Today we caught none. I don't even want to talk about it.
Today we caught one. What's to say? We just went out there, with Edie leading the way, and we found a loner, and we caught it, and we killed it, and I skinned it, and that was that. The rest of the day we just went around the streets, and I tried to do some talking to Edie, saying that I'd like to be a tracker one day, but she wouldn't talk back at me, just living in her own world, I guess. And Mr Bone says you don't get to be a tracker, kid, you have to be born a tracker, and Clingfilm said that was a pile of fuck. But what does he know? What does anybody know? Today we caught one.
Tonight we caught five. We did pretty good, and we were up for it, except we let one get away. That means we caught four. It's not the same as really catching four, because you never do, and that's that. It's just that one of them got away. That got Shiva mad, you bet. She hates it when they get away. And Clingfilm was cursing about the bonus again, when really it was all his fault that one got away. He was hiding behind the curses, even I can see that. But the strangest thing was when the one got away, and the four that were left went mad like, when they realized there was four of them, I suppose. Usually they come easy once they're caught, but these four went mad on us, and I was scared because I know that's how the Creeping Zero lost Wesley, catching five and letting one get away, and the four what's left going mad. But this time Shiva got them all. Got them good.
Today we caught none. I don't mind it. I was still shaken up from last night, and I can't stop thinking about Wesley now that I've started. I never met him, because I took his place. But all the crew, they go on about him, like he was brilliant or something, even though he got lost. I wish they wouldn't, because them going on like that means I'll have to be brilliant one day. I hope I am, one day, and that I get to be a top-notch tracker, but thinking about it just makes me shake even more. Today we caught none. Good.
Today we caught one. We did pretty good. Catching one ain't usually pretty good, but this time it was, because we had to keep it alive. Sometimes you have to do that, keep them alive. You get more money, so Clingfilm's happy. Mr Bone got word that the university wanted a live one, and so we had to be careful, because they would rather die than be kept alive. It's my first time at keeping one alive. It was a female. I wouldn't mind so much if it was a male, but it wasn't. It was a female. We had her tied up in the van, and all I could do was look at her struggling. I don't know, it's different. It's different close up. I thought it would be. I thought that close up it would be easy to tell, but it wasn't. Because she looked just like the rest of us. But, you know, beautiful. And that's why it was different. And Mr Bone says you have to be careful, thinking like that because them looking just like us is only the disguise. That's why Edie is so important, Mr Bone says, because without a tracker how would we ever know which to catch? And today we caught a live one.
Tonight we caught six. And everybody's going crazy good. But what is it, what's wrong? I can't stop thinking about yesterday and the one we kept alive, the female. Because why are we catching them? Nobody knows. I asked Mr Bone, he's the boss and he doesn't know. I asked Clingfilm and he said it's for the money, and I asked Shiva and she said it's just so we can kill them. And I asked Edie, and Edie didn't answer. And then Mr Bone says we shouldn't never ask that question, it's a stupid question, you might as well ask the moon why it keeps coming back every night. We just catch them, that's all. And tonight we caught six. And then I got to thinking about Wesley again, and why he went and got himself lost.
Tonight we caught two. Pretty good. Pretty bad. I don't know. Thinking about the girl, the female, I mean. And thinking about Wesley and the job and everything. There's only two ways to leave the job, so Shiva reckons. You can die, or you get lost. And you bet she said that dying is the best way, the only way, because getting lost is when you just walk out one night, away from the van, away from the crew, and you become one of them, one of the lost ones out there, wandering, wandering. Wandering until you get caught. But when I reminded her about Wesley, she just turned away and started messing with the gun. So I waited for the quiet time and I asked Mr Bone and he says you shouldn't be thinking about that. But Wesley got lost, I says. Yeah, Wesley got lost, and Mr Bone gets this look in him then. But he'll come back to us, he says. And I ask what that means. And he says, just like Edie came back to us.
Today we caught one, or was it two? I can't remember.
Tonight we caught some. I think we did. It's just that I can't stop looking at Edie now, knowing that she got lost, and then she came back, and now she's a tracker and can find the lost real easy. Maybe you have to get lost, to find the lost, to become a tracker. Maybe that's what Mr Bone meant when he said that you have to be born a tracker, because you certainly have to be born to get lost. And I'm scared, scared that I was born like that, with the losing inside me, and that one day I'll just walk clean away.
Tonight we caught something. What was it? The whole crew is damaged by the catching. Because ain't that the nightmare: to catch the ones who got lost and to have them turn around and not want to come back. Not like Edie, not like Edie came back with the tracking knowledge, but to just go crazy bad on us. It must be Wesley. It must be poor lost Wesley we caught, but Mr Bone won't mention it, and Edie's on the edge of something, and Shiva just sits there cleaning the gun like for ever, and Clingfilm won't even talk about the money any more, that bad. But we had a job to do. And we did it. We went out there and we caught it and we killed it and I dragged it back and I skinned it. We had a job to do.
Tonight we caught two and a half. We did pretty good and everybody's jumping because no-one's ever caught a half a one before. It's not really a half a one, that's just what we call them when they're in the changing state. Anyroads, it's very rare, so we're on for the bonus, most definitely. And everyone's saying I did brilliant, even Clingfilm, because I helped catch the half a one. It's the first one I ever caught, and it turned out real special. And then we just went floating through the night, and we was singing.
CRAWL TOWN
Old Tom Sharpsaw had this story that nobody ever left Crawl, that's why the cemetery was so crowded. That's why all the tombstones scratched up tight against each other. That's why the ground was so parched. That's why the housing estate was so rancid. That's why the food was so bad. That's why the buses always stopped at the edge of town. That's why we didn't have a football team. That's why the windows were always broken. That's why the roads curved around and kept meeting themselves halfway. That's why the sun worked like a fridge light, and the rain like a toilet flush. That's why all us girls wore sackcloth tracksuits. That's why the local library placed all the street-maps on the sex-education shelves. That's why the Town-Hall clock has only got one hand, and seven numbers. And it moves backwards. That's why, he'd say. That's why, that's why.