A Death In Rottnest

A Death in Rottnest We weren’t exactly drunk. We weren’t exactly driving. Yet, somewhere in the expansive English lexicon, there must be a term for riding a bicycle after drinking several beers. There were three of us that night: Brian, Steve, and me. We were stationed on Rottnest Island, Western Australia, on what was to be a routine science expedition: gathering data for an assessment to be made on the stability of the coastal cliffs. Of course, a routine science expedition rarely involves death. Quincy was a simple Quokka, he wanted very little from life but to forage in the brushy environments of the predator-free Island. There was nothing graceful about Quincy or any of his other brethren, and nothing would link them to their cousin the Kangaroo. Quincy was stout, and looked like a combination of a cat, a rat, and a wallaby. His matted, brown fur had lost the shine of youth. His wife pleaded with him to return to their all-organic diet, but he was too fond of the fatty morsels offered to him by the human visitors on the island. Besides, what goes better with beer or whiskey than a few cheezels? The three of us were unwinding at the only pub on the island, The Rotto Hotel. We sat under the starless night sky, drinking overpriced Victoria Bitter. We went over our data logged from the day and planned out our course for the next day. Rottnest is a not a large island, but it is of formidable size for a bike (the only form of

transportation.) Steve, a bit of a lightweight, had three beers under his belt and had acquired a shine to his eyes. His laughter came a bit slower and his words had a slight slur to them. Brian and I noted this and decided that the three of us should turn in for the evening. We knew that the uphill, two-mile bike ride back to our barracks would not be easy if Steve hit the sauce too hard. On top of that, it was “Schoolie Weekend” on Rottnest (the weekend where all of the high school students head to the Island to celebrate the end of their semester) and The Rotto Hotel was quickly becoming a dance party. Wanting none of that, we mounted our steel steeds and pedaled for home. Quincy and his family were returning home after a long day at the beach. He would have urged his family to leave sooner, but his wife insisted on watching the moonrise over the ocean. Their back legs, similar to a rabbit’s, bounded them along the moonlit road as they moved towards their abode. With only the lunar illumination cast upon them, the Quokka family looked much like a horde of oversized rats (making it easy to understand why the Dutch settlers who first landed on the Island thought that they were large rats, thus naming the Island “Rottenest” [Rat Nest].) Approaching them on the road were three bicycles, but they did not feel the need to scatter from the road to hide. Quincy and his family, along with all other Quokkas on the island, were accustomed to the large traffic of bicycles constantly speeding by on the roads. He did not fear them. Quincy actually had a

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strange fascination with the wheeled machines. He wanted to understand them, by licking at the bitter rubber tires, and sniffing at the pungent chain grease. This fascination was to be his undoing. The three of us moved swiftly in the cool night air. The fluctuation in temperature on the island was great: during the day it was hot and arid despite the sea breezes, but at night the mercury in the thermometer plummeted. The road that we biked on ran parallel to the coast, and the waves, crashing upon the very cliffs we had come to study, serenaded us on our trip home. The moon was nearly full, and it washed the landscape in an eerie pallor. A group of Quokkas was on the road, and they loped, hopped, and scampered in the same direction as we biked. I motioned to the other two to pull our bikes over to the side of the road. I foraged in the sparse undergrowth and managed to locate a sturdy branch. True, polo with a Quokka did not seem to fit within the parameters of our routine expedition, but the chances of me landing a blow on any of the marsupials seemed slight. The air pushed against us as we returned to the road and built up our speed, perhaps trying to prevent our less than benevolent intentions. I nodded at Steve, and signaled that he was to corral the Quokkas towards me so that I could land a glancing blow and we could officially say that we had tormented an Endangered Species. (I write this now, realizing that it must have been the alcohol that caused us to think that harassing an

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Endangered Species was a good idea). We yelled to disorient them as we rode down upon our prey, loudly and fiercely. Steve did not corral the way that he was supposed to. All of the Quokkas but Quincy fled to one side of the road. Quincy, however, froze and simply stared straight into Steve’s oncoming bicycle. Quincy bolted to the left at the last moment, but Steve swerved at the same moment, not wanting to actually hit the Quokka with his bike. There was a thud and a snap. Quincy’s neck must have broken on contact. Perhaps the snap was a skull fracture. Whatever the cause of death, Quincy went stiff and flopped onto his back and his small paws pointed straight into the air. There was no movement. Our bikes skidded to a halt shortly down the road. The three of us looked at each other in disbelief. What were the odds that both Quincy and Steve would choose to move in the same direction? Glancing back at the fallen rodent, we could see his family slowly creep out from the sides of the road to inspect their deceased paternal figure. There were seven Quokkas altogether and they moved silently about the corpse. Did they mourn the loss of their father? What was going through their small, marsupial brains? One of the Quokkas, I would like to think the mother, looked at us coldly in the moonlight. The feeling of animosity was most likely imagined, but all three of us shuddered simultaneously. We turned our bikes and continued on our now somber journey to the barracks. The gravity did not set in until we reached our

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destination, at which point we harangued Steve for what he did, not so much because we felt that he was guilty, but more to shirk our own guilt and confusion at what we had just witnessed. So was it drunk driving? Maybe, but I think it was the crime of hit-and-run that plagued our minds the most. We had simply left Quincy on the road; we offered no help to his kin. We were guilty, but we were never convicted of our crime. A warrant may exist somewhere, but I’d rather believe that, more than likely, a son of Quincy is out there somewhere, stalking Steve with a vendetta. And a bicycle.

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