Chapter 53 Miles
Miles
Miles stares at it in amazement: the kākāpō.
For a moment, the sight of the bird is so miraculous and exotic that it strips away all thoughts of anything else.
It’s bigger and rounder than he imagined from Reubyn’s description.
The kākāpō is vibrantly feathered, with bright shades of lime and yellow, and flecked with black.
It has a curious beak: wide and hooked into a downward point.
Miles almost doesn’t dare to breathe, for fear of frightening it away, but it seems completely unalarmed.
It’s a puzzling sight, the bird’s calmness.
But then Miles remembers what Reubyn told him about this species.
They don’t recognise their predators. The bird turns its head to look at him, and barely reacts, just continues on its haphazard path, lumbering heavily from foot to foot, doddery and oblivious to danger.
‘Do you see it?’ he whispers to Faith, without taking his eyes off the bird. She doesn’t respond; presumably, she hasn’t heard him or is as transfixed as he is – stunned into silence.
He’d like to take a photo or video, but his phone is dead. ‘Faith,’ he says, a little louder, his eyes still fixed on the kākāpō. ‘Can you get a video?’
Still, she says nothing. The kākāpō pecks at something on the ground, then carries on, unperturbed, in its curious and clumsy motion.
There’s a clicking noise behind him, metal on metal.
‘Faith,’ Miles says, turning to face her, ‘can you take a—’
The sight of her shocks him into silence. His next instinct, a split second later, is to laugh. But his laugh only half emerges. Because he’s realised: this isn’t a joke. The blood freezes in his veins.
The look of anger and determination on Faith’s face isn’t for show. It’s real. And so, he suspects, is the gun she’s pointing at him.