mean it, don't you? In, like, a global sense.”
“Yes. But it's more than just us versus whoever wants us gone.” I nod around at the other passengers. “Everyone is contributing to the disease that is slowly wiping us out. These companies think they can fix things with GMO seeds and new pesticides, but they don't have the long view. They're denying what the rest of humanity is doing every day.”
“Doing what?”
“You're killing the planet, Mere. All of you. It's ecocide.”
EIGHTEEN
Once we reach Rapa Nui, we pass through customs at Mataveri International Airport without much trouble. The agent inspecting our single suitcase raises an eyebrow at our minimalist packing until I say the word “honeymoon” and glance suggestively at Mere, who has the good grace to blush appropriately. The agent smirks, his eyes lingering on Mere's breasts, and stamps our passports, a quaint custom that hasn't gone out of style on Rapa Nui. It's the first real mark of approval these papers have seen.
Outside the airport, the air is warm and turgid. I have a headache from all the sun, and I collapse on the hard seats in the back of a cab, leaning to the side so that my head is out of the direct sunlight. I'm wearing my optics and they're dialed all the way down. I hear Mere ask the cabbie to take us to the best hotel on the island. “Yes,” she says in response to his reply. “The Hanga Roa Royal Resort is fine.”
The car lurches off, and we ride in silence for a few minutes. The windows of the cab are rolled down, and there is little breeze. The scent of Mere's skin wafts through the cab.
“Are they all like that?” she asks suddenly. “Looking inland.”
I don't have to open my eyes to know what she's talking about. The moai, one of the impassive stone heads the island is known for.
I grunt enough of a response for her to know I'm listening.
“I've seen pictures,” she says, “but it's a matter of context, I guess. You see the heads, and you know they're on an island and that they're remnants of some strange Cargo Cult religion. You just assume, I guess, that they're all facing outward.”
“They were tribute, built by the natives in recognition of the clan leaders,” I tell her. “Kind of like the pyramids in Egypt. Most of the moai were knocked over and broken shortly after the European discovery of the island. Inter-clan conflicts. You tend to break the other team's stuff, you know?”
She slaps my leg playfully and her touch is almost enough to get me to open my eyes. “Men,” she says. “It never changes, does it?”
I think of the reasons why the Achaeans came east, their army covering the Plain of Skamandros like black ants. “No, it doesn't.”
* * *
The day clerk at the hotel finds us a mid-sized suite on the inland side of the hotel, and I hang back as Mere crosses to the heavy curtains and pulls them open. There's a sliding door behind them, and a narrow balcony. Mere opens the door and lets the warm air in as she steps out onto the balcony. The sun is a hand's-width over the horizon—the ragged edge of the dome of Rano Kau, one of the three volcanoes that make up the island. Lightening my optics a few clicks, I step up to the sliding glass door, bracing myself for what I'm going to see, what I've been avoiding.
But I have to.
“You look like someone ran over your dog,” she says when she notices my expression.
“This island used to be covered with trees,” I sigh. “I knew there had been a collapse, but I hadn't been…” I hadn't been paying attention.
“What are you, the Lorax?” She means the question as a joke, but it comes off too brittle, too close to the truth, and I can tell she regrets the jab as soon as she says it.
I've been trying to remember when I was here last, and my memory has holes. Has it been that long? When did the Dutch discover the island? Seventeenth century? Eighteenth?
“This used to be covered with a forest of broadleaf trees.” I sweep my arm to indicate the nearby hills, covered with green grasses. “Toromiro and palm trees.” I lean heavily against the frame of the door. “It takes more than a hundred years for the palms to grow to their full height. Why didn't they replant? Why was this place abandoned?”
“By who?”