Real life in the TIME of Digital Nomadism

               “Mirage–” when then dust subsided around his Kawasaki KL650, he lifted his Araihelmet visor, used the grittyHeadwareto rub the heavy sweat layer from his eyes.

               As he swung his head back around he saw shimmering heat-waves rising up wherever he looked even as he also realised it was now almost sundown. Then he scanned back up the steep rise he’d just passed: “Sure’s still there, though–skinny little thing, scrunched up, right on top of that big bluff. Man, that long blonde-white hair, all tangled up, blowin’ out behind her in this dry desert-sea wind. Nice –skin’s shiny — all-over. Sort of – multi-coloured?”

               “Gone. Yup, she’s a mirage.” He re-started the bike, moved up closer, circling almost right round the big knoll this time, then stopped abruptly. As at one point it went straight down 60 metres or so, right into the excited sea. Once more he looked around, then up again and then nodded, grinned ruefully: “Gotta be more careful–must be dehydrated, seeing things like that. Maybe heat exhaustion — and a pretty little lady, too — that’s a first!”

He’d been alternatively riding and grid-sampling all day, “Guess it’s understandable, out in this hot sun, after 5am start today. Forgot to keep the darn water levels up after I stopped to eat.” Scanning about, he found a safe vantage point where he could still see right out over the sea, he could sleep snug up against this bluff. He backed up the bike.

“Tomorrow I might take a few rock chips off you, big, old bluff.” He looked up, searching again for that strange and beautiful apparition. Thought, “I’ll get a bit of rest, sleep-in tomorrow. Then scout round — it’s pretty alright up here.” He scanned the horizon, smiled, relaxed: “Can see for miles. Come morning I’ll stay here till I load that next grid-sector and check what I’ve got down so far.” He dismounted, stretched, leaned back against the chalky, white, hot stone bluff: “Out of that wicked wind here.” And smiled: I’ll be facing the sunrise.”

               He woke at first light, then lay there, consciously relaxing in his swag for a while. When he sat up he gazed out on a completely serene sea where that just-rising sun picked out and flashed against sets of superb, long, lazy waves as far below him they ambled into the wide bay below, with a fine, shining spray, all sticking out like a crew-cut. Each tip flying off as it curled in a playful breeze: “Perfect slabs” he thought, as his practiced eye ran along those inviting waves. Then he started, looked more closely: “There she is.” The girl. Surfing. Naked. No, almost, in a tiny string bikini. He leaned back, took in that scene with sheer pleasure. Totally at home on her board in those big, big waves,  hair streaming out again, though now lashing about behind her, glinting in the sun and matching the shine on the waves. “An absolute natural, no doubt about that.” He was pleased: “She’s no apparition, that’s one super-fit surfie-chick.” He leaned sideways against the rockface as somewhere on her body he saw another glint: “Ah, it’s metal” he thought: “she’s wearing some jewellery. It’s catching those bright sunrays, too, and making those rainbows.”

               “But what’s she doing way out here?” He rose, stretched, stepped out of his swag, lean, fit, naked, and moved closer to the edge. To where he could see down into the bay’s sparkling white beach: “No one. She’s alone?” he wondered to himself as he scanned along the entire sand: “it’s a long way from anywhere, out here.” For more than half an hour after he put on some shorts and T and came back and then leaned again against the big rock-face, he watched her. Then, while he was scanning the horizon, and the cloudless skies, and thinking about his beloved work: “I really like this new group. They’ve allocated the whole week for me to finish this grid”, he thought, “I’m already ahead, and” — suddenly he saw she had done another disappear.

He leaned out over the cliff-tip again but could not see her. Though he saw her board drawn up and deposited firmly and securely between two big rocks on the beach. Near a shallow cave, really just a hollow and where a little stream ran from there to the sea.

               He smiled happily: “Fresh water! Maybe. So, if the sampling goes as well today, then early tomorrow morning I can stay here and figure out a way down there.” He continued this train of thought as he scanned along the ridge: “Might do a little near-beach body-surfing myself. Good thing I brought my flippers, googles. Take the knife, bag, too. See if I can pry off some oyster breakfast and fill the water tank.” He tidily rolled up his swag but left it where it was and then made some light breakfast from his saddle-bags. 20 minutes later he was one the bike and away and into his day’s work.

Just before nightfall he gathered some firewood, cooked a few eggs. Salt, pepper a tomato and strong billy-tea. He slept a perfect sleep, awoke again early, refreshed and energized. Immediately dressed very lightly, filled up his backpack, found an easy descent down the cliff. Soon he too was enjoying the surf. The waves came in over a big heap of rocks, but he was a strong surfer so they presented little difficulty. After an hour or so, and during a lull in the wave-sets he lay back, floated in the water, looked up at the cliff, enjoying the sheer pleasure of the clear, fresh, cold water and the sheer natural beauty of this arid, unfamiliar landscape. Then sat up: “There she is” Above — right where he’d camped, and left his bike, computer, gear — “now she’s the one looking down at me.” No wind today, so her hair, still tangled, golden-white, hung down past her waist, and again he saw that metallic flash, now quite big. After he gathered and ate a couple of dozen oysters off the rocks, he returned across the sand, filled his water container, drank some and then sat on the edge of her surfboard where it sat between the rocks on the sand. “Nice,” he thought, softly running his hands down the board: “Expensive, four fins, brand new – she hasn’t had this long.” She watched him.

               Then he rapidly climbed the cliff, walked to his campsite. No one. He looked around, no evidence of her. Nothing disturbed, all just as he’d left it.  Again, he rode off, worked throughout another day, further away, all the while half-thinking about the girl. “Way out here on this desert coast and on her own?” By now he really wanted to meet her. “So, tomorrow morning–” What could he do? — Nothing. “Tonight I can spend camped at that rock but tomorrow I have to go way further down the big block of land that’s been allocated to grid and sample. Or I won’t do it right.”

               When he awoke to the next bright and early morning, he found her sitting on the rock. He stood up, pulled the sheet around his body — up close she looked amazing, even more so than at a distance. Her string bikini enhanced her beautiful form: “What?” He could see her bikini though she was fully covered in some type of thick blanket. Which had energy, shimmered and glistened as it changed from skin colour to many different hues, and textures, and pulsated at the same time, lengthening and contracting. “A solar blanket?” he wondered. Whatever it was, it was special.

               “Hello” she said.

He replied:

“What’s that amazing thing you’ve got ‘round you?” She moved ever so slightly, and the blanket slipped fully off, down from her shoulders, spread out onto the rock. She looked at it there.

“My boyfriend adapted this, it’s Mantel. He also adapted my body, so Mantel fits here.” She held up her other arm, till then out of sight. Then he really saw what that metallic flash was. Her arm: a complicated prosthesis from shoulder socket almost right down to her hand, with a big oval socket in her back, towards the shoulder blade.

“Wow. Nice.” He looked around: “Is your boyfriend way out here, too, then?” She looked calmly at him:

“No, I’m way out here by myself. He’s always with me, though – he died out there- ” she gestured out over the waves: “Where he wanted. Surfing.”

               He thought about that for a minute, then said: “So, you gonna come down? Want some breakfast — tomatoes, eggs and sardines – tinned? Then I’ve gotta go — leaving this morning, about an hour or so. I’m Robbie.”

She’d slid swiftly all the way down a smooth curve of the big bluff, and lightly dropped to the ground. Fearless.

“Thanks,” She put out her hand: “Pearla” he shook it, folded one of his blankets to make her a cushion, then glanced up the rock: “You left your blanket behind. Let me go get it for you.” She looked at him, shook her head: “Mantel’s fine, he’s made his own way down to the sea by now – through the guts of the rock. He can slide through any tiny crack, you see. He’s gotta get back in the water, now – been out a coupla hours.”

               He nodded as they scouted around for some wood, and he quickly lit the fire, then looked seawards: “Wow. So, Pearla, your boyfriend, who was he – to make stuff like that, and this?”  He indicated her arm.

“AI, medico, marine, scientist.”As he quickly tipped butter, eggs, tomatoes, some chilli and the last of his bread into the pan he said, “And what happened to you?”

 She looked down. “Ah. I’ve been surfing since I was 10, and after I survived about 20 drownings, the sea finally got really mad one day, and I ripped off more than skin. On those rocks you took the oysters off yesterday. When my boyfriend put my arm back together he re-built me so I can survive under water for long periods.” She lifted her arm and showed him the socket, with pride: “This is where Mantel fits, so I can breathe using his huge air streams.”

               “Mantel–you mean that amazingly beautiful thing you were wearing this morning, up there on the rock?” As he handed her a tin plate with half the hot food, and a fork he noticed her skin was cold. Even though by now the sun was already extremely hot. Then he saw her eyes fully open and gazing at him. An extraordinary green. Horizontal pupils.

He gulped: “Did you damage your eyes too — though they are really beautiful?”  She ate immediately.

“Yes, Mantel, and No, my eyes are another type of bonus. I wish he could see what happened after he joined me and Mantel up.” He was running out of time:

“So, help me here”, he smiled, “Your boyfriend didn’t make Mantel?” She looked up at him, smiled, watched his face closely, now: “Mantel was my boyfriend’s other best friend. He looks after me now. My boyfriend fixed me up, and at the same time joined Mantel and me. We’re a symbiotic partnership. You know?”

He put down his plate, looked at her: “Um, I don’t get it?” 

She smiled: “Mantel’s a Giant Pacific octopus. About 5 years old now, which is as long as they normally survive. This socket joins me to his air, and Mantel to my heart. Now Mantel’s gonna live as long as I do. Provided we stay by the sea.”

They sat and ate in silence, then.

               “So, are you out here all the time?” he asked her.

“Only leave when I have to. So yes, about 90% of the time I’m here, I guess. Why? This is home.”

END