened the corners of my eyes as the sheer absurdity of it washed over me—Clivilius, the barren void, the sunburnt dust... and here we were, attempting to herd chickens into a BMW.

Somehow, against every rational expectation, it felt like the most human moment I’d had in days.

Not one to be outdone, I threw myself into the fray with renewed determination, rolling up my sleeves and muttering something half-defiant under my breath. I’d wrangled hens before—back on our land in Collinsvale, they’d often wandered into the garden beds or slipped through poorly latched gates. I knew their rhythms. I knew their habits.

Or so I thought.

These hens, however, bore no resemblance to the waddling, half-domesticated creatures of my past. They were wiry and lean, their movements lightning-quick and unpredictable. Survival had sharpened them into cunning little escape artists, and they navigated the Drop Zone like it was a battlefield they’d already mapped out.

They zigzagged across the open ground with startling agility, talons throwing up dust in delicate puffs as they twisted and dodged with the finesse of trained athletes. Every lunge I made seemed to feed their enthusiasm, their feathers ruffling dramatically in their wake as they flaunted each narrow escape.

At one point, I managed to corner one—a bold, speckled hen with a sharp glint in her eye—between a stack of large boxes. My arms were outstretched, knees bent, poised like a goalkeeper bracing for the penalty shot.

She held my gaze for a half-second, calculating. I leaned in, heart pounding with anticipation.

And then—

With a flap and a flurry, she launched herself upwards, wings beating against the still air as she sailed clean over my outstretched arms. I gasped, staggered forward, and lost my footing entirely, landing with a graceless thud on the hard-packed ground. Dust billowed around me. The hen strutted off nonchalantly, tail feathers high, pausing only to ruffle her plumage in what I could only interpret as smug satisfaction.

Sprawled on hands and knees, I stared up at the pale, indifferent sky, blinking against the sun. My dignity, like the hen’s feathers, had taken a proper shaking.

Paul came into view above me, hands on his knees, panting and grinning in disbelief. Our eyes met, and for a beat, we just stared—utterly defeated, utterly absurd.

Then came the laughter.

It rose from both of us like steam venting from a pressure valve—first a chuckle, then something deeper, shaking our ribs and bending us at the waist. The sound echoed strangely across the emptiness, a bright and ridiculous counterpoint to the eerie stillness of Clivilius.

We must have looked unhinged: two dusty, dishevelled adults, chasing chickens round an abandoned vehicle as if the fate of the colony depended on it. Hair tousled, knees scuffed, egos slightly bruised.

“Wait,” I said suddenly, cutting through our mirth as the idea struck with unexpected clarity. I straightened up, dusting myself off as the mental pieces slid neatly into place. “What if we lure them in with some food?”

I turned to Paul, eyes wide with the simplest sort of revelation—the kind that always feels obvious after it lands.

He paused, then gave a short laugh, nodding as his breath caught. His face was flushed and still shining with exertion, but there was a flash of real admiration behind his grin. Relief, too. That we might finally gain the upper hand without another feathered fiasco.

Sometimes, it turned out, intellect did trump instinct.

The brief walk back to camp was, in truth, something of a reprieve. My breath came more evenly now, the burn in my thighs beginning to ease as I moved through the still air at a gentler pace. After the farcical chaos of the Drop Zone, the relative quiet was a balm—a chance to recalibrate, to let my mind catch up with the absurdity of what we were doing.

It felt like an intermission in a particularly lively play, the curtain drawn briefly to allow the actors to wipe the sweat from their brows and plot the next act. My own role, apparently, had shifted from reluctant livestock wrangler to tactical strategist.

Reaching the edge of camp, I slipped into the supply tent and began my small-scale foraging. It didn’t find much. But I arranged it in a shallow tray like some rustic approximation of a gourmet buffet—an enticing spread designed to appeal to the discriminating taste buds of our feathered adversaries.

Before leaving, I grabbed one of the makeshift fire torches—just a length of piping with a fuel-soaked cloth bound at one end, crudely efficient but reliable. The light was already beginning to thin at the edges, the long shadows of Clivilius creeping steadily across the camp like a slow, inevitable tide.

We’d been chasing hens for longer than I’d realised.

And the last thing either of us needed was to be caught fumbling around in the dark with a flock of recalcitrant poultry. It would shift from farce to horror in a heartbeat—a low-budget survival film where the hunters became the hunted, eyes glowing in the torchlight, wings flapping with theatrical menace.

I tucked the torch beneath my arm, balancing the tray of scavenged offerings with both hands, and began the walk back with renewed purpose. It was a bizarre scenario, yes. But in the grand scheme of Clivilius, it barely registered on the scale of strange anymore.

Still, part of me hoped the hens would see reason. I wasn’t sure I had another round in me.

---

Returning to the Drop Zone, I moved with quiet purpose as I laid out our humble trail. Each offering—seeds, scraps, half-dried grains—was placed with deliberation, forming a winding path that led directly into the rear of Glenda’s BMW. It looked absurd, like some post-apocalyptic retelling of Hansel and Gretel, the breadcrumbs now replaced with dog biscuits and the gingerbread house swapped for a luxury vehicle in the middle of a barren world.

Paul stood nearby, silent for once. The faint hiss of wind moved through the surrounding wreckage, but otherwise the Drop Zone was still. Together, we took a few paces back, crossing our arms, our fingers, our hopes. Our breath caught in collective anticipation, as if the slightest noise might break the spell.

To our delight—and no small measure of amusement—the hens, those irrepressible bundles of feathers and attitude, began to take notice. Their heads bobbed with curiosity, eyes sharp despite the approaching evening. One by one, they approached the trail, their talons scratching softly against the dust as they tested the terrain.

Their behaviour was almost cautious at first, like diners inspecting a menu. But hunger—or perhaps simply instinct—soon won out. Peck by peck, they advanced along the makeshift buffet, their bodies swaying gently with each step, confidence returning with every bite.

The first hen reached the open hatch of the BMW and paused. She gave the leather upholstery a suspicious glance, then, with a small hop and the ruffle of her wings, crossed the threshold. The others followed in a curious procession, heads turning this way and that, feathers brushing against the leather seats like accidental strokes in a surrealist painting.

Paul grinned beside me, and his voice broke the quiet with a warm, easy lilt. “Looks like we’ve found our chicken whisperer,” he said, his eyes twinkling with mirth and the faint glow of satisfaction.

I smiled, watching as the last of our wayward hens stepped gingerly into the vehicle. Her tail feathers gave a final twitch as she vanished into the shadowed interior, and with that, our mission was complete.

We moved cautiously, closing the doors with care, ensuring the windows remained slightly ajar—just enough to allow circulation, but not so wide as to risk opportunistic scavengers. Even here, in a world that seemed devoid of predators, I found it impossible to abandon precaution. Old instincts, like roots, ran deep.

“This has got to be the most expensive chicken coop in history,” I said with a wry laugh. The ridiculousness of it all—the plush leather seats, the hens now roosting on climate-controlled upholstery—struck me fully, and for a moment, it was bliss to lean into the absurdity.

Paul laughed too, but the edge of his smile wavered. A subtle crease formed between his brows. “I hope Glenda has a sense of humour,” he said, glancing at the car with something like guilt threading through the amusement.

I paused, hearing the unspoken part of that sentence. The part neither of us wanted to dwell on too long.

“We’ll clean it up before she finds out,” I said gently, my tone light, though a quiet unease had already begun to settle low in my chest. In truth, I wasn’t entirely convinced Glenda would be returning any time soon. No one said it aloud, but we all felt the growing stretch of her absence.

It lingered at the edge of things, that gnawing awareness—the way shadows cling just beyond the reach of torchlight.

But now wasn’t the time to sink into worry. Not yet.

“Let’s just hope the chickens don’t go for a joyride,” I added with a laugh, conjuring the ludicrous image of Vincent the goat navigating and a hen riding shotgun, wind ruffling their feathers as they cruised across the empty flats of Clivilius.

It was nonsense, of course. But for a moment, it was enough to lift the weight.