Contact Tracer

Janice coughed behind her mask and they shot her. Slumping to a defeated heap upon the 1.5 metre social distance sticker she occupied. All I could hear was the whistling of the peak hour city rail train and the business as usual monotone of the train carriage announcer “masks are mandatory on all railway trains and platforms. Non-compliance will not be tolerated”. I never knew why or how I became this way but all I knew was that when shit hit the proverbial fan I sprung into action. Some people freeze. Turned to stone by shock or a synapse overload of conscious decisions. But me, my hands just start working, as if I were brushing my teeth or turning on the television.

I slid quickly over to Janice’s side, she wasn’t breathing, I could already tell there was no rise and fall of her chest beneath the standard white Bonds tee and blue overalls of Sydney colony 5’s hygiene specific workwear. Reaching under my own shirt I felt for a fragment of metal, hearshapped, outdated, a memento of a life I left long ago - pulling it free from my neck with force the clasp broke away and with a second crunch on the train carriage floor the locket activated, a stern instructional voice singing out - “attach wires to patients bare chest” - I quickly unshackled the left and right shoulders of Janice’s overalls, her lifeless expression was all that focused me, flipping down the front denim panel I took to the base of her white tee, tearing it open and apart. There was no one around, City Rail guards long gone, privacy wasn’t a factor, and hell you can only have two people per carriage these days. I placed the first wire on her lower left side, near her oblique muscle and the second on her upper right breast, below her collarbone - the heart-shaped locket rang out again - “analysing heart rhythm stand clear of patient” - kneeled and poised like a cat I waited heavily on the next automation to determine Janice’s future - “shock advised, press the lightning button now” - “shock delivered, analysing heart rhythm” - it was over, her heart had endured to much, I tore the wire strings free from Janice’s chest and pocketed the locket - the train hurtled to a stop similarly as the realisation washed over me that Janice wasn’t getting off at Greensquare Station with me tonight, nor ever again for that matter.

This was my chance. “Greensquare Station” - the carriage doors slid open and a Contact Tracer round pinged past my head ricocheting off the outdated 2000’s carriage metal fixtures- I primed two feet against the back of the carriage wall and pushed off sliding over the gap between platform and train and between the two Contact Tracers inspecting our carriage pre transfer. “Get back here GS2017 Brown, we reviewed your carriage footage, we know what you have done” - “yeah fuck that” I yelled back as I clambered to my feet and made haste for the off platform stairwell spitting down at them as I put foot to pavement “You tools would pin anything on anyone these days if it meant less expenditure”. Bolting hard up the double stairwell, 32 steps, I knew it well, I made for the ticket sensor strips. The place was deserted, standard protocol. They must be holding the other trains. I know how these Tracers think and that is slow, yet clinical, Tracer, that’s what they used to call me, but that was another life, as I quickly approached the tap on ticket sensors I placed both hands either side upon the cold metal and flung myself over the hard plastic gateway, the City Rail attendant sitting behind the glass monitoring the escalators yelled “You cannot do that” as he slammed a duress assist button above his head - I was panting hard now, my facemask sucking against my lips on every exacerbated breath, the Tracers wouldn’t have moved, watching this all unfold on their touchscreen phones via live feed surveillance camera loops. One City Rail attendant stood at the base of the escalator, obstructing my path, about six foot four and built like a brick shithouse, he towered. I reached into my pocket rustling for the now knotted locket chain, I swung it around the back of my head and with a swift strike the metal made contact with the back of the attendant’s skull, out, and so was I. All that remained before me was a flat mezzanine, about 300 metres worth and a single 52 step stairwell. Un-manned, this was the easy part. I glided up the escalator, across the mezzanine, got half way up the stairwell and I saw the crisp black night’s sky, framed by the entrance to Greensquare Station. I traversed the final step and stuck my head out in the entrance in a stride and I felt it. A gloved hand covered my mouth and pulled me around the corner into darkness.

“Quiet GS2017 Brown, I mean babe” my rigid posture relaxed at those words. It was your father. “Don’t say anything now, they closed all non-essential businesses, our place was raided and is still being watched. They want you back”. I turned around to face him, flicking away the hand still covering my mouth, “seems like such a large operation for a little old me”. “Please take this more seriously, it’s not just you and I anymore, we have another to consider”. I cupped my left hand on my abdomen looking down then met his eyes in a smile which could be felt from beneath our masks and I nodded. “They killed Janice Ian, the camera morphed into a pistol and just shot her in the train carriage” - “she was a non-essential, not even a frontline worker, I am surprised she remained undiscovered in the last local government area lockdown to be honest”. Your father was steely and unencumbered by painful experience, desensitised, some of the many reasons why I loved him. Ian saw the hopeless inaction of government officials and its potential for disaster well before anyone and it’s probably why we are still alive. He kept us on track and gathered others to join our resistance.

I had been caught up in the rigmarole of metropolitan city life in late 2019 before I met him. I wanted to make something of myself in the corporate private sector. I was working for NSW Health’s advanced pandemic research division alongside Australia’s leading virologists, the likes of which had worked on SARS years prior. My role was documenting foreign aid worker’s movements through remote villages in China’s Wuhan province and their contact with live animal markets. We were a small department to begin with, and tracing the movements of the aid workers or ‘Contacts’ wasn't really cutting edge, but that all changed very quickly. A directive was sent down from Federal Finance Analysts and the Treasurer to merge all non-essential departments, go off public record, suspend non-essential international travel, and begin specific training, the Contact Tracer department was born.

I met Janice when she was announced as the private consultant to provide support to our operation. Janice was a wiry stoic woman who wore the tatters of a depression ridden youth in her resting expression. Her strawberry blonde hair delicately framed prominent cheekbones and a brow which when furrowed simply said business. At just thirty years of age she had risen steadily through the ranks of the World Health Organisation and was regarded as the top foreign consultant to United Nations virologists, but most importantly to me she was a true friend. Janice took me under her wing in those establishing days, providing constant reassurance and a glimmer of humor in what seemed at times like a deadly serious dance of bureaucracy. I admired Janice. But I also found myself jealous of how her husband at that time Ian would look at her. A look of pure unadulterated adoration. As if she could do no wrong and he in the cliche of modern insecurity had eyes only for her. I fell for Ian almost immediately. The roars of contestation and a disregard for strict policy during team meetings, Ian commanded attention and demanded it. He was deep in an interdepartmental mediation whilst still in probation. A soldier to his own unwavering principles. Ian was instructed by the HR department I later found out to bring some private sector knowledge into the fluff and conservative droll of this Health Department but once that HR Business Partner resigned he was accused of bullying and harassment. But Ian didn’t care, his ready fire aim gung-ho attitude perforated my mind and at a boozy after work drinks Ian perforated my soul. Janice was none the wiser and as Ian used to say “anyone can have multiple loves and it’s not to be of offense to any parties involved as each love is unique”. This was the only way to have both Janice and Ian in my life and working remotely alone for the majority of my youth, this pseudo family triangle provided the contentment and confidence I needed. The three of us had major problems with authority. We believed someone should assert their knowledge and demand respect if they wish to lead.

Sydney’s NSW Health hub on Pitt St was a cold grey building of 70’s mortar construction, only a single analog clock and hygiene paraphernalia graced the lobby walls. It was a front. An access portal to the belly below. We had implemented designations based on suburb of residence, postcode and surname. It simplified our transformation and Janice said in conjunction with the resurrected QR code technology for easy interface with the phone culture. A simple assemblage of patterns or squares which provided a link when referenced via a phone camera and sent the user to a check in facility so their location from this point could be mapped and a list of movements/ places visited, others they interacted with, was discernible. Ian would laugh every time he walked into the Pitt St lobby and greet us, “my girls, what’s the news” Janice found this derogatory sneer repulsive and retorted “only a man thinks he owns everything he touches” she mocked him smiling from ear to ear. We were inseparable and our work was making waves. As we glided across the lobby of the hub with pride we reached for our lanyards on our person and swiped the one grey tile on a wall of white below the ominous analog clock. A panel slid open and we stepped inside before it hastily slid back down, were descending an old metal spiral staircase, Janice was in the front, and Ian behind me, he breathed on my neck purposefully and I briefly leaned into him only for the briefest of pauses not to alert Janice, he was just all virility and charm. The space below was occupied by a single desk in the centre and workstations both on the left and right. Dimly lit and minimalist. A man draped in shadow at the back stepped forward, “be seated at a computer and click begin”. This is how it was and had been for the last year, the Contact Tracer training program was designed in Taiwan during SARS and had provided them much success in stemming the spread of a highly adaptive protean virus.

All three of us were seated, we put on the headphones, a nurse rolled in three separate drips and intravenously fed us a compound which boosted concentration and short term memory retention combined with a molecule which induced immediate sleep in 40 minutes once contact was made with the bloodstream. I placed a letter in an unsealed envelope and let sleep take me, no one knows what a contact tracer does.